The Battle Royale Cometh-The Dogfight For The Soul Of The Democratic Party-Call It Between Sleepy Joe Biden And Feel The Bern Sanders And You Would Not Be Far Off

By Alan Jackson

                                                                               

I have been around the political and cultural commentary business for a long time so nothing surprises me much when readers come out of left-field to have their say. That was the case recently from several readers who got up on their hindlegs when I mentioned, in passing, that a bigtime fight was brewing underneath the struggle for the 2020 Democratic Party presidential nomination. I mentioned, again in passing, that the corporate Democrats have had such a stranglehold on the party that it has become a fossil, has forgotten how to use its majority to actually win and forestall all the bullshit coming from the right. Has become the party of the donor class (or part of it), lobbyists, media mavens, and fussy insider bureaucrats who could not find their ways pass the Beltway with three tries.

No question that the Democrats have never claimed to be anything but a pro-capitalist, pro-corporate globalization party including one presidential candidate who has made a mantra out of declaring she is a “capitalist to the bone.” But in other times, and not to far back, they used to at least use the fig leaf of being a “people’s party.” (That “not too far back” being on the long side the New Deal and short side some variation of the Great Society.) Hence the alienation of former traditional bases like the working class, especially the working poor. The task as they have seen it is to get out the vote on election day and then do business as usual.    

Enter a new approach, an approach that reflects the very real damage Republicans have done to the electorate through voter suppression, increased hoops to pass through to register to vote and getting to the ballot box itself. That is to realize that many constituencies are hungry to have a say in history. Groups that have been neglected or not seen as reliable and worthwhile prospects to organize (from the comfort of Washington offices to be sure). In short what has become known as the Phillips thesis where rather than concentrate on some white working-class voter who might listen to the message, really a mythical figment of the Beltway imagination the party go after the young and energetic en masse, communities of color in all their diversities and the working poor (those who are working two and three jobs to put food on the table).        

So yes two very different ideas of how to avoid in the short term another Trump four years, four years unchained and long term to confine the Republicans to the dustbin of history. These ideas got their first serious workout in the Clinton-Sanders clash for the 2016 Democratic nomination but not everybody, including me, saw how much the corporate Democrats were out of step with the times and could not muster enough energy to beat a second-rate third rate bum of the month like Donald J. Trump. In every way as we head into the 2020 campaign season this fight which has been a long time coming is going to be played out as the race falls between Sleepy Joe Biden and Senator Sanders (with an outside chance of Senator Warren carrying some grassroots water). More later.