All the Right Moves

The men from the <i>Economist</i> explain why conservatism won out in America.

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Approach this book with caution, fellow progressives. It may confirm your worst fear. Two smart Brits who work for The Economist have written a vividly detailed study of why conservatives rule American politics. What is worse, they maintain that the right is likely to dominate for some time, even if the Democrats eke out a victory this fall.

The Right Nation has nothing in common with the crude polemics by the likes of Bill O’Reilly and Ann Coulter that growl from racks at every airport and mall. Micklethwait and Wooldridge gaze on their American subjects with the skepticism of European agnostics who’ve grown up in a tidy welfare state. The moralism of the evangelical right makes them shudder, and they mock the hypocrisy of a president who rails against “big government” but has blithely run up a record deficit. A keen grasp of history and demographic trends firms up their prose, which is spiked with the dry wit that seems the birthright of every Oxford graduate. Many Republicans, the authors report, believe high deficits will prevent liberals from enacting future social programs. That logic “is rather like saying that, because your brother-in-law drinks too much, you’re going to drink all the alcohol in the house before he visits for the Memorial Day weekend.”

All this frames an argument that the most confirmed W-hater should take seriously. In their view, three simple reasons explain why conservatives keep defeating the left: The right wins the battle of ideas, has a more determined and focused army of activists, and is reaping the benefits of long-term changes in American society.

The unlikely figure of William Jefferson Clinton proved an expert witness to the ideological sway of his opponents. “The era of big government is over,” declared the only Democratic president to win re-election since FDR. Clinton accomplished two historic feats that conservatives had long demanded—a balanced budget and punitive welfare “reform.” But his grand liberal dream to provide every American with medical insurance was a spectacular flop. Do you want a health care system run like the post office? asked the pitchmen for the right. It’s a myth that federal largesse goes mainly to lazy and immoral Americans—or ungrateful foreigners. But, after decades of skillful propaganda, most Americans believe this. The golden era when Congress created Medicare and Medicaid, not to mention the National Endowment for the Humanities and the EPA, seems to belong not just to an earlier century but to a different nation.

The men from The Economist appreciate how diverse is the cadre responsible for this sea change. At the top, of course, are white guys in expensive suits, men like Ralph Reed and William Kristol familiar to anyone who watches a Sunday morning talk show. But the authors also introduce pro-life college kids from Colorado Springs who believe conservatism is a benevolent creed, and they identify the many women in Bush’s inner circle who’ve enjoyed the support of right-wing foundations. Rich conservatives, the authors point out, don’t really donate more money than do their liberal counterparts in New York and Hollywood. But they target nearly all of it to projects whose sole mission is to advance the right’s cause.

The authors’ claim that the future smiles on conservatives is more dubious. Micklethwait and Wooldridge show that people who own stocks and homes and attend church tend to vote Republican, and those indicators are rising. Yet, if one deletes piety from the equation, Demo-crats do just as well. Latinos are the wild card in such electoral predictions. The authors predict the upwardly mobile and U.S.-born will shift toward the GOP. But most Latinos toil at working-class jobs and will probably do so for years to come. They are a natural constituency for progressives—if, indeed, the left can take its doctrine of social equality to heart.

And there’s the rub. The left can’t control demography, but it can build a smarter movement. In 1970, John Mitchell, Nixon’s leading henchman, said, “This country is going so far to the right, you are not even going to recognize it.” With zeal and an eye for liberal soft spots, conservatives set about fulfilling his prophecy.

Meanwhile, the left fragmented into a variety of worthy causes—from environmental defense to gay and lesbian rights to affirmative action. These fragments have helped make the United States a more humane place. But they forgot that the first rule of democratic politics is to state a few forceful ideas and to make clear how they can benefit the majority. Even Americans who despise the right know exactly what it believes: “family values” and “less government.” Since 9/11, conservatives have added the defeat of “Islamo-fascism” to the agenda. Can progressives unite behind ideas of similar clarity and appeal? Can they rid themselves of a nagging contempt for the unhip, the poorly educated, and the God-fearing? If the left is not a movement of and for working people—blemishes and all—then it has little chance to regain its previous influence.

Micklethwait and Wooldridge conclude their immensely valuable book with a sobering prediction. If Kerry wins, they write, “he will be reduced to trying to reconstruct the status quo ante, cutting back on tax cuts for the super-rich and repairing relations with foreigners (up to a point), but generally coping with an agenda dictated by the right.” Such a future is not inevitable; as John Mitchell knew, history often has a surprise up her sleeve. But if progressives want to prove the right wrong, they’ll have to stop boasting about how enlightened they are and start winning over the heart of America.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate