What Center?

The Associated Press reports: Democratic Hopefuls Snub Party Moderates

Not a single one of the eight presidential candidates plans to attend the Democratic Leadership Council’s summer meeting, a snub that says less about the centrist DLC than it does about a nomination process that rewards candidates who pander to their parties’ hardened cores while ignoring everybody else.

There is no magical center of independents. It has been shown by numerous polls to have vanished. The DLC wants to give away core values in exchange for nothing. Giving away a principled stand that might gain 1% on the Right, makes no sense when it costs you 2% on the Left.

A normal negotiation goes: seller asks for $10, buyer offers $5. Long conversation regarding children starving and relatives in hospital, seller asks for $9.50 and seller offers $5.50, rinse and repeat. Eventually a deal is struck at around $7.50 and everyone is happy because the seller would have sold at $4.50, and the buyer thinks he saved $2.50.

DLC negotiations with the Repubs go like this: Rupubs say $10, DLC offers $5. DLC has sanity, patriotism, and education questioned, so offers $6, but Repubs now want $11. In the end the DLC pays $15 and talks about a non-partisan compromise, while the Repubs tell the world that the DLC will have to raise taxes after paying too much for the item.

How many times does this have to happen before the DLC notices the pattern? The Repubs are not going to negotiate in good faith, because they already know the DLC is going to cave. This isn’t a slam against the Repubs, I wouldn’t act any differently.

There is only one Bill Clinton who could triangulate his way to prosperity and stability while under constant attack. No one currently running for president has those skills. The DLC advice has cost Democratic candidates elections that they could have won if they had stood their ground.