New Democrat Update - September 2003
BUSH’S BROKEN PROMISES
In the 2000 campaign, President Bush promised to be a “different kind of Republican,” to be a “compassionate conservative,” to change the tone in Washington, to unite the country, to restore integrity to the White House and to usher in a “responsibility era.” He also promised to "to confront problems, not pass them on to others" and "to leave this nation greater than we found it."
As brilliantly detailed by the national DLC’s Ed Kilgore and Bruce Reed in the latest issue of Blueprint, Bush has broken every one of these major promises. His agenda turned out to be a mere clone of Newt Gingrich’s, only with nicer packaging. Think of it as “cosmetic centrism” - mainstream rhetoric with right-wing results - protecting privilege with tax cuts for the wealthy, taking hard-right stands on social issues, trying to starve government, and pursuing an unilateralist foreign policy.
Rather than being a different kind of Republican, he never says no to the right wing of his party. Rather than so-called compassionate conservatism, his economic plan offers help only to those who need it least. He rewards privilege, not hard work, allowing those who have it to protect it and making it more difficult for those who work hard and aspire to join the middle class, to get there.
Rather than changing the tone, he has taken partisanship to new heights and exploited people’s fears to his political benefit. Rather than unifying the country, his agenda has divided us. In fact, a Washington Post poll last month indicated that Bush has sharply polarized the country along partisan lines.
Rather than restoring integrity to the Oval Office, he has continually sided with special interests. His energy plan was clearly geared to please industry donors and his steel tariffs nakedly were crafted for political advantage.
He has also been more than willing to say one thing and do another. In addition to embracing positions that he had opposed in the past (the Department of Homeland Security, national service, a stand-alone Medicare prescription drug benefit, etc.), his constantly changing rationales for tax cuts targeted to high earners have become legendary.
Rather than “confront problems, not pass them on to others," Bush has spurned any sense of fiscal responsibility in his budget, presiding over an $11 trillion swing from surpluses to deficits and offering no plan to reverse it. He continues to give away money the government does not have, making the middle class pay a greater share of the tax burden and passing a greater financial debt onto future generations than any administration in history. After it took the federal government more than 30 years to get back into the black, Bush has taken fewer than 30 months to put the country deeper in the red than at any time since World War II.
By any objective standard, Bush's record on the economy is the worst since Hoover's. In fact, Bush is the first president since Hoover to preside over a net loss of jobs in his first term. Middle-class incomes are flat and many families are stuck with a bigger net bill because of higher state/local taxes and fees needed to pay for schools, public safety, roads, and college.
Rather than leaving “this nation greater than we found it," Bush is well on his way to placing America in greater peril, with more sworn enemies and fewer friends, than any time since the darkest moments of the Cold War. While deserving some credit for victories in Afghanistan and Iraq (incidentally with a military built by his predecessor), he has still failed to “win the peace” in either country.
The administration has also undermined a host of global and regional institutions that have served U.S. interests very well for decades, diminishing our ability at such a crucial time to promote democracy and markets around the world. Although America has never enjoyed more might, we have rarely possessed less influence.
His record on homeland security may be even worse. While dismissing the role of state and local government, the administration has not even done the simple stuff - like integrating the numerous terrorist watch lists scattered throughout the federal government. Aviation security is still riddled with problems while very little has been done on border control, tracking visa holders, and basic personal identification.
THE OPPORTUNITY - AND CHALLENGE
This string of broken promises, a poor economic record and a scary foreign policy are taking their toll. A Zogby poll in mid-August had Bush’s "re-elect" number - those who want to support him for re-election without considering other candidates - at 43 percent and sinking. According to a recent Mark Penn DLC poll, the "right track" number - the percentage of Americans who think the country is headed in the right direction, always a key statistic for incumbents - is at a mere 45 percent.
Even the all-important issue of national security is looking less and less like Bush’s trump card. The Washington Post poll noted earlier revealed only 17 percent said they were doing better since Bush became president while 25 percent said they were worse off. That net negative rating is the worst since his father’s poor ratings on the economy in the early 1990s. Another poll reported that the number of people saying the military effort in Iraq was going very well had fallen from 61 percent in April to 19 percent last month.
Democrats must repeatedly present this compelling critique of the Bush administration. However, as the 2002 election clearly demonstrated, it is not enough to merely harp on Bush's failures without offering clear, compelling and better alternatives. Elections are always about the future, not the past. In the end, the real purpose of bringing up his miserable record is to remind voters why they don't want more of the same!
Democrats must offer future-oriented solutions that protect America and solve our growing problems. As detailed in The New Democrats’ Declaration, we must have an agenda that recognizes America's security is the central mission of our time; our economy cannot prosper if we don't live within our means; our job is to expand the middle-class, not the middle-class tax burden; and the true legacy of our party is not making big promises, but giving people the tools to meet big challenges. That will rally the support of Democrats and many others.
Bush’s miserable record is hurting his popularity but, ironically, it is also causing many Democrats to play right into Republican hands. Democrats must not let their intense anger turn into self-indulgent demonization of Bush. Two-thirds of the electorate like him personally - getting in his face will only backfire.
Blind outrage will be self-defeating. An out-of-control boxer provides his or her opponent with big openings and lucrative opportunities to land big punches.
In addition, our message and agenda should not be driven just by being as “different”as possible. In fact, the Bush White House desperately hopes that Democrats make the 2004 election an ideological contest between liberals and conservatives - that’s one battle Republicans know they can win. We should not take the bait.
Instead, our stands should always be based on our values. If that means we agree with the other side on a particular issue, we should work with them and solve that problem. When we disagree (and, as shown above, there are many important and fundamental differences), we must take our case to the voters. Instead of obsessing on being as “different” from Bush as possible, our focus should be on being better.
Democrats do not have to compromise their principles to win back America's trust. On the contrary, we need to live up to our best traditions: Jackson's belief in equal opportunity for all, special privileges for none; Roosevelt's passion for bold reform; Truman's tough-minded internationalism (especially important in the age of terrorism); Kennedy's ethic of civic obligation; Johnson's commitment to equal rights; and Clinton's insistence that opportunity and responsibility must go hand in hand.
For the sake of our party, and more importantly the country, we must be tough and smart. If we are both, this Bush’s re-election campaign will end the same way as his daddy’s - like father, like son.