Like beauty, ideology is in the eye of the beholder, which explains why Republicans can call Bill Clinton and Al Gore ”extreme liberals” while liberal Democrats complain that their party has become too conservative.
Who`s right? Neither. Or both, depending on definitions.
One reason for the confusion is that there are at least two kinds of liberals. And conservatives: Jack Kemp and Dan Quayle are conservative Republicans with very different views of society and government`s role therein. But for clarity`s sake, let`s stick to the liberals for now, and try to explain who is what, and where the 1992 ticket fits in.
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Not that long ago, from the time of Franklin Roosevelt to the time of John Kennedy, liberals were the ones who wanted to use government power and money for the benefit of everyone, but in the first instance for the benefit of those who were not rich. Liberals were on the side of the workers, especially industrial workers, and their unions. A liberal was for Social Security, low interest rates and high wages.
By this definition, Clinton and Gore are liberals. They don`t say much about unions, perhaps because so few voters belong to them any more, but Clinton does regularly speak of a ”high-skill, high-wage” economy.
George Bush doesn`t talk that way. He`s not for a high-wage economy. He was an employer, as were his forebears, as are his supporters. It would be unfair to say he`s for a low-wage economy. Let`s say he`s for a moderate-wage economy.
Sixty years after the New Deal, this remains one of the great divides of American economics and politics. One side opts for prosperity through lower wages which allow for higher profits, which inspire more investment, hence more jobs. The other argues that prosperity comes from higher wages which inspire more consumption, hence higher profits and more jobs. Along this divide, the candidates of 1992 are unambiguously opposed, Bush on the conservative side and Clinton on the liberal.
Clinton`s detailed economic plan reads like an updated version of the New Deal. His Public Works Administration is a $50-billion-a-year investment in roads, rails, communications and anti-pollution facilities. His GI Bill is a trust fund to lend money for college or vocational training. His Civilian Conservation Corps (and Peace Corps) is the option of repaying that loan by performing national service as a cop, teacher or counselor for a couple of years.
So Clinton is a liberal. Except that sometime around 1970 the definition of liberalism changed. Its focus became less economic and more cultural as upper-middle-income professionals took over from industrial workers. Though they were richer, they cared deeply about the poor, perhaps more deeply than they cared about the not-so-poor. What was important to the new liberals was not Social Security and high wages as much as the tolerance, even the approval, of the off-beat, the unconventional and what Jesse Jackson called
”the damned, the disinherited, the disrespected, the despised.”
It would be unfair to suggest that these liberals approved of every subculture except for the one in which men and women marry each other, stay that way, raise children, buy a home and go to church on Sunday. But it did sometimes seem that way as the liberal mind divided the citizenry into seperate categories, each with its own presumed entitlements.
By this definition, Clinton and Gore are not liberals. It`s no accident that Clinton`s economic plan does not target specific groups. It is not aimed at racial minorities, city dwellers, an age group or a gender. Its target is everyone.
Nor is it an accident that Clinton went out of his way to pick a fight with Jackson over the words used by a pop singer at a Jackson event, and then refused to deal with him during the Democratic convention. This was, among other things, Clinton`s way of saying that he wasn`t in the thrall of the various liberal pressure groups.
OK, there is a bit of oversimplification in this description, which is unfair to liberals. Whoever doubts that obeisance to specific constituencies is as old as the Republic need only look at agricultural price supports. Whoever doubts that conservatives can be just as craven toward their constituencies need only consider the Bush administration`s policies on gun control and fetal tissue research.
Unfair though it may be, it is Democrats and liberals who have been plagued by the reputation of being unwilling to confront some of their own pressure groups. Some liberals gripe about the unfairness. They lose. Clinton, Gore and their allies, both because they genuinely differ with some of the liberal interest groups and because they do not want to lose, do not hesitate to confront them, for which some of their Democratic colleagues call them traitors.
Like beauty, treason is in the eye of the beholder.