The collapse of the center: The mysterious disappearance of the moderate Democrat

September 21, 2006
Fred Hutchison, RenewAmerica analyst

The defeat of moderate Democrat Senator Joe Lieberman by Ned Lamont, a relatively unknown liberal, in the Connecticut primary election was a historic election upset. Lamont was an obscure dark horse candidate who waged a one-issue campaign, namely — Lieberman's support of the Iraq war.

Lieberman is a popular three-term Senator who is highly visible nationally. He was the running mate of Al Gore in the presidential election of 2000, which ended in a photo finish. In contrast to Gore's wooden demeanor, social awkwardness, and condescending manner, Lieberman's gracious and winsome ways won national praise. If Gore had won the election, it would have been the first time since 1960 that a popular running mate (Lyndon B. Johnson) helped push a controversial presidential candidate (John F. Kennedy) over the top in a close election.

The incredible decision of Connecticut Democratic voters to reject Lieberman in the primary has been a major topic of analysis by political pundits. The party that produced the moderate pragmatist Bill Clinton, who had a two-term presidency (1992–2000), suddenly had no place for a moderate Democratic senator. Clinton left office and Lieberman ran for Vice President only six only years ago. From the perspective of political history, the sea change in the Democratic Party has come rather suddenly.

Human nature does not usually accommodate such a rapid change in ideology. Something abrupt must have happened to the psyche of moderate Democrats between the years 2000 and 2006. Why is the political center vanishing before our eyes?

For several generations the old moderate wing of the Democratic Party corresponded to the center of the American political spectrum. Now, with the disappearance of that wing, centrists are losing their foothold in American politics. Without a center, we may be entering a time of instability in American politics.

The collapse of the center

The race to the left by moderate Democrats is probably caused by a collapse of the center, not by the persuasiveness of the left. Persuasion takes a long time, but a collapse can be sudden. Mass persuasion is unlikely because the left is no longer articulate. Leftists seldom offer coherent reasons for rejecting the administration's policies and rarely have policy alternatives to offer.

I once had intelligent conversations with four moderate Democrats before they moved to the left. Now that they are radicalized, reasonable discourse with them is no longer a possibility. Why would a smart, practical moderate Democrat rush leftwards toward that black hole of irrationality where one loses the faculty of reasonable communication? Centers develop through intelligent discussion of issues and whither away when such discussion ceases.

The political center has sunk, and many of the surviving Democrats who occupied the center are fleeing to the left like rats fleeing a sinking ship. They are fleeing from a collapsing center, not rushing towards a land of promise on the left.

Why are they not rushing to the right? A major movement of moderates to the right occurred during the Reagan era, which was a time of optimism, giving the Republican Party a small majority. The present sour mood of the electorate makes a significant move to the right by moderates unlikely in this election cycle.

The phenomenon of the "Reagan Democrat" materially weakened the moderate wing of the Democtaric Party. Moderate influence in the party revived during the Clinton Administration. Why is it now collapsing?

Persecution of the center

The left wing of the Democratic Party recently took vengeance upon Lieberman because of his support of the war in Iraq. The hard left will no longer tolerate dissent on major issues. However, the wrath of the liberals in Connecticut is only half of the story.

Substantial wealth flowed to Lamont from powerful left-wing groups outside of Connecticut. According to George Will, in a column published in early July, Lamont had over 9,000 contributors, many of whom were recruited from hundreds of left-wing blog sites. Will called Lamont "a creature of the radical bloggers."

It is unlikely that leftist bloggers around the country just happed to discover the obscure Lamont at the same time, at just the right moment, and spontaneously decided to lavish their money upon him. It is more likely that Lamont was recruited by power brokers of the left who already had an exhaustive directory of significant leftist web sites in America. The round-up of Lamont donors was carefully coordinated.

The game that the San Francisco leftists are playing in my home state of Ohio is a good example of how the left coordinates its national resources in local politics.

