Should we shut up?

I received the following thoughtful reply from a correspondent who clearly seems to agree with us on the issues. I hope you will give it -- and my response -- your full consideration.

While I understand well your position, I will respectfully decline to participate in the clothespin exercise. And Tom Coburn is dead set against all those positions you say you support. The difficulty, of course, is that if Carson came out for any of those positions, he would go counter to the positions and philosophy of about 2/3 of Oklahomans. Carson would get about 1/3 of the votes cast, as has many a doctrinaire liberal in this state. We must face the fact that most Oklahomans believe differently from us. Doesn't mean we have to give up, but it does mean that we must try to sway the minds of other people, not just pick on politicians. I witness for the viewpoint whenever I have the opportunity to do it without being obnoxious, i.e. if someone else starts the argument or discussion by presenting the conservative viewpoint, I never sit silently.

No politician can get too far in front of his constituency, I will vote for Brad Carson knowing he does not support every position I do. But that is the nature of politics. If I want someone who supports all my positions, I should run for office myself. Finally, there is what I would call the "Kansas Phenomenon." What keeps the majority of the people whose economic interests clearly lie with the Democrats and who are so very obviously hurt by the ruinous Republican economic issues is the so-called social issues. The place to win on these issues is not the ballot box, but in the hearts and minds of Americans. The GOP has chosen these issues to divide and conquer, and so far they have been successful. In the process, they have been dismantling virtually all the progressive legislation of the 20th Century, and we continue to make it easy for them by focusing on social issues ourselves. I urge any and every progressive to read Thomas Frank's "What's the Matter with Kansas? How the Conservatives Won the Heart of America." I will vote for Brad Carson because he makes economic good sense for Oklahoma and because he is a good and decent man who practices what he preaches. He represents my values of working together for the common good and against the laissez faire trickle down economic theories of the puppetmasters behind Bush.

Geez, this is pretty hard to argue against.

But give me a chance.

How the Right Hoodwinks America
I'm familiar with the "Kansas" book, though I must admit I have not yet read it. The premise, as I understand it, is that the Right has successfully promoted their TRUE issues (tax cuts for the wealthy, fewer restrictions on environmental degradation and workplace safety, fewer "costly" social programs) by convincing lots of people who would benefit from such programs to vote for Republican candidates. These voters are essentially voting against their own interests.

The Right gets them to do this by pushing so-called "conservative" social issues -- prayer in the school, anti-choice, flag divinity, etc. They parade these issues out year after year, in spite of their failure to given them any sort of legislative priority. Sure, they grandstand about "partial birth abortion" and pass laws that they know will be shot down (they made sure to embed the unconstitutional language denying the procedure even if it would save the life of the mother). They play these issues out and they reel them back in, election year after election year.

How the Left Lets Them
And so the criticism has some merit: The Left plays into Republican hands by taking an oppositional stance to these same social issues. We put the issues on the front burner, and our candidates get burned at the polls.

We should shut the hell up and vote like Republicans. Only for Democrats.

I Belong to No Organized Political Party
The problem with this argument is that it fails to acknowledge that the Left is a coalition organization (as evidenced by their representation by the Democratic Party). We're not homogenous, and we can't really try to be. So we fight amongst ourselves about which issues to put forward and which to shut up about; which issues will turn us out, and which issues will cause us to stay home. As a result, a significant portion percentage of us end up agreeing with the Democratic candidate on 80% of his platform, but on 2%, we are so incensed, we stay home and refuse to vote for him. We agree with the Democratic candidate on education, the economy, the war in Irag...but because she is pro-choice (or anti-choice), we effectively vote the Other Guy into office.

You know what? That's right! That's what we do. You keep hearing about how the voter turnout is low, even in presidential elections? This is why!

"Go Negative. Go Often."
And it's no accident. It's actually the goal of negative campaiging and wedge issues -- not to get voters to switch from Our Guy to Their Guy, but to get weaker supporters of Our Guy to stay home. So many people end up pissed off about a relatively few issues (or by the "negative campaigning" itself) they throw away the smallest but most vital unit of their power -- their ballot.

So maybe we should shut the hell up about social issues.

Or maybe not.

Vote with Your Mouth -- and With Your Pen
If forfeiting your franchise for the sake of a wedge issue is playing into the cynical Right's hands, so is forfeiting your right to dissent, even from your own party. What we need is a coalition party that acts more like a coalition party, not a coalition party that papers over its differences and behaves like the ring-through-the-nose Republicans.

The Clothespins for Carson Campaign is designed on this principle. No, we will not stay home; we will turn out. No, we will not stay silent; we will speak out.

But while doing so, we will advance the discourse. We will inform, educate and take on the role of opinion leaders. We will build a network out of our "opt-in" respondents and send them messages of hope. We will give them ammunition for the culture wars -- ammunition of reason, of compassion, of tolerance.

But no, we won't shut up, even when we're talking to Our Guy.

Comments

[Bob]

As the author of the original comment, I would like to reply to your argument against my position. First, let me say we appear to agree wholly on what is right insofar as what society should do about those social issues, but that is not the question at all. The question is a pragmatic one; how do we get there?

As Democrats we have been seeking to use the ballot box to win with issues that are supported by a minority of voters. We approach these issues from the left, and in so we make the Republican arguments that you cited plausible to voters who are threatened by change or who for one reason or another are uncertain of the wisdom of abandoning traditional ways. Therein lies our error. Therein also lies the fallacy of your arguments, which really are just the reverse of the religious right's arguments. You argue from the position of morality, which differs not one bit in principle from the other side's argument.

Instead of approaching these issues from the left, we should approach them from the center. Had we been doing so, we would be an overwhelming majority party. Consider abortion. I do not know of one single pro-choice voter who favors abortion or who thinks it's always the best solution. Yet we argue from the position of rights rather than practicalities. Now a very large majority of Americans even in today's radicalized environment feel there are circumstances when an abortion is justifed, but we're losing them by adopting the radical left stance. Instead, we should be arguing from the center and from practical considerations. We should first admit that many people have qualms about abortion and some are unalterably opposed to it. We can never win over that latter group, but we can keep the others in our camp instead of slowly losing them as we are currently. We can then ask how we can minimize the number of abortions while preserving the right to have one when it's needed. This will engage many of society's stakeholders in the discussion. It may well be that some restrictions are necessary or desirable, as even the Supreme Court ruled, but by dealing with the problem from the center, the right is preserved. If Bush is elected, Roe v. Wade likely will be overturned, and we have nobody to blame but ourselves for making ourselves vulnerable to the tactics and lies of the Right.

Consider also the issue of "Gay Marriage." Unfortunately, by pushing this issue from a legalistic, radical issue from the left rather than the center, we in Oklahoma and other states will likely end up placing bans on same-sex marriage in the constitutions. Had we argued this from the center, I believe we could have engaged the American basic sense of fair play to at least have brought equal rights to homosexual citizens that would have solved the main problems that gay people face in their relationships. As people came out, as people discovered their neighbors, friends and family were, in fact, gay, attitudes would have changed. Now we have to overcome constitutional amendments, all because we argued from a moralistic, rights-based position rather than from a practical position that came from the center.

So, what do we Progressives do? We should forget about asking the political system to enforce minority opinions or positions. Instead, we should be advocates for our positions in public forums. We should speak up, but forget using politics until a majority is on our side.

We face a dismantling of virtually all the progressive legislation of the 20th Century by a dedicated, resourceful and brilliant foe. We shouldn't make it easy for them. We need to decide if economic justice is important. Again, we should approach this from the Center, which Bill Clinton did. That he understood so very well was why the Right had to get him. If we bring everyone into the economic system, prosperity will grow for everyone, particularly those at the top. I tell my physician friends that at the present their income is limited by the large number of people who cannot afford to seek medical care. Even if they had to pay more in taxes, would they not be better off financially if more people could afford medical care? That's an argument that hits home. I know. I have seen their eyes.

We need to get back to our roots as Democrats. My limited study of Brad Carson shows he is doing that. He seems to stand for the virtues of hard work, and nobody works harder than working people, and cooperation. People get farther working together than in the laissez faire environment being promoted by the Right.

And you should read that Kansas book, as you refer to it.