realitybase - Journal

Democrats are expected to increase their majorities in both the House and Senate in tomorrow's election because the ideological center of the electorate has moved left, at least temporarily. But the most vulnerable GOP seats are those held by moderate Republicans, and they are most likely to be replaced by moderate Democrats, not left-wingers. Thus, the Democratic caucus will have a greater proportion of centrists, and the Republican caucus will have fewer centrists, according to Ezra Klein who quotes Kevin Drum and discusses this and some implications here.

To the contrary, as to economics, I see the Congressional Democratic caucus moving left from where it has been—despite the bigger tent. The leaders of the Wall Street wing of the Party, exemplified by Robert Rubin, have been gobsmacked by the reality that their theories and policies have failed rather spectacularly when continued by Bush. (I posted about Rubinomics in Crisis here.) As a result, the Democratic Leadership Council and Hamilton Project folks seem to be moving toward the labor wing in their economic understanding and policies. Rubin's apparent shift can be seen in this joint op ed today with Jared Bernstein of the Economic Policy Institute, which is the number one think tank of the labor wing of the Party.

Perhaps the Congressional Republicans will also allow recent spectacular realities to moderate their economic ideology. If not, Democratic pundit Paul Krugman says "the G.O.P.'s long transformation into the party of the unreasonable right, a haven for racists and reactionaries, seems likely to accelerate as a result of the impending defeat." Many "Conservative" and Republican pundits like David Brooks and Ross Douthat, who would not use Krugman's hyperbole, are very concerned about such a transformation and are scrambling to give the GOP a new direction focusing on middle-class economic well-being. Of course, if the Democrats fail to deliver what the electorate wants, the GOP may be able to get back into power without revamping itself, and that creates an incentive for the GOP's Congressional rump to be maximally united and maximally obstructionist.

Update on Friday, November 7, 2008 at 09:05AM by

Skeptic

Add Ramesh Ponnuru, senior editor of National Review, to the list of conservative intellectuals who say shifting to the right won't save the GOP because it needs a "coherent middle-class economic agenda" and doesn't have one. It's interesting, and I think significant, that Ponnuru, Douthat and other conservatives speak of how to move the middle toward the conservative agenda, rather than moving the party to the middle. They may have to do both, but I applaud their intellectual and rhetorical effort to change conventional wisdom. Think tanks and journals on the left should do more of this.

Update on Tuesday, November 11, 2008 at 08:00AM by

Skeptic

David Brooks points out here that all of the Republican institutions for fundraising, for development and spreading of ideas, and for activism are controlled by the "Traditionalist" wing of the GOP. Thus, the "Reformers" don't have the tools they need to move the Party toward different ideas and constituencies of the future. Meanwhile, Traditionalist heavyweights meeting last week seemed pleased that several moderate Republican Members of Congress had lost their reelection bids, making the Republican caucus more purely Traditionalist. It was not reported whether they are concerned that the GOP seems to have become primarily a regional party of the old Confederacy. Brooks, a self-described moderate Reformer, calls it "Darkness at Dusk."