The Democrats are a wholly different beast from what they were 20 years ago. A radically different one, if you want to go back 30 years.
The Clinton administration would hardly be considered "moderate" by today's standards. By some of the beliefs they held back then, they'd qualify as Republicans today, at least in more than a few columns. I think one of the biggest differences nowadays is how different they are economically.
Or at least how they want to be perceived economically. In fact, it was the era that birthed "it's the economy, stupid," where the Clinton admin was going to focus on growing the middle class and shrinking unemployment. We got the 1993 omnibus bill meant to bring down the deficit by $500 billion. Economists and party talking heads will argue for ages about how well it all actually worked, and I'll let them do that. That's not the point of this article.
The point is that even back then, Democrats had a very intense focus on coming off as far more economically literate to the voting public than the Republicans, and presented ideas that would bring America back into being an economic powerhouse. They wanted people to vote for them because they wanted to look like they knew what they were doing, and what they were doing was going to help America.
Fast-forward to today, and the Democrat Party's position looks very, very different. It doesn't want to come off sounding like it has any economic literacy at all. It doesn't care about that.
What it cares about is sounding like they're the most moral people in the room.
My colleague Rusty Weiss reported on Friday about a DSA (Democratic Socialists of America) leader named Megan Romer who came onto Martha MacCallum's show on Fox News, and proceeded to look like a complete idiot in front of the world. MacCallum was trying to get Romer to tell people what the DSA's economic plan was, since they were planning on doing what the DSA does best; use other people's money to pay for other people's benefits.
This obviously includes taking it from the rich, because nothing is more moral than doing that from a socialist's viewpoint. In any case, the DSA didn't do the math on what all these benefits would cost, but some economists did, and the White House had laid them out for everyone. Romer acted like these numbers were just plucked out of the air from Imaginationland, but didn't have her own numbers to counter them at all:
"Yeah, I mean, we understand that the White House, who does not like us very much, managed to come up with some math that made us look bad," the peppy, albeit intellectually handcuffed, Romer said. "Yeah, it’s a made-up number.”
“You say it’s a made-up number, but it was done by economists. Your number versus their number," MacCallum countered.
“What’s your number when you add up everything on that list? What number did you come up with?” she continued pressing.
This is where it gets embarrassing. A national co-chair of a movement that just helped send people to Congress could not, or would not, price her own wish list.
“There’s no like, one solid number because it depends on what pieces we can build in the meantime," said Romer.
MacCallum asked again for "a basic number," but Romer simply kept referencing the White House's actual math as "outrageous," or alternately, "ridiculous."
So much squirming.
"I’m not going to give you a solid number. That’s not what I’m here to do.”
Does Romer look stupid? Yes... to you.
To her and many of the apolitical folks out there who have been injected with leftist morality since they were born, this looked like a win.
As I said, the point of the DSA isn't to give anyone anything to chew on in terms of an economic plan. As Weiss said in his article, the socialists imagine money grows on trees, and while it's a joke, it's not that far from the truth, either. Money is not an issue, at least not when they have it. Money in their hands is used for the right reasons, no matter what those reasons are.
It's when that money is in the hands of the rich or the undeserving that it's a problem. Eating the rich isn't just a fun thing they like to say. It's more a declaration of moral certitude.
When you have that kind of attitude on your side, economic plans just get in the way. The only thing your voters need to know is that you're going to take from bad people and give it to people who need or deserve it.
That's it. That's the only message Romer needed. She delivered it on a network her voting base believes is a hive of billionaires and rich people. She effectively delivered a threat, and that's going to play well with the Democrats and the ignorant.
If she had delivered this on the air 30 years ago, she would've been laughed out of the DNC, but now, she and her kind are running the show in the Democrat Party. She can appear on Fox News and say all that she said with a straight face and be applauded for it.
This is not the Democrat Party anymore. I'd venture to say it's not even an American party of any variety. Saying "America would collapse economically under your plan" would likely invite applause from her and her people.
So just understand that this was not a failure on Romer's part. As far as she and her people are concerned, she knocked it out of the park.
