"Everything is pointing to a pretty big Democratic victory if attitudes toward Congress remain as negative as they are and attitudes toward President Bush remain as negative as they are. It's hard to imagine any way that wouldn't happen."
Thus spoke Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center, presumably before regaining his senses and recalling that Democratic leaders once again have met the enemy, and it is, of course, themselves.
It’s not at all hard to imagine how they could take the looming certainty of “a pretty big Democratic victory” and snatch it from the jaws of that selfsame victory, since the party’s power players, whenever they can stand the sight of each other, convene on how best to splinter both strategy and resources.
It has been reported that “Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), who is leading the party's effort to regain majority status in the House, stormed out of [Howard] Dean's office [earlier this month] leaving a trail of expletives.”
And why did the DCCC chairman storm out of the DNC chairman’s office in less than wholesome form? Because the former’s strategy of short-term trench warfare in critical battlegrounds met head-on the latter’s strategy of long-term party-building as an affordable luxury, and the latter wouldn’t budge.
Many hardcore and especially left-leaning Democrats love Howard for his outspoken rambunctiousness. He possesses a directness that borders on innocence -- a rare commodity in this age of politicians saying nothing not tested in common-denominator-seeking focus groups.
That is to his credit. But Howard also has a knack for reading the situation wrong. His own presidential campaign quickly flowered into a textbook study in what not to do, particularly when it comes to spending money. He raised -- and blew -- a phenomenal amount of cash in record time, dreaming all along of general-election grand strategy rather than next week’s bloody battleground.
His opponents didn’t. They stayed in the day-to-day trenches.
We are now spectators at a trench warfare vs. broad strategy rematch, one of only slightly different form.
Newspaper reports speak of the “tension that has pitted Democratic congressional leaders, who are focused on their best opportunities for electoral gains this fall, against Dean and many state party chairmen, who believe that the party needs to be rebuilt from the ground up -- even in states that have traditionally been Republican strongholds….
"Howard Dean … has … sent money he has raised to state parties for party-building” -- and here’s the key -- rather than funneling that money into targeted Congressional districts.
That’s a mistake, big-time, as Veep Cheney would say. And for once he’d be right.
Naturally state chairmen want the cash for local purposes, but those targeted districts that could unseat the House’s majority are the only ones that count -- for now.
Predictably, RNC chairman Ken Mehlman is on target, saying “in an interview that most of [the money his party has raised] would go to help embattled Republican Congressional candidates, a show of financial force that could frustrate Democrats in their search to win control.”
In short, it won’t be a fair or pretty fight if Republicans pour a mound of cash into those places it counts, while Democrats spread their resources hither and yon in pursuit of an unattainable 50-state organization.
Howard, you’re wrong. Rahm is right.