Political scientists believe that a slim majority of Americans are just to the conservative side of center in their political beliefs.
As the Republicans have been cast as conservative and the Democrats as liberal, it is therefore not surprising that since 1952 Republicans have been in the White House 36 years and the Democrats 20 years.
Even though no Republican could define what a is a liberal, the pejorative use of the term has been an effective negative branding tool for the Republicans (Talk of the Party, by Sharon Jarvis).
It is likewise quite difficult to define what is a conservative. Despite the fact that the English language has the most words of any language (more than five million, compared to 50,000 Chinese characters) we still have difficulty defining ourselves and objectively stating our beliefs.
It is remarkable that since 1952 we have gone to the moon, carry around Blackberries, do heart transplants, boil water in microwaves and blog on the Internet, yet we can not fully state who we are!
In an attempt to understand what is a Repbulican and a Democrat, I watched with fascination the recent CSPAN airing of the presidential nominee acceptance speeches since 1956.
I was able to watch Johnson, Humphrey, Ford, Bush I and Reagan. Unfortunately, I missed Eisenhower, but I pretty much know what Kennedy, Nixon, Carter, Clinton and Bush II have said in their speeches.
It is amazing how constant the Party themes are. Barack Obama's acceptance speech was almost word for word from Lyndon Johnson, and John McCain's paralleled Gerald Ford's speech.
The constancy of messages was so striking that I recorded the most commonly words for both parties and compared them to the words employed by Obama/McCain in their speeches. Amazingly, the same words appeared time after time and although they may be difficult to define, these words must actually represent the beliefs and goals of the respective parties.
What follows is a listing by party of the most commonly used words I recorded in the acceptance speeches, presented side by side for understanding the contrasting message by party:
Republican Democratic
Liberty Freedom
Country Society
Rights Justice
Responsibility Integrity
Prosperity Opportunity
Family Mankind
War, Threats Peace
Fight Compromise
Security Education
Evil, Religion Love
Tax, Spend Assist, Encourage
Guns Health, Jobs
Wealth, Business Creativity
Caution Optimism, Hope
At first some of these words may seem wrong and others preposterous, but think a little longer about your vocabulary and you will find which party you belong in.
Note that Democrats have been accused of tax and spend whereas the Republicans actually do so, thus some words have double meanings.
As Americans, we may not be able to precisely define who we are, but looking at our recent political history we seem to fall in one political camp or other and for lack of better terms: liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican.
The Republicans tend to center around the individual, wealth and security. The Democrats center around humanity, freedom and opportunity. There is some of each of these concepts in all of us, so it is little wonder that most of out elections are decided by a narrow margin.
Once in a while a president or candidate will deviate to the extreme of the message and become very unpopular, as with George W. Bush, Nixon, McGovern and Goldwater.
Unlike George W. Bush the President (not the campaigner of four and eight years ago), John McCain is back on Republican message and thus no surprise that he is running 50/50 with Obama, who is also staying on Democratic message.
The pundits and ads will try to distort the message but in the end, if the candidates stick to the old message, we will vote true to form and it will be another close election.
