Enemy Combatant
Friday, February 04, 2005
Thoughts Of Chairman How: Why I (Still) Support Dean
A while ago, a colleague of mine gave a deceptively simple explanation of the trick to succeeding at partisan politics. (Okay, he was actually talking about "the trick to succeeding at litigation," but I think the point applies equally well to partisan politics):
Keep the turd in the other guy's pocket.
Whatever your ultimate goal, short- or long-term, you've got to maneuver the discussion/frame the issue in such a way as to keep your opponent off-balance, and hence off-message. The more time and effort he spends swatting away flies, and discussing before the public and press what that awful stench might be, the less he's able to move forward on his own agenda. Bill Clinton -- with all his faults (and despite a few consequent missteps) -- was an absolute master at this, and Howard Dean seems to be pretty damn good at it, too.
Which is why -- right up until the moment when he got "punked" by the news networks, with a sound-engineered "scream" that nobody in the room actually heard at the time -- plainspoken, honest Howard Dean was well on his way to making mincemeat of the Cowboy Cretin. I believe Dean's message would have gone over well, even in the Red(neck) States. In contrast to Dean's candor, Bush's "fertilizer salesman" act might well have emboldened the press to begin comparing the latter's career successes -- and not favorably, either -- with those of Scott Peterson.
Only Dean has the courage and the will to tear the deadwood out of the Democratic Party -- raze the structure right back to its foundations, and start over. We missed the opportunity to have him try to do this while simultaneously trying to win a presidential election; as Chair of the DNC, Dean can focus laserlike attention on this goal, with no distractions.
And I fully understand why Dean's DNC candidacy has the Democratic fatcats quaking in their boots: They're much more comfortable lecturing (rather than listening) to the Party faithful. But it's high time we stop imitating the "soft bigotry of low expectations" we find in the Bush administration, where repeated, spectacular failure earns you promotions and praise. Dean fully understands that that business model doesn't really work in the "reality-based community" we call planet Earth.
