Regardless of the merits of the
left's arguments on each of those individual debates, there's a
structural reason why Obama and Congressional Democrats may not prove
as responsive to their demands as they hope. Liberals aren't as big a
component of the Democratic coalition as many of the Left's leaders
believe. Moderate voters are much more important to Democratic success
than liberal voters. And liberals are also less important to Democrats
than conservatives are to Republicans. That means liberals generally
have less leverage than they recognize in these internal party
arguments-and less leverage than conservatives can exert in internal
struggles over the GOP's direction. "Liberals are less central to the
Democratic coalition than conservatives are to the Republican
coalition," says Andy Kohut, director of the non-partisan Pew Research
Center for the People and the Press.
That contrast is apparent
from two different angles: identification and behavior. In cumulative
Pew data for 2008, Kohut says, only one-third of self-identified
Democrats described themselves as liberals; the rest identified as
moderates or conservatives. For Republicans the proportions were
reversed: two-thirds of Republicans considered themselves
conservatives, while only one-third identified as moderates or
liberals. Gallup's findings are similar: in their cumulative 2008 data,
just 39% of self-identified Democrats described themselves as liberals,
while 70% of Republicans identified as conservatives.
From quiet minority to struggling majority
The liberal left, the middle left, the center left—and Obama.