My problem with the Democratic Party

When I was 18 and first registered to vote, I looked at my options of party and I decided to check the box that was marked, "No Party at this time." I wanted to be independent from the two parties because I believed they both had their good and both had their bad and as an 18 year old, I didn't feel I leaned one way of the other.

My first election was the 1989 mayoral election and I voted for a third party candidate. I liked Mayor Koch, but with his loss to David Dinkins in the primary, my vote for a democrat went away with the loss. I thought Rudy Giuliani was mean and was too busy attacking the soft Mr. Dinkins rather than getting his message out. Even if there was a message of hope for New York, I didn't hear it through all his negative attacks. Henry Hewes was my pick. He was a republican who ran on the Right to Life Party. Knowing full well that a Mayor could not overturn Roe v. Wade, I focussed on Mr. Hewes message on policy, which was more positive than Mr. Giuliani's.

By 1992, we had a field day of democrats running for president and the man who ran on a positive message of centrism and change was William Clinton. President Bush offered nothing new, he raised taxes and looked disinterested in the debates. I wondered if he even wanted to win re-election. I did like Ross Perot and I enjoyed the movement of government reform to challenge Mr. Clinton's progressive change. Both appeared to attack the President's lack of direction. Perot foolishly dropped out and then jumped back in and had this ridiculous excuse of a threat on his family. If he did not drop out, it is quite possible we could've had an Independent President. Progression won out and in 1992, I had no qualms voting for Mr. Clinton to be my president.

Of course, through my 20s, I learned the good and bad of both parties to support my reasons of selecting "no party" on my registration card. But the 90s were years of economic expansion and with a Republican Congress and Democratic President, I found government working much better than the reverse back in the 80s.

So why did I finally change my registration to Republican? When did my party allegience occur?
Well, it happened after many stumbles the democrats have made throughout the years of paying attention.
1) Mayor Dinkins proved ineffective as Mayor and Rudy Giuliani learned from his 1989 campaign mistakes. Mr. Giuliani won the vote from New Yorkers (and me) and began to tackle crime and city reform.
2) Governor Cuomo was on the Tonight Show in 1994 talking about what New York needs to do to correct its problems. This would've been a great speech if it was coming from a challenger, but Mr. Cuomo was the incumbent. I could not understand how a man already in Albany for many years, talking like he has no power over how New York State is run. He correctly was defeated.
3) President Clinton's centrist message I found was all a ploy to get elected and the American People correctly voted for a Republican controlled Congress led by Newt Gingrich.
4) In 2000, Vice President Al Gore, once being a conservative Democrat from Tennessee, virtually had the Democratic nomination, especially with Sen. Bill Bradley running as a liberal candidate to Gore's "new Democrat" image he garnered back in 1992. But Gore chose to move left so he can win the liberal's support from Bradley and win the support from the Green's Ralph Nader. Al Gore could've returned to the centrist position Bill Clinton ran on saying he would be more effective than the President was in bringing bi-partisan policies that will be progressive. He campaigned as a liberal and did a lousy job doing it. George W. Bush ran a campaign on "compassionate conservativism" and bi-partisan centrism that stuck with many Americans.
5) With the election of George W. Bush, the democrats just fell apart. To use the Star Wars motto: Anger, Fear, Aggression, these are the signs of the Dark Side. The image of progress and change and being a "new" democrat that Bill Clinton ran on in 1992 was gone. The obstructionist party with no ideas was born.

Yesterday, WSJ.com's Opinion Journal published an opinion on why Democrats are losing favor with the American People. It pretty much sums up how I feel and how many feel about the Democratic party.

Here are some reasons why democrats are losing favor with the American People:

The Party of FDR & JFK no longer exists. There is no longer a moderate wing. There has been a total collapse of southern democrats. In 1980, there were 20 conservative Democrats in the Senate. Now, there are only four.

With the exception of Sen Lieberman, there are no Scoop Jackson defense hawks remaining with the party.

The Party that voted en masse for income and capital gains tax cuts under JFK now have one message on taxes: Raise them.

On trade, the Democrats delivered 102 House votes for NAFTA and Bill Clinton in 1994. At last count, all of five House votes are expected for the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

The Clinton Democrats helped enact welfare reform. Now today's party conspire to gut work-for-welfare requirements and prevent renewal of welfare reform by Congress.

There's the "know-nothing-ism" on Social Security. Democrats proclaim President Bush is advancing a risky scheme by destroying Social Security and creating risky private investment accounts. Only a few years go, when President Clinton was in office, elected Democratic leaders endorsed personal accounts. John Breaux. Chuck Robb. Bob Kerrey. Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Charles Stenholm. Tim Penny. Today, in the entire US Congress, only one Democrat, Allen Boyd of Florida, endorses privatization, and he has been shunned for his apostasy.

President Bush has proposed tax reform and a flat tax system that is pro-growth and pro-middle class. Democrats have an opportunity here to show progressive policy making. However, voices from obstructionists like Nancy Pelosi and Ted Kennedy are already proving that this may be another uphill battle. The Flat Tax idea is sweeping through Eastern Europe and proving successful. It was also once proposed and endorsed by Democrats such as Jerry Brown, Dick Gephardt, Bill Bradley and Leon Panetta.

Yesterday's New York Sun has an op-ed on other countries that have privatized their ailing public pension programs. At least 19 countries have already shifted to some for of personal-account system similar to President Bush's proposal.
Chile privatized there system back in 1981. Today, only 3% of Chileans remain on the old public pension system. Britain privatized in 1986. Sweden started doing it in 2001 and Lithuania started privatization in 2004.

Which party is the party of progress? Well, I believe it is the one I am now registered to. The Republican Party is not perfect, by no means. But is not sliding towards the Dark Side the way the Democrats are. I know the analogy by the Angry Left likes to pit the GOP as the Dark Side of the Force. But if you look where the venom and anger and violence towards innocent citizens out on the streets because of political views, you will see the Dark Side is not with the progressive party on the Right.