REDISCOVERING THE MEDIAN VOTER.

American Thinker contributor John Green responds, favorably, to Ruy "Liberal Patriot" Teixeira's wisdom.  "Democrats have embraced radical positions, because leftists have oversized influence on the party. That influence is driving the Democrat party to lose touch with the normies, who are still the vast majority of American voters."  That column distills from three long essays.  In one, Mr Teixeira suggests Democrats Must Move to the Center on Cultural Issues.

The idea that Democrats can just turn up the volume on economic issues and ignore their unpopular stances on sociocultural issues is absurd. Culture matters and the issues to which they are connected matter. They are a hugely important part of how voters assess who is on their side and who is not; whose philosophy they can identify with and whose they can’t.

Instead, for many working-class voters to seriously consider their economic pitch, Democrats need to convince them that they are not looked down on, that their concerns are taken seriously and that their views on culturally freighted issues will not be summarily dismissed as unenlightened. With today’s Democratic Party, as we have seen, this is very difficult. Resistance has been, and remains, stiff to any compromises that involve moving to the center on these issues, a problem that talking more about economic issues simply ignores.

Put simply, end the faculty lounge politics and name and shame the deplorable shamers.

In a second, he suggests Democrats Must Promote an Abundance Agenda.  That used to be second nature, the so-called progressives were in favor of what they called "broadly shared prosperity," never mind that they dissipated the Victory Dividend on all sorts of technocratic follies.  Mr Teixeira understands that prosperity can mean making better use of what you have.  "Abundance means just what you think it means: more stuff, more growth, more opportunity, being able to easily afford life’s necessities with a lot left over. In short, nicer, genuinely comfortable lives for all."  Markets deliver that sort of abundance, and wring out waste and resource depletion along the way.  Bragging about passing legislation sounds hollow in contrast.

The idea is for Biden and administration surrogates to fan out across the country to give voters the good news about the investments in their three big bills (the bipartisan infrastructure bill, the CHIPS and Science Act and the so-called Inflation Reduction Act (IRA)) and how they are bringing/will bring prosperity and good jobs to their communities.

It's not as if we've forgotten how previous "transformative" legislation has run afoul of the Law of Unintended Consequences and other reality checks.

In a third essay, he commits heresy.  Democrats Must Embrace Patriotism and Liberal Nationalism.  Yes, those scurrying feet were the Obama types heading toward the nearest fainting couch.  "Nor is it unknown for progressive commentators to grudgingly admit there are—or at least have been—some good things about America before they return to their preferred theme of the country’s abundant and appalling sins. But they just don’t seem very enthusiastic about the actually-existing country of America."  How can you govern a country you don't like?  As an occupying power would?  That will not turn out well.  "[Democrats] will if they want to become once again the party of the ordinary American, rather than the cultural elites who would find all this stuff distinctly uncool, if not outright reactionary. We shall see."

What's interesting is that Mr Teixeira draws heavily on work by Noah Smith and Brink Lindsey, not your usual sort of Democrat court intellectuals. With both major parties seemingly in thrall to their most vocal fringes, all either major party has to do is come off as not crazy, and that's a quality not forthcoming from leaders of either at the moment.