:-)
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Marv Gandall
Sent: Tuesday, February 09, 2016 11:32 PM
To: Pen-L Economics
Subject: Re: [Pen-l] Democratic disunity
On Feb 9, 2016, at 1:18 PM, James Creegan <[email protected]> wrote:
Marv Gandall wrote:
Bernie is certainly doing what he is doing right now to very
good effect. I was making an observation about the prospects for a third party
if he is denied the nomination, not proposing it as a strategy. Whatever Louis,
Carrol, Shane and others may think or hope, urban workers, women, blacks,
Hispanics, students, environmentalists, gays, etc. will continue to vote
Democratic as long as they see that party providing the only possibility for
defending their gains in the legislative, regulatory, and judicial arenas from
Republican attack.
Even those liberal Democrats who are more sympathetic to the
Green Party platform, as we saw in the Nader campaign, will still stick with
their party for this reason and even denounce a third party seen as paving the
way for Republicans to win elections.
A third party will have to begin consistently electing
representatives at the state and local levels before it is regarded as a
serious alternative, and it won't become a serious alternative until a
frustrated Democratic rank-and-file, drawn from the unions and social
movements, begin to join it large numbers. I suggested this is still a very
unlikely outcome despite the remarkable groundswell of support for Sanders who
will join them in supporting Clinton against the Republican candidate should
she get the nomination.
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I think Marv may be missing part of what's going on here. Isn't the
very same lesser evilist realpolitik in whose name voters are perennially urged
to vote for Democrats also being invoked as a reason to support Hillary as the
"electable" candidate? And isn't an entire cohort of mostly younger voters
showing itself to be oblivious to precisely such "pragmatic" arguments, to the
utter incomprehension and frustration of the Democratic establishment? Why
could not at least some of these younger voters, having got nowhere with the
Dems, supply a base for a third party?
Strictly conjecture on my part, Jim. The experience of dissident movements in
these parties is that after an internal defeat most fall away disillusioned or
fall into line behind the leadership with only a small percentage joining a
group further to the left. In this case, the nearest at hand would be the Green
Party, as it is in Canada for disillusioned NDP’ers.
It’s possible I may be underestimating how many in and around the Sanders
campaign will move out of the DP orbit if Clinton is the candidate. There is
more political ferment and dissatisfaction with the established parties than
we’ve seen in a long time, and perhaps it will redound to the benefit of the
Greens and supply them with the substantial base they currently lack.
Certainly, if you had predicted the scale of the Corbyn and Sanders
insurrections last year, I’d have said you were smoking something strong.
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