In an op-ed in the Philadelphia Inquirer that is stunning in its partisan short-sightedness and frightening in its implications for the belief system of many on the hard left, Stan Isaacs pushes the notion that President Obama, faced with a Supreme Court that is likely to rule against him in a narrow 5-4 fashion, should follow FDR’s lead and attempt to pack the Court in his favor.

Isaacs is practically giddy in telling us that the size of the Court has fluctuated over American history (though it has remained static since 1869), and FDR faced similar challenges from a hostile judiciary, so by this logic Obama would be well within his rights to simply expand the size of the Court and appoint a few ideologically aligned Justices to rubber stamp whatever proposals he gets passed through Congress.

The only problem is that it would be just as unpopular now as it was in FDR’s time. The public would correctly view such a move as a move by a single President to exert singular control over every potential measure of Constitutional check against his power. Technically, the President could probably do it, but in so doing he would cast himself as a unitary executive whose will would trump the concerns and protests of any who stood in his way.

The scary part is that folks like Isaacs have no problem whatsoever giving their favorite politician such authority. In their frustration with an American public that they see as too ignorant to know what’s best for them, they strive to give kingly powers to anyone who promises to enact their progressive agenda, democracy and the will of the people be damned.

With columns like this, can you really blame conservatives for getting antsy about the growth of government and the push to give Congress and the White House more and more power over economic and societal decisions? There is a disturbing willingness to circumvent the spirit and letter of the law in order to enact a political agenda pursued with an almost religious zeal. We see it in the most hardened arguments to ignore the protests of a wide segment of the country and ram through health care reform via reconciliation, and we see it in opinions expressed here.

Such acts are the baby steps of a banana republic, one that would quickly fall into totalitarianism. The processes of our government may be inconvenient, but they were designed to prevent any one faction from gaining too much power over all others. In a quest to fulfill a political wish list, some on the left (and right) would do well to remember that the Founders weren’t coming up with the rules and scorecards for some arcane political game that one can “win” and get everything they want enacted – they were attempting to create a form of government that simultaneously empowered a common sense majority and protected the rights of the minority opinion.

We have transformed our political process into a “winner take all” mentality, and our political discourse reflects this. It may be already too late to reverse this sports world mentality of government, but the integrity of our representative democracy demands that we try.

With Republican Scott Brown’s earth-shaking victory in Massachusetts, the Democrats have lost their filibuster-proof 60-vote majority. Though they still maintain a more than healthy 59-41 vote advantage, Brown’s win tonight in liberal Massachusetts should rightly send warning signs to Congressional Democrats and to the White House.

Rationalizations are being offered left and … well, left for Coakley’s defeat and the Democrats’ failure to retain Ted Kennedy’s seat. It’s obvious that Coakley was a bad candidate, and it’s fair to point that out as a reason for the loss, but not the main one, as a state as deep blue as the Bay State has had no compunction voting for bad candidates with a D behind their name, particularly in Senate races that Republicans haven’t won since 1978 when Edward Brooke went down in defeat.

Some are chalking the loss to a generalized anti-incumbent feeling that shouldn’t be ascribed to one particular party’s shortcomings – never mind that one particular party holds majorities in the House and Senate and controls the Presidency. In a bizarre twist of logic, some are blaming a Republican victory on Republican shortcomings - Howard Dean on MSNBC says dissatisfaction with “George Bush’s unemployment” drove the Coakley loss, and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer says that voter anger at GOP obstructionism that, um … caused the GOP candidate to win.

As much as some would like the election in Massachusetts to not be a referendum on the national Democratic agenda, it’s a simple fact that Scott Brown campaigned specifically on voting against the current health care reform effort. President Obama, in robocalls and at the Sunday rally he held for Coakley, said that health care reform depended on a Coakley victory. Massachusetts voters were told from both sides that they were voting to save or reject the Democrats’ health care efforts and by extension, the rest of their agenda.