San Francisco leftists hijack Ohio election race

The particular leftist group that is currently meddling in Ohio politics is the Tides Foundation of San Francisco. Tides financially supports left-wing groups such the ACLU, PETA (animal rights), NARAL (pro-abortion), The Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, Moveon.org (leftist politics), and The Council for American-Islamic Relations, which has links to terrorism. "Defcon" (Campaign to Defend the Constitution) is a project of the Tides Center, which is funded by The Tides Foundation.

Defcon has created a variety of political front groups around the country whose mission it is to defeat candidates that diverge from leftist group-think. The links of the front groups to Defcon and to the Tides Group are not easy to uncover, but Chuck Colson's research staff of the Breakpoint web site has uncovered some parts of the subterranean labyrinth that has the Tides Foundation at its core.

Defcon created a front group in Ohio titled "Help Ohio Public Education" (HOPE). Voters were led to believe that the front group is a grass roots movement in Ohio. Quite to the contrary, it consists of two leftist college professors who are sock puppets for Defcon. The use of secret operatives and secret sources of funds working through front groups is the politics of deceit. The left cannot win elections in America when they are honest about who they are and what they really believe, so they work through local proxies who wear masks to fool the public. The mission of the proxies is to lend their public name to the initiatives of the leftist group working secretly behind them and to take those actions that require public visibility.

The sole purpose of HOPE, the Defcon front group, is to defeat Deborah Owens-Fink, a distinguished member of the Ohio Board of Education who is running for reelection, and who has graciously given me permission to tell this story. Defcon, in the name of HOPE, recruited a candidate to run against Owens-Fink. The only qualifications of Defcon's candidate was name recognition with the voters and a willingness to be a tool of the left. No doubt, this puppet candidate will be receiving support from hundreds of leftist blog sites and thousands of generous donors from all parts of the country, just as Ned Lamont did.

Defcon has run a campaign of misinformation concerning Owens-Fink. They sent to members of the board 140,000 identical e-mails that misconstrue a project Owens-Fink is working on. One can go to a leftist web site, click on a link, and be instantly transported to Defcon's web site. Within minutes one can attach one's name to Defcon's canned e-mail message and have it sent to all the members of the Ohio Board of Education.

Did Defcon think that the board would be intimidated or fooled by these sophomoric tactics? The manufacture of massive numbers of identical e-mails to clog board members' inboxes so they cannot communicate with their constituents seems at first like a campus animal house prank. Actually it is a subversion of the election process. Fortunately, the leftists are none too bright, and their letter indicates that they do not understand the policies they are attacking.

What is it about Owens-Fink that San Francisco radicals do not approve of? She believes that children should be allowed to hear about the controversies concerning evolution that every scientist can read about in scientific magazines and journals — such as controversies about the Cambrian Explosion involving the sudden appearance of an estimated 70 new animal phyla, and controversies about the mechanism by which mutations bring about species change. Her opponents want these controversies to be concealed, and they want the children to be told that there are no controversies. For failing to join the agenda of the left in the suppression of inconvenient facts and uncomfortable controversies, San Francisco leftists have decreed that Owens-Fink shall be discredited and removed from her seat on the board.

Owens-Fink works full time as a college professor, is not a professional politician, and is entirely on her own in raising funds to oppose a lavishly funded giant of the left. She is a courageous local David, facing a wealthy, professional national Goliath.

The Front Group past and present

The tactic of Defcon in using front groups was perfected by the American Communist Party as it secretly worked for the Kremlin during the cold war. The liberals who volunteered to serve these front groups were called "useful idiots" by the Communists.

The late J. Edgar Hoover, founder and long-time director of the FBI, exposed some of these Communistic front groups and wrote the definitive book about them called Masters of Deceit. As a result, he was vilified by the liberal establishment, and his memory is still execrated by the left.

