Mr. Mike's Ratiometric Political Party Predictions

It's too late to watch the movie I'd intended to enjoy tonight (The Snapper, an Irish comedy with Colm Meaney), since the posts below took much longer than I thought to write and get frickin' Blogger to post. So, I'll throw this in and then hit the bed.

Even though we are a year out from the 2004 elections, it's not too early to start making predictions. Such things will be flexible, of course, as personalities and events will change the relationships. Most Americans still aren't paying attention, even though primary season is nearly on us, and most political junkies have already been feeding on this since last Spring. So, in order to lock in a track record on the subject, to create an arc by which I can later judge and be judged, I'd like to introduce Mr. Mike's Ratiometric Political Party Predictions.

I'll be predicting the vote percentages the political parties will be receiving this coming Fall. Each update will have the parties involved, their percentage of the votes cast, and whatever reasoning and explanation is necessary. To begin:

Republicans (Bush): 53%
Democrats (open): 37%
Greens (open): 7%
Libertarians (open): 3%

That Democratic number is shocking, I know, but I really sense a few currents to support it. First, is the leftward drift of the party away from Bill Clinton's Democratic Leadership Council centrism. That centrism is what made recent Democratic successes possible. Look at the numbers: 44, 46, then 49%. Clinton, Clinton II, then Gore. The dot-com bust exploded that, as did the reshaping of American thinking after 9/11.

Now, look at Howard Dean's rhetoric, and that of the other candidates. Only Lieberman is sounding even vaguely like the old DLC and he's not getting much press coverage at all. Nancy Pelosi's installation as House Minority Leader is another sign; listen to her today. She has moderated some, but the old firebrand still shows through. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, before he got submerged by the crush of War in Iraq news, was also moving leftward. But he's now being targeted within his own party for replacement, by not being activist enough. It will be telling to see the names floated as possible new leaders.

Then there's the free-floating anger of their loss in 2000 which got subsumed into anti-War on Terror feelings. I really do sense they are getting out of touch with a lot of the folks who used to be called Reagan Democrats, who are now moving toward Bush based on his handling of post-9/11 American international relations. The increasingly good economic news (Read Bill Hobbs' blog for excellent coverage on that score.) will only exacerbate the Leftist ideological pull, as this is the only place they know to go to, to take an anti-Bush stance.

Still, there are a lot of disaffected Dems who believe the party isn't Left enough, isn't actively anti-Bush administration enough on a wide range of non-War issues. I think we'll see a furtherance of the gains mady by the Greens as they become the new home for those retro-Marxian, activist Dems. Remember, Nader pulled in 5% last time, a phenomenal number. He's now making noises about trying again. While Dems and the clueless will make the usual noises about Nader "stealing" votes from them and "costing" them their "rightful" victory, I think the Greens will go from 5% last time to 7% this. Depending on whether the Democratic candidate makes much of a move back to the center after they have the nomination, it might be a tad higher.

On the other flank, there are a lot of Republicans who are rapidly and vocally becoming upset with the Republican Party's apparent disavowal of its traditional "small government - less spending" philosophy. Bush seems to want to co-opt every issue he can, usually by buying whatever solution will steal it. And Republican Congress-pigs are slopping the trough like we haven't seen since the heyday of Liberal Democrats back in the Seventies. Plenty of conservative, post-94 Gingrichian Republicans would very much like to make a point to the President. If the Dems sink as badly as I think they will, that leaves room for strategising by those Republicans. They may see enough room in the lead to make their displeasure known, while not jeopardising the President's re-election chances. I think this is a real possibility, if Bush's lead remains strong.

So, they end up in the Libertarian column to make their point. It won't be a lot of votes, hence the small slice I give them. The Libs polled one percent this past election, an embarrassment after once polling at three percent two elections back! Their philosophical purism, the "all or nothing at all, right now or never" attitude, has been holding them back all along. Dems don't stand up demanding the complete Socialist state all at once. They know that by gradualism, by taking each victory and never giving it back, they win the race. The Libs should learn from that strategy and try it.

By starting with small rollbacks; by cutting out some small, meaningless programs here and there; by not demanding complete ends to laws on drugs, prostitution, etc., but starting with baby steps in, say, sentencing and scope; by scaling back the scope of some privacy and surveillance laws while not being seen as foolish in the face of the War on Terror, the Libs could make sensible progress. It took a century to get where we are today with Progressive/Socialist/Democrat policies. You can't expect folks to welcome drastic and catastrophic change overnight. The philosophical underpinnings are only now coming into the consciousness of most Americans. Build slowly on that, don't overwhelm with a tidal wave.

The thing to watch for is Republican over-confidence. Yeah, the famous "red-blue" map makes it look like the Republicans have it made, but don't forget the narrowness of the victories in many of those precincts. It was often only a 2 or three point one! I do believe the country continues to trend Republican, but they stand to lose some of that momentum with their current behavior.

My main feeling now is that the Democratic Party is in for one rude, shocking awakening. Before Bill Clinton re-invented himself in New Hampshire as the "Comeback Kid," in 1992, the Democratic Party was polling at 23%, while Reform was polling, I think, fifteen or so. Clinton is the force that drove them back from the brink. Had things gone differently, the Dems might have stayed at that low level and been reduced by the Federal Election Commission's rules into minor party status. It would have been crippling, possibly sending them into a death spiral that reconfigured American politics. Alas, it didn't happen then, and there's no Reform on the horizon for 2004. But the same anti-politics as usual feeling remains; the current Republican behavior is only making it worse right now. Democratic floundering is killing their credibility. And there's no Bill Clinton this time.

So, there you have it. Discuss; refute. And watch this space between now and November 2004 for further adjustments and refinements.