As long as I’m tying things together, here are two more things I just read that seem to fit together well.<\/p>\n
Over at Political Animal, Amy Sullivan has a whip-smart post<\/a> that sets out what I also think the Democrats need to do – to position themselves as a party of reform.<\/p>\n The real concerns of Americans go much deeper than gay marriage or abortion–even if they have a hard time articulating them. Americans are very anxious about the idea that people will do whatever they can get away with, and their perception is that Democrats are the ones who let people get away with things. But Democrats can gain the advantage if they craft a consistent message. Some people certainly are opposed to abortion on principle; but many are simply offended by the idea that some people might rely on abortion as a means of birth control. But who else can you think of who has done something simply because they could get away with it? Do I hear, Ken Lay? Tom DeLay? All sorts of unregulated industries? Tie these into a consistent call for responsibility and Democrats have a better chance of claiming some moral ground.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Now, there are some problems in making this happen. Jim Moran, and his sweetheart $400K loan from MBNA (just before he introduced anti-consumer bankruptcy legislation); Nancy Pelosi, who appears to be as junket-happy (and also has a child on the campaign payroll); Harry Reid, whose children are a mini-lobbying empire, and so on.I titled a blog post in 2002, “Why My Ostensible Party, the Democrats, Will Not Be Able To Use Bush’s Corporate History Against Him<\/a>,” and the point holds.<\/p>\n The GOP are massively vulnerable on issues of conflict-of-interest. But to capitalize on those issues, the Democrats will have to clean up their act first, lest we see what we’re seeing now – “if you attack DeLay, we’ll attack Pelosi.”<\/p>\n Sullivan also ties the issue to the culture clash shown by the Democrats –<\/p>\n Also, don’t miss Dan Gerstein’s op-ed in today’s Wall St. Journal (if someone has a link that doesn’t require registration, could you please send it to me?) Here’s a taste:<\/p>\n The cultural elites are guilty of the very of silly oversimplification of which they frequently (and rightly) accuse conservatives. Not all parents who are concerned about the avalanche of crud crushing their children every day are obsessed with SpongeBob’s sexual orientation. Nor are they seeking to shred the First Amendment. Most are just looking for a little cooperation from the captains of culture to make the hard job of raising children in a fully-wired universe a little easier….<\/p>\n \nOne can only imagine how insulting our elitism is to the average mother in the exurbs of Georgia or Colorado who might be uncomfortable with open talk of threesomes on “Friends” at 8p.m. Well, actually, we don’t have to imagine too hard, not after John Kerry openly embraced Hollywood and went on to lose married women voters by a margin of 55% to 44%….<\/p>\n \nBut that is not a discussion the entertainment industry or its Democratic defenders want to have. In fact, most of the time they actively work to squelch it. Their first move usually is to deny that the culture has any influence on attitudes and behavior….Part of this response is clearly motivated by profit margins. But it also flows from a profound aversion to making moral judgments. And that’s the nub of the values problem for Democrats today. We don’t hesitate to judge people’s beliefs, but we blanch at judging their behavior. That leaves us silent on big moral issues at a time of great moral uncertainty, and leaves the impression that we are the party of “anything goes.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n These last few points are especially critical. In recent talks–including one this morning–I’ve been telling people that voters find it odd when Democrats bash big business and oil companies but turn a blind eye to the entertainment industry. Wouldn’t their Hollywood funders rebel if Democrats spoke up?, someone asked this morning. Frankly, it wouldn’t exactly hurt the party to have Susan Sarandon stand up and denounce the Democrats.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n And also points out their vulnerability to a narrow wedge of wealthy political investors.<\/p>\n This has come about, in no small part, because of their neglect of the real roots of local organizing as they (and the GOP, to a lesser extent) have become an increasingly media-driven institution.<\/p>\n I got a spam for a publication called The Boston Review<\/a> (yes, spam works sometimes…),which caught my eye with an article by Ari Lipman of the greater Boston Interfaith Organization called “Losing Faith: The Democrats called, but they didn’t call back<\/a>.”It’s a nice piece of commentary that pretty well nails the issues the Democrats will have to climb through to win.