Posted on 02/08/2005 9:41:03 AM PST by areafiftyone
A few weeks ago, when former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean declared his intention to run for chairman of the Democratic National Committee, news reports had the general tone of "Get this, that crazy scream guy is back, and he wants to run the party." Now, days before the vote, his victory is a "fait accompli." How did this happen? Are Democrats suicidally crazy?
Wait. That's too easy. Let me rephrase the question. Why are Democrats suicidally crazy?
The conventional rap against Dean as DNC chairman is essentially the same as the conventional rap against him as presidential candidate a year ago. Namely, he reinforces all the party's weaknesses. Democrats need to appeal to culturally traditional voters in the Midwest and border states who worry about the party's commitment to national security. Dean, with his intense secularism, arrogant style, throngs of high-profile counterculture supporters and association with the peace movement, is the precise opposite of the image Democrats want to send out.
The conventional rap is completely right. But, in a way, Dean is even less suited to run the DNC than he is to run for president.
The DNC chairman has two main jobs. First, he transmits the party's message -- an important role when the party lacks a president and majority leaders in Congress. This job requires one to master the dismal art of "message discipline," boiling down the party's ideas into a few simple phrases and repeating them over and over until they have sunk into the public consciousness.
It's a role for which Dean is particularly ill suited. During his campaign, remember, he fashioned himself a straight talker, delighting reporters by repeatedly wandering "off message.'' On the plus side, he won friends in the media by appearing honest and human. On the negative side, he did himself enormous damage, when, for example, he suggested that he wouldn't prejudge Osama bin Laden until he had been convicted in a court of law.
For presidential candidates, the negatives of "straight talk'' usually outweigh the positives. Paul Maslin, Dean's former pollster, wrote in the Atlantic Monthly after the campaign fell apart: "Our candidate's erratic judgment, loose tongue and overall stubbornness wore our spirits down.'' But at least for a presidential campaign there are some positives in going off message. In a job like party chairman, a loose cannon is nothing but downside.
The second major task of the DNC chairman is to run the party organization. And here, if this is at all possible, Dean looks even worse. Garance Franke-Ruta, who wrote sympathetic Dean pieces in the American Prospect during the campaign, spoke with several former Dean staffers. One called the candidate "a horrible manager'' and added, "I wouldn't trust him to run a company.'' Another called his management style "just a disaster.''
Dean, remember, raised about $50 million by positioning himself as the most anti-Bush candidate, but blew through it so fast that he was nearly broke by January. This represents the sort of financial acumen you associate with deluded, flash-in-the-pan celebrities, not with chairmen of major political parties.
So, how did Dean manage to trounce all comers for this position? Dean's supporters see his triumph as the victory of the masses over a tiny Democratic elite desperately trying to cling to power. As one left-liberal blogger gloated: "The fact that Howard Dean will most likely be heading up the Democratic Party is our victory. It is the voice of the grass roots lifted up into the halls of power once owned by the aristocracy of consultants.'' That actually has it backward. A recent Wall Street Journal poll found that only 27 percent of Democrats approve of Dean.
In the latest issue of the New Republic, Ryan Lizza described how Dean had prevailed in a process of third-rate intrigue. The choosing of the DNC chairman has been dominated by state parties, whose concerns revolve around expanding perks, including a demand for a $200,000 handout for each state party from the national party. Nobody seemed to pay much attention to the good of the party as a whole. Meanwhile, Dean touched those leaders' ideological erogenous zones, promising to "feed our core constituencies'' and not be "Republican-lite."
As the last election showed, the core constituencies are plenty well fed. There just aren't enough of them to win the White House.
Jonathan Chait is a senior editor at the New Republic.
This is interesting when you think the Clintons don't like him-I thought they more or less controlled the DNC. However I love it! This helps our side!
(steely)
DemicRATS have terminal diarrhea and they are selecting Ex-Lax as their national remedy.
Heil Dean!
I don't really know how I feel about Dean getting the DNC Chairmanship---
I know that I am rather naive when it comes to politics, but I just wonder if the is a "why" that we don't know about. In other words, we are all happy about it, but at the same time, wondering "why" would they choose him, when they themselves have to know what a loser he is?
