The Moose celebrates the emergence of the middle.
The political story of the week is that independent voters are heavily swinging to the Democrats this year. This shift could very well result in a Democratic wave that could propel the donkey to control both the Senate and the House.
We may very well be witnessing the collapse of the Rovian base model. Republicans are now suffering from base politics blowback. The independents are in open rebellion against petty partisan polarization. This is an insurgency of the center.
Forget about talk radio and the blogosphere! The real action in American politics is with folks who don't listen to Rush or log-in at the nutroots. The radical center is searching for leaders who offer concrete trans-ideological solutions to the nation's problems. They put country before party.
The Moose calls this new political powerhouse the New Patriotic Center.
Yesterday, E.J. Dionne noted the likely influence of these rad centrists on a Democratic Congress,
"The Democrats' dependence on moderate voters and moderate candidates belies Republican claims that a Democratic victory would bring radically liberal politics to Washington. In fact, the first imperative of Democratic congressional leaders, if their party is successful, will be finding policies, ideas and rhetoric to allow the party's progressives and moderates to get along and govern effectively together."
Contrary to the wishes of the nutroots, the DLC and their allies will be the big winners on election day. Democrats will be looking to ideas that are outlined in the American Dream Initiative, the Plan and With All Our Might to address the nation's domestic and foreign policy problems.
If Democrats gain control over the House and/or the Senate, they should not be deluded that they can't go into the minority in '06. The independent voters who will give them the majority will be watching carefully to see if the Democrats govern from the center or engage in the old polarizing politics that the voters rejected.
The independent center is not tied to either party. The idies are firing the Republicans. Can the Democrats win the allegiance of the radical center with a governing agenda that claims the middle of American politics?
If Democrats and Republicans merely bicker like Sunnis and Shiites over the next two years, independents could look outside the two party system for an answer. There is a severe lack of confidence in our entire leadership class, and donkeys and elephants will be making a major error if they ignore that fact. -- | 
Email
this post
