Finding the Real Center: Lessons of the 1996 Elections
Teixeira, Ruy
In 1992, Bill Clinton was elected president with 43 percent of the vote. In 1994, the Democratic congressional coalition collapsed and the Democrats were swept out of power in the House and the...
...And lacking such a synthesis, current Democratic strategy seems adrift—designed to push away the very voters on whom a new majority depends...
...Both approaches lack something, but a synthesis of the useful parts of each would have broad appeal to the non-college women and men whose support the Democrats need...
...For example, exit poll data reveal that, contrary to the trend in the presidential vote, the gender gap actually narrowed modestly in the House vote...
...This stance allowed him to reach relatively affluent swing voters who delivered the election for him...
...Of course Clinton tried to be in the center, since winner-take-all elections, by simple mathematics, are always about reaching voters in the center...
...Instead of just demanding responsible, moral behavior out of the poor and those who work for a living, Democrats can take the moral high ground by also demanding such behavior out of those who benefit from the work of others...
...After all, even President Clinton, the New-Democratin-Chief, got only 38 percent support among this group—five points lower than the supposed Democratic dinosaurs in the House...
...Thus, the House Democrats' real challenge is to increase their support among non-collegeeducated white men from where it is today (43 percent) to closer to what it was in 1992 (53 percent...
...SPRING • 1997...
...Thus, economically stressed non-college voters swung back toward the Democrats, despite continued deep suspicion of government and continued wage erosion...
...Analysis of which voters rejoined the Democrats reveals some interesting—and important—patterns...
...In 1994, the Democratic congressional coalition collapsed and the Democrats were swept out of power in the House and the Senate...
...This extension of values into economics represents a new synthesis of two approaches within the Democratic party: the New Democrat/DLC approach that focuses obsessively on values but confines the struggle over values to the noneconomic realm...
...As a number of recent studies have shown, Americans increasingly see their basic values as contradicted by these changes, especially the non-college women and men at the center of the electorate...
...Under the current strategy, a swing back against the Democrats may be more plausible than any expansion of the Democratic center—an old minority rather than a new majority...
...Part of the answer lies in what happened at the end of the campaign: the Democratic fund-raising scandal hurt Democratic congressional candidates more than Clinton...
...In contrast, New Democrat issues may have helped "inoculate" Clinton against Republican counterattacks, but were not really the drivers of his resurgence...
...This is where the conventional wisdom starts to fall apart...
...Emphasizing their orthodox New Democrat credentials seems unlikely to do the job...
...So, since he won the election, he must have been in the center...
...Rather than assuming that this is the only choice, a new approach would recognize that what the electoral center really wants is preser• This is the position associated with former Social Security Commissioner Bob Ball...
...This situation strikes the average American as enormously unfair and in need of drastic change...
...And the most important place here is non-collegeeducated white men...
...For example, in the Greenberg/CAF survey, non-college women reported the following levels of concern about economic problems: 74 percent are very concerned about being unable to afford health care when a family member is sick...
...56 • DISSENT Finding the Center Another key part of the administration's second term agenda is entitlement reform...
...All this seems a bit peculiar, because the congressional Democrats loyally promulgated the president's basic message and went so far as to adopt a "Families First" legislative agenda so strenuously moderate that only the delusional could possibly accuse it of "class warfare...
...To begin with, the House Democrats got about 49 percent of the popular vote, about the same level as the Republicans and also about the same level as Clinton in the Presidential contest...
...Thus, across the board, the House Democrats regained strength among the very groups that 54 • DISSENT Finding the Center were their main problem in 1994: non-collegeeducated men and women with falling wages...
...The identical question produced the same result in the Greenberg/ CAF post-election poll...
...Almost three-fifths (59 percent) of Clinton voters in this survey cited his support of domestic programs (education, Medicare, and the environment), compared to less than oneSPRING • 1997...
...Similarly, the 1995 median household income of women with some college was 8 percent lower than its 1989 level...
...The Greenberg/CAF poll shows this quite clearly—first, in results cited earlier on what motivated voters' support decisions, second, in a series of questions about voters' priorities for the new Congress and president...
...For three reasons: the first is that women and men have different attitudes toward the role of government, particularly with regard to social spending—that is, spending on just the kind of programs that were centerpiece issues in the campaign...
