Don't Hit Your Sister
Another Apple About to Fall From the Tree
By Robert A. Hahn Posted in 2006 — Comments (12) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Paul Kujawsky is a member of the California Democratic Party Central Committee. He has a sister. Here's what Paul has to say about her:
IN the 1960s, my sister was part of the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley. She was arrested in a civil rights sit-in. Naturally, she was a lifelong Democrat.
Today, she is a “9-11 Republican.” She is not alone.
My sister is no less committed to civil rights than before. But she believes that not being murdered by Islamist terrorists is also an important civil right. She is not sure that the Democratic Party completely agrees with her.
More below...
Mr. Kujawsky's article, in the Los Angeles Daily News, is an attempt to awaken his fellow Democrats to a sobering truth: his party is perceived by too many people — even lifelong Democrats like his sister — as simply being "not serious" about the defining struggle of our time. He describes that struggle as "a war between civilization and the political-religious movement usually called Islamism or Islamo-fascism."
Kujawsky notes that the Democratic Party once led the way in the fight against oppressive, fascistic regimes. Unfortunately, that history is history. It is — literally — so last century. Kujawsky believes his party should be leading this struggle, for the stakes are nothing less than the preservation of liberal democracy itself. And yet... as a party, Democrats are "not serious." He notes in wonder that Democrats in Connecticut have just rejected a long-time, upstanding liberal Senator because of a single issue: "agreeing with Bush on national security was an unforgivable sin for the 'netroots.'"
But it isn't just the 'netroots.' The Party's 2004 presidential nominee said today that Lieberman is "the new Cheney." While that might be considered a compliment in some circles, it most certainly is not among Democrats, to whom Cheney is best known as the man on the screen during the two-minute hates. Kujawsky can blame the wild-eyed crazies in his party for their fecklessness in the Struggle Of Our Time, but it can't be true that a man who won the party's nomination for president only two years ago is some sort of fringe figure.
What's more likely is that Paul Kujawsky is himself a fringe figure in the Democratic Party, despite his status as a state Central Committee member. His is a plea for sanity in a party that is no longer sane. He is correct that Americans do not wish to follow his party to their deaths, especially not so ignominious a death as suicide-by-negligence. That would be insane. And yet...
...on the one hand we have a party that is trying to win the war against Islamism, however ineptly. And on the other hand we have a party whose 2004 presidential candidate said, “We have to get back to the place we were, where terrorists are not the focus of our lives, but they're a nuisance.” In short, a party that is serious about this war, and one that is not serious.
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Don't Hit Your Sister 12 Comments (0 topical, 12 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
... and I sometimes think that a lot of the vaguely center-right bloggers must secretly live here, because if San Diegans ran the country hawkish moderates would get 60% of the vote in reality instead of just in wishful thinking (which usually involves Rudy or McCain).
I have been a republican since I came out of the service. My military background plus finally getting a paycheck and seeing what was taken out first brought me to the party. What this gentleman said about the democrats is right on. My mother is a 1960s lifelong democrat and voted for her first republican ever in 04 and that was GW Bush. She didn't agree with his social agenda but also didn't want her or her children killed by terrorists and didn't think Kerry or any of the other democrats would protect her family.
I don't know if she will vote R again but if it is up to my brother and I she will :).
Adam
liberals in college became conservative when they see what they lose to the government.
The democrats, atleast the base, believe Bush is more dangerous than the people who want to kill them. I don't know what the heck will wake them up, it seems like every plot that is foiled, they'll claim it was a Bush scam.
was just cooked up by Bush to scare us. Any successful plot? Cooked up by Bush to scare us even more.
left as the current dnc is. I was probably more of a typical Southern democrat-for instance while I was still leaning liberal during the first Gulf war, I supported that effort, but boy was a liberal when it came to welfare, entitlements etc.
I think I started to move away from my liberal entitlement stuff, when I got my first job as a juvenile probation officer-probation supervision was actually dont through social services, so it had a very social services edge to it. I learned a lot that turned me more cynical.
