August 4, 2004
WHEN IT'S ELECTION TIME YOU LOCK THE LEFT IN THE ATTIC LIKE A CRAZY AUNT:
The End of Republican Rule: Righteous populism holds the key to vanquishing Bush forever (Rick Perlstein, August 3rd, 2004, Villagew Voice)
Talking heads flap their mouths: about whether and how the Clintons will "overshadow" the nominee; about how (in the absurd, astonishing words of New Republic editor Peter Beinart) "liberalism is on tap virtually every night," stuffing up an activist-run party's "self-congratulatory echo chamber." About how many sentences of his speech John Kerry wrote himself.This is the audience the convention planners seem to play to. They respond predictably to words like "safer" and "first responder" and "daughter"; a keyword search reveals the phrases showing up 30, eight, and 23 times. Not so much to words having to do with official government malfeasance—which is why, strangely, John Kerry's single greatest achievement as senator, forcing Congress to face up to the Reagan administration's crimes negotiating with Iranian hostage-takers and sending the proceeds to death squads in Central America, was not mentioned at all.
No, this convention was supposed to make us feel good, be relentlessly positive. The theme was unity: national unity, party unity.
Niceness is nice. It makes a body feel good about himself. But it's no strategy with which to win a presidential election. Adlai Stevenson was nice; he lost two presidential elections for the Democrats. Michael Dukakis, Jimmy Carter: They were nice. And look what happened to them.
These days, talking about things like the growing gap between the rich and the rest of us is judged not very nice. Fixing it might require breaking some eggs. The pundits would call it "class warfare." So whenever a concession is demanded in the interests of unity, it will be demanded of the party's left wing, never of the corporate types.
Like the time, Tuesday night, one party liberal—this one—returned to find his seat occupied by one of those blue-suited thirtysomethings. I asked him to give it up. He refused. "We gave lots of money to the Democratic Party," he said, and demanded I sit in the aisle. "It would be shameful if I couldn't get a seat."
It was on behalf of all those poor single women who don't vote and who really hold the explosive power for beating George Bush on November 2, 2004, that I refused to give up my seat.
Poor Friend Perlstein, bad enough he hasn't gotten over the Sandinistas losing, but after expending all that energy a few weeks ago wondering how Christians could support a President who'd sinned, here he is stuck explaining how a liberal can support a party that just put on a stage show of Triumph of the Will. Posted by Orrin Judd at August 4, 2004 10:32 PM
How long do you think the phrase "poor single women" will roll around in Perlstein's mind before he makes the connection between "poor" and "single".
Posted by: Robert Duquette at August 4, 2004 10:53 PMA government structured around propping up its most dysfunctional members isn't likely to be a majority proposition.
Posted by: oj at August 4, 2004 10:58 PMPerlstein a Democratic "party liberal"? Isn't he a member of the Working Families Party?
Posted by: Matt Murphy at August 5, 2004 2:16 AMTriumph of the Won't, more likely.
Posted by: Barry Meilsin at August 5, 2004 2:26 AMIt was phony, the whole convention was phony, everybody in the country knew it was phony. Did your buddy get his seat back?
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at August 5, 2004 2:29 AMFirst, you would think that the left, appreciating the difference between "sanctimonious" and "nice", would realize that Jimmy Carter ain't nice.
Second, the "first responder" rhetoric was one of the Dem's key mistakes. It plays well to the base and to the firefighters' union, to whom Kerry owes a lot, but it reminds everyone else that "responders" need something to respond to. In other words, this one phrase makes people think about 9/11 (good for the President), on the fact that there haven't been any domestic attacks since 9/11 (good for the President), that we're in danger (good for the President), and that we'd rather go get the terrorists in their homes than have them come get us in our's (good for the President).
Posted by: David Cohen at August 5, 2004 7:43 AMGuys, how do you know what I do or don't think about the Sandanistas?
Posted by: Rick Perlstein at August 5, 2004 9:39 AMJohn Kerry's greatest triumph was outing the Contras? Do reporters know anything about history?
Posted by: jim hamlen at August 5, 2004 10:38 AMRick:
"John Kerry's single greatest achievement as senator, forcing Congress to face up to the Reagan administration's crimes negotiating with Iranian hostage-takers and sending the proceeds to death squads in Central America, was not mentioned at all."
Ever refer to George Washington and the American rebels as "death squads"?
Posted by: oj at August 5, 2004 11:12 AMre: "death squads"
Another example of how media bias isn't overt, but in the mindset that would consider a phrase like "death squad" to be a neutral and objective description. Note how in Iraq the tactics are much more deadly, and yet the media carefully refers to them as "militants" or "insurgents".
Posted by: Raoul Ortega at August 5, 2004 11:28 AMNext time somebody tries to take my seat at a ballgame, I'll defend it for poor single women. Then I'll write about it in a newspaper. That'll defeat George Bush!
Funniest thing I've read in a long time. Perlstein is a good (if unintentional) joke.
Posted by: Casey Abell at August 5, 2004 12:08 PMI'm looking for a good, conservative appraisal of Admin. policy re: Latin America in the 80's.
Any of the Brothers here got links they'd like to share?
Needed for the conservative-liberal wars on the MB I frequent.
Posted by: M Ali Choudhury at August 5, 2004 1:27 PMAli:
I liked this one:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0080405622/juddsbookreviews
Posted by: oj at August 5, 2004 2:07 PMDo I have to choose who to dislike between Stalin and Hitler, too, or can any of you wrap your mind around the concept that the Contras and the Sandanistas were BOTH unsavory?
Marynollingly along,
Rick
Rick:
So you've opined that FDR supported death squads and castigated him for it? Or you supported the same death squads as Reagan? I'm afraid you're losing me.
Posted by: oj at August 5, 2004 3:48 PMMr. Ortega;
It won't be long before the label "death squad" is applied to any armed group sponsored by the Iraqi government that engages the terrorists in Iraq.