It had all the makings of a Hollywood classic - drama, suspense, surprise, despair, defeat, and victory. This was not, however, a film. It was the United Kingdom's recent election, one of the most surprising in recent years.
The May 7 election had a seemingly predictable plot - one that the pundits and the polls followed in a predictable way. But the anticipated ho-hum election was upended when exit poll results rolled in on election night, and many supposedly safe seats in the House of Commons were lost. In true dramatic form, party leaders stood before teleprompters, supporters, and a stunned nation to humbly accept defeat.
While the shock value of the UK election provided fodder for the media, the unexpected plot twist also sends a message to presidential candidates here in the United States as the 2016 election approaches.
The Labour Party's leading man, Ed Miliband, will shoulder most of the blame for his party's decisive loss. What was once a respected moderate political party in good standing under the leadership of Tony Blair veered left during Miliband's campaign, using partisan tactics to drive the Labour Party off course. In a mere six-week campaign, the country seemingly tired of the divisive path Miliband chose, and voters went another route.
The Liberal Democrats were all but obliterated during the election. Their politics, which stand far left of center, failed to resonate with voters, and their leader, Nick Clegg, stepped down after failing to win sufficient votes.
David Cameron maintains his role of prime minister. But some argue that rather than voting for Cameron, constituents voted against his opposition. Lacking a clear message, and having failed to establish clear goals, Labour and the Lib Dems could not convince the voting public to put them in charge. The impact of running a campaign without creating a clear set of goals is perhaps most clearly illustrated in a quote by a Londoner, Peter Hamlin, who told The New York Times this:
"I think the general feeling is that maybe they had a hard job to do, and they kind of did it OK, and maybe it is time to give them a shot and maybe a shot on their own without liberals getting in the way of their policies."
In other words, he felt there was no better option.
The parties in Britain will scrutinize the electoral plot twist and draw their own conclusions about what happened. From where we stand, it seems pretty clear: The British were tired of watching legislation languish and watching politicians "getting in the way" before the election. During the campaign, the British public couldn't identify with any one particular party, due to all of the parties' muddled or absent goals. They felt alienated by the partisan politics at play during the campaign.
Our 2016 presidential candidates can avoid a similar exciting but unnecessary conclusion by taking note of what drove voters to "give up" or vote "against" particular parties. Integrating a bipartisan approach to leadership into the campaign will give any candidate an edge. Indeed, 63 percent of Americans want their elected leaders to work across the aisle, and to create credibility among candidates. We watched a British candidate project a partisan message for only six weeks, yet go on to lose significantly and take many of his partisan colleagues down with him. How would our candidates fare after 18 months of consistent partisan messaging?
Instead, our candidates could avoid a repeat of the UK experience by focusing their campaigns on goals and objectives. They should provide a clear pathway to their intentions, so that voters will know who and what they are voting for, not against. No Labels, a Washington-based, bipartisan organization, is developing a National Strategic Agenda supported by more than 40 members of Congress to address the nation's most urgent problems - issues the next president must tackle. The agenda's four goals, based on national polling data are: creating 25 million new jobs over the next 10 years; securing Social Security and Medicare for another 75 years; balancing the federal budget by 2030; and making America energy-secure by 2024.
We hope U.S. candidates who have learned the lesson of the skewed 2015 UK elections will embrace these goals to clarify the issues Americans should consider before voting. We are just settling in to watch our presidential campaign play out - there's no need for a UK sequel.
(AP photo)