In response, a state with a 3-1 Democrat to Republican ratio, a state that had not elected a Republican Senator in 30 years, a state that had not gone for a Republican Presidential candidate in 26 years, indeed, one of the bluest states in America – elected Scott Brown to the United State Senate.

Now the push is on for Democrats and liberals to simply ignore what happened today on their home turf and continue business as usual with health care reform and the rest of their agenda items. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi assured the nation that “one way or another” her party would get a victory on health care, and it appears that President Obama will adopt “a combative response” to the Brown victory.

Translation: Screw you, voters. This is history and we know better than you.

Smart and pragmatic politicians would take the Massachusetts result as a sign that if they’ve lost a reliably Democratic state, red and purple states probably aren’t going to be too happy either. Smart and pragmatic politicians would dial it all down a bit and tack toward the center, rolling in more Republican ideas and input and taking a moderate approach to governance – you know, what Bill Clinton did successfully after 1994. No, you probably won’t get Jim DeMint or Tom Coburn aboard, but you could absolutely get the likes of Lindsey Graham, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, hell, even John McCain on board with moderate legislation that didn’t promise to break the bank. Contrary to the spin, there are many moderate Republicans, particularly in the Senate, that are happy to cross the aisle to the chagrin of conservatives. That not even they have been won over isn’t a reflection of “unified GOP obstructionism” (particularly on an issue as historic as health care on which more than a few wouldn’t mind inking their names to such an effort), but it does speak volumes about how hard left the agenda has skewed.

Here’s the problem – the current Congressional leadership doesn’t appear to be composed of smart and pragmatic politicians so much as ideology-driven holy warriors in pursuit of a Holy Grail. Health care reform, you see, is so important that we should ignore what voters are telling us and ram it through in a historic kamikaze mission that, don’t worry, people will love us for later. It’s just that the bill’s too complex, you see, and voters are easily fooled by those evil Republicans, and don’t worry, it’s a fantastic bill, you’ll see! You’ll all see!

What I would like to see is a clear-headed Bill Clinton sit down with Barack Obama and explain to him the cold political reality. Doubling down on an unpopular bill and a liberal agenda may fulfill an ideological wish list, but it won’t reflect the growing unease of the electorate and it won’t help America or the Democratic party. What I fear is that the current leadership is composed of true-believer ideologues that think that the American people aren’t sophisticated enough to understand Congress they’re trying to do to them, so the best option is to ram through as much of their righteous agenda as possible before the rest of us can – foolishly in their minds – do anything about it.

That doesn’t sound like democracy in action – that sounds like an elitist aristocracy dictating from on high what we ought to do. I have a bad feeling that the Democratic leadership will shrug off their own hemorrhaging members< and go full speed ahead with their agenda.

After all, they know better and we don’t. But more clearly, it’s more important to make history than to govern responsibly.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.

Vice President Joe Biden was in upstate New York today stumping for Bill Owens in the heated NY-23 Congressional special election. You know, the one that doesn’t matter and has no national portent whatsoever, except if Owens wins, of course. In any event, Biden had a few words to say about Scozzafava’s departure and the GOP:

We aren’t asking you to switch your party. We are just saying join us in teaching a lesson to those absolutists who say no dissent is permitted within your own party … This is a different ideology. This is different than anything I’ve known in my 45 years of being familiar with this district. You know, they may not have any room for moderate views in the Republican Party upstate anymore, but let me assure you, we have room, we have room.

What’s ironic about Biden’s statement about “absolutists” is that it ignores his own party’s attempts at minimizing the effects of Blue Dogs and moderates on a variety of issues including health care reform. Concerns about the public option and potential costs are to be swept aside and steamrolled under the weight of an ideologically driven liberal agenda, moderate Dems be damned if need be (Pelosi has said as much in saying she’s willing to lose Blue Dog districts as long as her agenda gets through). Indeed, Mr. Biden, your own voters didn’t seem to have room for Joe Lieberman, who was primaried by the liberal faithful and still found victory as an independent. The threat of primary races still hangs over many moderate Democrats who don’t toe the liberal line well enough, and indeed, hangs over Arlen Specter, who the Democrats initially championed as a great moderate before working to ensure he will receive a challenge from a more liberal Democrat next year.

