The Closed Party Vs. the Open Party

I keep finding myself referring — both on this blog and social media — to this 2007 Tony Blair quote:

And the real dividing line to think of in modern politics has less to do with traditional positions of right versus left, more to do today, with what I would call the modern choice, which is open versus closed.

That divide identified by Blair instructs today’s David Brooks column. Brooks sees the old, left-right, big government vs. small government divide passing away:

Trump’s only hope is to change the debate from size of government to open/closed. His only hope is to cast his opponents as the right-left establishment that supports open borders, free trade, cosmopolitan culture and global intervention. He would stand as a right-left populist who supports closed borders, trade barriers, local and nationalistic culture and an America First foreign policy. …

I personally doubt that Trump will be able to pull off a right-left populist coalition. His views on women and minorities are unacceptable to nearly everybody on the left. There’s no evidence that he’s winning over many Sanders voters or downscale progressives.

But where Trump fails, somebody else will succeed. And that’s where he’s substantively revolutionary. The old size-of-government question was growing increasingly archaic and obsolete. In country after country the main battle lines of debate are evolving toward the open/closed framework.

If you don’t like our current political polarization, wait 10 years. One way or another it will go away. When the frame of debate shifts to open/closed, sometime soon, the old coalitions will smash apart and new ones will form. Politics will be unrecognizable.

Among the supporting data points in a new PRRI/Brookings public opinion survey:

— 55% of Americans believe “the American way of life needs to be protected against foreign influence,” including 74% of Republicans.

—  Nearly 60% of white Americans say “they are not comfortable being around immigrants who speak little or no English,” with roughly two-thirds of GOPers expressing discomfort.

— While nearly 60% of Americans “oppose building a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico,” some two-thirds of Republicans favor it.

— 47% say “immigrants today strengthen our country because of their hard work and talents,” while 43% say “immigrants are a burden on the country because they take jobs, housing, and health care.” Yet 65% of Republicans see immigrants as a burden.

— 52% say free trade agreements with other countries “are mostly harmful because they send U.S. jobs overseas and drive down wages,’ including 60% of Republicans.

— And then this on taxes: Almost 70% of Americans support increasing the tax rate on Americans earning at least $250,000 per year. But here is the real shocker: “Currently, a majority (54%) of Republicans express support for increasing the tax rate on Americans earning at least $250,000 a year—an 18-point increase from 2012.”

Taking both the above data and the results of this year’s presidential primary process, it’s not hard to both parties splintering into definable closed and open factions (followed by the sort of “recognizable” transformation Brooks refers to.) What sort of agenda might bridge those factions, at least on the right, or even be the basis of some new fusion party? Maybe something like this. I also wonder how the Silicon Valley political ethos, given the growing cultural power and political awareness of the tech sector, might play into all this.