It doesn’t matter as long as they win

Paul Krugman in the NYT: “In practice, any Democrat would probably preside over a significant increase in taxes on the wealthy and a significant but not huge expansion of the social safety net. Given a Democratic victory, a much-enhanced version of Obamacare would almost certainly be enacted; Medicare for All, not so much. Given a Democratic victory, Social Security and Medicare would be protected and expanded; Paul Ryan-type cuts wouldn’t be on the table. …

“Now, the Democratic Party is very different from the G.O.P. — it’s a loose coalition of interest groups, not a monolithic entity answering to a handful of billionaires allied with white nationalists. But this if anything makes it even harder for a Democratic president to lead his or her party very far from its political center of gravity, which is currently one of moderate progressivism.”

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One thought on “It doesn’t matter as long as they win

  1. Historically, the GOP has been fairly coherent ideologically. But as Krugman and 538 (https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/what-unites-republicans-may-be-changing-same-with-democrats/) note, that may be changing. The GOP is moving toward identity politics of a strain that could be called “white nationalism”, but is largely coterminous with the white working class, bolstered by support from what used to be called “the business class” or now “the one percent”.

    Oppositely, the Democrats used to be a grab-bag of identity groups, but seem to becoming more ideologically organized. This leads to weird things like black Democrats strongly supporting the old white guy in a race with a lot of first-tier black candidates, while young affluent white voters go for black candidates.

    Of course, you know pretty much how a leader of each party would govern, because the set of supporters of a party doesn’t change that fast.

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