Catch the Next Big (Moderate) Wave

Surfers are constantly on the lookout for the really Big Wave, the "Perfect Ride". Democrats seeking to win the White House in 2008 should be no different. The next Perfect Ride into the White House is going to be made by the candidate who catches the Moderate Wave with just the right board, at just the right moment.

Exit polls show that fully 47% of the voters in the 2006 mid-term elections categorize themselves as Moderates. The exit polls also show that 32% of the voters call themselves Conservatives and only 20% call themselves Liberals.

Democratic candidates for the US House of Representatives captured the Moderate vote by 22 points (60% to 38%). 20% of the Conservatives and 87% of the Liberals also voted for the Democrats for Congress. Moderate voters increased by 2% in 2006 growing from 45% in 2004. This increase came from the Conservative ranks which decreased by 2%.

John Kerry won the Moderate vote in 2004, but only by 9 points (54 to 45). Kerry also managed only 15% of the conservative vote. The electoral lesson here could not be more clear. Whoever appeals greatly to the Moderate voter and can peel away enough Conservative voters will be the next president of the United States. This candidate will also have to take care to not alienate enough of the Liberal voters to siphon off votes into a leftist third party candidate coffer (can you say Green Party?).

Democrats should read the 2006 election results tea leaves very carefully. The common wisdom postulates that the great issue in 2006 was the Iraq war. The question really becomes was it the war itself or the way it has been managed? That question arises because initially a majority of the voters supported the Iraq war. Exit polls from the 2004 election showed that voters approved of the decision to go to war in Iraq by a margin of 51 to 45%. The 2006 exit polls show that voters now disapprove of the war in Iraq by a 14 point margin, 56 to 42%.

So what changed in the past two years to bring about this change? The 2006 exit polls show that the voters believe the Iraq war has not made us safer by a whopping 24 point margin, 59 to 35%. That questions the basic competency of the Republican Administration in prosecuting the war on terror. The Hurricane Katrina relief fiasco also plays into the voters view of this administration as incompetent. Add in Republican corruption scandals and the Mark Foley - House Page scandal, and you have the perfect storm for the change of control of Congress that occurred on November 7, 2006.

What does this all mean for 2008? Some of the answers can be found by taking a close look at the Democrats who were newly elected to Congress. They are hardly a band of liberal fireaters. The New York Times took a look at the incoming Congressional freshmen in an article titled "Incoming Democrats Put Populism Before Ideology". Here is how the Times summarized their conversations with the newly elected Democrats:


in interviews with nearly half of them this week, the freshmen -- 41 in the
House and 9 in the Senate, including one independent -- conveyed a keen sense of
their own moment in history, and a distinct world view: they say they were given
a rare opportunity by voters, many of them independents and Republicans,
who were tired of the partisanship and gridlock in Washington. (Emphasis mine)




Voters are "tired of the partisanship and gridlock in Washington." In 2008, voters are going to be looking for a pragmatic problem solver, who will place progress over partisanship. Voters are absolutely fed up with the partisan sniping and gridlock in Congress, aided and abetted by the Bush administration. This is reflected in the 61% disapproval rating of Congress and a 57% Bush job disapproval rating voters reported in the 2006 exit polls.

What problems are the voters looking for their elected leaders to solve? Fully two thirds of the voters reported the Iraq war was extremely or very importatnt to them. 72% of the voters reported that terrorism was extremely or very important to them. During the next two years, the Iraq situation is likely to be well on the way to resolution. How much of an issue the Iraq war will be in 2008 is going to be a function of how far along the path to resolution we get by then.

Terrorism is doubtless to still be an issue in 2008. Democrats cleared an important hurdle in 2006. 51% of the voters reported that Democrats "would make us safe". 59% reported that Republicans "would make us safe." The so called "security gap" is thus down to 8 points. Significantly, a slight majority now believes the Democrats "would make us safe." Clearly , a successfull Democratic candidate in 2008 will have to present a smart, tough plan to combat terrorism.

Hidden by all the smoke of Iraq and corruption and scandals in 2006 may be the biggest lesson of these mid term elections. In 2008, it is very likely to be "the economy, stupid" again. While the exit polls showed the electorate evenly split on the condition of the economy, other questions revealed an opprtunity for a hopeful message on the economy for the 2008 campaign. 59% of voters reported their family's economic situation as worse or the same. 67% of voters say their family has just enough or are falling behind. And 68% see life for the next generation as worse than today or about the same.

The incoming Democratic freshman lawmakers seem to be tied to a common theme. Here is what the New York Times reported about some of them:


... many of these freshmen Democrats are hard to pigeonhole ideologically.
Even among the most socially conservative, there is a strong streak of economic
populism that is a unifying force.

Heath Shuler, for example, the former
professional football player and newly elected House Democrat from North
Carolina, is anti-abortion and pro-gun, but sounds like an old-style Democrat on
economic issues.

"I was taught at a very, very young age about faith and
personal responsibility, and through that, that responsibility was about helping
those who cannot help themselves," Mr. Shuler said. "If you look at what the
Democratic Party stands for, it is about helping others who can't help
themselves."

Like other Democrats, he supports legislation to increase the
minimum wage and make college tuition tax deductible. He also opposes trade
agreements that he says have led to a 78 percent loss in textile industry jobs
in his state.

Similarly, Ms. Boyda of Kansas, a first-time office holder who
relied on lengthy newspaper inserts to make her case to the voters, said, "The
rural economy has been left out." She added: "A lot of my district feels a great
deal of insecurity about their jobs, their health care, their business, their
family farm. They feel like they're just kind of hanging out there."

Carol Shea-Porter, a social worker and new House member from New Hampshire who
considers herself a populist, said, "The theme of my campaign was, I'm running
for the rest of us." She added that no matter how much the Bush administration
boasted of job growth, her voters "understood those were Wal-Mart jobs." And,
she said, "They understood when they talked about the stock market boom, that
half of Americans aren't even in the stock market."


This economic populism is the common story of most of those who were successfull in getting elected for the first time in 2006. A successfull presidential candidate in 2008 will be a pragmatic, problem solving economic populist, who also presents a tough and smart stance on the war on terror.

Who will be the candidate who catches this next big wave and gets the "Perfect Ride" into the White House in 2008?