And let’s get a few things straight. Scozzafava got a lot of monetary support from the national party, and she was only forced out when her poll numbers dropped so low that it was obvious the voters of NY-23 didn’t see her as a viable option in the race. And about Scozzafava’s “moderate” status -  it isn’t as though she’s a mostly solid Republican that had some pro-choice leanings. Her record is solidly liberal, with an award from Planned Parenthood for her abortion stance, her support of gay marriage, her support for card check, her support for the economic stimulus plan, her ties to unions, and her ties to ACORN and the Working Families Party. Those who have worn the “moderate” moniker like Tom Ridge, Rudy Giuliani, or John McCain are easily to the right of Scozzafava, so let’s be honest about what she is: a liberal, not a moderate.

That’s fine for her to hold those views, but it doesn’t take an “absolutist” to have issues with a Scozzafava candidacy. Disagreement on one or two or several issues is perfectly fine and quite healthy within a political party, as long as there are fundamental areas of agreement. But with a constellation of policy stands that are hard to accept, it becomes less of an ideological purity test and more of a practical argument along the lines of, “What will really be the difference in Congress if this liberal Republican candidate wins over the liberal Democrat?”

It’s a point I was trying to make yesterday, and a point I’ve been trying to make over the last year throughout the rhetorical fluctuations about Colin Powell and Arlen Specter. No one is trying to force moderates out of the party (or they shouldn’t be anyway), but at some point a fundamental question must be asked: what does it mean to be a Republican? If it means nothing besides being a “not-Democrat”, then the entire reason for the party’s existence is obliterated. This is why the GOP, if it is to have any success, must not simply hope for Democratic failure, but must create and articulate a series of core principles and positive plans for action if it is to have any chance at regaining the national electorate.

Democrats and liberals are hoping to forestall that examination by playing up the tension between factions of the Republican party, suggesting that the GOP is becoming too “extreme” or “too right-wing,” or that litmus tests of ideological purity are being administered and destroying the GOP’s inclusiveness. The truth is that the tension is originating not from factions within the party, but between a party leadership that is focused solely on statistical pandering for mathematically based victory and a Republican and conservative base that is yearning for its representatives to stand for something more than “not-Democrat.”

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.

The small town of Kinston, NC, population 23,000, voted to do away with partisan elections, meaning party affiliation would be meaningless in local contests. To comply with the Voting Rights Act, they first had to get the approval of the Justice Department, which in an opinion devoid of logic denied the request saying equal rights for black voters cannot be achieved without the explicit presence of a Democratic Party affiliation. I could not make this up if I tried (via the Washington Times):

Voters in this small city decided overwhelmingly last year to do away with the party affiliation of candidates in local elections, but the Obama administration recently overruled the electorate and decided that equal rights for black voters cannot be achieved without the Democratic Party. The Justice Department’s ruling, which affects races for City Council and mayor, went so far as to say partisan elections are needed so that black voters can elect their “candidates of choice” – identified by the department as those who are Democrats and almost exclusively black.

The department ruled that white voters in Kinston will vote for blacks only if they are Democrats and that therefore the city cannot get rid of party affiliations for local elections because that would violate black voters’ right to elect the candidates they want.

The punchline is that Kinston is a one-party Democratic town anyway, one that overwhelmingly voted for Barack Obama.

How much more demeaning and partisan could the Department of Justice become? In essence, they are saying that southern Democratic voters are so racist that only their blind partisanship will overwhelm their hatred to cause them to pull the lever for black candidates. Even more egregious is the notion that only Democratic candidates can ever be a candidate of choice for the black community, an opinion that seeks to paint an entire racial community into a corner that’s advantageous to one political party.

