Obama or McCain, same difference

Three great accomplishments defined mid-century American liberalism: liberal internationalism, middle-class entitlements like Social Security and Medicare, and liberal individualism… For four decades, from 1968 to 2008, the counterrevolutionaries of the right sought to abolish the middle-class entitlements… to replace treaties and collective security with scorn for international law and US global hegemony, and to reverse the trends toward individualism, secularism and pluralism…

And they failed. From the ’60s onward, conservatives lost every major battle. Conservative Republicans paid lip service to opposition to abortion and appointed strict constructionists to the federal bench. But the Supreme Court has not repealed Roe vs Wade… Nor has it restored prayer in public schools. [In] 2003 the Supreme Court struck down anti-gay sodomy laws nationwide. The recent state Supreme Court decision legalising gay marriage in California may yet be overturned by a popular initiative. But many of the goals of the gay rights movement have been achieved… Meanwhile, conservative campaigns to censor movies and TV and music were doomed first by cable TV and then by the internet. Even if there is a Republican in the White House, the major controversies in the next few years… are likely to be fought out not between the parties but among rival wings of the dominant Democratic party itself. The defeat of the conservative counterrevolution should not inspire complacency among liberals and centrists. By rejecting the radical right, the American electorate has not endorsed bold new initiatives…

The demise of the counterrevolutionary right could lead to the birth of a more populist and “Gaullist” American conservatism [which] might emulate the successful parties of the European right… Progressives who demand that the American right [reform] and look to Europe for models should worry that their wish will come true.

Excerpted from an article by Michael Lind in ‘Salon’