Peter Beinart, whose opinion more or less reflects a "liberal" version of Bill Kristol, recently argues that Health Care Reform signals of revival of the FDR Big Tent Democratic Party.

Once upon a time, the Democratic Party was a big tent—a big, ugly, tent. In Congress, liberals coexisted with all manner of racists, nativists, misogynists and morons.

Yet it was that big, ugly Democratic Party that from Franklin Roosevelt to Lyndon Johnson pushed through Social Security, the Wagner Act, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Tennessee Valley Authority, Food Stamps, Head Start, Medicare and Medicaid.

This was the devil’s pact that defined the Democratic Party for more than three decades, until the civil rights and women’s movement forced party leaders to choose.

Beinhart's argues for a new "Devil's Pact," one that abandons cultural liberalism in the name of rebuilding a new FDR State. As Beinhart writes, the Dem Party is about economic security, not cultural freedom. Beinhart calls the Stupak Amendment "a smart move" and warns cultural liberals to expect more where that came from.

I compare Beinart to Kristol because Beinart's advice will end up accomplishing for the Dems what Kristol's advice ended up accomplishing for the Repubs, namely defeat and discreditation. It was only 4 or 5 years ago that the talk was of a permanent republican majority, and Dem pundits like Beinart were making the rounds arguing for the Dem need to appeal to "values voters" and a neo-liberal hawkish interventionism. Of course, subsequently the Iraq War went sour, and the GOP overreached on Terry Schiavo, and the so-called permanent GOP majority collapsed. Why are the Dems intent on making the same mistakes? This business about reviving a "devil's pact" of the 1930s is nonsense. Those days are gone. And I imagine they didn't refer to it as a "devil's pact" back then, which is always a useful tidbit in trying to resurrect something that today would be labeled as such. The moral lesson of the Faustian bargain is that it leads to damnation for those foolhardy enough to enter into one.

The Stimulus and Health Care reform have more or less resurrected the GOP from the political graveyard. All this trite pundit analysis I read about the Dems having moved on to the serious business of being a permanent governing party while the GOP is relegated to purifying an increasingly non-extant minority is premature. The reality is that "core economic security" issues that Beinhart champions have collapsed in public opinion polling. Government Responsibility to ensure health insurance for all, which polled at 70-30 by Gallup back in 2007 is now polling 50-47 against. I suppose the polling reflects a dissatisfaction with the current system, but little enthusiasm for the public choice "clunker" the Dems are offering up in it's stead. American politics, contrary to Beinhart, is not settling into a permanent Political party majority, rather it's being characterized by dramatic swings in independent voting.

Anthony De Jasay in his critique of Politics noted the tendency of increasingly slimmer majorities attempting to exploit only slightly smaller minorities. And the difference, in this case, consists in swing, independent voters who identify with neither party, swinging back and forth between the two. And so we end up with either party using tenable, temporary majorities to push through extremist legislation(e.g., either in national security or health care) intended primarily to engineer a permanent party advantage.

The Health Care "Reform" bill, either H.R. 3962, or the senate version, is an affront to liberalism. Peter Beinhart's views are an affront to liberalism. But he is right about one thing; there is more where that came from in terms of liberal capitulation if that corporate boondoggle of a health care reform becomes law. That's exactly what i was referring to in a previous post when noting:

Stupak Amendment only portends what is to come if this thing actually becomes law and passes a challenge to the Supreme court. Washington isn't Boston. Be careful what you wish for...

meaning that if nationally corporatizing health care becomes an inevitability, then you are going to reignite a new avenue for the social conservative cultural wars. If Beinart is any indication, the Dem Party is more than willing to make this trade-off, and will offer up no defense.