What Went Wrong: The Crushing Political Defeat of 2004 |
Eli UngarIllustration by Martin Azari
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A few
weeks ago, if you had told me that I'd be writing this article, I would have
called you a cynic. Living here in our nice blue upper-Midwestern bubble, it
seemed not only possible, but likely, that George W. Bush would be fired on
November 2. When I went to vote, I felt a little like Donald Trump punching
that ballot in the Kerry-Edwards spot. But we were all mistaken. As the implications
of this defeat begin to settle, I feel compelled to ask: What went wrong? The
knee-jerk reaction that many have expressed is that Kerry was not the right
man for the job. This is supported by the fact that while Al Gore won the popular
vote in 2000 by some 500,000 votes, Kerry fell four million votes short of even
that meaningless victory. What's perplexing about this is that by all indications
Kerry seems to have been a stronger candidate than Gore and the Democratic get
out the vote effort actually worked. While the overall percentage of young voters
remained at 17 percent, there were far more young people voting in this election
than voted in 2000. So what happened? The answer that many inquiring minds have
arrived at can be summarized in two words: Karl Rove.
Karl Rove is being hailed as a political genius because he understood that in
order to win, he needed to direct his campaign at the born-again Christians
that now constitute 40 percent of our national population. The sociological
distinction between this group and the ever growing "Evangelicals" is a bit
fuzzy, but together, these two groups handed the president his victory. Furthermore,
the most important issue to voters this time around was neither Iraq nor the
economy. Rather, it was "values," and by a large margin voters who cared about
"values" voted for Shrubby.
This is where I get angry. When did "values" become a republican selling point?
What sort of "values" allow 45 million Americans to go without health insurance?
What kind of values dictate that we need a Constitutional amendment to define
marriage as a heterosexual relationship? What's worse ethically, getting a blowjob
from an intern, or killing 100,000 innocent civilians?
Not once did the Democrats take it to the Republicans on these issues. Moreover,
Kerry came across as somehow insincere when he talked about values. Was this
Kerry's fault? I think not. The Kerry-Edwards campaign simply failed to frame
their issues in terms of values. This miscalculation can be traced back to an
early strategic decision taken by the Democrats to target undecided voters.
While the Democrats proceeded to tip-toe around delicate issues like abortion
and gay marriage so as not to offend any potential swingers, Karl Rove was able
to keep the President on message with a clear delineation of his position. The
effect, that Rove further pushed with the whole "flip-flop" angle, was that
Bush looked decisive while Kerry came across as weak.
The skeptics out there will say that even if the Kerry campaign had focused
more on values, they still could not have defeated Bush. I accept this argument,
but the election is symptomatic of a much larger cultural issue that we face
today. In this bitterly divided country, where the culture wars rage ever hotter,
the conservatives have somehow succeeded in painting themselves as the "moral
majority." Liberals need to stop allowing these people to define our national
ethics. People like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson want us to believe that
the world is divided into the saved and the sinner, that to not have Jesus means
to live a life without values. For some reason, no one challenges them on these
points. Most liberals just dismiss them as religious nut jobs and continue with
their lives. The problem is that this has produced a de facto legitimacy for
fundamentalist values. When the left is no longer vocal about their values,
the only values that get air-time are those of the Falwells and the Robertsons.
It is just as important for people on the left to understand that being religious
doesn't mean being fundamentalist. Liberals like Bill Mahr often express their
disdain for religious beliefs in favor of a more rational world view. We need
to leave behind the fights of the Enlightenment and understand that religion
is not necessarily the enemy of science and reason. Liberals also have to come
to a better understanding of the complex and important role religion plays in
people's lives. This is where the real healing of the country needs to take
place. There will always be religious extremists spewing forth ideology. The
left needs to reframe the debate by putting forth a serious values agenda of
their own in order to redefine and repackage liberal values for the next generation.
Listening to Senator-elect Barack Obama the other day, I was filled once again
with the hope that I thought I'd lost on November 3. There is a brighter future
ahead for this country, but there's a lot of work to be done in the meantime.