Doesn’t Nixonism (“a structuring of electoral politics around a perceived set of cultural controversies between a purportedly arrogant liberal elite, and a purportedly salt-of-the-earth culturally conservative ‘mainstream’”) exist within and operate as an extension of a longer lived theme of cultural resentment that stretches at the very least to Andrew Jackson and likely even further to the Revolutionary era? Perhaps it did not previously achieve a totality of tactical focus as it does now, but hasn’t the elite vs. non elite (whether it as farmers vs. the monied interest during the Progressive/Populist era or rural versus urban during, well, all of American history) been with us for much longer than Nixon? Or were those earlier threads as much economic as cultural? If yes, then the particular reasons for the most recent outbreak of this crap will be like singular notes within a symphony: very interesting but ultimately only meaningful within the context of the structure itself. What is it about nascent American political culture that lead to this recurring political theme?

As a side note, of perhaps some value is this selection from Hunter Thompson’s obituary of Richard Nixon:

Some people will say that words like scum and rotten are wrong for Objective Journalism—which is true, but they miss the point. It was the built-in blind spots of the Objective rules and dogma that allowed Nixon to slither into the White House in the first place. He looked so good on paper that you could almost vote for him sight unseen. He seemed so all-American, so much like Horatio Alger, that he was able to slip through the cracks of Objective Journalism. You had to get Subjective to see Nixon clearly, and the shock of recognition was often painful.

” When Polly’s in trouble, I am not slow,
So it’s hip! hip! hip! and away I go”

When criminals in this world appear,
And break the laws that they should fear,
And frighten all who see or hear,
The cry goes up both far and near for
Underdog! Underdog! Underdog! Underdog!

If only…

I think the Nixonland ordering has persisted because both parties have benefited. The R’s had the short run gain of presidential victories and capturing the South. The D’s have steadily turned the non-southern urban areas uniformly democrat.

The game is up congressionally for the R’s and its nearly up for Republican presidential politics also.

We know how Nixonland will die, it will die from the Machete blow of Hispanic demographics. Nixonland will have to shed some of its Nativist, Sexist and Racist tropes.

What I find interesting is how ineffective Californian and Western Democrats have been in offering a national and presidential politics to change the terms of discourse. In the House and Senate we have Pelosi and Reid – Western Democrats and what is their brand? What is the identity? Who is their mythic leader of stature?

The national candidates Obama and Clinton seem to be a curious mix of diversity, fame and the traditional anti-Nixonland union and identity politics.

What is the face of Authority in the democrat brand? Putting the racism and class warfare aside, and concentrating on the America-First side of the equation, who or what for the democrats can fill the bad-ass role that the American masses (as others before them) have wanted in a leader?

That’s important! It used to be, politicians could travel around and give the same speeches everywhere (tailored a bit for particular locations) and the new audiences would appreciate it. Now they need to provide more.

So, 4 years from now the presidential candidates should have something new to present to the reporters, every few days. Something actually new would be better than silly sound bites.

So for example we could have a Democratic candidate on gun control:

“We know now that gun control doesn’t actually reduce crime much, though it has some effect on the small number of gun accidents. And gun ownership doesn’t reduce crime much. We need some other way to reduce crime than those.

“But OK, people in some cities want more gun control, and people in other cities and noncities don’t. We should let people get what they want in both cases. Sometimes people want stupid things. We can disagree about which choices are stupid, but if a city or other place has a policy you hate about firearms, you can put up with it or else don’t go there. Maybe they’ll see reason in time. Let localities do what they want. If a whole state wants to make a policy I guess that might be OK too.”

Or a Democratic candidate on abortion:

“We already know how to transfer a fetus from one mother to another up to X days after the pregnancy has started. So let’s deal with that. When a woman doesn’t want to carry her baby and it’s younger than X days, we can find a volunteer who does want it and do the transfer.

“Now about the costs, doesn’t it make sense that the original mother should pay half the cost if she can? And the rest of it can be paid by anybody who wants that baby to live and is willing to put his money where his mouth is.

“And let’s do research to extend those X days as far forward as we can. That way the costs of keeping babies alive don’t fall only on mothers who might not be able to afford it at all. They can be paid by everybody who cares.”

Maybe there are better positions to take. But every time you come up with something new you get the attention away from whatever stupid pet tricks the other side tries.

Second, there is the fear of being scooped. If one outlet will report the “news,” the others feel the need to do so as well. If major national outlets ignore it, minor national or local outlets will carry it, and make the majors look out-of-touch. Back in ‘92 w/ Clinton’s Gennifer Flowers affair, the national networks chose to ignore the tabloid story, but local affiliates reported it, and soon the majors were playing catch-up. Conference calls are used to make this by-pass possible; local reporters can call in rather than have to travel with a campaign or be located in the HQ city.

Third, the controversies are not about facts but about pseudo-facts—the “lipstick” comment, the Ferraro “lucky” comment, the Kerry “study hard” and other charges are chosen because they are spin-able and not easily refuted. NPR has harped on Palin’s bridge-to-nowhere mis-representations because they are verifiable in ways that intent is not.

The real enemy of democracy isn’t dumbness, it’s selfishness. A character flaw sadly now fixed at the center of the cultural genome, pandemic across all boundaries, and intensifying as things work steadily bleakward.

Bingo. Thanks for that, CO.

I also very strongly agree that the success of the idea that all politics is just sordid and dirty has been a huge help in their effort.

I’m also amazed at the skill many media people have in pegging people’s politics on the evidence of a few minutes of cocktail party chat. (The skill seems to have rubbed off on blog commenters too.) E.g., “I hate those liberals, they are so boring at parties and so arrogant, they always think they know better than me and they keep arguing even after I tell them they’re wrong,” etc. Or, “Sorry, Clive, you’ll just have to put up with these fireworks for an hour or so, you know how these people like that stuff.” Or, maybe, “I hate those liberal feminists (like Elizabeth Genovese) who say that there’s something wrong with American society and we should be less individualistic and less ‘consumerist‘.”

Before Henry’s post and the comments to it, I had never heard anyone actually say that Americans are divided into (a very few) “liberals” and (overwhelmingly many) “real Americans”—clearly, neither did the commenter who attacked me for jokingly putting it forward—and I’m surprised anyone has claimed the belief as their own, or even claimed empirical evidence for its being the belief of some identifiable group out there. Would it be possible to tell who has claimed they believe it, or claimed they believe others believe it?

I amend my earlier statement of the problem: getting stupid [racist] people not to make stupid [racist] choices, without getting them stupidly huffy about being stupid [and racist] and deep down knowing [and loving] it…

No problem; I can’t complain that you have copious free time.