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Tavis: As chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Senator Charles Schumer is widely credited for helping Democrats take back the Senate for the first time in 12 years. He is now a member of the Democratic leadership in the Senate, and author of the new book, “Positively American"

Tavis: Glad to have you on. I should mention to you, Friday night we had your roommate on this program. George Miller was our guest Friday night.

Schumer: He's a good man, and he's my landlord.

Tavis: (Laugh) Yeah.

Schumer: He's not just a roommate, he's the landlord.

Tavis: We had a good conversation about that. So many people, of course, saw the big story in "The New York Times" about the four of you who lived together down in Washington. I said to him, "That must be some kind of "'Animal House.'"

Schumer: Yeah, well, one of the columnists in "The New York Times" labeled me the Oscar Madison. The Walter Matthau (laugh) of the Senate.

Tavis: Well, we're delighted to have you on, no matter what "The New York Times" calls you.

Schumer: (Laugh) Okay, good.

Tavis: That said, to the book. Let me start by asking the obvious question. How did the Democrats lose the middle class, before we talk about how you get it back?

Schumer: Well, I think we started paying too much attention to special interest groups, left, right, and center. Too involved in what went on in Washington. And we really lost in the 1980. We had been in power since Roosevelt, pretty much, even when Eisenhower and Nixon weren't presidents; they played to the Democratic agenda.

And we thought we were impregnable, we couldn't be beaten. And there it happened. Ronald Reagan beat us, but mainly 'cause we stopped paying attention to the voters who had created the Roosevelt Coalition to begin with. And over the next 25 years, the Reagan philosophy, cut government, get it out of your life, has been dominant.

But I would argue, and I do in my book, "Positively American," that that's over. That the middle class is now looking for some help, Tavis, because the world has changed. We have terrorism. We have global competition, where we compete for jobs all over the world. We have our kids competing not just against our own kids, but Chinese and Indian kids.

We even live a lot longer, and people get married later, and maybe don't. Have kids later, and maybe don't. Thirty years of leisure time in retirement. All these things have changed the world, but government hasn't caught up. And I propose that Democrats start talking to average middle class voters about the things that are bothering them. And bring them back into our coalition, and create a big, lasting majority for a generation.

Tavis: All right, to your point now, a lot easier, though, said than done.

Schumer: No question.

Tavis: And since you pegged the Democrats' loss of the middle class, rather, to 1980 and the Reagan administration, the Reagan years, I could argue to you ... and I wanna know what your take is on this. I could argue that that happened in part because of personality, Reagan's, quite engaging, quite charming. I could argue policy. Or I could argue timing. Or I could argue all three.

Schumer: Yeah, well, I think all three are right, but let me give you the policy aspect, just one example. I came to Congress in 1980. Crime was ripping apart my working class district. People were running away from their homes. Crime was just rampant. And I got to Washington to try and do something about it, and what did I find?

That the ACLU was writing, not just at the table where they should be, 'cause civil liberties is part of crime legislation, but writing the legislation. And their view was, let a thousand guilty people go free, lest you convict one innocent person. It was so out of touch with people that we gave Reagan the opening. We should have been doing smart things about crime. We were doing nothing about crime.

Tavis: Okay, that's the policy piece. Let's take, then, the personality piece. And I don't wanna belittle this. This is significant. Reagan was a powerful personality, as was a guy named Bill Clinton. Here we are now, 2008, if you can't sell it, ain't nobody gonna buy it.

Schumer: That's true, but I would argue this. There are certain elections where policy matters more than it does in others. I would argue that the 2008 election does, because the average middle class voter ... and by the way, I call them Joe and Eileen Bailey. I have a fictional middle class couple in my head. I've talked to them for 15 years. They're not real, but they're real to me.

One of my press secretaries once told the press I had imaginary friends. But the Baileys are your typical middle class couple. He makes about $50,000. He's an insurance adjustor. She makes about 20; she works in a medical office. And they really are looking for some change. They want government to help them for the first time.

And I think the personalities are gonna be there, but they're not gonna mean as much. Or let's put it like this. Personality without a platform this time ain't gonna make it.

Tavis: All right, what about the third issue I raised, about timing. Is the timing right?

Schumer: Yes, the timing is right. People are looking for change. George Bush has given us a tremendous opening. And as you know, Tavis, in 2006, I led the charge to take back the Senate, but we had George Bush to kick around. And people voted against him rather than for us. Now, they're open to our message. That's the timing. But we gotta seal the deal with a message that matters to them.

It can't be Washington talk, it can't be partisanship, it can't be just what the special interest groups are interested in. It's gotta talk to Joe and Eileen Bailey, and that's why in the book, I have the second half of it's called the 50 percent solution, where I propose 11 goals that we're gonna promise the middle class we will accomplish in 10 years.

And they're all goals that they would like. Whether it's raising math and reading scores by 50 percent, cutting property tax by 50 percent, even reducing deaths by cancer by 50 percent, all of which we can do. And I lay it out, I think, in very readable, almost story like prose, as to how you can do it.

