There were only a handful of Republicans in office after they created the Great Depression!

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This graph is boring.

Here would be a cool graph:

Rate every senator (or Rep if you have the time) on how Conservative or Liberal they are by a consistent metric (that's the tricky part). Ignore party identification for the purpose of the graph.

The x axis is the conservative-liberal scale. The y axis is time -- say in increments of 4 years. On every line you plot EVERY SENATOR as a dot from left to right.

You will probably see a nice V pattern opening up, and probable a V is skewing it's opening to the right.You'd also be likely to see the dots begin to crowd near the edges -- at least for the right. I bet the left side of the graph would still have a good spread.

I've got the day off... now if I could just get my hands on the data.

Spam filter on the fritz again, huh? Hate when that happens.

This is interesting, though not surprising.

I'd like to see some sort of tie-in with the disconnect between elected officials (of both parties) and those they are supposed to represent.

I have no charts or numbers, but I do pay attention, and our government has been leaning right for many decades now, whereas the majority of the people do not. I read that we're a "center-right" nation but there's nothing whatever to back that up, except the skew from the wackadoodles on the right that wish a return to witch burning & those good old feudal times.

Look at Obama's presidency so far. The guy has gone out of his way to appoint or keep Republicans as part of his administration. His own views are basically that of a moderate Democrat (in 1972, he would have been a moderate Republican). But the media and right-wingers screech endlessly about how liberal he is. (How I wish he was!)

The people -- regular people -- believe in things like Social Security and Medicare. Generally they don't scratch the surface any further than that (we have a very disengaged population for the most part), but if they did, they'd be forced to take note that things like employee protections in the workplace, environmental protections, increased safety requirements in civil engineering and transportation -- all those things are in large part thanks to Dems. And for the elephant in the room -- abortion -- people I've talked to about it seem to think it should be legal but a personal issue ("nobody's damn business!"). The exceptions are -- entirely -- folks who are very religious and who have been told that it's murder.

But our elected officials, including today's ineffectual Democrats, are out of step with the needs and wants of the people. I'd like to see a chart about that, unfiltered by the media screeching machine.

Hey, Steve, you really have to rewrite your first sentence:
Since 2008, The conventional wisdom among many political observers is that Democrats and Republicans should be able to work together to find compromise solutions to pressing problems.

I say this
1) because it's probably true;
2) I want my read meat;
3) and even though I am not committed to peace nor to transformation, I agree with St. John about these things and would like to save him the trouble.

if you look at the socialism under richard nixon (price controls, etc.) and the china thingie... it's a pretty picture compared to the army of assholes of the 21st century republican party.

republicans today grow their heads beneath their shoulders.

Discussions like this overlook the fact that one of those parties if fundamentally dishonest about every issue in everything they do. The GOP is no longer a political party. It is at best a pathology and at worst a criminal conspiracy.

How about a chart comparing the split between what the majority of the country wants, and what the political parties want?

I suspect that chart would indicate that the problem is not the split in the political parties, it's that both parties to more or less a degree have stopped representing the majority will of the American people. And the Republicans are now a fringe party representing roughly twenty percent of the American people.

it is very apparent that from Obama to Baucus the democrats looking to 'work with republicans' schtick is just the democrats excuse for them to do the bidding of the plutocracy. Only an idiot would think that republicans have any inkling of doing anything productive or in anyway working with the democrats. Likewise, only an idiot would take the democrats stated desire to garner republican support that plainly is not possible at face value and not see that it is their crutch for inaction.

I think calling these people Goldwater Republicans is overestimating them.

Compromise is not in the interest of blind ideologues. It fundamentally undermines their blind ideology.

The southern-dominated GOP would rather be slaughtered marching under the banner of Joan of Alaska than be seen accomodating a liberal African American president. At least if the GOP dies trying they can achieve a modicum of satisfacation cavorting with the 7 abstinence-practicing Texas virgins inside the Pearly Gates.

I've long thought that Obama's true ambition is beyond anything mast liberals would even contemplate: finishing the job of reconstruction and bringing about the end of the more vicious aspects of Southern exceptionalism. I think he puts this project ahead of everything. To me that's beyond audacity.

This ambition plays out against a backdrop of 70%+ of southern whites admittimg to doubts that the president was born in the US. My idea is that we break out the brass knuckles and we deal with health care, global warming and the two wars we have going on and then get right on that whole national reconcilliation project.

The rational perspective is that the Parties are growing apart, but the devotees of High Broderism won't be swayed (especially Broder himself.) To the Villagers, this is part of their sentimental kumbaya handling of affairs in DC, such as false equivalency, transcription, "balance" at all costs provided by inept conservative or banally centrist commentators, etc.

One reason the Republicans are sliding away fromt he rest of America, especially in the South, is people like the commenter here in the thread about regional polling on Obama's place of birth:

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2009_07/019306.php#1556463

We need to ban super-majorities from every part of governance except in declaring war.

Super-majorities are meant to make anything impossible.

Institutionalizing the need for a super-majority destroys society by making it unworkable.

"Nationally, the [modern Republican Party] is dominated by Southern neo-Dixiecrats."

A gentle euphemism for those that share an agenda with David Duke.

neo-Dixiecrats

Nixiecrats, considering how much necessary legislation they are shooting down.

Democracy means the majority rules.

Super-majorities mean the minority rules.

It's literally perverted.

Excellent point about the once honorable party. However, with many of the current RepuGs, Goldwater would be considered far too liberal, even by Libertarian standards.

