This Isn't 1972 - This Is A Good Time To Be A Liberal!

[Butch McQueen]

I keep coming across references to how being a liberal will equal death on election day with reminders of the presidential election in 1972 thrown in.

I remember 1972... The middle class was near the peak of it's historic earning power. Unemployment was low. Unions were still strong. Banking and finance laws had yet to be gutted like a fish on a riverbank. Job security was taken for granted and most people took faith in the belief that their children's future would be better than their own. Young people could take their High School education and a solid work ethic out into the marketplace and find employment that actually provided a living wage for themselves and a family. And 1972 was the year that George McGovern failed to carry any state but Massachusetts. In hindsight that doesn't surprise me much - McGovern was a voice for change at a time when most people weren't all that interested in changing things.

Today has a lot more in common with 1932 than it does 1972. Be it unemployment statistics, the Gini coefficient, or a lack of adequate social service safety nets, 2013 looks a hell of a lot more like 1932 than it does 1972. And in 1932 Democrats took 59 out of 96 Senate seats, 313 out of 435 House seats, and elected FDR.

Now I may just be guilty of looking for hope where there isn't any, but it seems to me ideas such as raising the minimum wage, staying out of pointless wars, same sex marriage, banking reform, progressive tax policies, and so on, are starting to find real traction in the popular imagination. Even the basic concepts behind the ACA (when it isn't tagged with the red flag label "Obamacare&quot garner a majority of popular support in the polls. Now I'm not so naive as to think for a second that you could ever successfully market a candidate by advertising them as a liberal - that label has been successfully demonized by the right. However, I do believe that the country is reaching a point where it is ready for many of the IDEAS behind liberalism. We need candidates that support those ideas.

Now I live in teabagger country so it is kind hard for me to be optimistic based on the people I talk to every day, but my broader sense of things is that the future is starting to look brighter for liberalism. I'm I being rational here, or am I just delusional?

[babylonsister]

1. First off, welcome to DU! I

love your post, and you're right, but only if you choose to be optimistic, as I do.

It's nice to read a post that doesn't proclaim the sky is falling, an all too frequent occurrence here.

I think once Americans actually tune in to how damaging the rethugs are, they'll look around and hopefully think that the liberal ideas have merit.

[JaneyVee]

2. K & R! Good post & welcome!

[MannyGoldstein]

3. Hell, a Liberal won the Presidency as recently as 2008!

Public option for health insurance, ending the surveillance state, transparency in government, and end to the revolving door between government officials and lobbyists, not cutting Social Security etc.

Unfortunately the fellow who was elected had his body occupied by an investment banker between election and inauguration.

Welcome DU!

P.S. Obama also calls it ObamaCare. Except when it's having problems, then it's back to ACA, of course.

[7wo7rees]

4. Welcome to DU! Keep posting.

It is just so nice to not be under Bush. Things are getting better.
The "Hope and Change" was not fulfilled but we're getting better.
It ain't perfect but we are getting better.

[Warpy]

5. You're correct, of course

that this is more like 1932 than 1972. We just haven't had the collapse yet, although we've had the declining real estate prices they experienced through the 20s. We've had many years of wage deflation that hasn't been accompanied by price deflation, driving many people out of business. Unemployment is twice what is reported when you add in the people with part time, low wage jobs who are barely able to feed themselves with help from SNAP and the food pantries.

In 1972, things other than the war were going well. Nixon got in because old folks hated hippies and uppity college kids who hated the war. He stayed in for the same reasons.

We're in a Depression except nobody on the news or in power much cares because the rich are still flying high on hedge fund funny money.

I also think people have finally noticed and have a vague suspicion the Republicans are not on their side. You might be starting to see people voting Democratic and lying about it later so their neighbors don't reject them.

[Cha]

6. Not "delusional".. Full of Facts. Thanks Butch McQueen.. and

yes, Welcome to DU!

[polichick]

7. The stage is set for a new wave of liberalism - but both parties will fight it...

so if the people want it, the battle won't be easy.

[Scuba]

8. K&R

[deutsey]

9. It depends on whether there are politicians

who will genuinely embrace, advocate, and push liberal/left policies.

There are signs the people are ready...a socialist won in Seattle, de Blasio won in NYC, California is digging out of the rubble of conservative rule and has a surplus.

[bonzotex]

10. very rational, k/r

[Le Taz Hot]

11. Excellent post and observations.

I absolutely agree. People have been downsized and outsourced and foreclosed and phased out that, at some point, critical mass is inevitable and I think we've reached it. As has historically been the case, the Ruling Class doesn't know when they've reached overkill. Versailles was impenetrable, until it wasn't. The Kremlin was immovable, until it wasn't. Rome was undefeatable, until it wasn't.

In this country, they heyday of the Robber Barons has always been followed by reforms -- women's rights, labor unions, protections against big banks and against unfettered capitalism. I think we're coming full circle and I think the Predator Class needs to be put on notice.

[TBF]

12. It looks alot more like 1932 because

of the huge income inequality.

I do have faith that the current folks under 30 will do much better than the last couple generations that were led astray by folks like Reagan.

The only caution I have is that while this generation has Occupy, back in the 30s there were socialist/communist parties with candidates like Eugene Debs. They actually put fear into the ruling class of this country and FDR pretty much had to act to save capitalism.

Most of those serious leftists were driven out in the 50s and the current communist party is co-opted.

I don't know that we'll see the same kind of backlash due to that fact.

I'd love to be proven wrong.

[socialist_n_TN]

17. Well, a dialectic view would say that oppression creates it's own reaction.......

and resistance. And the oppression won't stop until it runs up against an immovable resistance.

Reds are becoming more and more popular. Their already more popular than Congress. And Sawant in Seattle won an at-large position with 90k votes and STATED positions like urging the workers to take over and occupy Boeing if it threatens to close and move the plant. In spite of the fact that I and Worker's Power have some problems with Socialist Alternative and their Ted Grantish type of positions on some issues, no one can deny that that IS a revolutionary socialist position. Not just socialist, but REVOLUTIONARY socialist.

I remain optimistic for revolutionary socialism simply because it IS the counter to capitalism, historically and logically. We'll just have to see how it plays out though and I'd love to see you proven wrong too.

[TBF]

18. ...

[HappyMe]

13. k&r

Well said.

[NuclearDem]

14. The tide is turning.

Why the Democrats as a whole are fighting against it is baffling. Bill de Blasio mentioned class warfare once and won with NYC's biggest margin ever. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are some of the most popular politicians in DC, and Occupy is still going strong.

[FiveGoodMen]

15. "Why the Democrats as a whole are fighting against it is baffling"

They're just following the money.

If we want a good Democratic Party, we need to drop the "Big Tent" bullshit and actually stand for something.

[socialist_n_TN]

16. I agree. One thing that's always been the case....

is that the power structure that's in place ALWAYS fights the LAST war and not the NEXT one. That goes for generals in the military and for political workers as well. Politically, there's a whole generation of politicians that have grown up AFTER the Reagan years and both sides, Dems and Republicans, have had their minds and attitudes ossified into those positions that were popular in 1980, but aren't so popular now.

Welcome to DU.