The "America the Beautiful" Party

Even before the voters of Wisconsin saved Thanksgiving, I was having a good vibe week. It began with Ben Rhodes’ lovely profile of Iowa’s Democratic gubernatorial candidate Rob Sand, who thrives in town meetings:

He begins his town halls by asking for a show of hands — who is a Republican, an independent or a Democrat — with a round of applause for each faction. Then he asks the audience to sing the first verse of “America the Beautiful.” Gimmicky? Yes. Corny? Definitely. But as the awkwardness subsides, a few hundred voices build into something resembling harmony, and a soft patriotism envelops the room.

Long live corn. It’s the opposite of cynicism. And it raised this thought: What if the ruckus in the Democratic Party is more about age than ideology? Sand is just about 44. In Connecticut, the former mayor of Hartford, Luke Bronin, 47, brought down an incumbent dinosaur John Larson, who is 78—two years younger than me. Bronin is a moderate, a Navy veteran. Across the border in Massachusetts, 47-year-old Rep. Seth Moulton, a Marine combat veteran and another moderate, is pressing incumbent Senator Ed Markey (80), with the same message as Ronin’s: Markey has been in Congress longer than Moulton has been alive. Indeed, Markey has an ad that features him walking purposefully through an empty loft space with supporters Bernie Sanders (83) and Elizabeth Warren (78): The Golden Girls Do Politics. (The dreadful Rep. Ayana Pressley, who has shaved off her hair and is a member of The Squad, also participates).

So, which matters more in these Democratic races, age or ideology? For a time this summer, it seemed ideology. The Democratic Socialists were winning elections with energy and outrage. Starting last year with Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral win in New York City and cresting with Abdul el-Sayed’s Senate primary win in Michigan, the young socialists just seemed more interesting and fun than their mainstream opponents. This resurrected a long forgotten rule of politics: Good candidates tend to beat bad candidates, no matter how well funded the latter are. The fact that so many of these incumbents were hapless in the face of Trump completed a trifecta of ineptitude—they were ineffective, boring and old. Hard to win like that. Their ineptitude was compounded by the fact that the Democratic consultant class has aged out as well, their pureed, market-tested memes have seemed stale ever since Trump came down the escalator speaking The People’s English. Democrats speak Focus Group, a waning dialect.

But Abdul El-Sayed won the Senate primary in Michigan narrowly and Francesca Hong lost the gubernatorial primary in Wisconsin—indications of the limits of the “socialist” conceit. And, quietly, moderate black men have been beating DSA extremists—Rep. Wesley Bell beat Squad member Cori Bush in St. Louis and Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley sent the Thanksgiving-bashing Hong packing in Wisconsin. It should be remembered that the black voters who are the heart of the Democratic Party are more moderate than the radical academic crazies who make so much of the noise. I’ve used this statistic before, but it bears repeating: 72% of blacks think crime is a major issue compared to 27% of white liberals.

It’s not just energy and charisma that’s propelled the Lefties, though. The issues have helped. Bibi Netanyahu leading Donald Trump around by the nose has been an unsightly spectacle. Jews may have been Yahweh’s anointed people but the public often finds it easy to fault us.The Trump inflation has helped the DSAs as well. The price of gasoline is the most important, but a strong argument can be made that our health care system could use structural change, if not quite Medicare for All. The housing and energy sectors need structural reforms as well though progress in both areas is best served by conservative solutions—the dismantling of decades of clotted regulations.

Another thing the Democrats have going at this moment is voter enthusiasm. Here’s Taegan Goddard on what happened in Minnesota:

Roughly 677,000 voters participated in the Democratic Senate primary, compared with just 404,000 in the Republican primary — a stunning 67% turnout advantage for Democrats.

As my podcast partner Joe Trippi constantly reminds me: that’s been happening across the country. Another Trippi point: Trump’s support among independents is a mere 18%.

So, a blue wave? I’m not so sure. The word “socialism” remains electoral poison. And the Democrats’ identitarian interest groups retain a choke-hold on the party.Even candidates like Moulton, who once said he didn’t want his daughters trampled by boys pretending to be girls on the athletic fields, was forced to back down by the trans extremists. The hubris of the teachers unions has become a big problem in cities like Chicago and New York. The Luddite labor movement, led by Bernie Sanders, seems more reactive than progressive on the issue of Artificial Intelligence; some regulatory oversight is surely needed, but the assumption of AI tyranny and disaster is the sort Ostrich politics that has crippled the left for decades..

Democrats remain unaware that argument for freedom—and against overweening government intervention (i.e. socialism)—is strong and the heart of the American creed. Marco Rubio, somewhat to my surprise, expressed it in a recent speech:

The world [socialism]. envisions for all of us is small, flat, gray, leveled of all exception, drained of all that is good and noble in the human soul. The world it envisions is a world without courage, a world without creativity or ambition, a world without heroes or glory or great causes to strive towards.

Socialism aspires to—and then tries to enforce—mediocrity. Democrats don’t win—no matter how horrendous Trump becomes (and it’s getting worse every week)—unless they present themselves as flagrantly patriotic. That’s why Rob Sand leading his audiences in a chorus of “America the Beautiful” must be the real future of the Party.