The result is depressingly thin progressive-policy gruel. In the measured words of beltway blogger Matt Yglesias, "There are a variety of issues that [Third Way] have nothing whatsoever to say on, and what policy ideas they do have are laughable in comparison to the scale of the problems they allegedly address."
Let's go back to that first question people have when Third Way rears its little gopher head: Who are these people?
Leading the way at Third Way is its 43-year-old founder and president, Jonathan Cowan. There is only slightly more information about Cowan available online than there is about his go-to national security guy Payne. What we do know about this would-be power broker is that he cut his political teeth as a staffer for Democratic California Congressman-turned-lobbyist Mel Levine. At 27, Cowan co-founded Lead ... or Leave, a mid-'90s curio of youth activism that raised hell over the deficit by protesting in favor of entitlement reform on the steps of the AARP's Washington offices. In the second Clinton administration, Cowan was a deputy director at Andrew Cuomo's Housing and Urban Development. He would later boast that while at HUD he worked to "blow up public housing," some of which was replaced with upmarket private condos. Cowan then went on to launch Americans For Gun Safety, a Washington-based gun-control advocacy group that briefly tag-teamed with the ascendant Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence.
It was at AGS that Cowan built a reputation as a messaging tactician for Democratic policies. Along the way, he networked like hell and hired Jim Kessler and Matt Bennett, both now vice presidents at Third Way.
Third Way launched just after the Democratic defeats in 2004. At the time, the group lacked its current eagerness to embrace the "progressive" label while distancing itself from the politics of Blair and Clinton. Shortly after Third Way's launch, John Harris of the Washington Post described, without controversy, the organization's mission as "using moderate Senate Democrats as the front line in a campaign to give the party a more centrist profile." The analysis that led to this strategy was a founding mission document titled, "The Politics of Polarization," penned by two veterans of the New Democrat Network, William Galston and Elaine Kamarck.
As Guy Saperstein wrote on AlterNet in 2007, the essay is based on the dubious argument that because self-described conservatives outnumber self-described liberals, Democrats must move right and avoid advocating "polarizing" progressive policies. In other words, let today's deranged conservatism define the placement of the coveted center, instead of doing the hard and necessary work of dragging that center left. Saperstein argued:
What "The Politics of Polarization" and Third Way choose not to do is precisely what made the conservative movement so effective: Challenge the existing status quo and educate the public about a new vision. What "The Politics of Polarization" and Third Way fail to do is precisely what progressives need to do: Change the underlying terms and norms of political discussion.
Whether Third Way's political vision is defined by caution bordering on cowardice because it genuinely believes this is the way forward, or whether they are merely doing the bidding of those paying their office rent and salaries, doesn't really matter. When an organization that masquerades as part of a progressive coalition injects a policy paper into the health care debate that could have been written by a mischievous insurer's group and then nervously claims it didn't really mean it, that organization deserves scorn and ridicule.
Which isn't to say there should be no role for Cowan's group of former gun-controllers and national security experts, who may or may not also be food photographers in Chicago. Adam Green of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee leaves open the possibility that Third Way could find a useful role in Democratic politics by reinventing itself as an animal with ambitions better suited to its size and talents.
"Third Way actually could have a constructive role in the movement, if they stuck to designing policy ideas and talking points on wedge cultural-divide issues like abortion and guns," writes Green. "Third Way's role should not be to push [these] wedge issues as they often do in a quest for relevance. " ¦ Instead, Third Way should recognize that their relevance comes from getting the ideas ready and sitting back and waiting ... being ready to go if Democrats are put on defense."
As they dust off their old gun-safety position papers, Third Way staffers should retire from debates over civil liberties, war and health care. If they insist on saying something, at the very least they should scrub their Web site of the word "progressive." This would help avoid any future misunderstandings.
Alexander Zaitchik is a Brooklyn-based freelance journalist and AlterNet contributing writer.
à © 2009 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/140998/
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