Left-wing Hollywood has accumulated every unsubstantiated rumor about Hoover over the fifty years period when he ran the FBI. Some of the slanders were originated by Communist front groups. These highly improbable allegations are portrayed in movies and on television as though they are historical facts. Since 1970, Hollywood has depicted Hoover as a vindictive control-freak dictator, as an enemy of civil liberties, as a corrupt official compromised by the mafia, as an obsessive conspiratorial maniac, and as a closet gay. These allegations run from the far-fetched to the ridiculous. The fastest way to be slimed by Hollywood is to expose the left.

The leftist front group is alive and well. The well-funded and highly organized left is using front groups to spread its tentacles throughout the country.

Has the Democratic Party been hijacked by the left?

Has the Democratic Party been taken captive by the far left? Not yet. On the one hand, an unprecedented number of radical leftists funded through the blogosphere have challenged Democratic incumbents in the primaries. But on the other hand, during the September primaries the incumbents won more often than not. The power of incumbency remains a stabilizing force that works against radicalism. Furthermore, when a radical leftist challenges a liberal candidate who is not as far to the left, American voters usually prefer the one who is less radical, if they are able to differentiate between the two.

The politics of concealment

Unfortunately, the leftists are increasingly skillful in concealing their true colors. Candidates like Ned Lamont will invariably swing hard to the left after the election. Al Gore was a fake moderate during the election campaign of 2000, and subsequently moved to the angry left. Now that he is thinking of running again, he is speaking with a softer voice. John Kerry works so hard at concealing who he is and what he really thinks that one might guess that he also is farther left than what he appears to be.

Kerry is like the late actor Peter Sellers, who got lost in his many roles and became the man who isn't there. The man who isn't there is invariably pulled leftwards by the peer pressure of the left. I like to call this phenomenon the "Sandra Day O'Connor syndrome." Fortunately, there are not enough hollow shells in office like Kerry and O'Connor for the radical leftists to seize complete control of the party.

However, it seems clear that fewer and fewer Democratic congressmen and senators are willing to stand against the party line, and the party line sounds more and more to my ears like the left-wing cant coming from San Francisco. The left is scary precisely because it displays is so little variation of opinion. Is this conformity partly caused by intimidation?

The intimidation of the left

Radio talk show host Tammy Bruce, author of The New Thought Police: Inside the Left's Assault on Free Speech and Free Minds, says that hell has no fury like the left when one of its members dissents from their group-think. She says that it is not just a matter of personal anger against a traitor to the cause. The left, according to Tammy, will organize and come after you as a group, seeking to destroy you. Individual conservatives might be outraged when their comrades defect to the left, but they never organize as a group to systematically destroy their mavericks and dissenters. Only the left does that, according to Tammy.

Tammy knows this from painful experience, having once been the head of the Los Angeles chapter of NOW (National Organization of Women), a leftist feminist organization. She is now a maverick quasi-conservative who fits into no mold other than that of her own eccentric and colorful personality. Many conservatives have criticized her, but none have organized to destroy her as the left did.

The left seeks more than to refute and defeat those who contradict them and oppose their agendas. They seek to ruin the reputation of the dissenter through a slander campaign. The left runs on hate and will not rest until their enemies are utterly crushed, publicly humiliated, and transformed into pariahs. J. Edgar Hoover has been dead for thirty years, but the left still portrays him as a monster. Like the torments of hell, the hatred of the left never rests.

Adolescent fury

The effort of a group to destroy its dissenting members is reminiscent of the dark side of adolescence. A high school clique develops an elaborate social code. The one who violates the code suffers heavy social penalties. If one leaves the clique, the clique declares war on that person and tells lies about him throughout the high school. The ways of the high school clique are perpetuated in the left because many of their members are perpetual adolescents.

The loss of eloquence

Leftists often sound like inarticulate adolescents. Group-think, a phenomenon of teen cliques, destroys the faculty of persuasive, eloquent speech.

The intimidation of dissenters by left-wing groups provides a plausible explanation of why the leaders and groupies of the Democratic Party are no longer persuasive except in a negative way. The range of ideas, colorful imagination, and rich vocabulary that makes for eloquence is squelched by group-think and intimidation.