...Here again a close examination of the data suggests such an interpretation is radically oversimplified in some respects and just plain wrong in others...
...Why did the House Democrats benefit from these economically squeezed voters in 1996, while they were hurt by these same voters in 1994...
...Social Security's funding problems do not even begin to obtain until the year 2029, and even these problems can probably be avoided by the relatively simple step of beginning to invest a portion of the trust fund's assets in common stocks...
...For example, women, while distrusting government as much as men do, are more appreciative of government's essential role in providing social services like health care and education...
...In sum, the hard-to-please New Democrats do not have the open-and-shut case for New Democrat orthodoxy they think they do...
...That poll, conducted by Mark Penn, asked voters several questions on what "this election was about...
...This underscores the volatile nature of these voters and the variability in effect of living standards problems, which can undercut the pro-incumbent effect of economic growth (as in 1994) or reinforce it (as in 1996...
...They are also more willing than men to see the government ensure job availability and a wholesome social and family environment...
...It also raises another interesting question, the dark underside of the gender gap for the Democrats: why didn't Clinton do better among men, particularly non-college men, if they were so optimistic...
...To begin with, of course, the questions should be disentangled, instead of being subsumed under "entitlements, problem of aging baby boomers and...
...52 • DISSENT Finding the Center ply that non-college-educated middle-class women played the key role in Bill Clinton's reelection...
...These data help bring the non-college-educated, middle-class women who re-elected Bill Clinton into sharper focus...
...In fact, they look worse...
...The first point to be noted here is the classdivided nature of his increase in support...
...Hard work and loyalty aren't rewarded the way they used to be, while those at the top, who have lost their sense of responsibility toward those who work for them, prosper enormously...
...51 Finding the Center third (31 percent) who cited his support of NewDemocrat-style positions (welfare reform, anticrime measures, balanced budget, moderation).* But perhaps the most convincing evidence for the central role of M2E2 is provided by a simple examination of the timing of Clinton's popularity surge in 1995...
...But what is not emphasized is that congressional Democrats' approval ratings in these areas are still pretty darn good (balanced budget, 59 percent...
...Indeed, the common state practice of running a separate capital budget for such investments, exempt from balance requirements, should be popularized as an option for the federal government—an option that current balanced budget plans exclude...
...There is also some evidence that the Democratic presidential campaign was less than generous in the disposition of financial resources to congressional candidates...
...The more forthright proposition, "reform[ing] entitlement programs by cutting back benefits for programs like Medicare and Social Security"—for this is what "slowing down the rate of increase in spending" means—garners this priority level from just 21 percent...
...They will not be happy to see the cuts in Medicare—their number one priority—that follow from budget balance, nor will they react well to the inevitable deep slashes in other government programs they value: education, social services, the environment and so on...
...More generally, many of the voters who, in 1994, targeted the Democrats and government as the cause of declining living standards concluded, by 1996, that the Republicans and their hostility even to useful government programs were an even greater threat to their living standards...
...Put simply, under the current system, cuts in benefits and/or increases in premiums to reduce program costs can only be followed by more of the same, due to the combined impact of health care costs and demographic trends...
...For example, Democratic support went up twelve points among men with some college and eight points among high-schoolgraduate men...
...The balanced budget is obviously a tricky issue, but it is far from clear that the current strategic approach of Democrats, where budget balance is hailed uncritically as a policy goal and the painful realities of balance are ignored, is the only viable way to respond to the public mood...
...Analysis of exit poll data reveals that Clinton's increased support relative to 1992 came overwhelmingly from non-college-educated voters, particularly those with just a high school diploma (up eight percentage points) and those with some college (up seven points...
...This suggests it will take more than increased short-term economic optimism—just as we saw in the 1996 election—for the Democrats to make large inroads among this group...
...All this does not mean that some New Democrat issues may not have helped Clinton hold and add on to his lead, but they did not create the basic advantage that Clinton rode to his re-election...
...This constitutes, I believe, a plausible account of why the Democrats were able to improve their showing in 1996, yet fell short of retaking the House...
...And these were the two groups that shifted most dramatically into Clinton's column in the 1996 election...