Tavis: Speaking of the prose laid out in the book, tell me more. I've seen the book, but those who've not, tell them more about how you share that story with this family, the Baileys, that you've created in the text.

Schumer: Well, I tell everything through the Baileys. I think the last thing in the world ... and as you said, the messenger is almost as important as the message. And if it was just sort of very professor and academic-like, people would sleep. But the Baileys are an interesting group, couple. And a family. And the people around them are interesting.

And we talk about how, as they go through life, things have changed for them, and how government can make it better. So, it's mainly anecdotal. It's different, for instance. We talk about reducing pornography on the Web. And there's somebody in the book, very liberal person, who all of a sudden calls me up one day and says, "You better get pornography off the Web."

And this person had been to the left of me, and beaten me up for not being liberal enough. I said, "It's a woman with two kids in the suburbs." I said, "Why are you calling, what's going on?" She said, "Well, my 10 year old was on the computer, looking at pornography." And these changes have occurred. Now, we have a novel approach to deal with that.

We don't want to limit adults. But we go after the credit card companies, 'cause pornography, if you wanna buy porno on the Web, you gotta pay for it. And we say the credit card companies can't do that unless they verify that the payer is over 18.

Tavis: Tell me how, in the text, and more importantly ... with all due respect to your book, in the text, but more importantly in real life, that is to say in Congress, where you serve, tell me how you strike a balance between getting this notion right that there is a role for government to play in our lives, but that government can't do everything, nor ought it be expected to.

Schumer: Well, you've hit the nail on the head. We have to find things that government can do. My books, the 11 goals in "Positively American," the subtitle is "Tavis: I hear your latter point, which raises this question. Since we, you in this case, think you know what the American public wants, specifically what American families need ... and I'm the last guy to argue with you, given that you won back the Senate for the Democrats. (Laugh) So I'm not gonna argue with you. But what makes you-

Schumer: And let me, Tavis, let me say something. I haven't lost an election. I beat Al D'Amato. I got 71 percent of the vote in 2004, a record in New York State, where 40 percent of the people who voted for Bush affirmatively crossed the line and voted for me, and I helped take back the Senate. You know how I did it all? By talking to the Baileys. I've been doing it for 15 years, and now what I wanna do is share my ideas with the party.

Tavis: Ah. But see, I say this in jest, you'll get the joke, obviously. That's the problem with you New Yorkers. You think you know everything. So the Baileys are a New York family. Tell me what makes you think you've got the prototype family in America?

Schumer: We say in the book, the Baileys of New York could be the Jensens of Roseville, (laugh) they could be the Rodriguezes of Aurora, Colorado. They're suburban, they're middle class, they're the swing voters, they're the plurality. The most frequent voters we have. And in 2004, the last presidential election, the Baileys voted for Bush by 22 percent, and that's why we lost.

And so we gotta start talking to them. And I hope, Tavis, that the presidential candidates, senate candidates, will rip off these ideas and use them. I wrote it out of anguish that we don't have a platform. No one's talking about a platform. And if it's just personalities, you know what happens? The Republican tactics are sharper and better, and they win. We have an opening now, and it can be an opening for a long time, if people will take it.

Tavis: Speaking of anguish, here's something personally. I get a chance every now and then on this program to grind my own axe. This is something I've been anguished about for years, and I must say, you are the first White guy that I've ever heard say this, or certainly heard say it in recent memory, and I want to pat you on the back just for saying this.

It's a quote from the book, and I read: "We were competitive among the middle class, voters with household incomes between $30,000 and $75,000, only because of near-unanimous support among middle class African American voters. And that support from African American voters at all economic levels has a lot more to do with three decades of the Republican Party's exploiting White racism to win elections than it does with any great Democratic Party achievements." Finally, somebody White said that.

Schumer: You bet. Well, that's the truth. I try to tell the truth in the book. And we have to do much more. I say this. I'm talking to the Baileys, but that is not pushing things aside. And when I don't agree with the Baileys, I tell them, but I talk in their terms. I'm a big advocate, as you know, Tavis, of affirmative action. The Baileys are metze-metz.

They're not negative, they're not positive. But I tell them why we need it. The Baileys actually are against gay marriage. I tell them why the anti-gay marriage amendment's a bad idea. But I don't talk to "The New York Times" or the "L.A. Times" editorial board when I do it. I talk to the Baileys. And they understand it. When I had to deal with impeachment in the race against D'Amato in 1998, could have tripped up many a Democrat.

Again, by talking to the Baileys, I succeeded. I wish, I hope, I pray that my party starts talking to the Baileys again, and we won't be a 51 percent majority. That's what George Bush tried to build. We'll be a 60 or 65 percent majority.

Tavis: In the book, Chuck Schumer talks to the Baileys. Now he wants to talk to you. You can have that conversation with him by picking up a copy of his new book, "Positively American."

Schumer: Great to be with you, Tavis. Hope to do it again.

Tavis: Thank you, sir.

Schumer: Take care, now.