Then I got married, and my first pregnancy pretty much changed my whole view on abortion-to that date, I was one of those "abortion is wrong for me, but I won't tell anyone else they can't get one" people. I think when I felt my daughter move, and saw her on an ultrasound, it hit me that there is always a baby inside and either it always has value or it doesn't.
Somehow I went from being pretty liberal and registered democrat to being pretty conservative registered republican over the course of about 6/7 years. But 1994 my change was complete, and I haven't voted for too many dems since (I think I remember voting for one DNC senator during that time period while in VA). And it isn't that I vote straight ticket, I would vote for a dem if they were in line with the majority of my worldview, but I find the democrat worldview just doesn't fit mine in most cases.
All that to say, I am not sure that my changeover had anything to do with how much the government takes, but more what the government chooses to do with what it takes, and how it fails to protect some of the most innocent among us.
But here is a big demographic which is often ignored and has been working for the Republican party for years.
We have an aging population, and as you get older, you get more cynical, less idealistic, and generally more conservative.
"Nothing works like freedom, Nothing succeeds like liberty"
Kyle
The Dems have been very good at motivating senior voters. That is the whole point of their scare tactics on Social Security. In 2000, IIRC Bush lost the senior vote but won bigtime among the under 30s. It swung back the other way in 2004, due to the success of the deeply dishonest Democrat campaign on the draft.
I regularly poll my students on political issues. (I should mention that only a small minority are American, the biggest groups are British and Chinese, though these groups together account for only around 50%). Two of the issues on which you get the most unanimity are social security privatisation (they are in favour) and the draft (they are against). The clear interests of 25 year olds stick out in both cases.
Quentin Langley
Editor of http://www.quentinlangley.net
According to the exit polls, the President lost the under 30 vote in 2004 45-54 and won the elderly vote 54-45. The exit poll shows a +7 for the President in the elderly category, so he won 47% in 2000. It shows no trend for the youth vote because they are different people, but IIRC the President won 48% in 2000 which is the best showing since people under 21 have been allowed to vote.
and idealistic. I am not sure that reality has settled in for them-a sort of naivety about how human nature and the world work, and the idea that every problem can be fixed with just enough money and the right program.
I think as we get older we realize that not every ill can be fixed, and that the right program is rarely if ever provided by the government. I think most people just tend to grow up and out of the idealism that seems so common among the young.
And not every idealist grows out of it, and there are always exceptions, but I do think part of why the young trend democrat or apathetic (with the apethetics mostly winning out) the progression into conservatism is probably just due mostly to understanding more how the world works.
Some don't ever outgrow the idealism-or they get caught up in specific politics that the idealism caters to more-identity type politics.
One thing I've noticed in a lot of polls (not only for President, but also for Senate) is that college graduates with Bachelor's degrees tend to vote for Republicans, but those with graduate degrees (Master's or doctorate degrees) tend to vote for Democrats.
This is just speculation, but it's possible that those who get a Bachelor's degree in order to land a good job tend to become pro-business conservatives, but those who spend more time in college (isolated from the "real world" of work) have more time to be influenced by the wild-eyed Ward Churchills of the world. Even Hillary Rodham (Clinton) was a "Goldwater girl" before she went to college...
It's probably a very lonely road to become a conservative professor in academia, but unless there are more volunteers, America's graduate schools will continue pouring out highly-educated limousine liberals, who look down their elite snobbish noses at any attempt at debate from under-educated conservative peons.
The bad news: Conservatism is hard to sell. The good news is that it works.
there are more people like his sister out there than are willing to admit it to pollsters.
"After all, the Democratic Party as a whole is more centrist than its leftist activists. ... These centrist folks, the weight of the party, need to become its dominant voice again."
You could have fooled me, but I live in California as does the author. There's the SF wing of the Democratic Party, and the LA wing which tends to be more Union biased. Interestingly, outside the coastal strips, CA is actually still quite conservative. The Republican party in CA has sort of lost it's way for now, with the Moderates within the party being in the minority position.
Who knows maybe one day things will change, Democrats are not going away, but there is a window to appeal to them on issues of strong family, strong anti crime and strong anti spending. The San Francisco wing of the Democratic party is not going to change or go away anytime soon.