...In conjunction with the concerns about preserving social spending and dealing with long-term economic anxieties, this explains, I believe, the sharp swing toward Clinton among non-college-educated women...
...For example, if the House Democrats' support levels had simply remained steady across all demographic groups between 1992 and 1996, they'd be controlling Congress quite easily today...
...and the liberal/populist approach that concentrates on economics and living standards, but leaves out the moral dimension of these issues...
...For example, take the issue of being a New Democrat: polling data show that, during the period when Clinton built his decisive lead over Bob Dole in the polls, the percentage of the public that thought Clinton was a "new kind of Democrat" actually decreased, reaching the lowest levels of his presidency...
...By December of 1995, Clinton was ten points ahead and never looked back...
...Thus, since Clinton's campaign became defined so strongly by his defense of "M2E2," women had more reason than men to overlook their basic distrust of government and move into Clinton's column...
...In the medium-to-long run, this is better than rushing headlong down a path that will ultimately alien58 • DISSENT Finding the Center ate these voters and undercut most other Democratic policy goals...
...Voters believed Republicans were contravening their values in these areas, so the Democrats benefited...
...This is not a happy scenario and it cries out for an alternative approach...
...Noncollege women have especially high levels of anxiety about the future...
...The short answer is: very poorly...
...Who Joined the Clinton Coalition...
...Indeed, for the latter group, "requir[ing] that all new trade agreements protect U.S...
...Support among non-college white men fell eighteen points in 1994 and, despite recovering by eight points in 1996, was still ten points below 1992 levels in that election...
...These figures suggest that increased support from non-college-educated voters accounted for about three-quarters of Clinton's overall increase in support.* And, since non-college-educated voters are predominantly of moderate income (fifteen to seventy-five thousand dollars in annual household income), perhaps the clearest way to summarize Clinton's increased support is that it came overwhelmingly from the non-college-educated middle class...
...Does this mean that "values" played no role in the 1996 election...
...This contrasts with behavior among non-college white women, whose support fell by nine points in 1994, but rose by seven points in 1996, almost making it back to 1992 levels...
...Take the issue of free trade...
...issues, including, of course, Medicare, Medicaid, education, and the environment...
...This corresponds exactly to the SPRING • 1997 • 57 Finding the Center preferences of the center of the American electorate, including non-college women and noncollege white men...
...Recall that, in 1994, the shift away from the Democrats was concentrated exclusively among the non-college-educated...
...What of the congressional election results...
...The change in 1996 was almost a mirror image...
...Indeed, given the long-term economic difficulties experienced by these women, why did they support the incumbent president...
...The increase in Democratic support was also confined to the noncollegeeducated, especially high school graduates (up eight points) and those with some college (up nine points), while support actually declined among those with a college education (down four points...
...He could afford to lose a few percentage points off his support and get 49 percent of the vote...
...And any economic slowdown will only make things worse—not least because it will make the effects of budget balance that much more draconian...
...Reality is more complicated and the road forward for congressional Democrats is similarly complicated...
...How did this remarkable swing take place...
...The third reason for Clinton's exceptional success with non-college women is that, despite their levels of anxiety and their long-term economic difficulties, these women did experience tangible economic improvement in the period immediately prior to the election...
...Funding the Medicare program is a much more serious and immediate problem and has everything to do with the overall problems of health care availability and health care cost containment in the United States...
...This suggests that the realities of balancing the budget will not be popular with voters, despite their support for the general idea...
...After the successful push to pass NAFTA in late 1993 and the subsequent highlighting of this victory in lists of the president's accomplishments, the issue was stunningly absent from the 1996 presidential campaign...
...Finally, the New Democrat account accuses congressional Democrats of being insufficiently enthusiastic about the state of the economy and too concerned with "focus[ing] relentlessly on wage stagnation and the perceived lack of good jobs" to reap benefits from voters for the expandSPRING • 1997 • 55 Finding the Center ing economy...
...Less plausible is the orthodox New Democrat account, summarized in a report by Mark Penn for the Democratic Leadership Council and repeated in numerous press stories: By this account, there is one and only one reason why the Democrats failed to retake the House: they weren't as fervently "New Democratic" as Bill Clinton was...
...For example, the median household income for high-school-graduate women was 9 percent lower at the end of 1995 than it was at the end of 1989...
