Embracing the Center, Without Losing the Wings

A week ago California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger suggested in that the Republican Party ought to of "move a little to the left" in order to grab some more voters. Arthur Chrenkoff disagreed with Arnold's reasoning, arguing that any votes gained would be offset by losses from the far right. I'm a big fan of Arthur's and a regular reader of his blog, but I have to disagree with him here. There's consistent evidence that a strong candidate running from a centrist position, like Arnold Schwarzenegger or Rudi Giuliani can capture new voters from the center/left without losing much of the party's right wing.

Some of this is just a matter of statistical distribution. If the distribution of voters along the traditional political spectrum approximates a standard bell curve, a big assumption but a reasonable one, a shift towards the center will gain far more votes from the fat part of the bell curve that it can ever lose from the right hand tail of the distribution. But this is not the critical point, however, as the goal should be, as Schwarzenegger stated, to expand the appeal of the party and hold on to conservative voters. The key is to move away from candidacies based upon specific issues and positions.

In truth, no candidate wins political office without winning votes from people who disagree with at least some of his or her stated positions. Every candidate must win the trust of people who hold differing views. These voters trust the candidate to respect their democratic rights, to assure that their views are heard and seriously considered, and to be supportive of the winning position whatever it may be. An election victory is not a free pass to do whatever you wish with the country; leadership is not dictatorship. Executives must deal with legislatures, legislators have to deal with the executive branch, and with each other. Everyone is accountable to the voters. Centrist candidates generally don't run on ideologies, but rather as skilled managers of this boisterous system, who can lead people of varying viewpoints to an agreement, and as open-minded protectors of the people's interest.

There is nothing here to threaten conservative voters. If their positions can muster support a centrist candidate ought to get behind them. This isn't "softness" on the issues, this is democracy at work. Here in California we have experience with legislators and governors who refused to accept the peoples' wishes, and we've developed an overactive initiative system as a result. We also tossed out a governor recently. Arnold really didn't run and win on a specific slate of issues and positions. He got votes because he seems to be listening, and he's willing to drive the democratic process in CA, without demanding upfront a specific result.

His comment from last weeks interview seems a bit off-the-cuff and I would have preferred that he didn't say "to the left", because that's not really what is needed. If we think instead about broadening the appeal, focusing on leadership toward common objectives, we can have the 5% gain Arnold looks for and more.