- Joined
- Jun 21, 2012
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- Libertarian - Left
... on fiscal issues. And this will be a direct consequence of this election.
To be sure, it isn't going to happen overnight. They'll probably put up a Movement Conservative in 2020, and may even win with one through a combination of voter fatigue and a cyclical recession.
But the long term trajectory is clear. William Jennings Bryan lost in 1896 (and 1900 and 1904), and the Democratic Party ran economically conservative candidates a few times thereafter (Alton Brooks Parker, John Davis, James Cox), but once the Democratic Party had settled on the white underclass for its base, the inevitable result was to drag the Democratic Party to the left on matters of economic egalitarianism and government intervention in the economy.
The same process will occur with the Republican Party, though my guess is that it'll be sold less as a progressive movement and more as a conservation of previous developments ("we must keep Social Security and Medicare solvent", "we must expand Affirmative Action to encompass low-income whites", etc.).
The Republican base isn't just far more socially conservative than the establishment - it's also far more economically liberal, in the New Deal sense of the word. That's what happens when you pander to the lumpenproletariat.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Party will become increasingly "conservative", not in the Movement Conservative sense of the term but in its preferences for established economic interests. That doesn't mean they're suddenly going to embrace Reaganoid economics; much of the emerging sectors of the modern economy - IT above all - prefers a more interventionist government. But that intervention will be directed towards increasingly less egalitarian ends and more towards the preservation of economic growth. This will run parallel to the gentrification of middle-class minorities, who will assimilate just as previous ethnic minority groups have.
The political battles of the future will be fought between nationalist populists and technocratic capitalists. Libertarians, Bernie Bros, and the Religious Right will be increasingly driven into the margins.
To be sure, it isn't going to happen overnight. They'll probably put up a Movement Conservative in 2020, and may even win with one through a combination of voter fatigue and a cyclical recession.
But the long term trajectory is clear. William Jennings Bryan lost in 1896 (and 1900 and 1904), and the Democratic Party ran economically conservative candidates a few times thereafter (Alton Brooks Parker, John Davis, James Cox), but once the Democratic Party had settled on the white underclass for its base, the inevitable result was to drag the Democratic Party to the left on matters of economic egalitarianism and government intervention in the economy.
The same process will occur with the Republican Party, though my guess is that it'll be sold less as a progressive movement and more as a conservation of previous developments ("we must keep Social Security and Medicare solvent", "we must expand Affirmative Action to encompass low-income whites", etc.).
The Republican base isn't just far more socially conservative than the establishment - it's also far more economically liberal, in the New Deal sense of the word. That's what happens when you pander to the lumpenproletariat.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Party will become increasingly "conservative", not in the Movement Conservative sense of the term but in its preferences for established economic interests. That doesn't mean they're suddenly going to embrace Reaganoid economics; much of the emerging sectors of the modern economy - IT above all - prefers a more interventionist government. But that intervention will be directed towards increasingly less egalitarian ends and more towards the preservation of economic growth. This will run parallel to the gentrification of middle-class minorities, who will assimilate just as previous ethnic minority groups have.
The political battles of the future will be fought between nationalist populists and technocratic capitalists. Libertarians, Bernie Bros, and the Religious Right will be increasingly driven into the margins.