By Mark J. Penn - October 6, 2008

My polling over the years has found that about two-thirds of Democrats define themselves as moderate, while two-thirds of Republicans see themselves as conservative. That polling trend was mirrored in the initial unsuccessful Sept. 29 House vote on the financial bailout proposal: Democrats were divided, with 60 percent of members in favor, while Republicans opposed the measure 2-to-1.

The 228-205 defeat saw the left and right team up against the center, revealing the fundamental unfulfilled divide in American politics today. Centrists viewed it as common sense to shore up the credit markets to stabilize America’s economic condition, which the president and others saw as on the verge of collapse. Yet to the right, it was an unacceptable intrusion by the federal government into the marketplace. And to the left, it was an unacceptable bailout of the rich on Wall Street. Together, they were successful in holding back the winds of change, if only temporarily, as a modified version of the bailout proposal was enacted four days later.

The two-party system works against moderates in Congress: Each side is a fusion of moderate and either left or right elements. So even though voters have repeatedly rejected politics too far to the right or left, the vital center often gets lost in the debate.

Presidential races have for years reflected the same trends. This year’s Democratic presidential primary race was decided by activist-dominated caucuses. In the end, depending upon how you count the Florida and Michigan contests, Hillary Rodham Clinton finished ahead in the primaries by between 40 and 80 delegates. But she was behind Barack Obama by about 160 delegates in the caucuses, especially in red states that are dominated by the most liberal voters, because moderates there tend to side with majority Republicans.

To capture the Republican nomination, John McCain abandoned many of his more centrist, bipartisan initiatives (when was the late time he spoke of immigration reform?). McCain wanted to pick as his running mate independent Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, the 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee, but Republican leaders warned him he would be on his own if he did. So he picked an anti-abortion conservative in Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, energizing his base but losing the middle in the process.

Much of today’s gridlock problems are the fault of President Bush, who in his 2000 campaign pledged to defuse partisanship but who, upon entering the White House, pushed it as far as it could go at every turn. Virtually every initiative that would have required the common-sense center to coalesce has collapsed. Immigration and health care reform have been nonstarters. Energy policy has turned into a patchwork agglomeration of gifts to every region and industry, rather than an effort to steer a clear, national direction. Trade and global economic policy are also a mess because the center could not win out.

And yet, freed from the constraints of the left and the right, and under the right leadership, there is a vital center waiting to enact all of these measures. If Obama wins the presidency, it will fall to him to put together coalitions that would earn congressional support. Yet even the likelihood of expanded Democratic congressional majorities does not ensure success. After all, during his first two years in office, President Bill Clinton enjoyed Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, but conservatives succeeded in 1994 by portraying his first two years as surrender to liberal big government.

During President Clinton’s next six years in office, working with Republican congressional majorities, he achieved partial immigration reform, welfare reform, a balanced budget and significant increases to the minimum wage. While some on the left denigrate these achievements as triangulation, it was actually a centrist government molded by the left and right pulls of Clinton and Republican leaders such as House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, each bound by what centrists in both parties would be willing to pass.

This brings us back to the bailout. Solving this immediate economic crisis is just a first step. America needs reform of energy policy, entitlements, immigration and health care, to name just a few pressing national problems, if it is going to remain competitive with the rest of the world in the 21st century. Free and fair trade represent further challenges.

The nation’s center could probably find solutions to all of these problems pretty quickly. On immigration reform, surveys show voters backing a combination of enhanced border security and tougher enforcement measures for illegal immigrants, combined with an earned path to citizenship. But Congress so far has been too fractured to support any set of comprehensive proposals.

If McCain loses the presidential race, along with the almost certain decline in Republicans’ congressional seats, the party’s centrists would probably be better off forming a new caucus, splitting off from the most conservative GOP elements. Such a centrist caucus would wield considerable power and influence and could be the nucleus of a new party. If the Democrats lose the White House, the party will have to look at reforms that give bigger voice to the centrist voters.

The bailout vote shows both sides the value of a centrist coalition in tackling the sorts of challenges the next president — whoever that is — will certainly face. And it is a warning to both parties that voters are generally moderates, who, if dissatisfied with ideological lurches to the left or right under the next administration and Congress, will in two years bring change of their own to end the gridlock, sweeping in lawmakers driven not by ideology but by the country’s needs.

Mark J. Penn served as chief adviser to President Bill Clinton in the 1996 presidential election and to Hillary Rodham Clinton during her Senate and presidential races. He is the author of “Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow’s Big Changes” (Twelve, 2007).