...That is, they are more opposed to free trade treaties, more protective of Medicare and Social Security, and more supportive of the spending programs that will get the axe under a balanced budget...
...These levels of concern are 14 to 24 percentage points higher than among the rest of the electorate...
...The problem with a balanced budget as a centrist policy priority, of course, is all the noncentrist things that have to be done to bring it about—starting with not protecting Medicare and Social Security...
...In this series of questions, the highest priorities for voters were "protect [ing] Medicare and Social Security against major cuts" (59 percent saying this should be single highest or one of top few priorities) compared to only 35 percent who accorded this priority level to "reform[ing] entitlement programs by slowing down the rate of increase in spending for programs like Medicare and Social Security"—a comparatively innocuous formulation...
...This sketch of alternative approaches to free trade, entitlement reform, and a balanced budget has an important theme running through it: the positive role of government in protecting and raising American living standards, from wages and jobs to health care and retirement...
...In addition, NBC1Wall Street Journal polls found, in both January and March of 1996, that about three-fifths of the public thought free trade agreements with other countries cost the United States more jobs than they created...
...So economic optimism must be combined with other factors to explain why Clinton did particularly well among non-college-educated women...
...But the fact remains that, despite the gains discussed above, the Democrats did not succeed in taking back the House...
...And this pattern holds when married women with children or working mothers with children—typical descriptions of "soccer moms"—are looked at directly: non-college-educated women from these groups were the overwhelming source of Clinton's increased support...
...Thus, Clinton, despite his allegedly superior New Democrat approach, did not succeed in outpolling the House Democrats...
...The question is: where was the center...
...The second important point about Clinton's increased support is that it came overwhelmingly from women...
...The "center" may have won the election, but the demographics and motivations of that center are quite different from the standard picture of Volvo-driving soccer mom swing voters, whose concerns are mostly about "values" and mostly outside of the realm of economics...
...Exit poll data also reveal that the increase in the Democratic House vote was even more classskewed than the increase in Clinton's support...
...And what does it mean for the political future...
...vation—and extension—of the health care security provided by the current Medicare system...
...Men increased their support of congressional Democrats by four points, while women's Democratic vote went up only two points...
...Here again the non-centrist nature of this policy focus is striking...
...As has been widely reported, business outspent labor by a factor of seven to one ($242 million to $35 million), with much of this spending helping fund the Republican surge in spending close to election day...
...In October 1996, right before his re-election, the public's assessment was not just similar but identical...
...This included passing the welfare bill and the Kennedy-Kassebaum health insurance bill, as well as—particularly important from the standpoint of moderate image-making— the minimum wage bill...
...As has been widely noted, Clinton's support increased by nine points among women, but by only two points among men, thereby widening the gender gap considerably in his favor...
...Similarly, the New Democrat account, based on a Penn/DLC post-election poll, emphasizes that Clinton has higher approval ratings than congressional Democrats in areas like the balanced budget, welfare, crime, and education...
...The truth is that Clinton's political resurgence was based on his defense .of Old Democrat programs, sometimes abbreviated as M2E2: Medicare, Medicaid, education, and the environment, as well as (somewhat closer to the election) a widespread perception that the economy was improving...
...And to make matters worse, non-collegeeducated women—the group that re-elected Bill Clinton—feel more strongly about these issues than the general public...
...Taken together, these two observations im* An estimate that finds general support in results from the Greenberg/CAF survey...
...As I argued earlier, voters tend to look at all issues in terms of values, not just narrowly defined "social" issues like crime or welfare...
...Labor played a key role in making M2E2 the centerpiece of the 1996 campaign, and thus, as we have seen, helped re-elect Bill Clinton, but simply didn't have the financial resources to compete successfully with business...
...welfare, 56 percent...
...The conventional wisdom also holds that Clinton owes his re-election to success among affluent swing voters, like suburban "soccer moms...
...Breaking down these data by gender shows that in contrast to the presidential data, House Democrats made strong gains among non-collegeeducated men, not just non-college-educated women...
...Noncollege men, who moved only sluggishly toward Clinton (and white non-college men, who didn't move at all over the two elections) were much more optimistic than their female counterparts at the time of the election...
...So far, not very centrist...
...House Democrats were also hurt by the increased moderation and bipartisan cooperation of House Republicans in the period leading up to the election...
...But without the right issues, the Democrats could have talked about "values" until they were blue in the face and it would have done them little good...
...Gradually dismantling the Medicare system won't do this, of course—but comprehensive reform of the health care system could, while at the same time providing mechanisms for the control of costs...
...I believe the key to selling these approaches, which individually have considerable appeal to the noncollegeeducated women and men at the center of the electorate, is selling that positive role for government...
...But Clinton did not pull away from Dole in trial heats until much later in the year, when he joined with congressional Democrats in defense of Medicare and other popular programs and the Republicans made their disastrous decision to shut down the government...
...By doing so, he was able to tap public commitment to the basics of the welfare state and connect to public sentiment that the Republicans were extreme and only likely to make things worse...
...And instead of artificially separating living standards and values, acting as if what happens in the economy and to people's livelihoods is a new...
...The data say otherwise...
...Through the end of 1995, the current economic expansion had failed to lift wages for the non-college-educated in general, and noncollegeeducated women in particular...
...Not unless centrist is redefined to mean the center of gravity of elite opinion, rather than the opinion of the American public...
...Indeed, the striking thing about the Clinton administration's approach, designed supposedly to reach the "vital center," is how very noncentrist most of it is...
...Finally, another poll from later in October showed 51 percent of the public characterizing Clinton as a "tax and spend Democrat" compared to 39 percent who rejected this characterization...
...66 percent are very concerned about not having enough money for retirement and with their children not having good job opportunities...
...jobs, labor rights and environmental standards" is one of their highest priorities for the new administration...
...Instead of equating values with narrowly defined non-economic issues—like crime or welfare— we need to realize that people see values in all • Another clear demonstration of the relative importance of M2E2 comes from a—distinctly under-publicized—result from a Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) postelection poll...
...tral, technological question, Democrats can make living standards a realm of values, where government has a virtuous, and essential, role to play...
...Such improvements did not come close to erasing post-1989 income losses, but they were enough to produce a more positive attitude toward the incumbent and his stewardship of the economy...
...it means we need to think about values in politics in a new way...
...It means real pain for real people, starting with themselves...
...This led to improved short-term economic perceptions, SPRING • 1997 . 53 Finding the Center which, in turn, made it easier for them to support the incumbent president...
...These findings were confirmed by an early December 1996 NBC/Wall Street Journal poll that showed protecting Medicare twenty percentage points ahead of reforming Medicare as a top priority and protecting Social Security twentytwo points ahead of reforming Social Security...
...But it is important to stress the words "in conjunction": increased economic optimism, by itself, would do little to explain why non-college women, in particular, moved so strongly in Clinton's direction between 1992 and 1996...
...Who Rejoined the Democrats...
...But protecting and raising American living standards can be a clear moral mission, a mission that would derive its force from how Americans feel about the economic changes they are experiencing...
...Conversely, if a basically antigovernment mood remains in place, these new approaches, and the new majority that could be built on them, will likely remain out of reach...
...And it is a very different, more economically stressed portrait than that painted by many media accounts...
...The second reason strengthens the first...
...Most observers credit Clinton's victory in 1996 to his move to the "center," a move defined by his New-Democrat style emphasis on small government and family values...
...Much of the answer lies in the same factor that benefited Clinton in 1996: the perception that the Republican plans for the budget ("M2E2") were a greater problem than the Democrats' attachment to "big government...
...In contrast, collegeeducated voters increased their support of Clinton by just three points...
...By these criteria, how does current Democratic strategy, particularly as embodied in the Clinton administration's apparent second term agenda, stack up...
...crime, 64 percent...
...A new approach would be responsive to the center's preference for a balanced budget but forthright about the costs of bringing it about...
...And this definitely applies to the role of government, where voters evaluate government by their moral criteria and currently see no clear moral mission for government...
...and (2) winning over a substantial segment of noncollegeeducated men, particularly white men, whose suspicions of government currently outweigh their desires for alleviation of economic stress and a more secure future...
...Yet he not only was re-elected, he also bettered his showing over 1992, attracting 49 percent of the popular vote...
...House Democrats couldn't...
...This compares very favorably to voters motivated by New Democrat-style issues, where just 40 percent of crime/drugs voters (7 percent of the electorate) and only 27 percent of budget deficit voters'(12 percent of the electorate) voted for Clinton...
...The reason for this is simple: free trade treaties in general, and NAFTA in particular, aren't popular...
...Nor do post-1989 economic trends look much brighter for non-college women when attention is shifted to overall household income, rather than wages...
...For example, the median household income of high-school-educated women went up 3 percent in the 1994-1995 period, while the income of women with some college went up 2 percent in the same period...
...Clinton embraced the balanced budget goal in June of 1995, a period during which he was apparently following Dick Morris's policy of "triangulation," designed to distance him from the congressional Democrats and showcase his status as a New Democrat...
...This presents a bleak future of a decreasingly effective and increasingly expensive program...
...What these findings do not do, however, is explain why it was non-college-educated women, rather than their male counterparts, who shifted into Clinton's column...
...Combined with rapidly improving public perceptions of the economy in the months immediately prior to the election, this political stance gave him an insuperable advantage in the election campaign...
...education, 66 percent), especially considering how low approval ratings for Congress as a whole have been...
...And comprehensive reform is just what non-college women and men want: they rank "guarantee[ing] affordable, comprehensive health care for all" as one of their top priorities for the new administration...
...The clear winner: "preserving Medicare, Medicaid, education and the environment" over such New Democrat favorites as "expanding opportunity, responsibility and working together as a community" and "ending old-style liberalism and bringing the Democratic Party into the mainstream...
...I believe such an approach is available, though it entails a significant break with current Democratic orthodoxy on a range of issues...
...The answer lies in the fact that noncollege men, despite their long-term economic problems, are generally unwilling to overlook their basic distrust of government and support government's role in providing social services and protection from the marketplace...
...The received wisdom here attributes the failure of the congressional Democrats to retake the House to their Old Democrat approach (too little on values, too much class warfare), thereby demonstrating the superiority of a resolutely New Democrat approach...
...Another part of the answer lies in the tremendous counterpunch of business-backed Republicans in the final stages of the campaign...
...Thus the logic of Clinton's so-called centrist agenda will be precisely to fragment his support among the very group that produced his centrist victory of 1996: non-college-educated women...
...A New Synthesis for a New Majority So the conventional wisdom on the 1996 election is off the mark...
...These findings call into question the emerging stereotype of affluent, Volvo-driving suburban mothers as the new Democratic voters...
...This is not what they thought they were electing Bill Clinton to do...
...Illustrating this, Clinton's success among women voters was driven by particularly spectacular rises among women high school graduates (up thirteen points) and women with some college (up eleven points...
...The government can be the agent for that change...
...This break may be usefully illustrated by sketching different scenarios for the three issues that loom large on the Clinton administration's second term agenda: free trade, entitlement reform, and a balanced budget...
...On the contrary, it simply ensures that programs popular with the center of the electorate will have to be cut severely and that the philosophical and fiscal basis for activist government will be further undermined...
...Instead of trying to reach these mythical swing voters, a truly centrist strategy would concentrate on two tasks: (1) strengthening the loyalty of non-college-educated women, who are under considerable economic stress and who see government as an agent (albeit a flawed one) for dealing with their anxieties about the future...
...and 61 percent are very concerned about being unable to save enough to put a child through college...
...At that point, many said that President Clinton was a goner: he'd never be reelected in 1996...
...Instead, his stalwart defense of "M2E2" should be credited...
...These voters need to know precisely what balancing the budget by the year 2002 really entails: it can't be done by simply eliminating "waste, fraud and abuse...
...All this hurt the House Democrats more than the president, since it reduced their comparative advantage over House Republicans, while enhancing the stature of the president, who first stopped the Republicans from going "too far," then was able to turn around and sign popular bills into law...
...The real problem is where their support fell in 1994 and didn't recover to 1992 levels...
...A post-election survey conducted by Stanley Greenberg for the Campaign for America's Future (CAF) found similar motivations among Clinton voters...
...However, no evidence is offered for this assertion and there is nothing in the DLC post-election poll (or any other poll, for that matter) that directly supports it...
