Political Challenge: Dealing with the LEGITIMATE conservative concerns

IMO, one of the biggest screw ups of the left side of the spectrum over the last 30 years is our failure to find the best way to address the very real concerns nd problems that average Americans have about liberalism and progressive policies. Failing to deal with that honestly has driven many people into the deceptive arms of conservatives and the GOP.

Most Americans (of most political stripes) have a basic division in their souls. They are liberal in some respects but they are libertarian and conservative in other respects. The political ideology one gravitates to is generally how the balance tips on an individual basis -- whether the liberal/progressive or libertarian/conservative side is strongest.

Let's face it. The goals of liberalism nd progressive populism are necessary, and desirable. But the means to achieve them can be burdensome on an individual basis.

For example, most Americans are in favor of protecting the environment. They don't want pollution. And it's easy to say "Crack down on the polluters" when it's a big remote corporation.....

However, the regulations that have been put into place to protect the environment are often a pain in the ass for individuals and for non-polluting businesses. When you have to go through a lot of rigermarole just get a permit to build an addition onto your house,it can seem like burdensome, meddlesome bureaucracy....Or well-intentioned businesses often still find that simple things can become much more complicated and expensive because of environmental restrictions and requirements.

Same thing with workers rights. Most people are in favor of workers getting paid fairly, having a safe workplace, etc....However, on an individual basis, regulations to enforce these things can be backbreakers for businesses, even businesses that are well-intentioned.

A backlash against the perceived burdens of liberal policies had a large part in driving the country to the right in the last 30 years. It's not just that people were brainwashed by the right-wing or are more selfish and greedy....Rather,the individual balances within people was tipped to the right because they felt their freedom was being impinged upon excessively.

That's also part of what gave rise to "centrism" in the Democratic Party. The desire to acknowledge the perceived downsides of liberalism, and minimize them.

However, the result of that was that we threw the baby out with the bathwater. The DLC and "centrists" became so obsessed with distancing themselves from the drawbacks of liberalism that they also abandoned the benefits and advantages and necessities of liberalism.

IMO, if our side is going to regain political power -- and if the national pendulum is to moved back from the right wing extremes -- we have to figure out ways to deal with this. Both in terms of "framing" and message, and in terms of substantial policies and governing philosophy.

I don't have a surefire solution to that dilemma, but I think it's both possible and necessary.

What's your thoughts on this?

How do we strike a middle ground between environmental protection and a homeowner's desires? Laws get passed that might not always be necessary in a particular instance, but how do you realize the intent of the law without creating so many loopholes that the thing becomes meaningless? The making of sausages comes to mind.

Maybe we ought to send saugage inspectors to oversee that process in Washington.

IN a more seriousd vein, part of it may be adding enough flexibility to allow for give-and-take, but have a strong bottom line as a last resort. Bureaucrats ought to be able to be humans too.

How do you hire enough bureaucrats to allow any of them to be human? Honestly, I think that's a lot of the problem with this particular issue - my mother-in-law is dealing with this exact thing and is getting frustrated simply with the wait time. Then the perception, among many at any rate, is that the problem is the law itself.

Think how many social service or environmental bureaucrats the Iraq War would have paid for, for example.

Also -- and here is where I think the conservatives have a point -- decentralization and doing things on the local and regional level would also help to make the bureaucracy less cumbersome. A somewhat diferent style of "federalism" perhaps where the state and local governments take on more responsibility, while being given the guildelines and resources from the Federal govt.

In terms of priorities, it could also mean aimning more guns at Big Business and easing up a biot on individuals, perhaps. I'm not saying do away with regulations on the individual level. Just re-prioritizing to put more concentratiion of resources on the keeping bigger guys under control.

which is where we get back to the hammers and tongs with conservatives. :)

I don't mind decentralization as long as the goals remain relatively the same. Is there some leeway on the goals? Depends on the issue and to whom you're talking.

In terms of priorities, it could also mean aimning more guns at Big Business and easing up a biot on individuals, perhaps. I'm not saying do away with regulations on the individual level. Just re-prioritizing to put more concentratiion of resources on the keeping bigger guys under control.

The big-time developer instead of Wanda Homeowner? I can go with that.

Maybe that could be a pitch.

I think the conservatives have half a point when it comes to Washington being too remote and "big" to undertstand local concerns....It's a double-edged sword. In one sense it ws absolutely correct for the feds to not tolerate sanctioned racism in the south. However, there are also cases where a "one size fits all" solution is not as good as allowing for diversity.

