Brooks vs. the netroots, round XVII
David Brooks’ column today makes me rethink my truculence about the death of TimesSelect. Brooks’ argument is that the liberal netroots are not meeting expectations in affecting the Democratic Party: Now it?s evident that if you want to understand the future of the Democratic Party you can learn almost nothing from the bloggers, billionaires and ...
David Brooks' column today makes me rethink my truculence about the death of TimesSelect. Brooks' argument is that the liberal netroots are not meeting expectations in affecting the Democratic Party: Now it?s evident that if you want to understand the future of the Democratic Party you can learn almost nothing from the bloggers, billionaires and activists on the left who make up the ?netroots.? You can learn most of what you need to know by paying attention to two different groups ? high school educated women in the Midwest, and the old Clinton establishment in Washington. In the first place, the netroots candidates are losing. In the various polls on the Daily Kos Web site, John Edwards, Barack Obama and even Al Gore crush Hillary Clinton, who limps in with 2 percent to 10 percent of the vote. Moguls like David Geffen have fled for Obama. But the party as a whole is going the other way. Hillary Clinton has established a commanding lead. Second, Clinton is drawing her support from the other demographic end of the party. As the journalist Ron Brownstein and others have noted, Democratic primary contests follow a general pattern. There are a few candidates who represent the affluent, educated intelligentsia (Eugene McCarthy, Bill Bradley) and they usually end up getting beaten by the candidate of the less educated, lower middle class. That?s what?s happening again. Read the whole thing... definitely not crap. But I do have a few cavils. Are celebrities mobuls really shying away from Clinton? Wasn't Steven Spielberg's endorsement a signal to other members of the cultural elite to line up behind Hillary? Similarly, hasn't Hillary's supporters been more likely to max out their campaign contributions to date -- suggesting that Obama has done just as well in tapping support from low income households? And would the netroots really be upset by President Hillary? Wasn't there a fair amount of netroots enthusiasm about Hillary's health care plan? Readers are requested to link to the most hyperbolic netroot response they can find to this column.
David Brooks’ column today makes me rethink my truculence about the death of TimesSelect. Brooks’ argument is that the liberal netroots are not meeting expectations in affecting the Democratic Party:
Now it?s evident that if you want to understand the future of the Democratic Party you can learn almost nothing from the bloggers, billionaires and activists on the left who make up the ?netroots.? You can learn most of what you need to know by paying attention to two different groups ? high school educated women in the Midwest, and the old Clinton establishment in Washington. In the first place, the netroots candidates are losing. In the various polls on the Daily Kos Web site, John Edwards, Barack Obama and even Al Gore crush Hillary Clinton, who limps in with 2 percent to 10 percent of the vote. Moguls like David Geffen have fled for Obama. But the party as a whole is going the other way. Hillary Clinton has established a commanding lead. Second, Clinton is drawing her support from the other demographic end of the party. As the journalist Ron Brownstein and others have noted, Democratic primary contests follow a general pattern. There are a few candidates who represent the affluent, educated intelligentsia (Eugene McCarthy, Bill Bradley) and they usually end up getting beaten by the candidate of the less educated, lower middle class. That?s what?s happening again.
Read the whole thing… definitely not crap. But I do have a few cavils. Are celebrities mobuls really shying away from Clinton? Wasn’t Steven Spielberg’s endorsement a signal to other members of the cultural elite to line up behind Hillary? Similarly, hasn’t Hillary’s supporters been more likely to max out their campaign contributions to date — suggesting that Obama has done just as well in tapping support from low income households? And would the netroots really be upset by President Hillary? Wasn’t there a fair amount of netroots enthusiasm about Hillary’s health care plan? Readers are requested to link to the most hyperbolic netroot response they can find to this column.
Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast. Twitter: @dandrezner
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