Southern Democrats turn left?
by digby
I saw this headline and inwardly groaned thinking oh boy, here we go, another piece about how the Democrats have to move right.
But it isn’t that at all:
Southern Democrats are joining others in the party who say that a return to advocating to lift people out of economic hardship and emphasizing spending on education and public works will re-energize black voters and attract whites as well.
“It’s time to draw a line in the sand and not surrender our brand,” Rickey Cole, the party chairman in Mississippi, said. He believes candidates have distanced themselves from the past half-century of Democratic principles.
“We don’t need a New Coke formula,” Cole said. “The problem is we’ve been out there trying to peddle Tab and RC Cola.”
Cole and other Southern Democrats acknowledge divisions with prominent populists such as Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is expected to run for president in 2016, and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Yet they see merit in pushing stronger voting rights laws, tighter bank regulation, labor-friendly policies such as a higher minimum wage and other familiar party themes.
I’d say it’s worth a try anyway. It’s certainly better than Blue Dogism which was all about being business friendly and obsessive about taxes.
I did think this was sort of funny though:
While the party’s positions on gay rights, minority voting access, women’s rights and immigration are not wrong, Cole said, “those people who don’t see themselves in those groups say, ‘What have the Democrats got for me?'”
That’s a pretty roundabout way of saying the Democrats need to attract white men.It’s an improvement over the old nonsense about putting “illegals” in the bait can and other retrograde nonsense we used to hear on this subject. He goes on to say this:
Unapologetic populism, he said, would “explain better that the Democratic Party is for justice and opportunity — with no qualifiers — for everyone.”
Unfortunately, part of the problem with the white male working class is that Democrats also seem to believe that they’re required show that they have disdain for these other groups in their coalition or they just aren’t appealing. Maybe that’s not so — maybe they can just make a direct, universal, populist appeal and when they’re questioned about all these “wedge issues” just say they believe everyone is entitled to a fair shake. It would be very interesting if they tried anyway. They certainly aren’t going to reconstitute the Blue Dogs. That ship sailed.
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