The opinion was handed down by the same Justice official, Loretta King, who dismissed the Black Panther case of voter intimidation in Philadelphia. Evidently Ms. King has more of a problem with the lack of a “D” by a candidate’s name than club-wielding thugs outside a polling station. My favorite criticism has to be from Abigail Thernstrom, member of the US Commission on Civil Rights, who had this to say:

“The Voting Rights Act is not supposed to be compensating for failure of voters to show up on Election Day,” she said. “The Voting Rights Act doesn’t guarantee an opportunity to elect a ‘candidate of choice.’ … My ‘candidate of choice’ loses all the time in an election.”

Sorry, but that’s just funny.

We should always be on the lookout for discrimination in voting laws and practices and ensure that all American citizens of all races have an opportunity to fairly cast a vote. This Justice decision, however, has nothing to do with protecting rights and everything to do with a purely partisan interest in protecting the ability of the Democratic Party to keep certain demographics within its sway – overriding the wishes of a small town to do away with party affiliation in the process.

It’s a remarkably partisan and racially polarizing decision from Attorney General Eric Holder’s Department of Justice, and it’s a disappointing step backward in moving toward a color-blind and letter-blind society where people are judged not by the color of their skin or the letter by their names, but by the content of their characters.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World

The Nobel Peace Prize was already flirting with irrelevance after recent selections like Al Gore, Yasser Arafat, and Jimmy Carter, but after the award was today announced as going to President Barack Obama, in office for only nine months and for only 12 days when the nomination period expired, the award can officially be said to mean pretty much nothing these days. It’s a shame since so many in the past have legitimately deserved recognition for their efforts – Martin Luther King, Mother Theresa, Lech Walesa, Nelson Mandela and our own Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. Can anyone legitimately argue that Obama has accomplished anything of major substance period, let alone anything that puts him in the league of the likes of those people?

The Nobel Committee said Obama was given the award based on his “changing the international climate” and “his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.” Basically, Obama promised a bunch of stuff and we like him, so here ya go! Obama himself said he didn’t think the award reflected his own accomplishments and to his credit said he didn’t think he deserved to be mentioned with other past transformational winners. The most generous of observers are claiming the award is based on the hope and promise of an Obama administration, but that returns to the question, “Has any of that happened yet?”

It’s interesting to see Democratic pushback on skepticism over the merits of an Obama Nobel Peace Prize. The DNC accused Republicans of “throwing their lot in with the Taliban” after RNC Chairman Michael Steele made light of the Obama win. Sen. Barbara Boxer continued the meme by repeating the Taliban smear on MSNBC. The Taliban did indeed say that Obama didn’t deserve the award, so grade school logic apparently allows you to equate laughing at the merits of the Nobel Peace Prize with being murdering misogynistic terrorist-loving thugs.

The only problem is who else is “throwing their lot in with the Taliban”:

• Lech Walesa, whose response was “So soon? Too early. He has no contribution so far.”
• The UK Times Online
• Mainstream news outlets like the New York Times and the Washington Post, who have acted as stunned and skeptical as anyone else
• Matt Lauer: “There are no major foreign policy achievements to date … In some ways he wins this for not being George W. Bush.”
• Mark Halperin, who recently gave Obama an A- on the job he’s had so far and compared his win today to Marisa Tomei’s Oscar
• CBS News

So I’m not really concerned with all the grumbling of critics being “un-American” or “unpatriotic,” particularly by folks who spent the last 8 years grousing about such terms. It seems those offended by Bush’s “If you’re not with us, you’re against us” attitude are quick to use it themselves to demonize opinions they don’t care for. The fact is that the kindest thing you can say about the win is that it’s far too premature. You don’t give awards based on expectations, you give them on results.

All of this debate focuses attention on the reality of Obama’s accomplishments, attention that the White House surely does not want. He had little when he was elected President and he has little nine months into his Presidency. To those who believe he deserves this based on some vague notion of transformational hope sweeping the globe due solely to Obama’s good intentions, smooth speeches and his general existence, I seriously question their grip on reality. I’m not mad about the prize, just confused and amused as Obama is rewarded yet again for style over substance.

