Asymmetric partisan confidence

Josh Marshall makes an observation about a mass-psychological aspect of the asymmetric partisan polarization that is such a central part of American politics (Why Are Dems Nervous? Because They’re Dems. TPM 08/31/2020):

We are now waiting to see the upshot or impact, if any, of the two successive national party conventions. The general consensus was that the Democrats did very well. Then last week – at least as I was hearing it – many seemed to think that the Republican convention was more effective than Democrats anticipated. Suddenly the tide seemed to shift. I felt some of this myself. I have no idea which of these is true. But I can offer one observation that I’m pretty certain is accurate. It’s born of years of experience watching elections.

Regardless of the objective realities, Democrats will consistently anticipate loss or worry about loss while Republicans will consistently be confident of victory. This is a good rule of thumb regardless of the objective realities of the moment, to the degree they can be known. This is not an absolute of course: overwhelming odds will buoy Democrats and hopeless situations will nudge Republicans to despair. But in general this is almost an iron law of political psychology in the United States.

Any public opinion trend this broad has a lot of mixed motives. But the pessimism of the Democratic base is part of the party's duck-and-cover instincts in the face of Republican attacks:

The Democratic establishment, especially since the 1990s, has struck a defensive posture in relation to the Republicans to the point of adopting Republican framing of issues, e.g., we're better at balancing the budget than Republicans. That's not something neither the Republican base or much less the Democrats' own voting base actually care about. But Democratic politician adopted a defensive posture rather than counter with their own defense of Keynesian stimulative policies. This habit of the Democrats is something to which the linguist George Lakoff called special attention. (Framing the issues: UC Berkeley professor George Lakoff tells how conservatives use language to dominate politics UC Berkeley News 10/27/2003)

Eugene Robison offered a version of this Democratic worry just this week in a column called Scared that Trump can come back to beat Biden? Good. Washington Post 08/31/2020: "Anyone who is hair-on-fire alarmed that President Trump might lie, cheat and steal his way to reelection should hold on to that attitude through Election Day. Joe Biden is much more likely to win if he and his supporters act as if he’s losing."

So there is a rational side to that tendency. Republican base voters are older and more likely to vote than those of the Democratic Party. So the Democrats have a very practical reason to motivate their voters with the threat that Republicans may win. But promoting that worry in a general way isn't nearly as important as setting up effective get-out-the-vote operations and maintaining local party organizations to coordinate such things.

But Robinson departs from the duck-and-cover posture by suggesting that Biden and the Democrats rely heavily on their own framing aimed at mobilizing their base:

Biden also needs to go to Michigan and remind voters there that he and Barack Obama saved the auto industry, while Trump has failed to keep his promise to revitalize the manufacturing sector. And yes, by all means, he needs to go to Wisconsin to underscore the fact that he, unlike Trump, opposes violence from both the far left and the far right.

And in all of these states, Biden also needs to make clear that he understands the reality of structural racism and the need to eradicate it once and for all. Hillary Clinton would be running for reelection right now if African American turnout in 2016 had been higher in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Detroit and Milwaukee.

Another factor in this contrast between the parties is that white authoritarians are heavily attracted to the Republicans, and a large part of their base is distinctively authoritarian. To them, it's obvious the Republicans should win and they are more likely to take their own preference as reflecting those of a righteous majority. While the Democratic Party not only relies on many of the same big donors as the Republicans. Many of its more vocal and visible advocates take positions that are socially liberal on issues of race, gender, and religion, but more conservative, even explicitly conservative, on economic issues. The larger group of the Democratic voters, though, are people who expect the party to fight for issues important to them and deliver important benefits. And their often-justified pessimism about the party's willingness to do that generates a lack of confidence in and enthusiasm for the party and its candidates among that latter group.

Progressive Democratic Sen. Ed Markey, who is facing a much more conservative Congressman Joe Kennedy III in a primary election tomorrow, has an ad that makes a clever counter to Kennedy's understandable use of the brand value of his dynastic name.

It invokes the famous line from President Kennedy's Inaugural Address in 1961, "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." That's a classic invocation of the need for collective action and even sacrifice for the common good. And it was in the context of themes like the technological race on space travel, which the successful Soviet Sputnik satellite had generated alarm that Americans were losing.

Markey's ad at the end turns that saying on its head, putting it in the context that people do have legitimate demands for their government to meet their real needs. He uses the need for common commitment to criticize Trump's response to the COVID-19 crisis. "But when crisis hit, Trump's government abandoned America. We asked what we could do for our country, they looked for what they could take." It ends with, "We asked what we could do for our country. We went out, we did it. With all due respect, it's time to start asking what your country can do for you."