Can the Democrats save themselves?

Glenn Reynolds had a very interesting discussion with regards to how the Democrats should deal with their kooks:

You rightly point out that we liberals must do our best to shout down, disassociate ourselves, do everything we can to make ourselves no longer the party of Michael Moore, Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky, et al.

And as you noted, the Right does do a better job of quieting its 'idiotarians'. The only problem is, they essentially do it with the "bribes and promises" approach. Jerry Falwell, even when muzzled, knows that to some degree he and the people he represents will get a hearing from the White House and congress, the American seats of power.

On the left, we are a minority in all branches of government. How can we cast off the extremists if we have nothing to offer to placate them, nothing to drive them away with? It makes it harder to easily dismiss them, and as we get drawn into a serious debate with them (which we'd handily win), the Republicans will simply say, "Look, the Democrats can't even stop their circular firing squad, how can they run the country?" and we'll lose more seats in Congress.

I'm with the College Dems at my school, and the reactionary extremism is so thick you could cut it with a knife. What's the solution for people like me? What *can* we do? Casting out the extremists seems an awful lot like putting salt on a bird's tail.

You've got a big pulpit. Help show us Dems how to make a party that's sane, but doesn't believe that America is a Christian nation or homosexuality is a sin or that all the poor are poor because they deserve it.

Well, I don't believe any of those three things -- I don't even think this is a "pulpit!" -- but I confess that I don't know how to save the Dems. I think that the "silent majority" -- those genuine moderate Democrats/Liberals that I keep hearing about, but don't hear a lot from on the national stage -- needs to realize the damage that the kooks do -- as the Republicans figured out -- and quit regarding extremism as evidence of "commitment" or "passion." I tried to sketch something like that alternate approach here, but though it's not hard to imagine, I think it would be hard for the Democrats to do.

I do think, though, that many people (me included) would cheer the Democrats for trying to make those changes, and while there might be a little bit of sniping from Republicans, that sniping would actually help the Democrats by calling attention to what was going on.

The alternative is for the Democratic party to get smaller as it gets angrier, and angrier as it gets smaller, until it just doesn't matter anymore. At some point the Republican Party will then likely split into a social-conservative wing and a libertarian wing, and I can join the latter, I guess. I'm not ready to call the Democrats the new Whigs, but it's not impossible for me to imagine.

The question is, will the Democrats be willing to do to Ted Kennedy, for his remarks on the war, what Republicans did to Trent Lott, for his remarks on Strom Thurmond and the 1948 election?

 

I agree. The Democrats seem to have learned nothing from the election. Its outspoken elements seem loonier and loonier and that drives more people to become Republicans.  At some point, the Republican party will end up splitting up and you'll have the Social Conservative party and a Libertarian Republican party or something.  I too would be in the latter.