Party of "Joyous Vulgarity"

There's a great piece in today's Wall Street Journal written by Democrat Dan Gerstein on why Democrats are losing the culture war and being rejected by "red" America (hat tip RealClearPolitics.com):

If the Democratic chieftains in Washington really want a window into why heartland residents are tuning out our party, they should stop huddling with loopy linguists from Berkeley like George Lakoff and just start reading Frank Rich's commentaries in the New York Times. There they will find a perfect distillation of the arrogance and narrow-mindedness that typifies the cultural thinking of our elites--and turns off red-state voters. In the view of Mr. Rich and his acolytes, freedom in our culture has been "under attack" ever since 9/11. Indeed, Mr. Rich has argued that this attack is being led by "new Puritans" who want to "stamp out" all that is "joyously vulgar" in American culture and who are fomenting a "government war against indecency" to get the job done.

Once you get past the absurdity of Mr. Rich's hyperbole--vulgarity, joyous or otherwise, is hardly in retreat--the implications of this mindset and the battle lines it establishes are clear. On one side are the forces of freedom, tolerance, diversity, modernity; on the other those of repression, intolerance, conformity and zealotry. And if you're not exactly enamored of watching titillating stunts and ads at the Super Bowl with your 6-year-old, you're part of the TV Taliban.

In this, the cultural elites are guilty of the very sin of silly oversimplification of which they frequently (and rightly) accuse conservatives. Not all parents who are concerned about the avalanche of crud crushing their children every day are obsessed with SpongeBob's sexual orientation. Nor are they seeking to shred the First Amendment. Most are just looking for a little cooperation from the captains of culture to make the hard job of raising children in a fully-wired universe a little easier.

As a regular consumer of provocative entertainment, I find the attitude of Democratic elites obnoxious, as well as intellectually flimsy. It is more than possible to enjoy "Pulp Fiction" and recognize that it is inappropriate for younger viewers who can't grasp the context. In much the same way, it is more than possible to set some voluntary boundaries for protecting children without sacrificing the ability of adults to consume adult-oriented material.

One can only imagine how insulting our elitism is to the average mother in the exurbs of Georgia or Colorado who might be uncomfortable with open talk of threesomes on "Friends" at 8 p.m. Well, actually, we don't have to imagine too hard, not after John Kerry openly embraced Hollywood and went on to lose married women voters by a margin of 55% to 44%.

The guy makes some great points, but then goes off the rails a little bit toward the end:

The solution to this cultural conundrum is not to go overboard and mimic the "Happy Days" conservatives, whose latest misguided and unconstitutional plan is to regulate cable content. Nor should Democrats go looking for cynical Sister Souljah moments. We should just try to mix a little courage with common sense. For starters, when a foul-mouthed entertainer calls the president of the United States a murderer at a fund-raiser for you, resist the urge to say later that they represent the heart and soul of America.

Or better yet, follow the lead of Hillary Clinton, who is making the progressive case for cultural responsibility better than anyone. Cynics tried to dismiss her recent speech on the issue as pre-presidential positioning. But the fact is that Sen. Clinton has been strong and steady in her advocacy for overwhelmed parents ever since coming to Washington. She's been smart, too: She does not demonize cultural producers, overstate the extent of the problem, or let parents off the hook. She frames the culture's influence as a public-health issue as much as a moral one, and cites research showing the potentially harmful effects of screen sex and violence. And she is honest about the limits of that research, which is why she has joined with Sen. Joe Lieberman in introducing a bill to fund more studies of the electronic media's impact on children.

At the same time, Sen. Clinton is not afraid to make clear statements of right and wrong. In recent comments, she forcefully condemned the sequence in the lurid video game Grand Theft Auto in which a player scores extra points for having sex with a prostitute and then stomping her to death. It says something sad about the Democrats that such a statement could be read as a sign of guts. But it does say something important that one of the left's leading icons is the one stating it. Come to think of it, maybe all that needs to be said about our values vacuum to Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and Howard Dean is: Lay off Lakoff and hire Hillary.

Gerstein clearly hopes, or wants to hope, that Hillary is a true believer in what she's now spouting, as opposed to being an craven opportunist who, like her husband before her, is making a run to the center to try and convince people she's something she's not. I don't buy her act for one minute, and frankly I think this is wishful thinking on Gerstein's part. He wants so desperately for some thoughtful Democrat to come along (his guy Lieberman didn't inspire the voters) that he's willing to ignore Hillary's past to put his faith in her today.