The Seinfeld Strategy

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SharinSharAlike

Sun, 16 Apr 2006 18:53:45 EDT

The Seinfeld Strategy

 

 

 

 

http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2600/

 

 

 

In These Times - 4/15/06

The Seinfeld Strategy

 

For the first time in more than a decade, Democrats seem to have a

shot at taking back Congress. But also for the first time in recent

history, Congress is on the cusp of switching hands without a voter

mandate. How is that possible? Because Democrats are only in the hunt

thanks to gross Republican " missteps " and they are going out of their

way to make sure their potential election to the majority is about

nothing.

 

Call it the Seinfeld strategy.

 

 

/Los Angeles Times/ columnist Ron Brownstein reports, " Democratic

leaders are drifting toward a midterm message that indicts Bush more

on grounds of competence (on issues such as Iraq, Hurricane Katrina

and prescription drugs) than ideology. "

 

As a short-term electoral tactic, the Seinfeldian " competence "

strategy allows the GOP to right itself with new management. Sadly,

it is not a strategy based on ideological differences that puts a

boot to conservatives neck when their hypocrisy trips them up and

they fall down. Thus, while Democrats celebrate the resignations of

people like Reps. Tom DeLay (Texas) and Duke Cunningham (Calif.), the

GOP simultaneously celebrates because they can now counter the

Democrats competence argument by pointing out that their

party has sloughed off the incompetents. In short, the Republican

Party and the right's ideological agenda march forward, largely

unscathed.

 

In making such a limited critique, Democrats tacitly validate

conservatives' ideological goals and further reinforce the public

feeling that Democrats have no convictions of their own. For example,

despite the GOP scandals and the political opportunities they present,

Democrats refuse to push serious reforms like public financing of

elections and instead push half-measures and focus on Republican

missteps.

 

In the process, they are implicitly saying they believe the system

that most Americans know is corrupt is actually perfectly acceptable.

The same thing on Iraq: The Democratic Party refuses to take a

position wholly different from the Republicans, simply saying the

management of the war " rather than the war itself " is the problem.

 

National Democratic leaders will say they are forced to use the

competence argument because it is the one big theme that unifies

their ideologically diverse congressional membership. But that hides

the not-so-secret fact that very powerful, very vocal, and very

ideological forces within the Democratic Party support many of the

conservative goals that a competence strategy inherently validates.

 

On domestic policy, these forces went public in April at a press

conference at the Brookings Institution. Led by Citigroup chairman

Robert Rubin " Clinton's former Treasury secretary " the Hamilton

Project announced plans to take on entrenched Democratic

interests such as teacher's unions, according to the /Financial

Times/.

 

Participants at the event used words like " protectionist " to

describe courageous congressional Democrats fighting to reform the

corporate-written trade pacts Rubin and others helped pass in the

90s. They also advocated " school vouchers and entitlement

reform " code words for defunding public education and eviscerating

bedrock Democratic programs like Social Security and Medicare. At

least they were honest in naming themselves after Alexander Hamilton,

the leader of the elitist Federalist Party and rival of Thomas

Jefferson, the populist founder of the Democratic Party.

 

Public opinion data consistently show Americans are desperate for

political leaders who will represent ordinary citizens

interests not just powerful lobbyists and their wealthy corporate

clients.

 

Until Democrats decide to stop taking part in " business as usual "

and start fighting back against the right wing's ideology, they will

face the same political liabilities they do today.