February 6, 2005
IT'S THE TRUTH, THEY JUST THINK IT'S HELL:
The Dems' Week from Hell: They're in a hole, and they keep digging. (Noemie Emery, 02/14/2005, Weekly Standard)
THE DEMOCRATS' WORST WEEK AND a half since Black Tuesday (November 2, 2004, when the U.S. election returns came in) began on January 18, when Barbara Boxer took on Condi Rice in the Senate, and ended on Black Sunday (January 30, 2005, when Iraq held its first free election). In one comparatively short window of time, the Democrats managed to exhibit all of the class, grace, wisdom, presence, good sense, and strategic and tactical brilliance that had allowed them to move from absolute parity after the 2000 election to the loss of the House, Senate, and White House in the 2004 election, and left them apparently poised to lose even more. You too can turn yourself into a loser if you study and follow their recent behavior, and the cases to look at are these...
Actually, the week since may have been worse: opposing Alberto Gonzales, picking Howard Dean for DNC chair, and the widely-ridiculed Democratic response to the State of the Union were all indicative of a Party that's trying to destroy itself, mostly in a fit of pique at George W. Bush.
MORE:
Dean 'The Scream' is Dem gravedigger (Michael Goodwin, 2/05/05, NY Daily News)
The Democratic Party died yesterday after a long, painful lack of direction. Born in 1792, it was the second-oldest political party in the world, after the Tories of Great Britain. But it suffered decline for years and finally succumbed to complications brought on by elitism and anger. The cause of death was officially attributed to an obstruction lodged in its leadership.Posted by Orrin Judd at February 6, 2005 10:17 AMOkay, as Mark Twain might say, reports of the Democratic Party's death are premature. But come Feb. 12, they won't be.
That's the day Howard (The Scream) Dean is likely to win the job of national Dem boss. It's also the day the party ceases to be a viable alternative to George Bush.
How did it happen that the party of Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson and Clinton became irrelevant to the majority of Americans? How could the "party of the common man," as it first called itself more than 200 years ago, become out of power and out of touch?
The easy answer is that, like all social nightmares, this one happened because good people did nothing as the virus spread. So while there is much dissent from the party faithful, most of it is in private.
In public, there is silence from those who know that Dean will take the party over the cliff and into an abyss of fringe liberalism that has no foundation in the American populace. Dean and the extremists he represents shouldn't even be allowed to call themselves Democrats. Deaniacs is what they are.
Like the band at a bar mitzvah or wedding reception, the Democrats are playing the tunes the people who pay the bills want them to play.
The money for the DNC comes from queers, the Hollywood reprobates, George Soros and the hate-America trustfunders like Katrina Vandenheuvel and now, Arianna Huffington.
Why is anyone surprised at the staggering level of stupidity in their positions and puerility in their behavior?
Posted by: Bart at February 6, 2005 11:33 AMDean's selection is a sympton of the party's decline, but the party chair has no power to make or break the party.
Meanwhile, Bart's comment gives me a hook (ok, more of a minimal excuse) to tell the following story: We were in New York this weekend. Yesterday, as I was leaving our hotel, I saw signs directing guests to the "David McCabe bar mitzvah." There's America in a nutshell.
Posted by: David Cohen at February 6, 2005 12:07 PMWatching Tim Russert dissect Edward M. Kennedy this morning on Meet the Press gives you a general idea about how weak the Democrats' proactive positions are as far as the war on terror or Social Security reform. Kennedy had virtually nothing constructive to offer on either issue, and I thought he was going to get up and come across the table in sheer frustration when Russert put up a list of items -- most of them inconsequential pork-barrel stuff-- that the senator deemed more of a crisis than long-term Social Security reform.
However, I will have to admit that Sen. Kennedy was right about one thing -- Patriots over Eagles. Big.
Posted by: John at February 6, 2005 12:09 PMIf Cab Calloway could sing 'Minnie the Moocher' with his band at his grandson's bar mitzvah, anything is possible.
As Don King, not a Jew(not yet anyway), would say, 'Only in America, baby! Only in America!'
Posted by: Bart at February 6, 2005 12:10 PMJohn:
I'll post the "crisis" transcript as soon as I find it--that was hilarious.
Posted by: oj at February 6, 2005 12:13 PMOJ:
Thanks for planning to post it, since I have to admit I was channel flipping between Russert's vicious use of logic on the Massachusetts seantor and watching Rumsfeld tear a couple of new ones into Thomas Friedman and the brother of President Bush's ambassador-designate to Japan on "Face the Nation" this morning, when they tried to state some Democratic talking points as facts. Less informative, but way more fun than Russert's discussion with Rummy (done about an hour before the scrum on CBS).
Posted by: John at February 6, 2005 1:09 PM"The money for the DNC comes from queers, the Hollywood reprobates, George Soros and the hate-America trustfunders like Katrina Vandenheuvel and now, Arianna Huffington."
Actually, this year the money for the DNC came mostly from average working Americans like me; straight, trustfundless and never having met any of the people you seem so preoccupied with. What breathtaking arrogance, elitism and ignorance.