On 2012-04-02, at 8:59 PM, Doug Henwood wrote:
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> On Apr 2, 2012, at 7:49 PM, Michael Smith wrote:
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>> It's a little confusing, this material.
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> It's really not hard to understand. The two parties used to have liberal and conservative wings. They don't anymore. The Reps are very conservative, with no centrists or liberals, and the Dems vary from centrist to liberal, and almost no conservatives. The most conservative Dem still votes to the left of the most liberal Rep. I know this violates your foundational assumptions, but it really seems to be true. Which is not to say for a second that the Dems don't suck, but it is to say that the two parties are not identical.
It depends which Democrats and Republicans you are talking about.
There is a great deal of collegiality and bipartisanship at the top of both major parties. There is really not that much to choose between a Barack Obama and Mitt Romney or a Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell, nor between any of the other members of the three branches of government, nearly all drawn from the upper bourgeoisie. They may have differing liberal or conservative values, but the range of policy options open to them is narrow, as they quickly come to appreciate on assuming office.
The two parties are much more divided at the base in terms of their social composition and values. The Republicans are favoured by predominantly white small propertyholders and their employees in rural and suburban areas. The Democrats are favoured by organized workers, students and professionals, blacks and Hispanics and other minorities in the in the big cities. The supporters of each party have profound and widening differences over social, economic, and foreign policy. Rachel Maddow, Michael Moore, and Keith Olbermann represent one side of the divide; Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Sean Hannity the other.
To a great extent, whatever divisions there are at the top between the leaders of the two parties represent conflicting pressures emanating from their respective bases. The House is less insulated from mass pressure than the Senate, so the partisan gap is somewhat more apparent in the lower than the upper chamber. It's also evident in the key appointments made by the parties to the courts, bureaucracy, and regulatory agencies.
The confusion to which Michael refers arises out of this failure to distinguish between the collaboration practiced between liberal and conservative leaders at the top of the political hierarchy and the mounting conflict at the bottom between the supporters of the two parties. The rise of the tea party on the right and the Occupy movement on the left are a reflection of how the differences between the two bases have begun to spill over from the electoral arena into the streets as the crises at home and abroad of an America in relative decline multiply.