Democrats! We had the 2020 election before! Remember?

. Let me begin this submission by saying that, while it is literally true that a time in the future could not have occurred yet, I would still maintain that the election of 2020 has occurred in the United States before. Let me prove it to you.

. The election to which I refer took place at a time of great social upheaval and in a time of war. Domestically, the new militancy of the Afro-American movement in both the political and economic arenas was met by political and social resistance of the white majority. There was tremendous growth in the 15-to -35 year old population. Combining large numbers of young Afro-Americans with the decline of the manufacturing sector, the weakening of traditional social controls, and an explosion in the use of illegal narcotics by all races, made the inevitable happen. Poor and minority youths and police officers came into frequent-and frequently violent-contact. During this time, both women and Hispanics made substantial gains, again both of which were resisted by the white majority-including, it should be noted, many white women.

. Making things even worse, during the previous election, the forces of the left in the Democratic Party felt that they were cheated of their choice for the Presidential. nomination by a party structure that smothered any opposition to its centrist nominee. Because of those divisions in the Democratic Party, that centrist nominee lost.

. What had happened in the previous election was almost unthinkable. The Republican party nominated a candidate who, while clearly intelligent, was best known for vilifying and challenging the patriotism of every major Democrat of his generation. His entire election strategy was based on fears of crime and fears of black people from within and of enemies from without. He claimed that he could bring about peace in a war that had seemed endless.

. Once in office, he greatly deviated from Republican economic orthodoxy. He was willing to have government enter into areas of the economy where it had not gone before. He made unorthodox moves in foreign policy. However, the hard feelings that the Democrats had for him from past actions combined with the ambivalent feelings many people had about the president combined to make it very difficult for much of what the president’s plan for legislation to pass.

. Nonetheless, his fixation upon foreign policy challenges eventually bore fruit. He made major breakthroughs in relations with both Russia and China in the final year of his first term. He also brought most of the U.S. troops engaged in combat home, massively reducing combat casualties.

. But most Democrats were enraged that the president did not end foreign wars soon enough. They were greatly upset with the growing social and economic gulf between the races. The battle against poverty, seemingly winnable only a few years before, was again being viewed as an intractable dilemma. Because of the massive split in the Democratic Party in the previous election, the Democratic National Committee changed the rules for selection of delegates for the upcoming political convention. In the lead up to that convention, it was the moderates who were split, not the left wing. For once, the left wing prevailed. Their dream candidate was the nominee of the Democratic Party!

. The Democratic party program for that election year had a number of attractive points. The party had sensible and firm ideas for ending a major foreign conflict. It also had a program to further economic justice.

. With the left wing of the Democratic Party did not have was a sense of American society as that society viewed itself. Much of America had come to think of its major conflict as an expensive and an unnecessary mistake. But the left wing of the Democratic Party felt compelled to present its program as one which created not an American withdrawal, but rather a deserved American defeat. Instead of presenting its economic program as part of the continuing Democratic Party legacy of improving the lives of poor, working class and middle-class Americans, the left wing was almost vindictive in its attack on the entire concept of wealth itself and of the private enterprise system. The Republican incumbent, flush with massive cash contributions to the Republican National Committee, had an easy time labeling the program of the Democratic Party as alien and outside the mainstream of American life. Other than hiring political operatives from the Republican Party to compose its messaging, the Democratic Party could not do much more to sabotage itself than it did by running the kind of campaign that it ran.

. The results proved the political. incompetence of the left wing of the Democratic Party. The Republican incumbent, arguably as of that time the most divisive President of the postwar era and the most hated by his political opponents, won reelection by one of the largest majorities in the history of the United States.

. Have you figured out the election to which I refer yet? You probably have, if you are a Baby Boomer. Richard Nixon’s massive victory would have been the last thing Democrats would have expected even in early 1972.

. Two prominent political scientists in the middle of the last century said America was “unyoung, unpoor, unblack.” (Scammon and Wattenberg, “The Real Majority”, 1970, p.57). While American demographics have changed in the last fifty years, I submit the way the economically productive see themselves and their country has not greatly changed. To the extent that it has, the people who pay the bulk of the taxes have come to see themselves increasingly as victimized, as facing insatiable demands from people who believe their needs immediately translate into their right to the wealth of the productive.

. Democrats, this election is too important to screw up. I truly believe that Vice President Joe Biden was correct when he said that America could survive one term of Donald Trump, but might not survive two terms. Our task must be not only to defeat Donald Trump but also to defeat Trumpism. The election of 2016 showed just how badly fractured American society has become. While those on the left look at the economic and political oppression of the poor and minority groups in this country, the simple fact is that the white working class and middle class see themselves as being forgotten and left behind. While those on the left view the relative economic success of the white working class and white middle class as attributable to “white privilege“, the purported beneficiaries of this purported privilege do not view themselves as being privileged.

. I respectfully suggest that the issues of “white privilege” and other pejorative terms which deny the legitimacy of the wealth of the people who have it be confined to dorm rooms and campus coffeehouses. until after the 2020 election. If we do not create a political and economic program which maximizes the economic gains of the maximum number of people and which is not viewed as punitive against one group and in favor of another group, then we will lose not only an election, but very possibly our country.

. I personally do not care one bit if the President of the United States goes to bed at night with a man, a woman or a house plant. But I am not the voter we have to reach.

. Elizabeth Warren wants a tax on wealth. She has just one tiny problem: the Sixteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution: “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes (my emphasis) from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.” She would have to have a Constitutional amendment if she wants to tax wealth.

. Bernie Sanders got married in 1987 and left the next day on his honeymoon-a business trip/honeymoon in the U.S.S.R. As the Washington Post, May 3, 2019, described his impressions:

As he stood on Soviet soil, Sanders, then 46 years old, criticized the cost of housing and health care in the United States, while lauding the lower prices — but not the quality — of that available in the Soviet Union. Then, at a banquet attended by about 100 people, Sanders blasted the way the United States had intervened in other countries, stunning one of those who had accompanied him…

Returning to Vermont, Sanders held an hour-long news conference in which he extolled Russian policies on housing and health care, while criticizing the cost of both in the United States — and boasted that he was willing to criticize his homeland.

“The fact that we were willing to be critical of the United States . . . I think that made them maybe more appreciative of our criticisms we made of their own society,” Sanders said then. “We were saying, ‘Yeah, in our country, we also have a housing crisis. Our housing in general is better than yours, but people are paying 40 percent of their income for housing. The quality of your housing is not good, but we appreciate the fact that people are paying 5 percent. The quality of your health care is not good, but in the United States, believe me, we have enormous problems in terms of our health-care system.’ ”

. Note from Baby Boomers to younger generations: many people my age don’t think of the U.S.S.R. in such a positive way. Portraying Sanders as having beliefs that are alien and even antithetical to American values will be simple for the successors of Lee Atwater and Karl Rove.

. Joe Biden grew up on city streets of an industrial town. I’ll bet he played half ball and step ball. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren came from modest backgrounds. But when Biden left the Senate for the Vice-Presidency, he was still either the poorest Senator or one of the poorest. By 2008, both Sanders and Warren has been comfortable for some time. Joe Biden went back to his home every night to raise his kids. He never left the feel of the neighborhood.

. Many of Trump’s voters grew up in homes like Biden’s. Will we get 100% of Trump voters by nominating Joe? Probably not. Will we get 50%? Not likely. Will we get 10%? Almost certainly. And that will be enough to win. If we get 20% of the Trump vote, we will crush the GOP.

. Keep your eyes on the prize, Democrats!

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