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Minority Success: Big Problem For Democrats - Who Now Seek A Solution

Ross Kaminsky - 8/10/2005

Much of the reason for the Democrats' notable lack of success is their failed class-warfare economic rhetoric. While they argue that they are the Party of the little guy, that little guy (especially the American version) generally believes in opportunity and self-reliance. Most Americans (outside of leadership of unions and the Democratic Party) do not consider transfer payments, "soaking the rich", anti-competitive regulations, and tariffs which increase the country's cost of living to be the preferred tools of economic policy.

These same "leaders", however, are so isolated from the real America that they do not understand Americans. They do not understand that the American dream is a powerful and real force. They feet are so firmly cemented in an ideology most like a soft socialism that contrary ideas don't even register as possible.

So their only reaction when the country votes for a Republican President, House of Representatives, Senate, and majority of Governors is that Americans are simply too stupid to realize what they are doing.

Even we stupid people don't like being considered stupid, especially by people without any qualification to make such a diagnosis, and that leaves the Democrats as a non-option for many Americans, even for those who do not find the Republicans particularly attractive.

Yet the Democrats have, at least until recently, had a long period of electoral success. (And the Republicans should not be complacent; nobody is in the majority forever.) A major component of this success was the vote of minority groups to whom the Democrats pandered with promises of transfer payments to buy their votes.

Particularly with African-Americans, the Democrats have been complicit with the worst, most racist parts of minority organizations. They have tacitly accepted claims by hate-mongers like Jesse Jackson and Kweisi Mfume that "white America" owes the rest of America, and particularly those of African descent, a free ride. (I have written about one of the most recent such claims in this prior posting.)

The key to the Democrats' keeping this demographic as a loyal voting block is keeping them believing that they can't succeed without government help, that no problem they have is their own fault, that being more like "white" (read "successful") people is immoral, and that America is simply against them. The key to the Democrats' success is therefore to keep poor people poor and then buy their votes with transfer payments.

With this background, the combination of two recent news stories is very interesting. First comes a report from the US Census Bureau (based on 2002 data) which shows minority-owned businesses growing in number much faster than overall business growth.

From 1997 to 2002, the number of black-owned businesses increased 45%, hispanic-owned businesses increased 31%, asian-owned up 24%, and women-owned up 20%.

Although the absolute numbers of these businesses are small, both the trend and the message are hugely important: anybody can succeed in America (with my own personal note that it is generally in spite of and not because of government.)

These statistics must therefore be truly frightening to Democrats who know that investors and small business owners tend to vote Republican by substantial margins. If enough women became business owners, the Democrats might lose much of their "gender gap" advantage as well as their advantage among minorities.

The Democrats have to figure out what to do to keep these people voting for the party of higher taxes and more regulation. It's unlikely they would be able to overtly keep minority entrepreneurs from succeeding, though I wouldn't doubt that they would consider the possibility. They should assume that vote buying through transfer payments will become slightly less effective than it used to be, though of course there will always be a hard core of recipients and unions who will remain reliable Democratic voters.

Given the closeness of recent races, "slightly less effective" is enough to destroy the Democrats' hopes on a national scale for quite some time if they do not regroup and figure out a more positive message.

The second story, then: Now comes the Democracy Alliance, a new funding conduit for liberal think tanks. Conservative and libertarian groups have a big lead in terms of funding and experience, but liberals could close the gap substantially and quickly if this experiment is a success.

In fact, I hope they do. Although I agree with the Republicans much more often than with the Democrats, the GOP still troubles me frequently, particularly on social issues and because of their abandoning fiscal responsibility in the past 5 years. I would love to see the Democrats be able to develop a message that actually leads to electoral competition, particularly because that message would have to be much less socialist and racist than their current positions.

A problem the Democrats will have is that much of their funding comes from special interest groups which want the government to take money from citizens and give it to them, or to their pet projects. Conservative and (even more so) libertarian think tanks are often the main forces arguing against funding special projects.

Public choice economics points out that government spending is usually about concentrated benefits and diffuse costs. In other words, if there is going to be a $200MM bridge built (say, in Alaska), at a cost of about 80 cents per American (actually about $3 per taxpayer), the construction companies and other beneficiaries will spend plenty of money to make sure the project happens. But few taxpayers will go to Washington (even if they could get an appointment with their Representative or Senator) to save the $3.

My point is that think tanks who argue against these bridges and most other forms of government spending are acting much more out of principle than the groups who argue for raising taxes, creating subsidies, diverting taxpayer money to their pet projects, etc. People arguing out of principle are much more committed for the long term and are a more reliable source of funding than those wanting to grab a particular dollar, or the dollars of a particular group.

So, while I believe the "80 wealthy liberals (who) have pledged to contribute $1 million or more apiece" will make a difference in the quality and quantity of liberal think tanks, I think it is still an uphill battle for those organizations and for the Democratic Party as a whole.

Until they come up with a real message which goes beyond "We'll take money from that rich white guy and give it to you if you vote for us", the Democrats will continue to have electoral difficulties...although I'm sure the Republicans will continue to make enough mistakes to give the opposition a fighting chance.