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Saturday, November 27, 2004

Deanocratic National Committee Horse Race Update
Posted by Jill | 8:05 AM

MyDD gives us an interesting update on the race for DNC chair, which is shaping up as a showdown between the Clintonistas, who still delude themselves that Clinton won because of them, not because he just happened to be the most charismatic politician of our time, and the Deaniac reform movement.

Eleanor Clift comes down on the right side of the angels.

The irony of this split between the Clinton/DLC wing and the Dean/progressive wing of the party is that Dean isn't the second coming of Joe Hill that the media has made him out to be. As governor of Vermont, he has a decidedly centrist record, particularly on fiscal affairs, something the Democrats ought to, but have so far failed to, make hay of in this age of profligate borrowing and spending on the part of the Republicans. Dean is regarded as a radical simply because of being the first major national figure to come out against the Iraq War (and he has since been proven right), and the first governor to sign a gay civil unions bill.

I've heard enough Republicans say after the election that they were relieved Bush didn't have to run against Howard Dean that I'm skeptical he would have been as bad a nominee as conventional wisdom indicated. Yes, Rove would have blasted him on the "in good enough shape to ski but not to serve his country" meme, but is that any worse than what they did to John Kerry? At least Dean would have had the stones to fight back, something Kerry didn't -- and his campaign never recovered. Still, if we want to take as a given that Bush would have cleaned Dean's clock just for the sake of argument, heading the DLC would give Dean exactly the bully pulpit his innate passion and fire were made for.

The question is whether the Democratic Party even WANTS to be reformed. This race is shaking down as something no less for a fight for not just the future of the party, but its very existence. The party hacks seem perfectly happy with sipping the few dregs of wine from the bottom of the glasses and nibbling the dried and curling brie left from the Republican corporate money feast. They get paid, what do they care if they lose all the time? The problem is that the people have run out of patience, and there's only so long they can get away with it.

The other aspect to this race is its impact on the right wing's favorite obsession: The Hillary In 2008 factor. I'm still not convinced that Hillary is planning to run, but even moderate Republicans are hyperventiliating with panic attacks already. I think Hillary is a decent senator and a bright woman, but she's such a polarizing figure that whether the venom is justified or not, she's a goner before she even starts. And her vote for the Iraq war shows she doesn't have the stones to fight back either. So to me, any DNC head that sends a message against a run by Hillary is A-OK by me. We can no longer afford to keep losing. Creeping fascism won't wait forever.

Historically, the DNC is about generating money, and Terry McAuliffe is from all accounts a master at emptying the pockets of fatcats -- at least what's left after they've finished donating to Republicans. A Dean-based DNC would probably shift the focus away from corporations to the grassroots. Both the Dean and Kerry campaigns (the latter helped largely by Deaniacs being good soldiers -- something we won't do again) showed that you can generate a ton of money from individuals if they believe what you stand for. Arguably, the Kerry campaign showed you can do it even if they don't KNOW what you stand for. But with the Republican Party increasingly blatant about being corporate America's bitch, this can only allow the Democrats to position themselves as being a real alternative...for a change.
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