2008 and 1988

1988 was the first election I really remember well. I have vague recollections of Mondale '84, but only because I remember my parents worrying about him raising their taxes. (We lived in New Hampshire, and at that time, there was no such thing as a good level of taxes.) But in 1988, I remember watching some of the Democratic Convention with my dad. I asked him what the difference was between Democrats and Republicans and he replied "you won't understand this now, but Democrats want to give money to poor people, and Republicans want to give money to rich people." To which I replied "then, I am a Democrat," and my dad (a lifelong Republican) just smiled. Funny thing though, I've been a Democrat since that day.

Glenn Greenwald (whose blog at Salon is required reading for much of the blogosphere, like Digby's) has a post up today reminding us that the current model for Republican campaigns was created in 1988.

Just as is true now, Americans heading into the 1988 election had endured almost two full terms of Republican rule under a President who -- contrary to the Myth of the Canonized Ronald Reagan -- they had come to distrust and disapprove of. That's why 1987 and early 1988 polls continuously showed George Bush the First running far behind prospective Democratic challengers -- because the GOP brand, like now, was profoundly discredited among the citizenry (though to a lesser extent than it is now).
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For those reasons, just as is true now, the GOP operatives running Bush the First's campaign -- Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes -- realized that they could never win the election if Americas voted on the basis of substance, policy positions and issues. They thus resolved to shift the playing field away from issues to manipulative, adolescent questions of patriotism, manliness, and personal likability. Hence: Dukakis is an effete elitist who doesn't believe in the Pledge of Allegiance; he looks dorky bowling wearing a helmet; he proved he wasn't a man when he failed to show primal rage when asked in a debate about his wife being hypothetically raped, etc. etc.

With the help of a media enthralled to such shallow, easy-to-chatter-about attacks, they succeeded in electing a highly unpopular figure from a scandal-plagued, discredited party. And Republicans, with their media partners, have been using that depraved playbook ever since, and will continue to do so this year. For the 1988 election, Reagan's severe economic mismanagement, his disastrous foreign policy filled with savage covert wars, and widespread perceptions that top Reagan officials had blatantly lied about breaking the law were all just disappeared. Actual issues played virtually no role in George Bush the First's 40-state triumph. - Glenn Greenwald

Now, I think Glenn is right to raise the cautionary tale of 1988, but I think we can get too caught up in negativism. There is little concrete evidence that the Democrats are in a bad position this year, in spite of what the pundits might say. On the contrary, more people are identifying as Democrats than ever.

It is valuable to be reminded how Ronald Reagan's image has been reimagined over the past twenty years, though. It's funny what a generation of relentless hagiography can do.