I have to say I’m amused at the justifications and rationalizations being employed to explain why Obama deserved this award more than anyone else in the world, explanations that strain the limits of credibility and logic. But here’s the reason the award bothers me and why critics are speaking out about it: Obama and his supporters can and will use the Nobel Peace Prize win as a political cudgel to silence critics and throw prestige toward whatever cause the administration desires. That such a politically powerful award (for those that will now recognize it anyway) was given for so little accomplishment in the real world shows how far the Nobel Peace Prize has fallen and underscores a continuing theme of Barack Obama’s political career: reward for rhetoric and style … and little else.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.

Pick your preferred source on this one, whether it’s the AP or the Times of London. The Obama administration appears to be headed down a course that would see the focus of military operations in Afghanistan shift away from fighting the Taliban toward simply hunting al-Qaeda. During the shift the administration is apparently willing to accept the Taliban have “some role” in Afghanistan’s government, and perhaps even cede territory to them on the ground.

This is the so-called counterterrorism option, and while the administration says it won’t let the Taliban retake power, if you give them an inch, they will undoubtedly be emboldened to seize a mile. The aim is to use Predator drone attacks and special forces in going after al-Qaeda targets, a thought process that leaves out the fact that you don’t just push a button one thousand miles away and kill yourself some terrorists – you need intel on the ground in order to make such attacks surgical and effective.

You don’t have to take my word for it, though – just take a look at what CBS’ Afghanistan correspondent Lara Logan has to say about it. Having spent a great deal of time in-country, she calls such a move “disastrous” and “catastrophic” in that it leaves the troops we have there currently undermanned and vulnerable to a surge in military momentum that favors the Taliban. Hell, even Code Pink are rethinking their support for Afghanistan demilitarization.

The move to redefine the Taliban as some kind of accidental enemy of the United States is designed to provide rhetorical cover to avoid sending more troops, acting more aggressively or generally working to provide a winnable strategy in the region. By saying the Taliban isn’t really our enemy (even after they’ve harbored terrorists and killed our soldiers) the administration can simply declare victory and get back to enacting its sweeping domestic agenda.

What a shift from last year when candidate Obama was pledging to refocus and redouble our efforts in Afghanistan (including increasing troop levels) and even knocking then Pakistani Pres. Musharraf for making peace deals with the Taliban. Now we’re poised to do the same thing ourselves in the name of political expediency and saving face. The move is also designed to provide the appearance of “doing something” to remove the distraction of Afghanistan from the President’s true focus – that of his domestic agenda. Indeed, the whole of Obama’s foreign policy so far seems to be a mere holding pattern at best and outright scaling back at worst.

It appears that Obama is now prepared to ignore the urgent advice of General McChrystal, a man he himself installed as Afghanistan commander ostensibly because Obama trusted his judgment and his expertise. I know soldiers who have served past and present in Afghanistan and no decision to send more troops in should be taken lightly. But with troop morale low, soldiers on the ground recognize they need some help. Instead of that assistance, we’ll simply be shifting our priorities instead.

I want all of our brave soldiers to come home safely and honorably, and I want Afghanistan to be a stable country free of the specter of al-Qaeda and terrorism. I don’t know how reclassifying the Taliban squares with those goals, but I can’t imagine how it would be helpful. Ceding ground to the Taliban may prove to be a viable political option, but it looks to me to be the forerunner of disaster in Afghanistan.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.

Controversy has been swirling the last few days over the Associated Press’ decision to publish a photo depicting Lance Cpl. Joshua Bernard mortally wounded in combat. The picture shows the massive leg injuries of Lance Cpl. Bernard, sustained during an ambush grenade attack, to which Bernard later succumbed. Defense Secretary Robert Gates had asked the AP to forgo publishing the picture, and expressed his disappointment in its release. The AP defended its actions, with senior managing editor John Daniszewski commenting, “We thought that the image told a story of sacrifice; it told a story of bravery. We felt that the picture told a story that people needed to see and be aware of.”

