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By Cenk Uygur
The press still doesn't get it. Even without the presidential election, we are about to have one of the most transformative elections in our lifetimes. If experts like , or , are right, the Republicans are about to lose another 20 to 34 seats in the House and at least seven seats in the Senate.
That is gigantic. It will take decades - maybe even generations - for the Republicans to recover from that. Political tsunamis like this don't come along very often - and we are about to have two, back to back. In 2006, the total tally between the House and the Senate was an astounding 36-0 seat change in favor of the Democrats.
This is an enormous story and yet hardly a peep has been heard from the press about this. In fact, quite to the contrary Newsweek just wrote a cover story on how this is . On which planet? Could you have imagined the press declaring after the 1994 Republican "revolution" that it meant nothing because this was still a fundamentally liberal country?
The problem is the Washington bubble. Inside the Washington bubble, the Republicans are always right, the Democrats are always cowed. Every issue is framed from the conservative perspective and liberals are some fringe group outside of the "mainstream of America." Wake up press, mainstream Americans are about tell you for the second election in a row that they are definitely not conservative.
You see, every member of the traditional press that just read that last sentence will rebel. "Come on, how can you say the country is not conservative? That's outrageous." Watch, I'll outrage you even more - the United States of America is a liberal country.
Compared to some Western European countries, we could be a little more liberal. But compared to the rest of the world, it's not even close. We are one of the bastions of liberalism. In fact, the United States has almost always led the world in being progressive. We created the United Nations, we rebuilt our enemies through the Marshall Plan, we pushed for human rights throughout the world, we established the idea of freedom of speech and of the press, and the list goes on and on. We are a liberal country and proud.
Now, these last two elections will show that a short-term flirtation with the conservative movement was a gigantic failure. We gave the country over to our conservatives for the last eight years - and we hated what they did with it.
That's because Americans are not fundamentally conservative. They believe that when there is a disaster like Katrina, we should help one another and it is the government's job to be there for its citizens. They believe it is the government's job to regulate the markets (which simply means to establish some fair rules by which everyone has to play) so that the free markets are not left unfettered. They believe that first strike wars in foreign lands turn out to be a bad idea. They don't like torture. They believe in a minimum wage. And they fundamentally believe in a social safety net, as established in programs like Social Security.
Since the national press has been brainwashed by the conservatives for several decades now, it will take them some time to adjust to this. But adjust they must, because the Democrats will have control over Congress for along time to come if any of these projections are accurate. I know it's really hard to get it through their heads, but James Dobson does not represent us, Nancy Pelosi does. How long and how forcefully can the American people say that before the press acknowledges it?
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NOTE: I agree with Cenk on this, and before you disagree let me give you some information (rather than just opinion) as to why.
. Again, rather than just basing this on their opinions, they gathered a bunch of great non-partisan polling data on several core issues. Here is an excerpt/summary provided from the link above...
"...The issues covered in this report include the following:
The role of government - Americans support an active government that tackles problems, provides services, and aids those in need.
The economy - Americans support increasing the minimum wage and strong unions, and believe the wealthy and corporations don't pay their fair share of taxes.
Social issues - Americans support legal abortion and embryonic stem cell research; opinions on equal rights for women and gay Americans have grown dramatically more progressive in recent years.
Security - Americans support a progressive approach to national security, emphasizing strong alliances and diplomacy over the indiscriminate use of military force. On domestic security issues, progressive approaches to crime and gun control enjoy wide support.
The environment - By enormous margins, Americans favor strong environmental protections, a core progressive belief.
Energy - Americans support energy conservation and the development of alternative fuels.
Health care - Americans clearly favor universal coverage and are more than comfortable with government solutions to the health care problem..."
PS---I would only add that since this report is from June of 2007 we can probably assume that the numbers are even *higher* now in favor of progressive stances on these core issues. And on an unrelated note, don't miss tomorrow's . You can also check out previous guests like John Cusack, Rachel Maddow and Michael Moore in the section (and keep an eye out for upcoming guests like Margaret Cho).
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