Turn the Page, Turn the Page!

Turn the Page, Turn the Page!

Turn the page, turn the page! No, not the one you are reading, not just yet. It is the country that needs to turn onto a new page. It is hard to think of an aspect of our political, social, and economic life that hasn’t been stained by all these years of “Conservative Revolution.” Something is very wrong—everywhere. This is the Democrats’ election to lose.

So here is an interesting question: should the Democrats have a party? No, I don’t mean a premature celebration of unity or electoral victory. I mean a political party. There needs to be a far-reaching discussion of what political organization should mean in this country—whatever the results in November. Nominating a candidate is not the same thing as electing one, as David Greenberg points out in his important lead article in this issue. Let’s hope it initiates a debate.

Why, for instance, should there be open primaries? Why should Republicans and independents vote to select the candidate of a party to which they have no commitment, with which they have no identification? Why should Democrats and independents be able to vote in Republican contests? Joining an American political party requires no more than a registration tick, and that itself has pretty limited meaning. Political commitments in a democracy need to be more than a tick.

It would be salutary if politics were more a matter of good ideas overcoming bad ones. After all, a lot of bad ideas has dominated public debate for som...