ENOUGH OF THE THREE G's, WHAT ABOUT MY THREE B's?:

Democrats & culture issues (Bruce Reed & Ed Kilgore, 12/13/2003, UPI)

Since every move the Bush White House makes -- on the war, late-term abortion, taxes -- is designed to drive new wedges into the electorate, every Democrat had better have a survival plan for Wedgie World.

Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean recently went to South Carolina to explain his plan for dealing with divisive cultural issues: change the subject. Appearing on Fox News Sunday, Dean was asked by Chris Wallace about the meaning of his stock-speech line: "I am tired of coming to the South and fighting elections on guns, God and gays. We're going to fight this election on our turf, which is going to be jobs, education and healthcare."

The heart of Dean's reply was: "Why can't we talk about jobs, healthcare and education, which is what we all have in common, instead of allowing the Republicans to consistently divide us by talking about guns, God, gays, abortion and all this controversial social stuff that we're not going to come to an agreement on?"

We're not sure which is more doomed to fail -- the naïve hope that if we just change the subject, divisive issues will go away, or the condescending idea that Americans who care passionately about "all this controversial social stuff" should move on and care about something else.

As Clinton showed time and again, the way to deal with divisive issues is to actually deal with them.

One of the things that's going unnoticed as Mr. Dean claws his way to the top of the dwarfpile is what a lightweight he is. Even setting aside how far his campaign is out of the mainstream of middle America, Democrats have to be worried about how badly he's handled himself each time one of these dustups has occurred.

Posted by Orrin Judd at December 14, 2003 7:35 AM