And yes, I think if government has to focus its regulatory energy somewhere, I'd rather it be on the big corporations than individuals. That's where the real harm is being done....And i think, if presented right, it could win some people over who don't like to see the big guys get away with everything, but who are also somewhat libertarian on an individual level.

P.S. I'm surprised that there isn;t more interest in this. IMO, as I said in the original post, I think figuring out how to advance liberal agenda while also respecting and addressing the real concerns of real people is one of the biggest unspoken chal;lenges our side faces.

re: your ps - one might have imagined that certain of our more conservative brethren & cistern would have been quite interested in this topic, yes.

That is the first step towards a cleaner planet. If we spent just the amount of money on alternative energy research as we do on the interest on our debt we would solve most of our problems. We need to spend our money more wisely and I doubt many Republicans would disagree with that.

I like the idea of clean energy as an Applollo Project

I saw robert redford representing a group with that goal. What was interesting is that the groups sounded like it represented a cross spectrum of individuals from different interests and ideologies, who support it because it is simple common sense.

One of the reasons we get caught in these idiotic intrigues and wars in the Middle East is because oif oil. The idea of being more self-sufficient in energy by developing clean, renewable alternatives, could be a winning message too.

Think of the quagmire that builders go through to build houses and businesses that are within building and zoning codes. They bitch and moan about why they can't do one thing or another, but they really should be glad such regulations are in place, I don't want to live in a house that will catch fire if you plug in a toaster, and I don't want to go into a store that DIDN'T have fire exits. The balance is practicality, these are burdens, yes, but NECESSARY burdens. Same for enviromental and labor regulations. No offense, but what balance are we to forge here?

What are we to do, get rid of OSHA? Get rid of pollution controls, the FEW we have right now? Hell, the EEOC is a "burden" let's get rid of that too! Of the two you mentioned, they rarely, if ever, effect the great majority of citizens, and to be frank, to business owners, I don't really care what they think. Don't like minimum wage, fine, don't do business. Same for everything else.

Beyond all of the bullshite and spin, the anger and frustration of people with regulations is probably one of the major contributors to conservatism.

It's just human nature to be want to be left alone.

So there is a balance that has to be found, or a way to regulation more palatable to people.

that some urban liberals simply do NOT get is that many Dems and indies own guns, lawfully and responsibly, and wish to keep them.

Alienated Rural Democrat

Dems and the Gun Issue - Now What?

Some people would like to believe that if you own nonhunting guns, you must either be some sort of crazy freeper worried about black helicopers and the "gubmint," or some insecure dweeb compensating for one's shortcomings in some pseudo-Freudian way. But 40% of U.S. households, and a third of American women, own guns; half of U.S. gun owners are NOT repubs; 80% of gun owners are NOT hunters.

Guns in the wrong hands in urban areas tends to lead to crossfire fatalities. That turns people against guns pretty quickly, as their is no defense against this except for staying inside, away from windows. During the eighties, with the rise of guns and drug trafficking among relative amateurs in the trade, a lot of the unintended victims were children too small to carry a weapon even if it would have helped. Loose gun laws in rural areas leads to traffic in guns which brings them to urban areas. What you have there is two competing sets of needs. Or so it seems.

During the nineties this problem was greatly ameliorated by increased police presence in cities and probably by the relative prosperity of the era. Turns out, more policing is another way to approach the problem. Now, with municipal budgets stretched to the limit, homeland security money being diverted to unlikely areas and fewer cops on the beat and increased poverty, violent crime is rising again.

What would be good would be if we tried to understand each other and agitate for solutions that address both sets of problems. While we who wouldn't have a gun in the house need to understand those who do, I think the folks who feel they do need them should understand the very real problems the presence of many guns and not enough law enforcement has caused in other environs.

I think this conflation of legal and illegal gun ownership is part of the reason it's so hard to address guns in criminal hands. 95% or more of the people shooting other people in urban areas are people who cannot legally TOUCH a gun or even a single round of ammunition; who have never been to a shooting range; who couldn't get a permit to carry a gun even if they were interesting in compliance with such legal requirements; and to whom the culture of civilian gun ownership in this country is completely alien.

Banning the modern-looking rifle in the lawful gun owner's gun safe, whether rural or urban, doesn't do a THING about the illegal .38 revolver stuffed in your local criminal's waistband. When illegal guns are smuggled about disguised as routine cocaine shipments, rummaging through the gun safes of law-abiding owners is worse than counterproductive.

