In Part I, we examined the roots of the rise and fall of the liberal movement. We discovered that the liberal movement was separate from the New Left. Classic liberalism in the mode of Kennedy, and Johnson failed due to reasons previously stated.

In Part II we will explore in more detail how the tactics of the Democratic Party added to these failures. We will begin in 1972 and work up to today.

1972: George McGovern, the Democratic presidential nominee, lost to Richard Nixon. It was the biggest landslide in American History, 49 out of 50 states.

1973: the Democratic Party conducted an autopsy to evaluate what went wrong. They concluded that McGovern was too liberal. The American people were to the right of McGovern’s liberal policies. Influenced by Southern democrats like Sam Nunn, D, GA, and Chuck Robb, D, VA, the party founded the Coalition for a Democratic Majority (CDM). The goal was to move the Democratic Party to the right and to purge the leftists, liberals and socialists from the party.

1976: Jimmy Carter was elected with a narrow majority. Although he was not a member of CDM and he ignored CDM suggestions on cabinet members, he did give in to pressure to move to the right. According to Sanders, “Over the years, in the 1970s, the Democratic Party became more dependent on corporate money. if you need money, you go to wealthy people." Over the years, the Ds became more and more dependent on corporate money.

Some have suggested that Carter’s Presidency was a turning point in the Ds move to the center right.

Carter becomes the first Democrat in recent history not to push a major anti-poverty program. Since 1972 there has never been a proposal for a major anti-poverty program. Carter also brought back draft registration (not the draft itself, just registration) seven years after Congress eliminated the draft.

1979: the Shah of Iran is overthrown by the Islamic Revolution. He needs gallstone treatment and Carter allows him to receive treatment in a New York hospital despite warnings from Iranian revolutionaries. As a result, Iranian revolutionaries seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and held the staff as hostages for 144 days. Democrats seemed weak on foreign policy and Carter’s popularity tanked. 1980: Ted Kennedy challenged Carter in the 1980 primaries. During the convention that year the Ds pushed through rule changes disallowing delegates the ability to vote their minds. Carter won the nomination but lost the 1980 election to Reagan. The electoral vote was 489 to 49.

In 1978, military spending was 100 billion dollars. At the end of Carter’s presidency, military spending had risen to about 180 billion dollars.

1981-1984: during these years the CDM having failed to re-elect Carter withered. Although they were successful in pasteurizing liberals and progressives with the result that many if not most liberals and progressives sat out the election, the CDM basically failed in its mission.

1984: the CDM failed again. Walter Mondale lost the election to Ronald Reagan who sailed to a second term. This was in spite of a deep recession and high unemployment under Reagan. Both parties moved to the right as Reagan decimated safety nets and anti-poverty programs. Both the Ds and the Rs began to focus on “swing voters” and independents. Both parties ignored the traditional concerns of liberals and progressives, the environment, poverty, racism, and income inequality.

The Ds formed the Democratic Leadership council (DLC) whose policy goals were: welfare reform, school vouchers, charter school, free trade deals (NAFTA), and other policies which were to the right of the 1972 Rs. The DLC continued well into the Obama years.

1988: Dukakis lost to George H.W. Bush. The DLC used this loss to push the Ds further to the right.

1992: Clinton won the election. This election win was attributed to the third party candidate, Ross Perot and the inability of Bush to handle the recession.

Dick Morris, consultant to Clinton, told Clinton to focus on wedge issues such as flag burning, gays in the military, etc.

Liberalism was almost dead. No one in Congress suggested bills to reduce poverty reform prisons, etc.

During his administration, Clinton accomplished the following: welfare reform, NAFTA, defense of Marriage Act, “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

In a speech to a joint session of Congress, Clinton said, “Capture the peace dividend for investment purposes, and…switch the balance in the budget from consumption to more investment.”[3]

Alienated liberals voted in lower numbers and the DLC still pursued swing voters.

2000: Gore lost to G.W.Bush. Bush’s legacy was a long war, legalized torture, and a crash in 2008 that almost matched the Depression.

2008: Obama won the election. This would be the peak of the centrist counter-revolution. Obama unfortunately did the following:

1. Failed to appoint a single liberal to his cabinet. Appointed people like Timothy Geithner to his cabinet. 
2. Bailed out the banks that caused the 2008 meltdown. 7.77 trillion dollars went to big banks; 10 billion dollars went to an extension of unemployment benefits; 814 billion dollars went to the stimulus package. Not one banker has gone to jail
3. Removed the single-payer option from Medicare.
4. Allowed NSA spying on innocent Americans.
5. Allowed drone warfare.
6. Recently signed the “Dark Act” removing current state GMO labeling laws.
7. Supports the Trans Pacific Pact a trade agreement that is NAFTA on steroids

 W     What Can we do about this?

We are at a unique moment in the history of our country. For the last 45 years, the gains that we have seen, our social safety nets, our environmental protections, the rights of women and minorities and many other issues are seriously threatened. It is no accident that the Bernie Sanders movement has taken hold.

Consciously or unconsciously, many are becoming aware that there needs to be change. We have seen how the false assumptions of the Democratic Party almost destroyed our hard-won gains.

Is it too late? I don’t think so. But we ordinary Americans must stand up for ourselves and those we love and care about. Today more than ever, we must challenge the false assumptions and beliefs that threaten to destroy all that our parents and grandparents fought and paid for. False assumptions that undermined the Democratic Party and all that we hold dear.

No longer can we afford to vote for “the lesser of two evils.” Those days are over. We need to hold future leaders accountable for how they perform in the offices that we elect them to. If Hillary is elected, we must send a strong message that we will no longer automatically vote for her if she betrays us and follows the policies of the center-right.

Because a bully and a tyrant threatens to become President, it is more than likely that Hillary will win. If she does, we need to make it clear that she has one shot to get it right. If at the end of four years, we see that once again we have been betrayed by a center-right Democratic Party, we have the option of withholding our vote for her second term. She must hear loudly and clearly that the days of voting for the lesser of two evils are over. We will no longer have our votes assumed by a center-right Democratic Party that believes that liberals and progressives have nowhere else to go “so of course they’ll vote for us.”

Americans are not stupid; our eyes are slowly being opened. And we don’t like what we see. But we will do something about it. The road ahead will not be easy but we will travel it.