SALON

Friday, May 7, 2010 5:45 PM UTC

Mark Penn is wrong about literally everything

The Pollster Grifter says Nick Clegg's victory will show the power of political independence (and then Nick lost)

By

Topics: British Election, War Room, Media Criticism,

Mark Penn is wrong about literally everythingMark Penn

In addition to being a highly paid charlatan, Pollster Grifter Mark Penn is epically, heroically wrong about everything.

Yesterday, as British voters were heading to the polls, he wrote a wonderful column for the Washington Post. The column is a love letter to the legendary Independent Voter. Penn’s entire argument is predicated on the success of Britain’s Nick Clegg, the leader of the Liberal-Democrat party. Penn says the inevitable, stunning success of that third party will definitively prove that Mark Penn is always, always right when he says that America is full of independents who think about things the same way that Mark Penn does:

Thursday’s elections in Britain could be a harbinger of what is likely to come to America in the not-too-distant future: new movements and even parties that shake up the political system. Cleggmania shows that even the most tradition-bound electoral systems are facing the pressures of rapid change made possible by modern communications. These movements may not win out of the gate, but they will become significant political factors.

And:

Nick Clegg is a dynamic leader who was able to increase support for his Liberal Democrats through the country’s first televised debates. And he set off a firestorm.

And after that firestorm, everyone went back to voting for either the Tories or Labour. Nick Clegg’s Liberal-Democrats (whose platform is basically the Penn ideal of what American Democrats should look like: socially liberal and fiscally capital-L Liberal) actually suffered a net loss of five seats in the UK’s general election.

Later on, Penn moves to the traditional “pox on both houses” portion of the monthly call for a Third Way:

Today, strong reassertions of ideological extremes are taking place in the Democratic and Republican parties; witness conservative and liberal primary challenges arising against incumbents. While the country is moving to the center and record numbers are registering as independents, the Republicans are effectively being driven, and pressured, by Sarah Palin, and the Democrats by MoveOn.org.

Several factors could trigger the growth of these kinds of movements here. The Supreme Court has made it easier to launch massive paid political advertising campaigns; the Internet has made it possible to mobilize millions of voters quickly. From Connecticut to Pennsylvania to Florida to Utah, the pattern is emerging that when the left or right extremes mount a primary challenge, the incumbent can move outside the party — and win. More and more candidates, especially self-funders, are considering the independent option

This is a mantra for the sort of people who write columns in the Washington Post. “Both parties,” we are always told, are controlled by the extremist fringes. America is full of moderates who fall precisely in the middle of those two parties, ideologically.

That’s absurd. There’s party polarization, but that doesn’t mean there’s an extreme-right party and an extreme-left party. You take a look at the roll call vote on the Brown-Kaufman SAFE Banking Amendment and tell me there’s a left-wing party battling a right-wing party.

The Republican Party has proven that in a two-party state, you can let the ideological fringe take over and still win elections about 50 percent of the time. The Democrats have proven that there’s no consistent electoral reward for giving in to the mushy middle.

As Jon Chait pointed out, these hordes of socially liberal, fiscally conservative independent voters are entirely the fantasies of the Washington elite, which is largely made up of wealthy, educated people who do hold those rare views. (Basically the vast majority of these moderate pundits are old-fashioned New England Republicans. And D.C. must have more libertarians per capita than a Rush concert.) A shitload more Americans, in fact, would love to break up the banks and soak the rich and and get free healthcare from the government. But they’re uncomfortable with gay marriage.

Alex Pareene

Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon and is the author of "The Rude Guide to Mitt." Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene More Alex Pareene.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 11 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
New Yorker launches tool by Aaron Swartz to protect leaks: Strongbox, co-created by the late technologist, is an open-source drop box for leaked documents
210 points211 points | 7 comments
vote
New Yorker launches tool by Aaron Swartz to protect leaks: Strongbox, co-created by the persecuted late technologist, is an open-source drop box for leaked documents
149 points150 points | comment
vote
Obstruction will ruin the GOP: Playing politics and abusing the system can excite the extremes, but it's a recipe for long-term political disaster
49 points50 points | 8 comments
vote
Loaded terminology like "entitlements" and "welfare" skews the debate and alters America. How right-wingers use semantic tricks to kill government.
66 points67 points | 23 comments
vote
With the help of Photoshop, artist Yao Lu has made shanshui — traditional ink paintings — of China's landfills
24 points25 points | comment

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations