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CBS...........The Democratic Party Is Choking

Mike

Well-known member
Do Democrats Fear Winning?
CBS News ^ | March 6, 2008 | Dick Meyer



The Democratic Party is choking.

Facing nothing but open field ahead, the team can’t get the ball in the end zone. The incumbent Republican president’s unpopularity is historically high. The country is opposed to the Iraq war and worried about the recession. Gas prices are heading toward $4 a gallon. John McCain, the Republican nominee, is the oldest presidential nominee in history.

But the Democrats can’t score. They’re not even on the field yet. They’re still stuck in the locker room of the primaries, bickering.

The veteran offensive line, the Clintonistas, won’t block for the young players at the skill positions, the Obamists. They have the ball and are perfectly poised to fumble.

In sports, there are always “gimme the ball” players, the super-confident stars who want the ball with three seconds left in the game. Clinton and Obama want the ball, alright, but the rest of the team doesn’t really want to win or know how to win. They’re choking.

This is pretty much the natural order of modern politics.

When I first started covering national politics for CBS News 23 years ago, the Democrats were coming off an especially inept performance in the 1984 campaign. The “Atari Democrat,” Gary Hart, was the man of new ideas and a disposition inclined against the party’s interest group establishment. Walter Mondale was the establishment. They bled each other through a long primary season and establishment managed to keep Hart down. The voters kept Mondale way down in November.

Since then, the party has continued to create rules (proportional representation) that encourage long, bloody primaries.

What’s very different about 2008 is that the Democrats in 1984 really never had a prayer against Ronald Reagan. In 2008, conditions are perfect for a Democratic victory. Only the hapless Democrats could blow this lead.

The primary campaign is now guaranteed to run for a few more months. Considering that the campaign basically began full-time in late November 2004, this has been by far the longest nominee selection marathon in history. It is a race that will likely sap the strength and enthusiasm of a once excited and bloodthirsty electorate of Democrats and independents. Despite the fact that there is not an especially wide policy gulf between the two candidates, the party could be divided when the primaries are over. Certainly the winner will be bloody against a healthy John McCain.

One obvious, but politically incorrect and cynical point is that it was always a very high-risk proposition for the party to nominate a woman or a black. As historically significant and uplifting as it is to shatter an old and embarrassing barrier, it is a risky way for a political party to seize power. No one has a clue what will happen with a white woman or a black man at the top of the ticket. But sending an unknown brand of warrior into battle against a uniquely weak enemy doesn’t make sense if you’ve been losing a long war.

Nor does carrying on with a flawed, Byzantine nomination process that encourages divineness, manipulation and tediousness.

The Democrats seem to have either a political death-wish or a dire fear of success. Don’t give us the ball, please. We’re happy to be the opposition party.

This begs a question: is there something about contemporary Democratism that is simply unsuited to governance? Is the party semi-dysfunctional because it lacks a philosophic core that is simple, sensible and attractive? Or is it just something about the personality of Democrats?

The country obviously wants an alternative to Bushism. It might well settle for McCainism.
 

Mike

Well-known member
March 6, 2008 -- IF AL GORE can pull himself away from saving the planet long enough, he might want to consider rescuing the Demo cratic Party from the clutches of utter self-destruction.

Campaigning against an unpopular war in Iraq, a sputtering economy and a disappearing dollar, Democrats cannot lose in November.

But wait! They're Democrats!

"The only reason we ever lose is when we beat ourselves," one nervous Democrat grumbled yesterday as the primary dogfight dragged on.

Hillary Rodham Clinton has made it clear she won't quit and no one expects Barack Obama to exit - and so on to the Denver party convention they go, viciously attacking one another all the way.

Forget the red phone for a national-security crisis. Where is the red phone for a political party trying to destroy itself?

And where is the party leader with the respect, stature, wisdom and influence to answer the crisis phone?

Former President Bill Clinton has a slight conflict of interest, not to mention that his wife's campaign now has him sequestered in a secure, undisclosed location until the election is over.

Virtually powerless Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean is a screaming castrato still regarded suspiciously by the party establishment.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who won her post promising the end the war in Iraq? Still waiting for that to happen.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is in a political pickle.

His top two lieutenants - Chuck Schumer and Dick Durbin - are not just split on this matter. They are Clinton's and Obama's loyal seat mates in the Senate and top campaign supporters on each side. Schumer's for Hillary, Durbin for Obama.

Living together as the Odd Couple in a house on Capitol Hill doesn't ease tensions between Schumer and Durbin, aides say.

If Reid picks one candidate over the other, his leadership team collapses and sets off a terrible power struggle in the Senate.

That leaves Al Gore as the only person with the experience to answer the red phone and force a peaceful end to this civil war.

The inconvenient truth is that the red phone is now ringing and Al Gore hears it. The only question is whether he has the guts to pick it up.

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olderroper

Well-known member
Mike said:
Hillary Rodham Clinton has made it clear she won't quit and no one expects Barack Obama to exit - and so on to the Denver party convention they go, viciously attacking one another all the way.
I just read an ongoing soap opera style report last night on why Hillry has to win the prsidential bid. Something about Hillry running the money.at http://worldreports.org/
Arrive at your own opinions. I find it to be more interesting that any soap opera.
 
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