Biden could be the unlikely instrument of a new generational alignment
Opinion by
E.J. Dionne Jr.
Columnist
June 28, 2020 at 4:20 p.m. EDT
full article at washingtonpost.com
excerpt:
When Barack Obama won his sweeping victory in 2008 and carried Democrats to enlarged majorities in the House and Senate, progressive voices rang out in celebration of a new political majority empowered by a new generation.
Obama’s triumph was seen not just as an individual success, but also as a realigning event. The Obama Coalition, its champions insisted, would set the tone for the coming decades, much as the New Deal Coalition had defined the parameters of American politics from 1932 to 1968.
It didn’t quite work out that way. Republicans came roaring back to take control of the House in 2010. Far from adjusting themselves to a liberalism thought to be on the rise, the GOP moved even further right as the tea party became the new political vogue.
Obama did win reelection, but Republicans continued their forward march in Congress, taking the Senate in 2014. Two years later, Donald Trump eked out his electoral college victory and shook the country to its foundations.
You might fairly conclude that political analysts predicting realignments are not much different from stock market touts whose absolute — and mistaken — certainties about coming bull or bear markets lose a lot of people a lot of money. Since the rise of Ronald Reagan in 1980, many more realignments have been forecast than actually materialized.
But there is another way to look at those 2008 predictions: They were not wrong, they were just premature. As a result, a 77-year-old Democratic presidential nominee may be the unlikely instrument of a new generational alignment.
Why now and not in 2008? The most important reason is the obvious one: The backlash against Trump is the driving factor in this election so far — and there could be no better representative of the politics of the past than the current occupant in the White House. He is stubbornly out of touch with the country’s attitudes on many questions, and especially so on racial justice.
continues at washingtonpost.com |
