On 2010-09-01, at 11:28 PM, CGreen7223 at aol.com wrote:
>
> Doug Henwood wrote
> "You'd think, from reading this sort of thing (which I have about 1,000
> times), that there's a great untapped vein of radicalism in the U.S.
> population that's frustrated by the constant sellouts of the Dem Party. There isn't,
> as far as I know."
> What do you or anybody else think about Chomsky's frequent citation of
> polling data which purports to show that a significant majority of Americans
> have views significantly to the left of the Democratic Party? Chomsky is
> always citing these polls particularly during election time. These polls show
> that significant majorities support socialized medicine, think higher taxes
> to protect their environment are all-right, think the UN should handle
> Iraqi and Afghan reconstruction and that we should get militarily get out of
> countries where populations don't want us, 46 percent of Bush voters
> supported the Kyoto protocol and think Bush did too, etc.
>
> I think Chomsky sometimes reads a little too much into these polls. For
> one, as Chomsky said recently, the support of Americans for any welfare state
> measure goes way down if they think such measures will disproportionately
> benefit blacks or illegal immigrants.
==================================
I agree with your conclusion that Chomsky - like Chuck, Carrol, and others on the left eager to outflank the Democratic party from the outside - read a little too much into these polls. While the polls show that Americans have liberal rather than conservative views on these issues when the questions are posed fairly, many respondents nevertheless remain apolitical or, as you note, are so poisoned by racism as to render them vulnerable to right-wing demagoguery, despite each of these stances being in contradiction to their apparent understanding at some level of what is in their own and the country's best interest.
Those who delve more deeply into which of the two parties is more attuned to their preferences, and go on to express themselves politically, invariably support the Democrats. They are not a "great untapped pool of radicalism" which sits outside of the Democratic party (as the working class socialist movement once did) but you might still describe them as a great untapped pool of left liberalism which sits inside of it, whose desire for single payer, for an end to the Afghan war, for more aggressive action against polluters, for fiscal stimulus directly aimed at job creation, for bankruptcy laws permitting the alteration of underwater mortgages, etc. all have the potential to bring these DP activists and supporters into conflict with the party establishment which has blocked these measures. For that potential to be realized requires their further political education and organization, however.