The case recalls the uproar of a few years ago when the AP published photos of the flag-draped coffins of fallen soldiers. I don’t think a direct comparison can be made – in the previous case, the images were nothing so disturbing as boxes draped with Old Glory, and I think the AP was well within the bounds of decency to publish those. In this instance, we’re talking about an image of a soldier who has just had his legs practically blown off. The subject matter of the two kinds of photos are completely different.

I can understand a greater societal need to keep war from being overly sanitized and turned into a video game. And I can sympathize with a desire to associate an image with the sometimes faceless soldiers serving, fighting, and dying in America in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are two problems, though: I don’t think for a second the AP had these intentions at heart, and the publication goes against the expressed strong wishes of the family of Lance Cpl. Bernard.

It’s my opinion that the AP didn’t use the image for any purpose beyond voyeurism and sensationalism. The photo itself is a little blurry, and I find suspicious the claim that this particular photo was so newsworthy it demanded release. I don’t believe the AP finds the controversy all that distracting, as it’s given them an opportunity to pat themselves on the back for their journalistic integrity.

It’s got nothing to do with politics or an agenda, and everything to do with the simple catchphrase in the news business: “If it bleeds, it leads.” I could care less if Sec. Gates was ignored. What does matter to me is that the parents of the dead Marine told the AP twice they didn’t want the photo of their mortally wounded son run in newspapers and websites across the world. Indeed, Daniszewski admitted the AP didn’t seek permission for the photo’s release.

Forget the politics of left and right. This is a failure of fundamental human decency. There are numerous other images of the harsh realities of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which by no means should be forgotten or whitewashed. But this particular photo wasn’t so newsworthy that it deserved publication over the objections of a fallen soldier’s family.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.

After a brutal August recess, there’s more bad news for Congress today from the Pew Research Center, who finds Congress’ favorability rating at 37%, which is the worst it’s had in 24 years. In addition, Democrats are clinging to a 1% margin of people who would vote for them over a Republican in generic balloting, compared to a 12-point advantage four years ago.

It’s not all suns and peach trees for the GOP, though. Though the Democrats have had their lead dramatically lessened, they’re still better trusted to handle the economy and health care reform, and viewed as caring more for people and as more honest and ethical. With characters like Charlie Rangel, John Murtha, Timothy Geithner, and a whole host of others, it’s tough to see how much longer that last perception will last. It is interesting to note that the poll respondents’ faith in the Democrats to handle the budget deficit has fallen by 19 points since September 2006, and that they have only a 4-point advantage in the party that can better manage government.

Though you get a general sense of the feeling of the voting populace, it’s hard to take anything concrete away from Congressional favorability polls and generic ballot match-ups. It’s usually the case that voters hate Congress but love their Congressmen, but clearly the Democrats have taken major hits, which spells trouble for Democrats in borderline districts.

It’s clear that the GOP has to do a better job of getting its message across. Throughout the entire August recess, Republicans have essentially relied on the common citizenry to make their point at town halls, with the occasional isolated comment on health care from the few Representatives and Senators who make time to do so. There’s been no concerted push from the RNC on health care, which make the drop in approval that much more amazing and more illustrative that opposition to the current health care bill is clearly more organic than astroturfed.

As tempting as it might be, Republicans can’t simply stand back and watch the Democrats implode. They need to do a better job at highlighting their own health care bill, HR 2520, and at articulating a unified agenda of positive action items. Attacking the myriad deficiencies of the Democratic agenda may be cathartic and satisfying, but it’s not enough to win back the trust of the electorate. Michael Steele, you can’t afford to be out to lunch on this one. Get on it, and get it right.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.

In a must-read article on Big Hollywood, Patrick Courrielche relates his musing related to conference call on August 10th hosted by the National Endowment for the Arts, the White House Office of Public Engagement, and United We Serve. The call was aimed at “a group of artists, producers, promoters, organizers, influencers, marketers, taste-makers, leaders or just plain cool people to join together and work together to promote a more civically engaged America and celebrate how the arts can be used for a positive change!”

