Posted on 08/17/2006 11:48:59 AM PDT by neverdem
In the history of the Democratic Party, the election of 1980 looms large: the year the party lost the White House, the Senate, a generation of Midwestern liberals and, in some ways, its confidence that it was the natural, even inevitable, majority party.
Now, that election has a sequel.
Call it the return of the sons: Chet Culver, the Iowa secretary of state and the son of former Senator John C. Culver, is running for governor of Iowa. Senator Evan Bayh, son of former Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana, is organizing and testing the waters for a possible presidential bid in 2008. And Jack Carter, the son of former President Jimmy Carter, has decided at the age of 59 to run an uphill race for the Senate in Nevada, his first foray into electoral politics.
All of them had their political sensibilities shaped, to some extent, by the election that defeated their fathers and began a generation of conservative dominance. The Democratic strategist William Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, described it as the first of “a series of rolling shocks” for the Democratic Party that “started in 1980,” when Ronald Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter, “and really didn’t end until 1994.”
They say their values are the same as their fathers’, but their political approach is adapted to a different time. In one measure of the difference, the elder Mr. Bayh and Mr. Culver were invariably described as liberals; the sons, in recent interviews, avoided the term.
“I find the world just too complex to embrace a single ideological point of view,” Evan Bayh said. Moreover, he argued, conservative strategists like Karl Rove like nothing better than to push Democrats into an ideological corner.
“It shouldn’t be about ideology,” Mr. Bayh said. “It ought to be about practical...”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
That just about sums it up. Bravo!
I didn't go to the link to read the rest of the article. Do they get around to mentioning that Jacko had his butt handed to him?
In short, it should be about ideology.
So their values remain liberal like their fathers, but they will do a better job of lying to the public about NOT being a liberal.
Even worse! Harold Ford Jr.
You are exactly right. Harold Ford Jr. (D) is comparing himself to Reagan.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.