<\/p>\n A week before the Democratic National Convention, I got a call from an organizer of one of the convention\u2019s largest delegate caucuses. He was struggling to find a local member of the clergy to open a Sunday meeting. Apparently the Democratic Party had few connections within the Boston faith community, so he called me, a staff person of a local nonpartisan interfaith organization, for help.<\/p>\n \n\u201cAre you looking for someone from a particular denomination or with particular experience?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n \n\u201cWe want a minister of color.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\u201cI see. It will be hard to find a minister of color who is available on Sunday, because he is likely to be in, you know, church. How about a rabbi?\u201d<\/p>\n \n\u201cWe really want a black minister.\u201d<\/p>\n \nI should have hung up the phone, but I was caught up in the excitement of the convention.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n He finds one – a Haitian Seventh-Day Adventist, and puts the Party staffer in touch with him.<\/p>\n On the Friday evening before the convention I received a frantic call from another convention staffer. \u201cWe forgot to call Elder Benoit, and now we can’t reach him. We don’t have anyone confirmed to give the opening prayer! Can you call him for us?\u201d<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s his Sabbath now,\u201d I explained. \u201cHe won’t answer the phone until Saturday evening.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\u201cOh.\u201d<\/p>\n \nI staked out Elder Benoit at his church that next morning. \u201cWhat\u2019s going on with the DNC?\u201d he asked me, disappointed. \u201cHave they found someone else?\u201d No, I assured him, they indeed wanted him to offer the prayer.<\/p>\n \n…<\/p>\n \nThe next day, when we arrived at the Hynes Convention Center, we found that Elder Benoit\u2019s first and last names were both mangled beyond recognition on the caucus program: \u201cElder Erdy Dinot.\u201d What first had seemed like simple incompetence was now revealing itself as a pattern of neglect. We notified an event organizer of the mistake. We wrote out the correct spelling of his name, along with a phonetic pronunciation. She promised to pass along this note. The emcee then mispronounced Elder Benoit\u2019s name three times.<\/p>\n \nElder Benoit responded to the disrespect graciously and offered a powerful prayer. I was livid and embarrassed. We were given two credentials to the convention for our trouble, and that is the last we heard from the Democratic Party.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Read the whole thing. But I have to close by copying his conclusion, because it’s perfect, and I couldn’t say it any better.<\/p>\n It was clear that Elder Benoit\u2019s role had been ornamental\u2014a prayerful black face for a photo opportunity. The Democrats had no interest in recruiting or cultivating Elder Benoit as the talented leader of a significant constituency that might associate its diverse social and economic interests with either party<\/b>. (my emphasis – A.L.)<\/p>\n \nThe reality of American democracy is that religious assembly has always been a primary entry point for citizens (such as Elder Benoit) into public life. We transform our private religious values into public action at the ballot box. As the Democrats are now discovering, parties ignore this fact at their peril.<\/p>\n \nEngaging religious Americans does not necessarily mean altering the fundamental values and platform of the Democratic Party. After all, I would venture to say that many Haitian Seventh-day Adventists who vote Democratic do so even though they hold the same views on same-sex marriage and abortion as white evangelicals in Ohio\u2014they just have, at least for now, a different analysis of their interests, priorities, and allies.<\/p>\n \nBut Democrats need more than a pious new vocabulary. Party leaders must drop their thinly veiled scorn for religious Americans and seek to engage them sincerely around common interests, both in houses of worship and on convention floors. Treating potential leaders like Elder Benoit with simple respect would not be a bad place to start. <\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n No kidding.<\/p>\n Read these two articles, Democrats, and pay some attention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As long as I’m tying things together, here are two more things I just read that seem to fit together well. Over at Political Animal, Amy Sullivan has a whip-smart post that sets out what I also think the Democrats need to do – to position themselves as a party of reform. The real concerns […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}