Between now and Election Day 2020, the American public will be deluged with the claim that the Democratic Party is shifting toward Venezuelan-style socialism.
But there is a wide chasm between the American left and the authoritarian socialism of Chavez and Madura. Not to mention that Venezuela has been authoritarian under these two leaders. You will see Democratic efforts for consumer protectionism with renewed regulations, but there will be no attempt at nationalizing Wall Street. Just as they did during the Roosevelt administration, Republicans will claim that Democratic policies will destroy capitalism. In reality, FDR saved American capitalism from its worst excesses and did so in such a manner that this nation went through much less socialistic upheaval than the rest of the industrialized nations.
It is true that there are, unfortunately, fewer moderates in the Democratic Party, and I sincerely hope that my party will not become as isolated on the left as the Republican Party is isolated on the right. Perhaps, decades from now, that might happen, but I don’t think I will see it in my lifetime.
Ask yourself: Is the Democratic Party shifting away from the American mainstream as did the Republican Party, or is it merely reflecting a leftward march by the mainstream? There is a primary reason the right rails against the mainstream media. The right is not representative of the mainstream. Should you persist in believing this is a right-of-center nation, you are not paying attention to reality. Polling after polling within the past decade should be evidence enough of that. In polls on issue after divisive issue, even those from conservative sources such as Fox News, the results show the nation has moved left of center.
A January 2017 Pew Research Center survey indicated that 60 percent of think the federal government should ensure that all Americans have health coverage. A May 2017 Economist/YouGov study showed a majority of Americans want the expansion of “Medicare to provide health insurance to everyone.” Two-thirds of Americans support stricter gun laws, 62 percent a ban on assault-style weapons, and 87 percent support background checks or every single gun purchase.
The mainstream view on same-sex marriage is another example of the leftward shift. According to Pew and other polling sources, Americans support it by roughly a two-to-one margin; 62 percent vs. 32 percent. Among white Protestants, such support rides at 68 percent, and among Catholics it is 67 percent. Even support among white evangelicals has more than doubled in 11 years and now stands at 35 percent.
These same trends are clearly reflected on issues such as legalization of marijuana, immigration and Trump’s wall. On even that most divisive of all issues, abortion, there is not a clear-cut conservative consensus. One, of course must be careful here, because how an abortion vs. women’s rights survey is worded becomes a significant factor in the poll’s outcome. While a vast majority oppose any abortion after five months of conception, 58 percent say abortions should be legal in most cases, according to a Pew poll.
These are hard facts for conservatives to swallow. A great many will contend until the day they die that ours is a right-of-center nation, regardless of evidence to the contrary. Such conviction is one reason why the Republican party’s presidential candidates have won a plurality of votes in only one election since 1988, and that came during a war. No American president has lost re-election during a war. Unless the GOP realizes that America has shifted left of center, or unless it can bamboozle the electorate to believe otherwise, a Democrat will hold the plurality of the vote in 2020.
Michael Adkins formerly was chairman of the Hancock County Democratic Party. Send comments to [email protected].
