The Case for Bringing Back the Political Machines

[YoungDemCA]

Thought that this was an interesting, thought-provoking article. I very much sympathize with the sentiment that if the Democratic Party will ever have the slightest chance to effectively serve and successfully advocate for working people and the most marginalized in American society - immigrants, women (particularly poor women, women of color, and LGBT women), black people and other people of color, the poor and financially insecure in general, LGBT, renters, the homeless, he physically and mentally handicapped, the mentally ill, the many people who are in prison for nonviolent offenses (or simply possessing marijuana or being wrongfully convicted for that matter) - the party must be well-organized and well-disciplined at the LOCAL level; and, just as critically, all of the aforementioned communities and groups must be an integral part of leading the way in every aspect of politics, starting from the ground up.

Even in my diverse, liberal, heavily Democratic locale in the SF Bay Area, the anti-union, anti-public sector right-wingers seem to be far better organized in local politics than the liberal, progressive, and left-wing voices. The exceptions usually are related to organized (emphasis) labor, as well as progressive religious organizations (emphasis) like black and Latino churches, etc. That is telling. Change does indeed come from the bottom up, but our organization at the bottom is simply not adequate right now for us to effectively be what we ought to be - the force for progressive change and social justice (and I am including racial, gender, economic, and other forms of justice under that rubric).

When Barack Obama came into power in 2008 with large majorities in both houses of Congress, it was hailed as the beginning of a new and lasting era of Democratic rule. Two years later, Democrats lost six U.S. Senate seats and 63 House seats—their worst beating in the House in 72 years. They also lost 680 seats in state legislatures, an all-time record, and six governorships. The 2014 midterms were no better: Democrats lost nine more Senate seats—their worst showing since the Reagan Massacre of 1980—plus another 13 House seats, and forfeited a net of two more governors’ mansions and eleven more legislative chambers. The party was reduced to its lowest standing on the state and national levels since 1900—and is now so feeble that it cannot even force the Senate to fulfill its constitutional mandate to hold hearings for an empty seat on the Supreme Court.

How is it possible for Democrats—seemingly the natural “majority party,” on the right side of every significant demographic trend—to suffer such catastrophic losses? Explanations abound, most of which revolve around the money advantage Republicans derived from the Citizens United decision. Or the hoary, self-congratulatory fable of how Democrats martyred themselves to goodness, forsaking the white working class forever because it passed the landmark civil rights bills of 1964 and 1965. Or how the party must move to the left, or the right, or someplace closer to the center—Peoria, maybe, or Pasadena.

But there’s a more likely explanation for these Democratic disasters. While 61.6 percent of all eligible voters went to the polls in the historic presidential year of 2008, only 40.9 percent bothered to get there in 2010, and just 36.4 percent showed up in 2014, the worst midterm showing since 1942. What the Democrats are missing is not substance, but a system to enact and enforce that substance: a professional, efficient political organization consistently capable of turning out the vote, every year, in every precinct.

What they lack is a machine.

If the machine was our party system at its most corrupt, it was also at its most efficacious. It gave form to our ideals. Interviewing a clutch of Tea Party activists last year, I was struck by the fact that nearly all of them had started out as grassroots activists, and then made their way up a ladder provided by the right-wing moneymen to become full-time organizers—with the promise of even more lucrative and fulfilling careers, in and out of government, still to come.

For nearly 50 years now, the right has painstakingly built its own party infrastructure. The number of corporate PACs and right-wing lobbyists in Washington has grown exponentially since 1968. Corporate lobbying money grew from an estimated $100 million in 1971 to more than $3.5 billion by 2015. The Koch brothers poured money into right-wing and libertarian think tanks and the Tea Party. By the height of the Bush administration, conservative think tanks outnumbered their liberal counterparts two to one, and outspent them nearly four to one. The right, in short, has built the twenty-first-century equivalent of the old machine.

So how can Democrats get back in the game of practical politics? The trick is to take the best of what the machines gave us—the populism, the participation, the inclusion—while avoiding the old venality, racism, authoritarianism, and exploitation. This was never any mean feat, and the task has been too long delayed. But drawing on history, one can suggest some guidelines for building a modern-day political machine:

1. Start at the bottom.

2. Don’t wait until election years to recruit.

3. Build a program.

4. Grow the grassroots.

5. Pay attention to the quid pro quo.

(the author elaborates on each of this guidelines)

https://newrepublic.com/article/135686/soul-new-machine