This might be why Air America (a liberal talk radio network) is such a flop. Nothing is more boring than hearing an inarticulate leftist ventilating his angry feelings in a rambling, disconnected way.

It is up to conservatives to restore the charms of eloquence to the American political stage. Rhetoric was one of the seven liberal arts and is essential to a vigorous culture and a healthy democracy.

Intimidated moderates

The intimidation by the left of dissenters and mavericks is a partial explanation for the collapse of the left. As liberal Democrats have become increasingly united in their radicalism and group-think — and less willing to endure the presence of moderate Democrats in their party — some of the moderates have collapsed in the face of this pressure and conformed to the left in order to survive. Do the remaining moderates ever organize and fight back against the intimidation tactics of the left? Occasionally.

Seven moderate Democrats (including Joe Lieberman) joined with seven moderate Republicans to limit Senate Democrats' sophomoric tactic of filibustering court nominees. There are still some grown-ups in the Senate to stop the adolescent games.

So far, we have only partial explanation of the collapse of the center. Let us go deeper.

The center cannot hold

"Turning and turning in the widening gyre/ The falcon cannot hear the falconer;/ Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;/ Mere anarchy is unloosed upon the world,/ The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere / The ceremony of innocence is drowned./ The best lack all conviction; while the/ Worst are filled with passionate intensity." — William Butler Yeats, The Second Coming, 1921

Yeats wrote this famous poem when the disillusionment of Western Intellectuals was at flood tide. Their intense disillusionment with World War I and with the Western society and culture that produced that futile war was the source of the dismal frame of mind expressed by Yeats. Left-wing intellectuals have never entirely recovered from their bitterness or from their distrust of the West.

If the political center collapsed in Yeats' day and was reformulated, it can collapse again and once more be restored. Perhaps the reformulation of the center during the New Deal was too much of a makeshift, jerrybuilt affair. The moderate center was more of a pragmatic coalition than a thoughtful meeting of the minds. Perhaps the rambunctious coalition was too flimsy to go the distance — leaving the Democratic center vulnerable to a second collapse. Perhaps the deep wounds of the Democratic intelligentsia were never completely healed, leaving them open to new disillusionments.

But what has all this to do with a poem about a falcon? Yeats begins his poem with the spiraling flight of a falcon, in what is called a gyre. He put forward a theory of history that he illustrated with spirals. The falcon in the poem was spiraling outwards and was too far to hear the voice of the falconer who was standing at the center of the spiral. Once free of the falconer's voice, the wayward bird might break free, prey upon any small creature and return to a state of nature.

What is the metaphorical falcon, and what is the metaphorical falconer? We shall consider that in the next section, which explores Yeats' poem.

Anarchy unleashed

"Mere anarchy is unleashed upon the world." The jihadists terror attacks indicate that the forces of evil are breaking free of their natural restraints and bringing anarchy and "the blood-dimmed tide" to many places around the world. Illegal aliens by the millions are streaming across the our poorly defended borders bringing anarchy to our cities. The government does not have the courage or political will to act decisively to bring order. Teen gangs are running rampant on the city streets, selling drugs and terrifying the citizens with violence. Where are the police? The breaking free of restraints by lawless elements of society is hinted at in the metaphor "The falcon cannot hear the falconer."

"The ceremony of innocence is drowned." Richard Weaver said in the book Ideas Have Consequences:

"Hope of restoration depends upon recovery of the 'ceremony of innocence'... from 'that clearness of vision and knowledge of form which will enable us to sense what is alien and destructive, what does not comport with our moral vision."

In other words, society must regain its moral vision and rational clarity of thought in order to discern evil influences that can harm the innocent and the vulnerable. Because of a lack of moral discernment, children are sexualized at earlier and earlier ages, and the blissful days of innocence are cut short. Many children lack the protection of a father or the nurture of a mother. Many more pine away their sad childhoods in dismal orphanages that we like to call "day care," but are more accurately called "day neglect."