...But there is at least one major component of the administration's second term agenda that does qualify: a balanced budget...
...I will return to this point in the concluding section of this article...
...Instead, these new Democratic voters seem more likely to be driving Cavaliers, struggling to get by economically, and worrying that family financial meltdown is right around the corner...
...Preserving Social Security is simply not a problem on the order of funding the Medicare program...
...And voters need to be reminded that much of the good that government has done would not have been possible without borrowing to invest in the future—exactly what their household and their state probably do today...
...This alternative approach, then, would engage voters in the center in a dialogue about the harsh realities of a balanced budget under current strictures and how options like a capital budget are probably necessary to preserve programs they support and to build for the future...
...The economic strains on these voters have been intense...
...In terms of free trade, a new approach would reject the relentless pursuit of free trade treaties and the coddling of mercantilist, antilabor nations like China, instead emphasizing fair trade, workers' rights, and the protection of American living standards...
...Except for the first part of this claim—that he moved to the center—every other part of it is either inaccurate or radically incomplete...
...In October of 1995, almost two years after the passage of NAFTA, people told Times-Mirror pollsters by a 55 percent to 36 percent margin that more free trade treaties like NAFTA would be likely to hurt, not help, the job situation...
...In light of these data, there is nothing particularly "centrist" about the administration's desire to press ahead with fast-track negotiating authority to bring Chile into NAFTA, to renew most-favored-nation status for China, and to push for China's accession to the World Trade Organization...
...In addition, while the Democrats did not take back the House, they did gain ten seats and increase their share of the popular vote for the House by 3 percentage points over 1994...
...So Clinton's "safe, centrist" strategy seems neither safe nor centrist...
...That survey found that 78 percent of new Clinton voters (those that voted for him in 1996, but not in 1992) were non-college-educated...
...Far-reaching entitlement reform, including benefit cuts and privatization, may set hearts aflutter inside the Beltway, but the center of the American electorate thought their 1996 votes were cast to protect Medicare and Social Security...
...The flip side of this is the relatively trivial role of the affluent swing voters on whom so much media and Democratic attention was lavished...
...Thus, Clinton won, they lost, end of story...
...There is no clear need for privatization of the program, and a centrist Democratic position would recognize this and assure the public that Social Security can and will be preserved as a program that provides a secure, predictable level of benefits...
...It is also the position of Ball and five others (out of thirteen) who served on the panel evaluating Social Security...
...For example, women with some college saw their wages continue to deteriorate throughout the expansion, so that their wages at the end of 1995 were 5 percent lower than they were in 1989...
...And the additional definition of his campaign by small-scale government regulation proposals affecting families (the V-chip, school uniforms, extending family and medical leave, and so on) probably reinforced this differential appeal to women...
...This is shown by exit poll results identifying the economy/jobs (21 percent), Medicare and Social Security (15 percent), and education (12 percent) as the key issues that moved voters into the Clinton column (three-fifths to three-quarters of voters who said these were their most important concerns voted for Clinton...
...In addition, since nondefense discretionary spending will have to be cut to the bone to reach budget balance by 2002, other federal programs that reflect centrist priorities— education, the environment, job training, transportation— may face devastating cuts...
...A new approach to entitlement reform would take seriously the preferences of non-college women and men for protecting Medicare and Social Security, instead of assuming those preferences can be easily manipulated by a parade of bipartisan commissions and elite experts...
...This almost exactly reverses the results of a March 1994 Times-Mirror poll where, in an initial burst of post-NAFTA optimism, 52 percent of respondents felt more free trade treaties would help the job situation, compared to 32 percent who thought such treaties would hurt...
...As countless polls have shown, a balanced budget is broadly popular and, in the Greenberg/CAF poll, ranked only behind protecting Medicare and Social Security as a voter priority...
...Unless we believe that Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole, or their equivalents, will always be there to bring them back, the case for a new synthesis seems compelling...
...Other polling data reinforce this point: in October of 1994, right before the Democrats' debacle, 44 percent of the public said Clinton's approach to issues was liberal, 42 percent said it was moderate, and 9 percent said it was conservative...
...Here, I think we need to learn to talk about the role of government in raising living standards in a language voters understand: the language of values...
Vol. 44 • April 1997 • No. 2