There is broad common ground to be found on the gun issue if the issue is confined to CRIMINAL gun use. But like the proverbial drunk who dropped his keys in the ditch but looks for them in the parking lot because the light is better there, it seems that a lot of people who are concerned about criminal gun violence reflexively want to target those who aren't responsible for it, rather than those who are. I suppose it's easier to pass new laws aimed at people who obey laws than to deal with the root causes of criminal violence--urban blight, lack of inner-city opportunity, education issues, poverty, our poor socialization of young males (particularly in urban areas) compared to other nations, the catastrophic results of the War on Drugs, and so on.

BTW, I suspect that gun laws are a lot tighter in rural areas than you might realize. The National Firearms Act, the Gun Control Act of 1968, the background-check law, and so on are all national, and together represent a tight regulatory framework setting forth what limited kinds of guns civilians are allowed to possess, and the qualifications necessary to possess them.

Personally, I don't live in a rural area; I live in a suburb within the city limits of a moderate-sized town. Used to live in a city of ~300,000, not huge but certainly not rural.


I concur. But I would caveat that it's not the presence of lawfully owned guns that's the problem; it's the possession of guns by those NOT allowed to own them that leads to the mayhem you describe.

IMO a big problem regarding the gun issue is that discrepancy between how gunes are used and viewed in different regions. Although it techniclly isn't just a "liberal/conservative" issue (it has elements of both) the GOp has successfully used it as a core wedge issue against "liberals" over the years, and it's a big reason for the reason rural areas tend to be red rather than blue.

Guns are viewed differently in rural regions and urban areas. In rural regions they are often considered example of a lifestyle of hunting, target shooting and collecting -- and the freedom to do such things. In rural areas, they are more likely asspociated with crime and violence.

The problem is when strict controls that may be appropriate and publicly supported in a big city are imposed on country folks, there is a backlash. And in some ways it's justified.

IMO we'd be a lot better off if liberals/Democrats left it to the local and stete levels, and limited Federal involvement to interstate traffiking of firtearms.

though I'd have to say that I'm not in the category of "country folk," per se. Although gun ownership rates are undoubtedly highest in rural areas, most gun owners aren't rural simply because most of the U.S. population isn't rural. I'd be one of those "suburban folk," I'm afraid...

...and to much based on identity politics. Ask people on the street to describe a stereotypical left-winger and they'll discribe that person as an upper middle class yuppie drinking $4 lattes, a hippie, a member of Greenpeace, a college professor, or an African-American; not a working-class person. the backlash against the 60's radicalism had gotten the Democratic Party stuck in a rut.

When I was growing up, the Democratic Party was perceived as the party of the working class.

The schisms of the 60's and 70's set up that divide that exists today.

But we ought to be able to put that behind us. In truth, what most progressive "leftists" want is the same thing that most members of the working class wnt, in terms of issues of the economy and preservation of a participatory democracy.

Also, those latte drinking yuppies are nopt necessarily liberals. They are more often likely to be part of the oligarchy that is at the base of corporate conservative economics, regardless of their views on social issues like guns and gays.

As I read through this thread thus far, it seems clear there's an agreement that the issue is real and the solution may lie in some decentralization of not only authority, but also regulation.

I am involved in an international professional association. We recently voted that our members need to maintain a level of continuing education and maintain a minimum level of professional standards. The difficulty came when we tried to apply a universal standard that was as meaningful and appropriate to a member in, say, Los Angeles, as it was to a member in, say, Manilla. And we do, indeed, have members in places that diverse.

What we eventually developed was a set of standards for professionalism and continuing education that were pointed to what we wanted to accomplish, but sufficiently vague and open ended so as to allow each local jurisdiction to establish their own specific rules and regulations. These local rules and regs get submitted to the global governing body for review and approval. Once approved, compliance becomes, again, a local matter.

In short, the central body established the goals and standards. The local bodies established rules and regs that were appropriate to their culture, but still met the global standards.

We are now seven years into the program and it is working very well.

I recognize this is a very simple example, but the concept is global and could serve as a model for ideas that would answer the question you posed in the OP.

That's one of the things we need to get better at, in terms of finding ways to "sell" and advance liberal ideas in ways that a majority can support.

I'm not convinced that environmental regulation is a "pain in the ass." If I actually had a house to build things on I would want it to be environmental way beyond regulation. My parents' super-middle-of-the-road neighbors are putting up a solar heating system. No individual profits by screwing the environment. If the businesses they buy stuff from were forced to clean up their act, they might end up paying a little more for products, but the health benefits alone would turn this to a huge net savings.

