Some Questions for Moderates/Independents

Is it just a matter of voting for the moderate no matter which party he or she is in? Is it then a matter of indifference to you which party controls the House or the Senate?  Can Moderates have any moderating effect whatsoever if the Republicans continue to control all three branches of the government?  Why is it so difficult to see that moderates have a role to play only when there is a stalemate between two opposing power centers? Why is it so difficult to grasp that individuals by themselves have no power and that any individual office holder must play for one team or the other?  Why is it so hard to see that the Republicans have no reason to compromise unless they are forced to and that the cannot be forced to unless there is a power strong enough to do so?

If Independents really want to have an impact, they have no other choice but to vote Democrat this November.  Once the Democrats control the congress, then moderates/independents will have a mediating role to play.  Until then, they are irrelevant pawns in a power game they must play on terms defined exclusively by the Republicans.  They are nowhere men like Joe Lieberman.  That's why the GOP is supporting him.  They'll support anybody who will prevent the Dems from seating a majority.  They understand how power works.

We see what a mess letting the Republicans have all three branches has led us into.  There is no more important issue that faces us than simply to take away one or both of the Congressional majorities from the them.  The situation looks good for Democrats to succeed this November, but we should never ever underestimate the Republicans' ability to manipulate the system to insure that they hold on to their majorities. 

If Independents have a case to make for hoping that moderate Republicans or Independents win, I would like to hear your rebuttal to what I have said in these posts over the last week or so.  For the life of me, I can't see how anybody can think anything is a higher priority than taking away Bush's congressional majority.

Comments

[Jason]

Your posts on this topic are well-taken.

I had always considered myself a liberal-leaning independent. I usually voted Democratic, but had no problem punching the occasional Republican ballot, and I generally rejected party identity or affiliation.

However, in mid-2004, it dawned on me that as the Republican party rammed through disaterous policy after disasterous policy, and told lie after lie, it was time to take sides. Maintaining "independence" was tantamount to enablment. Someone had to take a stand, and by default, it had to be the Democrats. I think a lot of other nominal "independents" became Democrats in this same way, and thus you're seeing the current rejuvination of Democratic activists who, dispite the "scary liberal" fear mongering from the right and the traditional media (who would have everyone believe it's still the summer of 1968), are quite "moderate" in their political beliefs, if moderate is to have any meaning.

So, as one of Josh Marshall's "partisanized moderates," I emplore any fence-sitters out there to drop pretext and take a stand. You'll sleep better, I promise.

[Jack Whelan]

Jason--

Thanks for your response. I think your story is a fairly typical one for people who are not excited by either party, but who have come to see the threat posed by the GOP in the last decade.

I think there are two things that make fence-sitters resistant to your appeal. One, they may be on the fence but they are hanging on the republican side of it. They find the cultural left a harder team to identify with than the trandiationalists of the libertarians on the right. They may agree that GOP policies are a disaster, but they could never bring themselves to vote for a Lamont-like candidate, because they buy the conventional media wisdom that he's a wacky, anti-war lefty. Independents like this can vote for no one to the left of Joe Lieberman. Voting for right-center Dems is as independent as they get. That the Dems threw JL out, is a sign to them how wacky the Dems are.

Second, even if they are willing to vote for a more liberal candidate, they only consider the individual candidate, not whether he plays a role in supporting the GOP majority. It's very, very hard for a lot of people to look at politics as about power. The inclination is to look at it as a matter of individual character. I'm not saying that character and whether a candidate is principled or not is unimportant, but my first assumption is that any candidate once elected will do what is in her or his political self -interest first, and that usually means playing ball with the heavies in their party. That's why party matters, and now more than ever.