During the call, the artists were thanked for their enthusiasm for the Obama campaign, reminded that they have the power to “shape the lives” of the people around them, and urged to create art and art initiatives that bring awareness to “core areas of the recovery agenda – health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.”

Even more key is this passage:

Discussed throughout the conference call was a hope that this group would be one that would carry on past the United We Serve campaign to support the President’s initiatives and those issues for which the group was passionate. The making of a machine appeared to be in its infancy, initiated by the NEA, to corral artists to address specific issues. This function was not the original intention for creating the National Endowment for the Arts. 

A machine that the NEA helped to create could potentially be wielded by the state to push policy. Through providing guidelines to the art community on what topics to discuss and providing them a step-by-step instruction to apply their art form to these issues, the “nation’s largest annual funder of the arts” is attempting to direct imagery, songs, films, and literature that could create the illusion of a national consensus. This is what Noam Chomsky calls “manufacturing consent.”

I’m with Mr. Courrielchein his recognition of a huge conflict of interest when an taxpayer-funded arts organization joins up with the government that funds it to collaborate on an agenda. Moreover, he’s right to recognize the potential danger of the White House using the NEA to direct art campaigns as a kind of propaganda to sway the masses. If you need further proof, Courrielche provides it with this quote from the call:

This is just the beginning. This is the first telephone call of a brand new conversation. We are just now learning how to really bring this community together to speak with the government. What that looks like legally?…bare with us as we learn the language so that we can speak to each other safely…

Political activism and collaboration with the government in disseminating a message doesn’t fit the mandate of a taxpayer-funded arts organization, and to see such a movement in its infancy is disturbing. It goes beyond a conflict of interest and becomes an dangerous game of propaganda, paid for by your tax dollars.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.

According to a Gallup poll, more people now self-identify as conservative than as liberal in all 50 American states. 40% of respondents have called themselves “conservative” or “very conservative,” while 21% call themselves liberal, and 35% moderate. As I’ve noted before in these ideological surveys, it’s hard to gauge the strength of a “moderate” bloc, as it’s generally people who cherry-pick positions from both sides or have no strong opinions either way.

Alabama has, no surprise, the biggest conservative majority, 49%-15%. New York and New Jersey have 6-point margins, and Obama’s home state of Illinois has a margin of 35-23%. My own state of Ohio has a margin of 39%-19% according to the state-by-state breakdown, and 3 states have conservative leads within the margin of error – Massachusetts, Hawaii, and Vermont.

Perhaps not surprisingly, only one area polled with more liberals (37%-23%) – Washington, D.C. Perhaps that might be a cause for all the dissatisfaction in national politics, hmmm?

What’s odd about the results is that with these ideological leanings, Democrats still hold an advantage in party identification in 30 states compared to 4 states for Republicans. Some on the left might crow about that, but the disparity suggests a yet-to-be-realized shift away from the Democrats as they move farther to the left in both rhetoric and policy. It is literally impossible to maintain power when you have an agenda that is opposite that of a majority of your constituents.

The ideological leanings illustrate another reason why Democrats, Blue Dog and otherwise, are becoming increasingly nervous over the health care debate. They know that if the bill is pushed too far to the left (as it would be with a public option), they’ll face the wrath of a voting public that isn’t on their side. This is where the Democrats complete lack of a centrist bipartisan agenda has harmed them since the 2008 election. Speaker Pelosi seems to be driving the push toward liberal interests that may please big party donors, but will ultimately severely harm the standing of the Democratic Party.

The Gallup analysis exposes a weakness that the GOP would be wise to exploit – if Democrats are found to be too liberal, they will not survive in an electoral environment poisonous to their agenda. So far they’ve been able to pass themselves off as moderate and centrist, but all that needs to be done is demonstrate the disparity between perception and reality as the Democratic Party has taken advantage of its majority to push through a raft of liberal agenda items.

It’s cause for optimism, but complacency is too tempting a path to ignore. If the GOP is too weak or mismanaged to take advantage of the nature of the American character, then it won’t matter at all that conservatives are in the decisive majority.

Cross-posted at Wellsy’s World.