I totally agree that there are many positive reasons for environmentally sound practices. That's the carrot aspects of "carrots and sticks" necessary to protect the environment.

However, I'm talkiing in terms of the larger perception many people have to increased reegulations, including building codes.

Setting aside the hard-core anti-government conservatives and libertarians, there is a natural reaction people have against perceived intrusions by bureaucracies on their freedom and initiative. I'm not talking in a strictly ideological sense -- it's just human nature.

I'm also NOT saying regulation (including building codes) is wrong or should be abandoned. But on a core philosophical level, we have to find a way to make regulations more palatable and aimed at the real sources of problems.

There's a good scene in the John Sayles movie Sunshine State tyhat addresses this. A guy is making the point that some of the practices that we have adopted to protect the environment actually backfire because they make it so expensive to build that only Big developers with trult ruinous projects can afford to go through the process.

But I don't see them in the same light as environmental regulation of industry and the military (one of the largest polluters). These are upstream changes, the consumer knows the difference, unless we let the RW propaganda get to him. If they allow "regulation" in general to be the topic, of course people will oppose it. We need to change the discourse to "protection," which people will generally advocate.

So when peopel encournter problems, it actually is more of municipal concern.

There are also state and federal mandates, but they tend to be oopen to interpretation at tyhe local level.

So in reality, peopel who get screwed by building codes (or who think they are) tend to see it more in terms of local p
It's probably partially a matter of counteriong the RW propaganda and make it easier to seperate the actions of corrupt or abusive local building codes and inspectors from the larger principles of liberalism and environmentalism.

It should be an American ideal! If a business has to be forced to be fair it should be considered un American. We need to trade clean water and clean air for winning an election? I don't think so. What we have here is a failure to communicate. The right has painted us into a corner were we are willing to trade off our ideals for a chance at winning. To do so we have to become like them. That is bullshit. We must stake out a definite set of values and defend them and not let the right define us. Social justice is not something we should run away from but something we should be in favor of. We need to find a way to define the terms that Americans use rather than play by the rights's rules. I see not glory in winning if it means we foster the same ideals as the right does. What is a liberal anyway? We need to be the ones to define that.

I am not advocating that we abandon liberal.progressive ideals and goals in any way.

But we do have to find a way to accomplish that in ways that do not miss the point. We also have to find a way to sell the liberal approach again, in terms that wil;l encourage people to suport them voluntarily.

That gets down to values, which includes politics, but also goes beyoind it. Businesses, for example,. should WANT to provide a safe workplace and a fair days pay for a fair days work, and the public should demand that as a social norm. That's the way thangs had been for a number of decades. Even though, for example, the minimum wage was a poverty eage in the 60's it was at lkeast at a level where a person could at least cover his or her living expenses....It had a more important symbolic value too. It was expected that anyone who worked full time woukld be paid enough to support themselves.

than a candidates whole persona. As I just wrote in another thread, the key, imho, is authenticity. People want to know they are buying the real deal. Gore and Kerry did not fail because they were pro gun control or slightly too far to the left on environmental regulation, they lost because they were perceived, by the middle of the country, as being somehwat fake and somewhat phony. They were perceived as candidates who would change their stance on issues, or change their personality even, to follow a pollster's advice.
(and yes, I know Gore won, that's not what this thread is about).

What we need is a leader who cannot be demonized this way. We need a candidate who is so true to his/her belief system, so glaringly authentic and real, that when the Republicans try to demonize him/her, it will fall completely flat.

We need a straight talking Harry Truman type. As long as they are center left or center right, the positions on individual issues don't matter one whit.

A truly authentic candidate can present many of these things in a positive context.

Although the right and the mainstream media like to characterize him as a "far left" socialist, Cong. Bernie Sanders consistently wins his state by veryu wide margins because he is authentic and direct. The problem, is that the Democratic "strategists" are also too afraid to be as outspoken and honest as he is. But, he is actually just what a mainstream liberal was in earlier decades.

The proof of the potential success of that is in the pudding. A plain spoken liberal/progressive candidate with Sanders' honesty, and the factualiness of his arguments, resonate with people from all sides of the spectrum.

The Democrats ahouild emulate that. For examplethey are taking a step in the right direction by advocating for an increase in in the minimum wage. That will resonate if they honestly make the case that it is not intended as a punative imposition on business, but asa necessary aspect to maintain a livable wage level for all workers.

