The Politico asked me to write an essay on what advice I would give to the Democratic Presidential candidates. It is running today and is below. Would love your thoughts.
The Democratic Opportunity
Simon Rosenberg
April 11, 2007 05:28 PM EST
As we look to 2008, it is clear the two parties face a vastly different political landscape than anything we’ve seen in recent years. For the first time in a generation, the Republicans are in retreat, their brand damaged and ideology discredited. The Democrats won a resounding national victory in 2006 and according to a recent Pew Center poll, have opened up an extraordinary 15 percentage point advantage in party identification.
It is now reasonable to speculate that if Democrats win the presidency in 2008 it could be the beginning of a sustained period of Democratic control of government, akin to their run in the middle of the past century. President George W. Bush, meanwhile, is looking more like a 21st century version of Herbert Hoover each day.
Thus the stakes in 2008 are very high. It is not just about the control of the White House, but whether Democrats can take advantage of a profound mishandling of government by the Republicans, and build the foundation for a 21st century majority as strong as it had in the 20th.
To do so, Democrats will have to apply their values to a new set of realities that are making the new politics of this new century different from the one just past; requiring us to offer a new agenda that meets the challenges of our time, master the new technology and media that is changing the way we all communicate, and speak to and engage the new American population of this new century, one very different from Americas of previous generations.
A New Governing Agenda That Tackles The Emerging Challenges Of Our Time
When in power during the 20th Century, Democrats succeeded by tackling the great challenges of that time. Abroad, we defeated fascism, were instrumental in the triumph over communist totalitarianism, and constructed an international system based on FDR’s vision of a United Nations, bringing unprecedented liberty and prosperity to the people of the world. At home, we rescued America from its greatest economic crisis, the Depression. We further created Social Security and Medicare, and spearheaded the civil rights, consumer, labor, women’s and environmental movements that have helped make America not just great, but good. And, when we last held presidential power in the 1990s, progressives oversaw the greatest economic expansion in our history. It is a record to be proud of.
In the years ahead, our leaders will face a new set of tough 21st century governing challenges. We must keep the world peaceful and our country safe, restore broad-based prosperity in a much more competitive age of globalization, invest in infrastructure and people to ensure future prosperity, address global climate change and move toward greater energy independence, modernize our health care system while guaranteeing that all Americans have access to health insurance, manage the retirement of the baby boom, get our federal budget under control, and reform our broken immigration system. These are no small set of challenges.
For Democrats, success in 2008 will require offering real solutions to these great challenges, something the current governing party has utterly failed to do.
A New Post-Broadcast Media And Communications Era
As FDR mastered early broadcast radio and JFK excelled on the new technology of his time, television, future success will depend on the mastery of an emergent post-broadcast communications environment. We are in the very early stages of a whole new era of political communications, which is more personal, iterative, participatory, mobile, fragmented, digital, networked – and whose rate of change is accelerating.
In 2003, we saw how an unknown candidate, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, used these new 21st century tools to leapfrog his competition among rival Democratic presidential candidates. In 2004, we saw the DNC use them to raise more money than the RNC for the first time in recent memory. And in 2006, we saw the early power of viral video help take down GOP Sen. George Allen in Virginia, giving Democrats control of the Senate.
The rise of the broadband internet, cable and satellite television, mobile telephony and media and their increasing use is radically changing the way the American people connect and communicate with one another. In response, we must radically alter our approach to media and political communications. For Democrats, success in 2008 will require replacing the 20th century model of political communications, with a new spirit of experimentation, and a new set of political tools.
The American People Themselves Have Changed
Since FDR built the Democratic Party’s last great majority electoral coalition, the American people have changed a great deal. In recent decades America has become increasingly suburban and exurban, Southern and Western, Hispanic and Asian, immigrant and Spanish-speaking, aging Boomer and Millennial, and more digital age in our orientation towards life and work than industrial age. We live in literally what is a new America.
These new demographic realities have created a new 21st electoral majority strategy for Democrats, one that was used to win the Senate and House in 2006, and that has now produced 42 states with either a Democratic senator or governor. This new map starts with Democratic strengths in the Northeast, Midwest and Coastal West, and seeks to consolidate opportunities in the Inter-mountain West, the Southwest, the Plains and the South.
Democrats start the hunt for the presidency with much more strength at the Electoral College level than is widely understood; having what could be considered perhaps a high floor but low ceiling. The party has received 250 Electoral College votes or more in the last four national elections, a feat last accomplished in the FDR era.
While Ohio alone may give the Democrats the presidency in 2008, a great new Hispanic opening has emerged with what may be a permanent degradation of the Republican brand resulting from the terrible immigration debate in 2006. Exploiting this opening could flip Arizona, Colorado, Florida, New Mexico and Nevada, and give the Democrats another 56 electoral votes. What is remarkable is that this new Electoral College strategy is essentially the same way Democrats won the Senate and House, creating for this old party a very new, achievable and durable way of holding power in this new century.
What’s Next
So how are Democrats doing so far in mastering this new politics of the 21st century? Well, after years of failed conservative government, Democrats have put big issues – restoring broad-based prosperity, fixing Iraq, health care for all, reforming immigration, global climate change and energy independence – on the agenda. Our presidential candidates have already embraced powerful new tools like viral video and social networking, and are using these and other new tools to involve already close to a million people – an extraordinary number – in their campaigns. Our party’s emerging leaders – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, presidential candidates Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama, John Edwards, Bill Richardson, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, DNC Chairman Dean – look like 21st century America, and hail from the region’s critical to locking in this 21st century electoral majority.
Our new primary calendar includes states from the fastest growing regions of the country, the South and West, which will allow African-Americans and Hispanics to participate in our primary process as never before. Our 2008 convention is in Denver, at the epicenter of the most important new strategic opening in this election, the Southwest, and will be chaired in part by the compelling Sen. Ken Salazar of Colorado, a member of a new generation of Hispanic leaders.
There is much at stake in 2008. Only one political party, the Democrats, built a sustained majority coalition in the 20th century. The historic failures of the Bush era have made it possible for Democrats to imagine replicating this success in our new century. And while a great deal of attention will go into winning the 2008 elections, it is critical for us to also be looking ahead at a much more strategic level, and recognize that by mastering this new politics of the new century we may be taking the critical early steps in building a majority coalition as robust and durable as the one FDR built more than 70 years ago.
Simon Rosenberg is the President of NDN, a progressive think tank and advocacy organization.
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