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Reagan and Obama (and Thatcher, and Clinton, and Cameron, and...)

Kanishk Tharoor
11 - 06 - 08

On Time's RealClearPolitics blog, Bob Beckel - Walter Mondale's campaign manager for the 1984 presidential election - finds clear parallels between Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama.

Barack Obama's current political circumstance is eerily similar to that of Ronald Reagan in his 1980 campaign for president. Both Obama and Reagan, from the beginning of their insurgent campaigns, were viewed as transformative political figures. Both enjoyed passionate grassroots support.

Both men had defeated centrist establishment candidates for their party's nomination. Reagan defeated George H.W. Bush, who was viewed by the growing conservative base of the Republican Party as too moderate. Obama beat Hilary Clinton whose husband had been elected twice by moving away from his party's traditional progressive roots and running as a centrist, a path Clinton herself followed (at least at the beginning of her campaign).

Fair enough, but these sorts of comparisons are made too often, to the point that they risk meaninglessness. Trans-Atlantic banter is rife with them: the moment that brought on the reign of Tony Blair, who is twinned to Bill Clinton, is likened to the supposedly imminent catastrophe awaiting the Republicans in November, which is likely to be replicated in 2010 when the Conservatives sweep into power behind Cameron, who in his powers of re-invention and vision is very much like Obama, who now echoes Reagan, who was an American Thatcher. So by two degrees of this kind of abstracting separation, Obama finds himself hand-in-hand with Margaret Thatcher. Has this improved our understanding of American politics? I doubt it.

There will be Obama Republicans in 2008 just as there were Reagan Democrats through the 1980s. Reagan, however, did not drift far from the anchor of conservative politics. Obama has promised to hurdle the "red-blue" divide. Can he do this while being as progressive as Reagan was conservative?

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Certainly.There are several

katana0182 | Thu, 2008-06-12 05:49

Certainly.There are several bunches of folks in the conservative coalition:

-Rich "enterpriser" conservatives oriented towards economic "freedom", i.e. tax the poor and put big business on welfare; support the religious conservatives, cause they can be degenerate in their mansions, and their daughters can have safe abortions if enough money is paid.

-National security conservatives, who include both the isolationist
old-right and the neocon new right. Much less of an electoral role now.
The fear vote is going away....

-Religious conservatives, who often become conservative as a result of social policy that they are opposed to; they support the economic policy of the enterprisers because the enterprisers support their social policies, but they really aren't too keen on those policies. Disciplined, but many former Democrats in this category.

Even though you still might have some despondent Hillaryistas in the hills you might have to look out for, the Democratic party is unified, and that's good. Obama is generally likeable to Hillary backers. The party will remain unified behind Obama.

The best strategy is wedging some of the evangelical moderates off of the conservative ship and bring them into the Democratic Party. This could be accomplished by both talking about pocketbook issues--many religious are lower income--and by talking about faith, and how faith can work in progressive ways... Obama's credible about faith; he speaks the same language--and he can connect with them.  Action should be taken to make Democratic issues fit with their worldviews, and concerns, and also to make some of their issues Democratic ones.

If Obama's able to wedge some of the moderate Christians enough-a sort of new New Deal Coalition could emerge. Combine this with a Vice President who is from the uniformed services, and statements opposing harsh gun control, you could get the Mountain states to support you.

These are just some possibilities. It just means respecting religious Christians (including Catholics) for who they are, keeping the gun issue on the back burner, and getting a VP who has years of military experience into the campaign to fill you out.

Then there's really no progressive goal Obama can't win--except gun control, and maybe a few inducements for the Christians.

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