Interestingly, Weaver explicitly cites the refusal to see the distinction between male and female as a factor in the loss of innocence. He said that identical roles in a relationship produces confusion and alienation. According to the Bible, the unity of the Christian community comes from the diversity of gifts and roles under the same head. The different roles of male and female are part of that greater unity. An artificial and uniform equality that contradicts reality leads to conflict, not harmony.

The policy of the education establishment is to indoctrinate young children so that they think the sexes are identical and that gay unions are normal. Never has "the ceremony of innocence" been so systematically "drowned" by the power of the state.

"The best lack all conviction while the worst are filled with passionate intensity." The Islamist extremists are filled with passionate intensity, while many of the spokesmen of the liberal West lack the conviction to unequivocally speak out against this evil. The left wing of the Democratic Party is prone to terrible outbursts of rage and vindictive attacks on their enemies and internal dissenters. For a picture of passionate intensity cut free from moral character, listen to any speech of Howard Dean or Ted Kennedy. Where is the strong, unequivocal rebuke to these infantile outrages? Where is the adult in Congress to spank these screaming babies?

One reason why Dean and Kennedy are unrestrained in their rages is that they have no high ideals and lack a "metaphysical dream."

The loss of the metaphysical dream

Richard Weaver said that every civilization has a "metaphysical dream." A civilization arises when a society is united by a vision or ideal concerning another world or a transcendent realm. A civilization begins to decline when it cuts itself off from its metaphysical dream.

The term "metaphysical" is apt because metaphysics deals with ultimate reality. What a society believes is ultimately real will guide the people in how they order their society. The shared metaphysical dream enables a society to agree upon what the good life is and what the good community should be. A center of essential agreement makes possible a culture that has healthy boundaries and restraints and that promotes a culture of human flourishing.

A shared metaphysical dream makes the social order legitimate and blesses the people with contentment in their station in life. In Mark Twain's book, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, a Yankee transported to the medieval world is amazed to find the servants and serfs content with their lot.

A metaphysical dream makes it possible to build a society using reason. The structures and forms derived from the metaphysical dream must be assembled through the work of reason. A stable center requires rationality and self-restraint.

What has all this to do with a historically recent collapse of the center? The West has been breaking free in stages from its metaphysical dream for two hundred years. What is so special about the last six years?

Unrestrained baby boomers

The baby boomers have come into power and occupy most of the executive positions in America. The existentialist boomers are the least rational, the least self-controlled, and the least contented of any of the generations. They participated in the unwarranted and unreasonable campus rebellion of 1968–1970, followed by the sexual revolution of the 1970's. The campus rebels cast aside self-restraint and freely ventilated their rage and their passions. Among them were a disproportionate number of narcissists. Some of these narcissists who are now in positions of power have a high tolerance for chaos, an absence of moral courage, and no stomach for fighting to bring order to the community. They will not confront the passionate intensity of evil.

The "me" generation left their campus radicalism behind for a season of calm as they entered adult life, and contingently accepted the political moderation of their parents. However, that weak moderation was not based upon rationality or high ideals, but on pragmatism and sentimental personal associations of long standing. A few shocks can cause an unprincipled moderation of that kind to fall apart.

The destruction of a moderate

A moderately liberal friend of mine suffered several personal shocks and rapidly moved to the left. He had career setbacks and suffered depressions. He lost some political and personal associations of long standing. He got a divorce. He went through several moves to new houses in new communities. One by one, the restraining influences were torn away from his life.

He changed his religious affiliation to Unitarianism, where it does not matter what you believe, just so you are "sincere" and "tolerant." He loves The Da Vinci Code and shallow New Age cult literature. New Age spirituality is narcissistic and often draws one towards left-wing politics.

He is now as an addict of left-wing conspiracy theories. He has fallen into the Al Franken syndrome of calling everyone who disagrees with him a liar. He is deeply anti-American while insisting that he is patriotic. He refuses to talk to me because I cannot agree with his claim that he is a patriot.

