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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (13305)	10/21/2003 3:26:25 PM
From: LindyBill	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 793698

Here is Sullivan's speculation on the Dem ticket. ________________________________________________ Dream-Tickets Dean-Clark vs. Bush-Rice? Here's a scenario that will likely frighten the White House. Two words: Dean-Clark. It is, of course, way too early to start talk about potential tickets for 2004. But it is not too early to recognize a couple of obvious facts about the Democratic race. Howard Dean is both the easy front-runner, the only man to have galvanized the base, the only candidate to have raised really serious money, and to have provided a simple, clear message: get rid of Bush and move to the center, while coopting the left. At the same time, it's also pretty clear that he's going to have a hell of a job winning over the country as a whole in 2004. He's way too Northeastern for the South and West; he is way too dovish for an electorate concerned about post-9/11 national security; and he's far too prickly to endear himself to anyone but ideological firebrands. And no, he can't take solace from California. To see the Schwarzenegger victory as the harbinger of a populist revolt against all incumbents, including the White House, is a bit of a stretch. It's hard to argue that a 62 percent Republican vote in California presages a Democratic surge and a Dean victory nationwide. And you can see how the White House will portray Dean: the mayor of Vermont, with no foreign policy experience, a man who would have left Saddam in power, would raise your taxes and delegate American diplomacy to Paris. Ouch. At the same time, the White House doesn't seem too worried about General Wesley Clark. He may have leapt to the front of the national polls, but he'll have to win a few front-loaded primaries next year to become the nominee. He's moribund in Iowa, struggling in New Hampshire, and a long shot in South Carolina - the key early battlegrounds. He's also barely a Democrat and has so far developed far more rapport with floating middle class voters than with the party activist base. His campaign has been shambolic so far - losing a campaign manager only ten days ago. His debate performances have been decent, but they certainly haven't been stellar; and he has recently endured a battering from his fellow Dems. Unless Dean stumbles badly or the dynamic of the race changes dramatically, I'd say the odds are against him. But he has a critical element that the Democrats desperately need: some national security credibility and a Southern background. After all, that's why he gained traction at all. So isn't the ideal combination a Dean-Clark ticket with Clark as the vice-president? He'd be Howard Dean's Dick Cheney, the father-figure who reassures nervous centrists that they aren't just electing a crunchy, liberal space-cadet as president in a dangerous, terror-ridden world. Before Clark entered the race, Dean observed that he would make a great running mate. And, from the Democrats' point of view, it's a dream combination: you'd run on conciliating allies, focusing on nation-building in Iraq (which Clark did in the Balkans), cutting the deficit, and providing healthcare to America's children. In an electorate exhausted by the traumas of the Bush presidency, it might be quite appealing. How would Bush respond? He might stick, as he often does, with his familiar team and familiar strategy. And this wouldn't be reckless. Despite the spin about his sinking popularity, he's still the clear favorite next year. He's at 56 percent in the polls - which is higher than Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton at this point in their first term, and both of them won re-election in a landslide. The economy is growing at a faster rate - projected to grow between 3 and 4 percent next year. Jobless claims are now falling; inflation is negligible; his base is committed. He has amassed a huge war-chest in campaign cash and, unlike his father, will have no contested primaries. Scwarzenegger's victory has helped neutralize a big advantage for the Democrats - taking California for granted. As for Iraq, you just have to watch the money. The U.S. is pouring cash into that country - eight times as much per capita in real terms as it did in post-war Germany. There are still plenty of things that can go wrong. But with a new U.N. mandate, more money, slowly improving security and the likely capture of Saddam at some point in the future, the chances are still that Iraq will look better in a year's time than it does today. But it's still iffy. Disaster could still strike abroad. The country is still evenly divided. The raw feelings of the third of the country that is partisan and Democrat are intense. These Michael-Moore reading activists have real energy to get rid of Bush; and, in elections, intensity matters. There may, in the next year, be a bitter cultural fight over a proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage or any marriage-like benefits to gay couples in the U.S. - a fight that could polarize the country still further and push Bush into the arms of his religious right base. The deficits are huge and growing and some voters will be asking why we can spend $20 billion on Iraqi reconstruction, while the states are going bankrupt. If I were Bush, that would be the time to ask Condi Rice to be his running mate. Dick Cheney's role in the first term - teaching Bush how to handle the Washington bureaucracy - has been accomplished. Cheney is not a natural campaigner in an election that will require a ferocious, barn-storming effort. He is in poor health, giving him an easy out. The odds are that Bush will still want him. The Beltway scuttlebutt is that Rice is being groomed to be secretary of state in a second term. But the advantages of Rice are still striking. She is already, in some ways, vice-president. She is the president's closest confidant, best friend and soul-mate. Her role has been to listen in meetings and then talk to the president afterwards about her views and advice. She has had a rocky tenure at the National Security Council, having to juggle the competing egos of Rumsfeld and Powell. But she is admired and trusted. To the country and world at large, she would also be a striking symbol. A black woman a heart-beat away from the presidency would be a cultural breakthrough. The inclusive message it would send not just to African-Americans, but to other minorities would help move the Republicans in the Schwarzenegger direction, where the future lies. Her strong ties to California would be a boon. Across the world, she would become an emblem of an America that is truly democratic, open-minded but also hard-headed in foreign policy and national defence. It would be a fusion of neoconservatism and Arnold conservatism. It would also make for a fascinating race: Dean-Clark versus Bush-Rice. An evenly matched contest of argument, culture, and personality. You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one. andrewsullivan.com

