Abstract

Left Out of the Party?

For progressive Democrats, the first year of U.S. President Bill Clinton Administration was discouraging. The President did stay true to his pro-choice promises. He pushed through a better tax scheme. On the big-money items, the budget, trade policies, Clinton has guided his Democratic Party deeper into the pocket of Wall Street. NAFTA and its cause, economic globalization, may lead to the favorite prediction of political analysts: a strategic realignment. In this case, if the U.S. economy, presently zipping along, according to conventional measurements, gets mired in a low-wage cycle, then it's-the-economy-stupid Democrats might find their endeavors to build a middle-class-oriented coalition threatened by working-class voters who bolt.