The Morning After ... Blues

 As we write, the newsboys are standing on the corners shouting, "Wuxtry! Read all about it! Blue wave swamps billionaires' yacht! Getcha morning paper!"

Which is to say the the November 2025 election appears to be good news for the Democratic Party and correspondingly bad for the Republicans. This appearance is purely arithmetical, in the sense that it is attested by votes counted and estimated. While no doubt encouraging, it is by no means clear -- nor could it be at this preliminary stage -- that the results will actually conduce to strengthening the Democratic Party or weakening the grip of Trumpism on America.

Two of the most heralded victories of the moment, for example, are those of Zohran Mamdani in New York City and Abigail Spanberger in Virginia.  Neither of these is surprising in itself. Mamdani was the Democratic nominee in a city where Democrats enjoy a powerful historic advantage, notwithstanding the Giuliani years. Spanberger was the Democratic nominee in a state where governors must stand down after a single term, and are most often chosen from the party that does not hold the White House. (She was also running against a Black woman in the South.) So neither victory was inherently unpredictable.

The more interesting point, as pundits observed often during the campaign, is that these are two very different varieties of Democrat. New York's mayor-elect is conspicuously young for the job, at 34. Although born in Africa, he was raised in the cushiest and New-Yorkest of confines, among the Upper West Side's academic and artistic elites.  His politics certainly lean left, as reflected by his decade-long affiliation with the Democratic Socialists. He is a Muslim. Also -- and perhaps most interesting to both readers of this blog -- he worked on the unsuccessful 2017 campaign of our friend and seminary classmate, the Rev. Khader El-Yateem.

Spanberger is 12 years older than Mamdani. In matters of faith, she is something called "Protestant Unspecified," which we imagine means as religious as her constituents need her to be in the moment. Born in New Jersey but raised in Virginia, with a background in federal law enforcement and intelligence, she has cut a considerably more conservative pose. After the Dems' 2020 election losses, she famously argued that they had suffered because Republicans were able to accuse them of "socialism," as well as because of the poorly-phrased call to "defund the police." She went so far as to propose that no Democrat should ever use the word "socialist" again.

Clearly, these two Democrats are shaped differently, both by their life experience and by the constituencies they serve. While it is certainly true that America's two principal parties are by nature complex and often unwieldy coalitions, it is also fair to ask how easily these two leaders, or their respective supporters, will be able to collaborate on policy and governance.  This is not a new question; the co-existence of conservative Democrats and liberal Democrats is as old as the party. But in a time when Republicans are so very ascendant, and so very averse to be caught compromising with the other party, it will be impossible for Democrats to make headway except by working closely with each other, even when their convictions and constituencies differ deeply.

Looking for analogies on the other side of the aisle, we recall that the Paleo-Cons and Neo-Cons of old managed reasonably well despite some fundamental differences. Yes, the Tea Party was the bane of John Boehner's life, but he was also able to make common cause with them against the ACA, and even to promote the career of a TP leader.  More recently, though, there appears to be an impassible chasm between the radical Republicans aligned with President Trump and virtually the entirety of the party's old guard.  Even the late Dick Cheney, than whom few Republican leaders could be called more Republican, and whom this blog pilloried with zeal during his vice-presidency, cast his last vote for a Democrat. 

Put plainly, Republicans unwilling to endorse both Trump's extreme policies and his chaotic personal style find themselves as impotent at the moment as Democrats, if not more so. Democrats are feeling good indeed this morning, as well they might -- but their ability to continue feeling good, and above all to govern effectively, may come to depend on their ability to do what the Republicans currently cannot and do not need to: work closely even when they disagree.