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (13305)	10/21/2003 3:46:58 PM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 793698

Candidates vie over two kinds of Democrats By Thomas Oliphant, 10/21/2003 WASHINGTON I ONLY SEE "GD" in the most average of the average spots, so I really wasn't surprised the other evening to see him hanging at Vinnie's up in Queens, sipping on a Bud, nibbling nachos, his not entirely natural threads wrinkled even when clean, worried as usual about his retired mom who scrapes by with three-quarters of her average income from Social Security. GD is average without effort, not an ounce of pretense, a political consultant's dream -- with John Edwards's hair, John Kerry's chin, Joe Lieberman's wit, Dick Gephardt's eyes, Wes Clark's shoulders, and he fairly exudes a hint of former governor of Vermont. The perfect look, however, masks a basically moderate person. Can't miss, this GD guy -- Generic Democrat -- if only he could get nominated. Naturally, the Bush White House goes nutty at the mere mention of Generic Democrat. It is ridiculous, they say, to pit the president -- a genuine, breathing, regular guy -- against some glorified ideal. The fact that Bush has been losing in the polls to GD for months now has nothing to do with it, I am assured; Republicans are standing on principle and ethics here. While the GOP fumes, few have noticed that Generic Democrat is beginning to stray from his role trying to block George W.'s reelection and has shown up in the contest for the increasingly worthwhile Democratic nomination as well. In the media, the ink, the TV news time, and the buzz usually go at first to his cousin, "RD," almost always to be found in Manhattan. This guy is angry and passionate about whomping the Republicans next year, pretty much intolerant of the shades of gray that sometimes creep into politics. Real Democrat makes more money than his cousin, which makes his economic instincts on the conservative side, but his prosperity frees him to indulge his ideology, particularly about the rest of the world. The two of them can argue quite vigorously about domestic issues -- they are, after all, Democrats -- but even in their vigor there is a tacit awareness that they each hit from the left side of the plate and that their policy differences don't touch on basic values. In foreign policy, things can get much hotter, especially these days. Real Democrat was against invading Iraq from before the beginning; Generic Democrat was inclined to support it. Real Democrat shouts that the postwar chaos and violence prove he was right to oppose the war and prove Bush doctored the evidence to fool people like his cousin; Generic Democrat hates the chaos and the ongoing cost in lives and treasure, but he still believes it is better by far that Saddam Hussein's regime is toast. Real Democrat is almost ready to adopt the slogan of Dennis Kucinich's fringe campaign, that the task now is to get the UN in and the United States out of the broken country. Generic Democrat is in favor of many more allies contributing many more troops and dollars so that we all can finally make this thing work. In the press, the conventional wisdom going back to Vietnam has been that Real Democrat stirs his party's activist soul and that he has a built-in advantage in the early-voting states. Against that grain is the proposition that this wisdom helps explain George McGovern more than 30 years ago but that ever since Generic Democrat has usually been the dominant figure -- in good political years and bad. Last week there was an opinion poll that actually shed light on this perennial tussle, underlining how fluid the race is at the moment. Taken by Stan Greenberg, Bill Clinton's guy in 1992, its horse race results in three early states (Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina) were interesting, but its value in analyzing the Real versus Generic struggle was more so. In Iowa, Howard Dean and Dick Gephardt are neck and neck, with the always important third position up for grabs; in New Hampshire, Dean's advantage over fellow New Englander John Kerry remains substantial; and in South Carolina, next year's new wrinkle that symbolizes a slew of states that vote just seven days after New Hampshire, the initial advantage is shared by Gephardt, Clark, and Edwards. The most interesting poll question, however, was about Iraq -- should the nominee be someone who opposed the war from the start or someone who supported the use of force but turned critical of Bush for failing to get international support. In all three, the latter, more nuanced view (Generic) beat hard-core opposition (Real). The margin was 59-37 percent in supposedly liberal-dominated Iowa and 58-35 percent in New Hampshire (where a third of the sample is independent). Interestingly, the spread was closest, 50-41 percent, in South Carolina, where half the sample was African-American. As always most of the Democratic would-be voters are concerned about the economy, and as many worry about Medicare and Social Security as are preoccupied with Iraq. It may be that Dean merits the famous "front runner" label because of his astonishing fund-raising prowess. His political support, however, is less established. Generic Democrat is probably waiting to see if one of the other candidates (Clark, Edwards, or Gephardt) can figure out how to communicate with him. boston.com