IN THIS HIGH SEASON of political battles, three different wars have gone on. There was the faux contest on the Democrats’ side, where Al Gore mopped up Bill Bradley. There was the battle royal on the Republicans’ side, where John McCain and George W. Bush locked antlers. And there has been, under those two, a third major struggle: the de facto war for the radical center, the insurgent movement, the disaffected, floating, and less-aligned voter, the turbulent moderate core. In this, Bill Bradley was thoroughly whipped by McCain.
Both McCain and Bradley had problems within their own parties (McCain’s at least partly of his own making), and each had a message — reform and integrity — that should have had appeal across party lines. But over and over, it was McCain who crossed them, while Bradley was trapped. McCain drew independents, new voters, and conservative Democrats, while Bradley didn’t. McCain was able to tap into Bradley’s pool of potential voters. Few seem to have gone in the other direction. What caused this procession of one-way traffic? The answer may lie in a cluster of issues, the approach to which creates a tone or a temper that in and of itself can attract or repel many voters. Let us see what they are:
1. Abortion. As Bradley made clear, when it came to abortion, he was the purest of the liberal pure. There was no form of the procedure he did not approve of and would not sanction, no matter how late-term or how grisly. There was not one that he would decline to fund with taxpayers’ money; no moment when he entertained a doubt. He attacked Gore for having voted pro-life as a Tennessee congressman, for having once voted against federal funding, for having once written that abortion is “arguably the taking of a human life.” The problem for Bradley is that most voters — most pro-choice voters — favor restrictions, oppose federal funding, and think that abortion is the taking of life.
McCain calls himself “proudly pro-life” and has a pro-life voting record in Congress, but he has also had dust-ups with the base of his party. He has said that overturning Roe v. Wade (which he has called bad law and worse ethics) is less important than making a pro-life case to the public, and has accused both pro-life and pro-choice extremists of polarizing a complex and difficult issue. “This is the kind of issue you can’t straddle,” Bradley said in one of his campaign advertisements. Actually, it is one you can straddle, and one that most people do. Polls show consistently that absolute views (like Bradley’s) appeal to small numbers at opposite ends of the spectrum, while most of the public remains ambivalent; either pro-life with exceptions, or pro-choice with restraints. Attacks from his right helped boost McCain’s standing inside this centermost sector: Contrary to the theories and wishes of activists, most voters are perfectly happy with a less rigid candidate, and might even prefer one. McCain was the less rigid, more accessible, figure. Advantage McCain.
2. Gender. As with abortion, Bradley trends to the left of the left on the gender agenda, courting the fervent endorsement of gays. He is for gay marriage; for having open gays serve in the armed forces, no matter what experts say about unit cohesion. He has said that a talk show hostess, Dr. Laura Schlessinger, who has annoyed some gay activists should be forced off the air.
McCain, needless to say, opposes these measures. But he managed, ever so slightly, to distance himself from his party’s hard right. He is the one Republican candidate to have met with the Log Cabin Republicans. He said he would not rule out hiring gays if made president. He has said he can see a day when a homosexual could become president of the United States. This may sound Clintonesque, but is really quite different: Clinton ostentatiously appoints noisy gay activists, to pay off an interest group. McCain is saying that gayness is not a reason for denying a qualified person his due. This is close to the center of public opinion, which wants to be fair to individuals who are homosexual, without recognizing a new class of victims, or endorsing gayness per se. He is for fairness; against gender-identity preference. Advantage McCain.
3. Race. Bradley has said that race is his issue, but on this his record is strange. He was quick to condemn John Rocker, the young relief pitcher for the Atlanta Braves who made intemperate remarks to Sports Illustrated, and urge he be thrown out of base-ball. On the other hand, he has stood proudly next to Al Sharpton, a vicious race-baiter, whose words have not only offended many, but slandered and nearly destroyed four innocent people, and are widely believed to have incited riots that cost seven others their lives. Bradley’s excuse is that Sharpton is a “civil rights leader,” who must be permitted to “grow.” (Into what?) The logic of this passes all understanding. But the lesson is also quite obvious: Bradley is tolerant of intolerance when it comes from the friends of his party.
McCain is not. He is the one who in late 1999 invited Pat Buchanan to exit the GOP. He was quick to butt heads with his own party’s idols over issues of prejudice. Attacks from the far right actually helped him — before he took it too far. He can be accused of excess, but not hypocrisy. Advantage McCain.
Since the culture wars erupted in the late 1960s, each party has walked with its own shadow image, an exaggerated version of its worst proclivities that some suspect is the real thing. Republicans seem like the party that wants a 13-year-old girl who has been raped by her idiot uncle to continue a pregnancy. Democrats, on the other hand, seem like people willing to dismember what is in fact a live baby, to define the value of life in terms of its interest to others, and to reduce matters of life and death to the level of choosing a movie to go to. Republicans seem like people eager to hound gays, or even to see harm befall them. Democrats seem eager to excuse or promote dangerous, deviant conduct; and to subordinate issues of national defense policy to the preferences of gay and feminist lobbies.
Since the southern strategy was conceived by Richard Nixon in his first term in office, Republicans have been tainted by the secessionist past, the segregationist past, even by the anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic, and anti-Semitic themes of the Klan and of the Know-Nothing party. Democrats are open to charges of racism reversed, of being ready to excuse or condone hate speech when uttered by, violence when induced by, or crime when committed by non-whites and race hustlers. Some Republicans cannot believe that the Civil War ended; many Democrats think that the only reason people were disturbed by the odd furlough program Michael Dukakis defended was that Willie Horton was black.
Together, these aggregate themes make two poison packs that tend to make voters uneasy. They are a reason why voter turnout is falling; why many resist party alignment; why the Democrats have stopped being a majority party; and why the Republicans have not yet become one. They are the reason why the Confederate flag, Willie Horton, Bob Jones, and Al Sharpton are such powerful symbols. In general elections, candidates succeed to the extent they can soften the shadow behind them, and blacken the one behind their opponent. Bill Clinton did this in the 1992 election, with his Sister Souljah moment, his support for the death penalty, and his insistence — later belied by his actions — that abortion should be “safe, legal, and rare” (italics mine). John McCain was able to step out of his shadow and attract a broad range of backers. Bradley embraced his, and failed.
In recent weeks, some members of the conservative establishment accused McCain of caving to liberals, of changing his views to court their approval. This is inaccurate: On balance, he is no more to the left than George W. Bush, and most of his backers were fully aware of his more conservative attitudes. But what he did do was something less obvious: He created an atmosphere in which some of his backers could differ with him and still not feel threatened; a different, and more subtle, thing. He made himself accessible to a wide range of voters, who were then willing to subsume their differences to pursue common objectives.
On the other hand, Bradley’s views were so extreme and so rigid that they served as a roadblock of daunting dimensions to anyone who did not exactly share his point of view. Anyone to the right of the far-left-of-center would have been distinctly uncomfortable voting for Bradley. Centrists would find him extreme and unbending. Reagan Democrats would never have backed him — he is why they left home in the first place. His adherence to his party’s strict dogma also impeded his claims to be independent and “different.” How much of a reformer can you really be when you grovel so shamelessly to every interest group in your party? And how can you hope to move beyond your own base?
A candidate cannot diss his own base — as McCain did — and be viable, but he would be wise to acknowledge the baggage his party bears and quietly work to neutralize its more negative aspects. How do you become a majority party? The shadow knows.
Noemie Emery is a frequent contributor to THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