The stable moderate

In contrast, another friend has remained a moderate Democrat, but is toying with becoming an independent as he sees the center collapse. He has no interest in moving to the right to join me, but intends to remain a moderate for the duration. He has a stable marriage, children, a strong faith in God, a commitment to his church, a steady job, and a rational mind. He is a natural leader who refuses to lead, for reasons unknown to me. He has a firm grip on the center because of his faith, commitment, relationships, stability, and rationality.

The friend who moved to the left is a narcissist, and the friend who stayed moderate is not. Is narcissism incompatible with moderation but compatible with leftist extremes? Does narcissism explain the permanent adolescence of the left, their sophomoric games, their cliquish behavior, and their lack of personal restraint?

Collapse into Narcissism

Tammy Bruce discovered that feminism, the gay agenda, and black identity politics are not as much about women, gays, and blacks as about left-wing ideology and the universal narcissism of the left. Identity politics is based upon the notion that the world revolves around me and my identity.

Narcissist identity politics is full of identity-based assertions and demands. "I am woman, I am gay, I am black, I am Hispanic, therefore I demand." If these demands are not promptly met, "I am victim," soon follows. The bitter emotional blackmail of the self-styled victim is designed to shame and intimidate. Leftist rage is the primal scream of "I want what I want when I want it." Inflated by a sense of entitlement by identity politics, a free pass is demanded to exempt them from moral accountability.

Narcissists expect the world to make way for them and their self-absorbed identity image. For example, gay couples insist that the legal system indulge their fancy that their relationships are marriages, regardless of what such distortion does to real marriages and to the culture. They demand to be allowed to adopt children so that their life as gays may be enhanced, regardless of what this does to the children. They insist the military must accommodate their desire to serve as they openly brandish their gay identity and entice soldiers to gay sex, regardless of what this does to national security.

Leftists fly into a rage when their agendas are rejected, because as narcissists, they cannot endure being crossed. A leftist woman I know disrupted a meeting to ventilate her rage because the state upheld capital punishment — even though the meeting had nothing to do with capital punishment. She hijacked the meeting on a whim. On another occasion, the same woman showered me with insulting epithets because I questioned the evidence supporting global warming. This woman and I were friends until I questioned global warming — and then we were enemies. She did not try to refute my ideas or to persuade me. I was an instant enemy who she would forever execrate.

Narcissistic leftists cannot endure reason because reason requires one to stand outside himself for a moment. If you try to reason with a narcissist, he will feel threatened or offended.

Narcissists try to turn all issues into a story about themselves. They cannot step outside themselves and see the big picture. That is why they respond to every disagreement about issues with personal offense.

The permanently wounded

Tammy broke with organized feminism when she realized that the leaders were not seeking the healing of society, but were using the organization to perpetuate themselves in power. They deliberately rubbed salt in the wounds of aggrieved women to keep them permanently embittered. Members of NOW are constantly indoctrinated in conspiracy theories and the hatred of men to keep the feelings of bitterness and victimization fresh. If the wounds were healed, there would be no more need of feminist leaders. A leader explained her rationalization to Tammy: If society is healed, the movement will vanish — and if male oppression returns, there will be no feminist organization to protect women. At that moment Tammy decided to quit.

Radical feminist leaders are like the narcissistic mother who keeps her child slightly sick so that she can be the child's permanent, indispensable nurse.

Christ the healer

In contrast to the left, which rubs salt into old wounds to keep old hatreds alive, Jesus Christ was wounded to heal our wounds and bring peace where there was hate. The narcissists of the left damage society in order to exalt themselves. Jesus Christ, who is divine, humbled himself and became a mortal man in lowly circumstances in order to heal our broken world.

Although the center is beginning to collapse, and the fate of civilization stands in the balance, we can find our center in Christ and rebuild this fragmented society. We can use the spirit of "power, love, and a sound mind" (2 Timothy 1: 7) that He provides to attend to the tasks of restoration.

© Fred Hutchison