NEWSWEEK Cover: America the Conservative By Jon Meacham
It Is Easy To Detect Dawn Of A New Progressive Era In Autumn Of Obama's Campaign; But History Shows Democratic Presidents 'Wind Up Moving Farther Right Than They Thought They Ever Would' 'Should Obama Win, He Will Govern A Nation That Is More Instinctively Conservative Than It Is Liberal - A Perennial Reality That Past Democratic Presidents Have Ignored At Their Peril' It is easy -- for some, even tempting -- to detect the dawn of a new progressive era in the autumn of Barack Obama's campaign for the presidency," Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham writes in the current issue. Obama is leading John McCain, and Democrats may gain seats on Capitol Hill. "But history ... tells us that Democratic presidents from FDR to JFK to LBJ to Carter to Clinton usually wind up moving farther right than they thought they ever would, or they pay for their continued liberalism at the polls," Meacham writes in the October 27 Newsweek cover, "America the Conservative" (on newsstands Monday, October 20). "Should Obama win, he will have to govern a nation that is more instinctively conservative than it is liberal -- a perennial reality that past Democratic presidents have ignored at their peril," he writes. The conservative instinct, which Meacham describes as "a fundamental human impulse to preserve what one has and loves," suggests America is more likely to tack toward the familiar on big questions of politics and culture than it is to enthusiastically embrace radical change.
"So are we a centrist country, or a right-of-center one? I think the latter, because the mean to which most Americans revert tends to be more conservative than liberal," Meacham writes. "According to the Newsweek Poll, nearly twice as many people call themselves conservatives as liberals (40 percent to 20 percent), and Republicans have dominated presidential politics -- in many ways the most personal, visceral vote we cast -- for 40 years. Since 1968, Democrats have won only three of 10 general elections (1976, 1992 and 1996), and in those years they were led by Southern Baptist nominees who ran away from the liberal label.
"Is this a center-right country? Yes, compared to Europe or Canada it's obviously much more conservative," says Adrian Wooldridge, coauthor of "The Right Nation: Conservative Power in America" and Washington bureau chief of the London-based Economist. "There's a much higher tolerance for inequality, much greater cultural conservatism, a higher incarceration rate, legalized handguns and greater distrust of the state." Meacham continues: "The argument I am making -- that we are at heart a right -- leaning country skeptical of government once a crisis that requires government has passed-is probably going to look dumb, or at least out of step, for many months to come. A big blue tsunami appears imminent. Election night and the first phase of a possible Obama administration may feel as though we have left the old categories behind, striking out on a bold new path in which pragmatism trumps dogma ... Economically, the deficits are so vast that we're all supersized Keynesians now, and there will most likely be political and intellectual cover for a stimulus package of new spending in the new year."
In a counterpoint essay, Senior Editor Jonathan Alter writes that Meacham is right that by the standards of a European-style welfare state, we will always be a relatively conservative country. "But closer to home, the norm has not been consistently conservative over the course of the 20th century. If anything, the nation was more often center-left. Democrats controlled the House of Representatives -- the 'People's House' -- for six straight decades between 1930 and 1994 (with only a short exception). While many were Southern conservatives on race, the huge chunks of progressive legislation they swallowed over many years could choke an elephant.“ Alter writes that for all the statistical permutations, analyzing the makeup of the American electorate for the past half-century is fairly simple. "About 40 percent of voters are reliable Democrats (whether they call themselves liberals or not), 40 percent are conservative Republicans (a term starting to lose its coherence), and the shape of our politics is determined by the 20 percent in the middle, mostly independents. Since about 1980, we've been living in a center-right America, but we're center-center now, and likely headed left. Even if McCain pulls an upset, the Democratic Congress would nudge him leftward on issues like alternative energy and taxes (and his healthcare plan would be DOA). Should Obama win, he will press hard for his ambitious agenda, even, aides say, at the risk of being a one-term president. Then it would all be about execution." If Obama moves "smart left" next year, Alter writes, he will have succeeded in rewriting the American social contract -- the obligations of the government to the people on the economy, energy, health care and education. But if we see a revival of the dumb left with old-fashioned capitulation to interest groups and a series of rookie mistakes on foreign policy, even a big Democratic victory next month would be a speed bump on the Ronald Reagan highway. (Read cover package at www.Newsweek.com)