Ruy Teixeira

Where did the Democrats lose in 2002? A lot rides on this question; wrong answers will produce poor targeting and ineffective politics, and the Democrats can afford precious little of either. But right answers can set the stage for future gains in the 2004 election and beyond. Base Mobilization Perhaps the most common answer — […]

Some say the Democrats don’t have the courage of their convictions. Could be. But what I worry about more is that they don’t have the courage of the public’s convictions. Take the issue of war with Iraq. Polls have consistently shown that the public is leery of unilateral action in Iraq and would prefer not […]

It may be true that the era of big government being over is over, as conservative Christopher Caldwell has argued, done in by President Bush’s reluctance to challenge popular spending programs. But it may also be true that the era of big business being over has just begun. By that, I don’t mean that people […]

Pity the poor Democrats. They thought they had discovered the perfect issue: “fiscal discipline.” By draping themselves in the mantle of fiscal rectitude, Democrats discovered they could oppose tax cuts without advocating any specific government spending — thereby avoiding both the potentially controversial nature of any new outlay and the generic “Big Spender” label (as […]

Over the last few months, the public’s attention has shifted dramatically from a single-minded focus on combating terrorism to concerns about the ailing economy. That’s a big and politically significant change: A bad economy almost always hurts the incumbent president’s party in congressional elections. While this shift in our collective concern should mean a big […]

A recent widely noted New York Times article recounted the many difficulties that Democrats are having getting their preferred candidates to run in key races in 2002. Many prospective candidates are backing off from running because they believe that the current war against terrorism will make it too hard to run a strong campaign. The […]

What is “the third way?” According to the joint declaration by Tony Blair and Gerhard Schröder (“The Third Way/Die Neue Mitte”), it is “about addressing the concerns of people who live and cope with societies undergoing rapid change–both winners and losers. In this newly emerging world, people want politicians who approach issues without […]