Sunday, November 07, 2004
(10:36 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
Conservative Perspectives
Tonight was the first time I've talked to my parents since the election, and both were eager to discuss politics. Although they now disagree on many particular issues, my parents both seemed to agree that the discrepancies between the exit polls showing John Kerry ahead and the actual results was that people are embarrassed to admit that they voted Republican. In my mom's case, this followed from another discussion in which I mentioned that people acted in a certain way because "no one wants to look like a fundamentalist," and she said, "Right, that's why the exit polls were wrong."I argued against the idea, saying that it is really cool to vote Republican where I am. My mom just finished her coursework in college and is student teaching, and she said that she always felt pressured to follow the liberal orthodoxy in school -- some classes she felt like she would have failed if she expressed conservative views. I countered that academics have long been known to be left-wing and that they are not representative of any other segment of society. She mentioned something like liberal guilt, the general impression that the Democrats care more about people -- something that I argued was reinforced by the fact that most of the public spokesmen for conservatism are completely assholes (something she basically agreed with, although of course pointing out that there are rude people on both sides -- right, kind of like there are black people on both sides).
After getting off the phone, however, I reconsidered. Perhaps, I thought, the Democrats do have a certain sense of entitlement -- look at the assumption, obviously disproven in the most recent election, that higher voter turnout always helps Democrats. It's also possible that many of the non-Moral Majority Republican voters are embarrassed of being so publicly associated with certain retrograde elements in society, or that there are many Republicans who are uncomfortable with the "attitude" of Fox News or the vitriol of right-wing radio. Perhaps, just as the Democrats have been painted as "out of touch" because they are so disproportionately represented among the educated elites, despite the fact that plenty of ordinary people are Democrats, so also the Republicans have been painted as reactionary dick-weeds because they are so disproportionately represented among the fundamentalist Christian and pasty white bully elites, despite the fact that plenty of ordinary people are Republicans.
I know Republican voters; I work with them every day. They're decent people. They're neither evil nor stupid. They just did the math and decided that Bush was a better bet. On "moral issues" such as abortion or homosexuality, I can definitely see not trusting a party that holds moral views that you find repugnant. I would like to say that the Democrats are a ton better on what I consider to be real moral issues like poverty and economic justice more generally, but as Mike points out below, they've basically bought into the Republican economic conventional wisdom. I know there's been a lot of soul-searching on the left half of the blogosphere this week about moral issues, and I definitely agree that economic justice is a more pressing moral issue than sexuality -- but maybe deploying economic justice rhetoric is putting the cart before the horse in this case. Since we're apparently trying to appeal to conservative Christians here, a group that generally distrusts Democrats anyway, it'd be pretty cool if the Democrats would give us a little bit more than talk (and sometimes not even talk!) about poverty, about the need for universal health care and progressive taxation, etc., etc.
In the end, I don't care what political rhetoric or strategy is used or what kind of coalition is built with religious people or atheists -- I want there to be a party in this country that works for economic justice in a real, concrete way. Right now, there is not such a party. The Democrats could fill that void. I want them to fill it, not just so that they can pick up some Christian voters or keep those asshole Republicans out of office, but so that policies can be implemented that will help make it so that all children get adequate nutrition, so that homelessness decreases, so that urban minorities don't get sub-standard education, etc., etc., etc.
Being the party of fiscal responsibility and middle-class tax cuts is not the same as being the party of justice for the poor. Claiming the moral high ground of being the party of justice for the poor while actually doing nothing aside from a few token gestures (if that) accomplishes nothing but laying a guilt-trip on people -- and maybe people will vote in the guilt-tripping party for a while, but eventually they'll just lie to the exit pollster.
