Schisms in the national parties

[Tex]

Listened to Limbaugh the other day while out for lunch, and he made an interesting point. Both parties are undergoing some internal troubles right now as candidates vie for the candidacy. What's interesting is what they revolving around.

Republicans: Ideas. Immigration, the economy, social issues. A little about religion.
Democrats: Race and gender.

Republicans are working to find a central character around which to wrap their ideas. Democrats are trying to figure out which candidate will make them look the most PC.

Pretty telling.

[Detroitdad]

Originally Posted by Tex

Republicans are working to find a central character around which to wrap their ideas. Democrats are trying to figure out which candidate will make them look the most PC.

Pretty telling.

It's comments like these that make people think you are a pure partisan.

You don't really think that the parties are ready for much of a schism do you? Where are the voters going to go? Are the democratic voters that are supposedly so upset about race or gender going to vote for the Republicans? I don't think so. That is the main problem (asset?) with the two party system.

These struggles naturally happen during primaries as candidates try to differentiate themselves. You are way to smart to listen to Rush. You could out Rush rush.

[Tex]

Originally Posted by Detroitdad

It's comments like these that make people think you are a pure partisan.

You don't really think that the parties are ready for much of a schism do you? Where are the voters going to go? Are the democratic voters that are supposedly so upset about race or gender going to vote for the Republicans? I don't think so. That is the main problem (asset?) with the two party system.

These struggles naturally happen during primaries as candidates try to differentiate themselves. You are way to smart to listen to Rush. You could out Rush rush.

Don't get so hung up on the term "schism." I just mean that the internal debates are revolving around two very different subjects. You don't really hear the Dems debating policy that much. Can you tell me the difference between Hillary and Obama on health care? the war? taxes? abortion?

Now try the same questions with the Republicans.

Two different debates going on right now, and personally I'd rather have it be over ideas than identity politics. (Mike Huckabee excepted)

[danimal]

Originally Posted by Tex

Don't get so hung up on the term "schism." I just mean that the internal debates are revolving around two very different subjects. You don't really hear the Dems debating policy that much. Can you tell me the difference between Hillary and Obama on health care? the war? taxes? abortion?

Now try the same questions with the Republicans.

Two different debates going on right now, and personally I'd rather have it be over ideas than identity politics. (Mike Huckabee excepted)

Might it not be that the 2 democratic candidates are much closer ideologically than the Republicans? Because their policies don't differ that much, then the focus becomes other issues.

[Detroitdad]

Originally Posted by Tex

Don't get so hung up on the term "schism." I just mean that the internal debates are revolving around two very different subjects. You don't really hear the Dems debating policy that much. Can you tell me the difference between Hillary and Obama on health care? the war? taxes? abortion?

Now try the same questions with the Republicans.

Two different debates going on right now, and personally I'd rather have it be over ideas than identity politics. (Mike Huckabee excepted)

see if you would have just said this without the snide remarks you would be a poitically astute observer (which you are) without any baggage.

I agree with your thoughts, for the most part, especially because Sen. Clinton is heavy on specifics but Obama is pretty vague on that account. I would rather not get hung up on identity politics either, (although I will point out that the Huckabee-Christian right-Romney Mormon juxtaposition has more than a whiff if identity politics in it-and that the Christian right in general identity has strongly impacted the party's nominees over the past decade and a half).

I think some identity politics is natural when you have the first feasible woman and black candidates, at the same time. So I am not that surprised nor worried about it from a Democrats point of view.

[Tex]

Originally Posted by danimal

Might it not be that the 2 democratic candidates are much closer ideologically than the Republicans? Because their policies don't differ that much, then the focus becomes other issues.

That's my point.

Originally Posted by Detroitdad

see if you would have just said this without the snide remarks you would be a poitically astute observer (which you are) without any baggage.

I agree with your thoughts, for the most part, especially because Sen. Clinton is heavy on specifics but Obama is pretty vague on that account. I would rather not get hung up on identity politics either, (although I will point out that the Huckabee-Christian right-Romney Mormon juxtaposition has more than a whiff if identity politics in it-and that the Christian right in general identity has strongly impacted the party's nominees over the past decade and a half).