I don't want to be lumped in with the tin foil hat crowd, but I don't get it--with Hildebeast just waiting for election season to start, what is in it for her? Is she gonna run as a maverick in the Dem. party---be more centrist, moderate than even the party chair?
I'm sure someone smarter than I may know---but I don't really want to find out on the day AFTER a Hillary election for President win!
I think the D's are in a bit of a pickle. Looks like the GOP in about 1973. But at least we had Reagan waiting in the wings....the D's have....Dean and Hillary and an ever leftward-lurching base.
Dick Morris suggested the plan was for dean to wreck the party and then the dems before 08 would being bill and hill to save them and hand the strings to them.
I had previously though that we would see a backroom effort to put down dean because the Clinton's are not people to leave anything to chance and if Dean would get lucky for a year or two that would wreck 08 for them.
So it appears that dean walks in to the most powerful Job in the democratic party
The article cited bloggers intimateing that dean will blow out part of the old guard one can only wonder what they expect him to expel -- Ted Kennedy, John Kerry and those that put him down?
I guess we will see how this now plays out.
Well, the Dems' real weakness is that they're treating it all as a marketing problem.
Sure, politics is in many respects a marketing enterprise; however, it's supposed to be a matter of selling your position to voters, and not a matter of defining your positions to attract them.
The R's are doing better right now, precisely because they're mostly holding firm on their historical platform, whereas the Dems are thrashing around for a way to attract voters without mentioning their platform (which appears to be driven by abortion, primarily).
I still stay its money. The Dems wanted to tap into Dean's source. He made tons and I mean tons of money off of the ultra left internet crowd. What better person to bring in money for the DNC. The Dems have been dying to get their hands on that money flow since he dropped out of the race but he refused to give it up. He must have told them I want a piece of the action before you get a hold of my sources.
Dean will make a wonderful albatross.
Of course it will all be Karl Rove's fault somehow.
Don't you know that if a dim sneezes, it was Karl Rove that sprinkled the pepper in the air?
Dean won't raise money like McAwful could. He doesn't have the contacts to big money. Maybe, maybe he can tap into the college students to have them donate $20-$50 again, but as DNC chair, he will be forced to have self-discipline. He can't say things that will annoy too many Democratic office holders. So, he will either be a loose cannon or a party loyalist. Either way, he will annoy somebody. In fact, I don't think he will even last until the 2008 primaries. McAuliffe made the position of DNC chair a PR position. In the past (and in the GOP) this position was fundraising and logistics. Dean just will not be able to raise money and will turn off long-term donors. I think 2006 will be a blood bath. The Dems are tapped out from 2004 and Dean will say enough stupid things to turn off even the true believers.
You may be right and that money is the issue--
If that is the case, then I will say YAY, cause what Dean brings IN in money, he will LOSE in running his mouth---
The dems may really regret this, because whenever I have watched Dean, he seems to get more arrogant and more unstable, the more attention he gets, and like the article says, the DNC Chairman has the most power in the Dem. Party--this little man will puff himself up and start strutting himself around and his mouth is gonna get the dems in trouble--
I agree "follow the money" is a smart investigative maneuver, but I think the Dem party is in such tatters that nobody respectable wants to lead it at this point. I am still stunned that Bush didn't win by a larger margin but blame the press for one-sidedly portraying news as "Dems good, Republicans bad" for the past 3 decades.
The Dean money is a drop in the bucket compared to the Soros/other tycoons supporting the party. I think they squoze every dollar out of the peacenik crowd in '04 and that wouldn't have kept them on par with the Republican fundraising. I also think the clintons are aging rapidly and don't pose the threat they once did. I don't think Hillary has a chance to be president in this lifetime.
LOL..These are brilliant.
I'm in the minority here, but he scares me.
His appearance on MTP a while back was very reasoned, much more appealing than McAwful.
If he can continue to put forth that image, he'll be a real threat.
If he does wander off the reservation with comments about how he hates all Republicans, then he's the bonanza most see him to be.
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.