I honestly don't believe that there's been a Republican President that would meet up to today's GOP standards. Ever.

Look at their histories (working backwards) we've seen how trendy it now is to jump on Bush for TARP etc. -- he's out. His daddy was s bad they chose a different Texan and ruined any chance of reelection. Reagan talked to Commies and raised tax revenue. Nixon talked to China. Eisenhower decried the military industrial complex and built federal roads instead of leaving to the states as God intended. Roosevelt started the Socialist National Park System and was the most famous trustbusting Pres in US history.

Not a one of them is conservative enough for these guys.

I have a question for the Birthers,

Do they believe torture works?

I'm obviously far from the first to point this out, but the parties are much, much more ideologically homogeneous than they were 50 years ago. Back then, Nelson Rockefeller, Robert Taft, and Joseph McCarthy were all Republicans, and George Wallace and Hubert Humphrey were both Democrats.

Plus the global village factor: regional differences, though still significant, were far greater in years past. All in all, there isn't a lot of room for cross-party coalition building.

the watershed moment was the civil rights act of 64.... the day before, the gop had both moderates and conservatives with lots of elected officials in the northeast and midwest...the democrats had three groups..libs & mods [all over the place outside the south] and southern cons....the day after, the geographic shift/transfusion began.....

i would gently disagree with kth, right above me...regional differences are alive and well....and more stark than ever...well, at least ONE region is different

obama approve/disapprove from kos
NORTHEAST 86 11
SOUTH 35 63
MIDWEST 69 29
WEST 67 32

democratic party approve/disapprove
NORTHEAST 65 25
SOUTH 23 68
MIDWEST 50 45
WEST 48 46

republican party approve/disapprove
NORTHEAST 6 92
SOUTH 40 45
MIDWEST 12 81
WEST 12 79

Senators and Representatives cast many votes. Even though various interest groups may scream about voting any of them out because of certain votes, I doubt if this happens as frequently as the interest groups would like to have one believe.

However, in recent years, there have been two major votes, where Yea votes became the kiss of death to political careers. As dj spellchecka stated, supra, the voting in support of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act became the kiss of death for several moderate to liberal Republicans. Senator Thomas Kuechel (R) of California was voted out in the next primary. The other significant loss of careers came for several who voted for the Brady Bill. It cost Tom Foley and others and led to the capture of the House by the RepuGs. They all stood tall and showed tremendous courage, but, their actions came at an equally tremendous personal price.

it is very apparent that from Obama to Baucus the democrats looking to 'work with republicans' schtick is just the democrats excuse for them to do the bidding of the plutocracy. Only an idiot would think that republicans have any inkling of doing anything productive or in anyway working with the democrats. Likewise, only an idiot would take the democrats stated desire to garner republican support that plainly is not possible at face value and not see that it is their crutch for inaction.

Agreed.

Which means that the time has come to give the Democrats the old heave ho.

"Compromise is not in the interest of blind ideologues."

Exactly, and that's why Pelosi, Miller, Rockefeller, etc. have so little interest in real compromise.

But in Steve Benen's intellectually dishonest world, all liberal Democrats are statesmen and all Republicans are extremists.

Nice straw man Michael Freeman.

The fact remains that Republicans ran the government for most of last 8 years. Thanks in part to significant bipartisan support for even their most conservative initiatives, they were able to get virtually all of their priorities passed except the privatization of Social Security.

The result has been a disaster and now they are a minority in both houses of Congress and lost the presidency. Yet in vote after vote every single Republican has voted no. There have been exceptions but only a very few of those exceptions have been on anything but routine measures. Worse, it has become routine for any action in the Senate to require 60 votes.

So no, not all liberal Democrats are statesment and not all Republicans are extremists. But the lack of bipartisanship in the current DOES stem much more from a literally unprecedented level of obstructionism by the Republicans.

What's worse is that much of it is not ideologically driven. One memo and strategy paper after another keeps coming to light showing that pure partisan electoral calculations are at least as big a factor as ideology.

Notice the point at which the curve starts rising again. Right around 1980.

Another graph posted somewhere recently showed that 1980 was the time when Americans began to spend recklessly and accumulate debt.

The election of Ronald Reagan was truly twilight for America. It's been downhill since then.

--Larry

Which means that the time has come to give the Democrats the old heave ho.
Posted by: mcgurk on August 1, 2009 at 3:35 PM | PERMALINK

Agreed. Starting with getting rid of reid. Then flush Nelson, Baucus, Bayh, lieberman, spector, Hoyer, all Blue Dogs, and all the conservative Vichy dem senators.

As someone old enough to remember Evert Dirksen, it seemed to me the ideology of the parties was not the end all be all of things. There was a bottom line that both parties could agree on--which was WHAT was BEST for the country. It's too bad we don't even have citizens let alone politicians who can step back and look at things without coloring everything Republican or Democrat. This country has become too selfish and self-absorbed.

Since Republicans refuse to cooperate anyway, it's time to get Democrats on board for a single-payer system. When the inevitable whines from insurers and other big business arise, point out that the Republicans refused to do anything. Let business suffer from their willingness to cooperate with Republicans.

Here's another version, showing agreement levels between Senators in the 87th (1961-62) and 106th (1999-2000) Senate. In the 87 graph, the parties show up as amorphous clouds, and the Republican caucus (upper right) is shot through with Southern Democrats. In the 106 graph, the parties form two distinct blocks, with only a narrow fringe showing even moderate agreement with the other party.