I’ve read three interesting columns addressing some of the same subjects over the last 24 hours:
- An interview with Brad DeLong on Vox.com in which DeLong argues that the center-left should guide and support the left, not lead it, because there is no responsible center-right partner among the Republicans with whom to work to get things done.
- A column by Tim Wu in the NYT in which the author takes the position that Americans are actually united in support of a number of leftist economic positions, but that “industry groups” and “experts” are frustrating their will.
- A column by Ross Douthat in the NYT which argues that the center-left lost its influence by capitulating to the left on social and cultural influences.
Are any of them right? Not exactly, although DeLong is closest. Here are my reactions:
- No, the center-left is not dead, at least among the electorate. The results of the 2018 election prove that, as does Biden’s current position in the polls.
- Douthat is correct when he points out that the Democratic Party as a whole has moved left on social issues, and that the drift probably created more antagonism with the Reactionary faction of the GOP. Just as the GOP undervalues, from its perspective, the cuts in discretionary spending that have occurred over the last several years, the Democrats take their victories on social issues for granted, and tend to forget how much they inflame the right. The suggestion, however, that the center-left would have found more support among the public, and more cooperative partners among the GOP, conflicts with the facts. Obama didn’t support gay marriage in 2009, and nobody had heard of #MeToo. How much GOP support was there for any of his policy initiatives?
- Wu’s observations about public support for leftist economics are accurate, but meaningless, because many of the people who take these positions are reactionaries who vote for the GOP for racial and cultural reasons. It is these values voters, not “experts” or “donors” or some other dark forces, that block the path of higher taxes for the rich and more social spending, because their deal with the PBPs on tax cuts and welfare spending is the foundation of the current GOP.
- DeLong correctly notes that Obama actually advocated positions on health care and the environment that had been espoused by GOP leaders in prior years, and that the GOP opposed them for opportunistic reasons. What he doesn’t seem to acknowledge, however, is that Obama actually accomplished quite a lot of the center-left agenda while in office. In a lot of ways, the center-left agenda is still the status quo.
- DeLong has a point about the lack of a responsible center-right partner in today’s world. That could change, however, if the Democrats demolish Trumpism in 2020. Otherwise, significant change will have to wait on the “revolution” and the abolition of the filibuster. We’ll see.