David Brooks Gets It Right, Again
Angry!
I'm starting to have more and more respect for the NY Times David Brooks. He was right before in what he said about the Democratic refusal to support the Iraqi aid package (morally wrong and extremely short-sighted) and he's right today with what he says about Howard Dean.
Howard Dean is angry, mad as hell and he's not gonna take it anymore! This rage just may propel him to the Democratic nomination but it won't win him the presidency. Americans are turned off by divisive angry leaders and their politics. The only people they motivate are the hardcore base of their respective party, and one can't win a national election by motivating only their base. The Republicans have figured this out, look how quickly they jettisoned Pat Buchanan after their disastrous 1992 convention with his calls for "cultural civil war" and attacks on gays and Latinos.
Unfortunately the Democrats haven't seemed to learn their lesson. Once again we stand at the edge of a yawning precipice, with Dean as our nominee we're going to be practically guaranteed a stunning defeat in 2004 and I don't give a rat's ass how many people Dean can draw to his meetups. It's not your performance in drawing hardcore Democrats to the caucuses and primaries that matters. Its how many of the huge middle in this country that you can motivate and sway to your side that counts and while Democrats may be pissed off at Bush, and I am too, that anger will not win us any elections in 2004.
Dean is the anti-candidate and anti-candidates motivate their base and that's all. They don't win elections on a national scale and they don't sway moderate voters. All-in-all we're headed for disaster if Howard Dean is our nominee in 2004.
11:15:29 AM 
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