Christopher Beam tries to answer the question:
Read the whole thing. I’d say Beam’s problem is his insistence that a political term have some clearly defined meaning. Take the term “neoconservative” for example. Half the “serious” journalists in Washington have no idea what the word means, but we still understand what they’re saying when they use it. In the case of describing the United States as a ‘center-right nation,’ I think it’s pretty clear that this must be taken as relative to other countries. Beam’s not impressed by that explanation:
Center-right may not have much impact on whom we elect, but it does mean that the elected should steer well clear of the social and foreign policies engineered in center-left European democracies. The American left has a fascination with European social policy and a love affair with international institutions. Conservatives fear both. Of course center-right has little bearing on whom we elect, otherwise we would have elected the center-right candidate. But perhaps conservatives mean this as a warning, as in, even though you won the election, don’t try and make the United States into a social democracy with an anti-Israel, anti-democracy-promotion tilt in foreign affairs. Voters won’t like it. This is still a center-right nation.