Thus, why I said Mike Huckabee excepted.

Originally Posted by Detroitdad

I think some identity politics is natural when you have the first feasible woman and black candidates, at the same time. So I am not that surprised nor worried about it from a Democrats point of view.

Perhaps. I wonder if we had a black or a woman candidate on the Republican side, if you'd see this kind of rancor between the candidates. I have a hard time seeing Condi Rice or Colin Powell or Michael Steele or Kay Bailey Hutchison on that stage with the other white guys, and having the Democrats' flavor of problems.

[Tex]

More, via Peggy Noonan:

We begin, as one always must now, again, with Bill Clinton. The past week he has traveled South Carolina, leaving discord in his wake. Barack Obama, that "fairytale," is low, sneaky. "He put out a hit job on me." The press is cruelly carrying Mr. Obama's counter-jabs. "You live for it."

In Dillon, S.C., according to the Associated Press, on Thursday Mr. Clinton "predicted that many voters will be guided mainly by gender and race loyalties" and suggested he wife may lose Saturday's primary because black voters will side with Mr. Obama. Who is raising race as an issue? Bill Clinton knows. It's the press, and Mr. Obama. "Shame on you," Mr. Clinton said to a CNN reporter. The same day the Web site believed to be the back door of the Clinton war room unveiled a new name for the senator from Illinois: "Sticky Fingers Obama."

Bill Clinton, with his trembly, red faced rage, makes John McCain look young. His divisive and destructive daily comportment—this is a former president of the United States—is a civic embarrassment. It is also an education, and there is something heartening in this.

There are many serious and thoughtful liberals and Democrats who support Mr. Obama and John Edwards, and who are seeing Mr. Clinton in a new way and saying so. Here is William Greider in The Nation, the venerable left-liberal magazine. The Clintons are "high minded" on the surface but "smarmily duplicitous underneath, meanwhile jabbing hard at the groin area. They are a slippery pair and come as a package. The nation is at fair risk of getting them back in the White House for four years."

That, again, is from one of the premier liberal journals in the United States. It is exactly what conservatives have been saying for a decade. This may mark a certain coming together of the thoughtful on both sides. The Clintons, uniters at last.

Mr. Obama takes the pummeling and preaches the high road. It's all windup with him, like a great pitcher more comfortable preparing to throw than throwing. Something in him resists aggression. He tends to be indirect in his language, feinting, only suggestive. I used to think he was being careful not to tear the party apart, and endanger his own future.

But the Clintons are tearing the party apart. It will not be the same after this. It will not be the same after its most famous leader, and probable ultimate victor, treated a proud and accomplished black man who is a U.S. senator as if he were nothing, a mere impediment to their plans. And to do it in a way that signals, to his supporters, How dare you have the temerity, the ingratitude, after all we've done for you?

Watch for the GOP to attempt swoop in after the November elections and make profit of the wreckage.

http://online.wsj.com/article/declarations.html

[MikeWaters]

The idea of having Bill Clinton back for 8 more years is beyond depressing.

[Detroitdad]

Originally Posted by Tex

Perhaps. I wonder if we had a black or a woman candidate on the Republican side, if you'd see this kind of rancor between the candidates. I have a hard time seeing Condi Rice or Colin Powell or Michael Steele or Kay Bailey Hutchison on that stage with the other white guys, and having the Democrats' flavor of problems.

Do you have any basis for believing that? Just a suspicion. And I strongly suspect the opposite.

[Tex]

Originally Posted by Detroitdad

Do you have any basis for believing that? Just a suspicion. And I strongly suspect the opposite.

Empirical? No, just a gut feeling. I don't think it's any secret that the Democrat party has taken the black vote for granted, simultaneously treating them like 2nd-class citizens. Bill Clinton's comparison of Jesse Jackson and Obama is just a glimpse of the Democrat "Southern strategy."

You don't see that kind of relationship between the Republican party, its black candidates, and the rare 10% of the black population that vote for them nationally.

I hope someday to see my theory tested.