The repukes always shoot this down by claiming that it will hurt the economy, which is bullshit.

In fact, public opinion polls have long shown that an increase in the minimum wage is widely supported (including moderates and many conservatives) in recognition of the basic bargain that is supposed to exist between workers and employers.

(In 04, at leadst two states that voted for Bush also passed ballot initiatives to raise the state miniomum wage.)

IMO the Democrats should go much farther than that but it's a start.

it was a combination of issues AND persona. I don't care HOW personable a candidate is--taking the gun issue as an example, if one promises to outlaw half the guns in people's gun safes (as Senator Kerry unwittingly did), one is NOT going to win many heavily gun-owning states unless the other issues slant way in your favor. Granted, Gore may have been hurt to some degree because he's not as good a speaker as Clinton was, but the fact is that Gore lost his own home state largely on the gun issue alone. Winning Tennessee and heavily Democratic West Virginia (two states that were lost largely on the gun issue) would have put Gore in the White House, regardless of Florida (and don't think the gun issue wasn't a big part of the Florida vote, either). And regardless of how poor a speaker Gore and Kerry might have been, you can't tell me that W was anything but worse.

"Packaging" only goes so far; the thing is, it's a lot easier for a candidate to motivate people to vote AGAINST you than to vote for you. Telling 40% or more of voters that you are thinking about sending guys with machine guns and black body armor to their doors is guaranteed to alienate a lot of them, and to motivate the indifferent to either sit out th election, or (worse) get to the polls and pull the lever for the other guy. I don't care how well you package an "I'm going to take half your guns" message, it's still going to scare the heck out of those whom it potentially affects.

If you polled people who voted for W, I'll bet a lot of them felt they were voting for "the lesser of two evils" (I saw that phrase a lot on the gun boards in '00 and '04). Probing WHY people feel that way (not just on the gun issue, but on other issues) would go a long way toward understanding why Gore/Kerry didn't win.

My observation in the original post was based on a lot of conversations I've had over the years with people who feel like it's a choice between two parties who ignore their real interests.

They've become conservative "by default" because they don't like to be overregulated. The problem on the left side is that we have failed to adequatly cultivate a recognition of the reasons for such things. We also probably did go overboard in terms of going too far in some respects, with regulations that restricted average peope while letting the Big Fish get away with murder.

IMO, I agree that we should drop (or refocus) positions on responsible gun ownership, and reserve our fire for the real issues of Money and Power that many gun ownwrs might support us on.

better job at doing is welcoming diversity of perspective.

You can read threads here on the DU and see that diversity of opinions on social and economic issues is typically met with insults like "racist" or "xenophobe" when someone disagrees.

Maybe it's not just presenting a united message. Maybe there needs to be more acceptance of diversity of perspective, too.

Right now, many Republicans are ripe for changing parties. Heck, I did! But if they come to a place like the DU and find that they are unwelcomed because they don't agree with every little perspective, then they just think that they don't want to be a part of the Democratic party at all.

Anyhow, just something to think about before someone decides to insult another member here. You might be sending that person back to the Republican party. Try to discuss ISSUES rather than insult perspectives. JMO.

This is just my perspective, but I don't see the frictions on our side being so much "moderates" versus "liberals" or "leftists."

I think it has to do with the tension between supporting the Status Quo Oligarchy versus The People.

IMO it's possible to be a "conservative Democrat" on individual issues, as long as there is general, agreement on the core issues of Money and Power. Democrats have to stand up against the entrenched interests of big corporate power that have been steadily eroding democracy and gutting the economy and pushing down the middle class and poor and smaller businesses.

IMO it's also possible to have a spectrum between moderate and more "radical" in terms of pace, as long as we're all on the same side in terms of the basic goal of democrats, which should be to represent the general interests of the middle class and the disadvantaged against the wealthy oligarchs and corporate power.

Actually, not only have I seen it here, but I have been subjected to it.

It's odd how our party of tolerance does not tolerate differing views/paths on how to come to the same conclusion/outcome.

Just this past week I encountered a few posters who were quick to call names when a varying view was described. I thought it very odd because we're all on the same side.

And all this while, I thought it was the Neo-cons who were in total lock step with no room for diversity. Now I see how prevalent that is here on the DU. Doesn't look too good from where I sit. But, I would personally never jump to the 'Pub party.

Thanks for your honesty!

Guess I missed them.

ban gay marriage and those who want to ban civil unions.

That's diversity, I guess. :crazy: