Electoral Politics
Can the Democrats Win in the Mountain West?
By John Yewell, 3-14-05
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In "Purple Mountains Strategy," published Sunday in The Salt Lake Tribune, I discuss some of the reason the Democratic Party should pay close attention to the mountain West in the coming years. It is not just that the West has at least five legitimate swing states totaling 32 electoral votes -- one more than New York -- but also because what winning as a Democrat in this region can teach the party about appealing to the broader electorate.
We’ve been hearing a lot about morals and the importance of faith to the average voter. There is a lot of that in the West too. But Westerners are not proselytizers; they believe in live and let live. They believe in being forthright, solving problems, acting fairly, and taking care of each other and the land. They value independence and cooperation in equal measure.
Democrats nationwide are wrapped up with figuring out what to believe in that will appeal to voters. I think that’s the wrong question. They should be asking: How do I learn to live with people I disagree with, and still reach out to them, still help them, still find ways to make this complicated country work together. What is the right way to live? Westerners can teach Democrats the answers to these questions. Those answers will help them win not just here, in the Mountain West, but across the country.
Character, not morals, is the issue, and that’s what the West can teach Democrats. How to be themselves, how to live -- and how to win.
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Comments
They should be asking: How do I learn to live with people I disagree with, and still reach out to them, still help them, still find ways to make this complicated country work together. What is the right way to live?
Good question. I don't have the answers but I have some intermediate steps.
My recent observation, as a registered and occasionally politically active Democrat, is that "Democrat" needs to be sharply defined. I have had many people telling me what I stand for as a Democrat but it's got little to do with what I actually do advocate. Conservatives have been defining "Democrat" in a virtual vacuum. As a result, even people who value traditional Democratic values have come to identify "Democrats" as the bad guys. The Republicans have no lock on morality and certainly not on ethics and they have left an opening for Democrats to reclaim middle America.
A few months ago, I read an analysis that laid the blame for this situation squarely on former presidential candidate George McGovern. I think that's over-reaching, but there is an element of sanity at the core. McGovern believed that putting together coalitions of marginalized voters would achieve a majority. We've had empirical evidence since then that 5% + 18% + 28% = 51% does not constitute a majority unless they vote as a block. They don't. The Republicans have mastered the fact that for every marginalized issue with a small number of fervent supporters, there are many opposed or indifferent.
The Democratic party needs to build consensus over coalition and establish that it is built on good, solid values that matter to most people.
So what does the modern Democrat stand for?
Cheers,
Cindy
Democrats believe that as citizens we have a responsibility to do our community and nation. We have a responsibility to leave a better world and nation than the one that was left to us. That is the overarching principle that unites the many issues that energize Democrats: "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country"
For too long, those one the left have been organizing around issues, instead of organizing around organizing...