>Right-wing appointees to the federal bench will help narrow the
>boundaries of political opportunities for the left for the next 20-30
>years.
>
>Conservative Christian evangelicals are the largest single voting bloc
>in the Republican Party.
>
>A dualistic version of apocalyptic millennialism has become a paradigm
>for many people in our society, from secular neoconservatives to the
>Christian Right to Patriot movement xenophobes.
You could have said the same about the liberal/Keynesian/New Deal consensus in the 1970s. The courts were full of liberals, common sense was that FDR was a great president, etc. You're describing the present and recent past, not necessarily the future.
>Many Democratic Party pundits still cling to the idea that pasting silly
>names on the opposition ("religious political extremist," "radical
>religious right") is more effective than developing actual policies that
>challenge Republican/conservative ideology.
>
>Same with the idiotic idea that Framing alone wins power struggles, when
>any sophomore sociology major can list what a successful mass social
>movement needs is more than Framing:
No one thinks naming & framing can do anything themselves, but the right did very well with "card-carrying member of the ACLU" and the "death tax." They turned "liberal" into a sneering synonym for elitist pansy. It's not an either-or thing, really.
Doug