Do Democrats' "insurgent bloggers" herald a revolution like Goldwater's?

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: An Antiwar Campaign That Takes a Page From the G.O.P. Playbook
By SAM TANENHAUS
Published: August 13, 2006

....the (Lieberman/Lamont) campaign offers an intriguing twist in the history of insurgency that has shaped the identities of both parties over the last several decades. Some commentators have portrayed the bloggers who led the charge against Senator Lieberman as the ideological descendants of the left-wing Democrats who nearly brought the party to its knees in the 1960’s and 70’s. But in strategic terms they resemble more closely the “movement conservatives” who transformed the Republican Party from 1955 to 1980, when it rose to dominate American politics.

Like the current Democratic insurgency, the conservative movement was driven by activists who combined journalism with partisanship. Just as today’s insurgents often post their analyses and self-described “rants” on Web sites like Daily Kos, so the conservative rebels of an earlier day poured forth their opinions in the National Review, the biweekly magazine founded in 1955 by the 29-year-old William F. Buckley Jr....

***

Before the Connecticut primary, the insurgents had achieved no significant victories. But like the conservative activists of an earlier time, today’s liberal insurgents seem undeterred by setbacks. After Goldwater’s devastating loss in 1964 to President Johnson, movement conservatives instantly regrouped, forming new organizations (like the American Conservative Union) and rallying around a new leader, Reagan....The new wave of activist liberals have also tasted defeat. Many were active in the insurgent presidential bid of Howard Dean in 2004. Like the Goldwater crusade in 1964, this failed campaign seemed to create a legacy. Mr. Dean’s ingenious use of the Web, for instance, resurfaced in the Internet-driven campaign that defeated Senator Lieberman. The advocacy group Democracy for America, which helped drive the Lamont campaign, is the latest incarnation of the organization that had brought millions into Mr. Dean’s candidacy.

All this has gone forward with little help from the Democratic establishment, which for years has played down ideology in its mission to recapture the elusive center of American politics. The party’s reigning figure is Bill Clinton, whose genius for splitting the differences between left and right, has proved so fleeting a philosophy that few other politicians have been able to duplicate it....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/13/weekinreview/13tanen.html

[PATRICK]

1. Not the same

and thus not ideological. Sorry "centrists". It is the NEW ability of sane people to talk to one another beyond the control of the establishment clubs and gatekeepers. Loons and poor and mere commercial quality sink. If that makes the "left" especially advantaged this is what the human race(democratically) wants and needs.

[AntiFascist]

2. I agree...

I just watched a Democrat, Republican, and a "Centrist" debate the war on Lou Dobbs. The Centrist missed the point altogether and the Democrat looked weak, eventhough the Democrat probably represented the majority, sane viewpoint.

[pinto]

3. Interesting piece. I don't know if the CT primary is a watershed

of any kind for the Democratic party and our left wing or not. I think Sam Tanenhaus is stretching the analogy, but it's a good read.

[DeepModem Mom]

5. I thought it was a nice, wishful thought -- that we could dominate...

politics for decades.

[pinto]

7. I'll take effectiveness.

Democrats have always been the party of an effective, pro-active role for the Federal government. If we are to have any kind of "revolution" as implied in the article, I don't think we can count on a purely idealogical movement like the Republican right wing used to capture the House and Senate. They were extremists but they managed to mobilize a small but effective "base" in State races.

While I think we ought to emulate their organizational successes, I think we need to reassert the role of the Federal government as a positive force in national life.

The Republicans have sold our foreign policy out to the highest bidder, dismantled much of our federal structure - again, under the ruse that the highest bidder would be the most efficient - and undermined the trust implied by their authority.

Much of this is not idealogical - everyday folks see the corruption of Iraq, the blatant ineptitude of Katrina, the sleight of hand in Social Security "reform". Those are nuts and bolts issues that effect everyone. Those are our issues. I think the electorate will agree.

[welshTerrier2]

4. a revolution? yes ... like Goldwater's? no ... at least not yet ...

the internets have given us a voice that we did not have in the same way before ... it has definitely created a "revolution" in the sense that we are able to communicate; we are not isolated; and we are heard beyond the constraints of the internet ...

even something as specific as fundraising has radically changed ... MoveOn spreads the word they want money for a "mission" and they raise a million overnight ... you're a very powerful and dangerous community when you can raise money like that ...

but Goldwater's "hardcores" were ideological ... i think there's an element like that today around the war but the rest of the "online agenda" is much, much more vague ... there might be a sense of being generally more liberal ... but it's really hard to see a driving agenda beyond hating bush ... in fact, i often wonder what kind of community online progressives will be once Dems take over the entire government ... so much that is written is anti-bush ...

i've written several threads trying to discuss themes and ideas and a few platform planks ... nobody like the ideas; nobody disliked the ideas ... sinkeroooooo ... the threads go nowhere ...

try starting a thread on how the Dems should talk to voters about the republican's "free market" mantra and you'll get very few responses ... talk about what role a national push for mass transit should play in '08 and you might as well go to sleep ... try one on the bush's latest poll numbers of make a negative comment about <insert candidate here> and you'll produce a huge thread ... that's not ideology; that's politics ...

so i don't think today's "net revolution" is ideologically based ... it's too bad, too ... all the warriors who are so busy fighting republicans are building an election campaign; they aren't building a long-term movement ... that takes a much deeper underlying platform ... we don't seem to spend much time working on that ... online activists are a powerful force for change and we're a growing force ... at some point, we're going to need a healthy infusion of ideology with specific platform planks ...

[DeepModem Mom]

9. Interesting! See my post #8. nt

[dolstein]

6. Well, the Goldwater revolution tapped a latent conservative majority

The Goldwater revolution would have fizzled if the South hadn't gone Republican in the wake of the civil rights revolution. The fact that the South had been solidly Democratic was a historical anomoly, and by the 50s, Southern Democrats had very little in common with Northern Democrats.

Is here a latent liberal majority that the Kos crowd can tap?
There was a quiet revolution during the 1990s, when the northern suburbs began to trend Democratic, but there hasn't been a similar trend in the South. And I don't think that dissatisfaction with the current administration is going to be enough to change that.

[DeepModem Mom]

8. NOTE: The point is made that, in contrast, Dems are less ideological.

"The contrast with what is happening today in the Democratic Party is instructive. The challenge now comes from an insurgency in the Lamont campaign that is in no way as ideological as the new right was in its heyday....Many Americans have qualms about Iraq. This does not make them hardened ideologues. So, too, with the today’s liberal insurgents, who in most cases equally reject the neo-conservative vision of the Bush administration and the worldviews of 60’s radicals. Most identify instead with the Democratic Party and accept its traditional values of activist government and strong international alliances."

[Name removed]

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