Why Dems strike out like the Cubs
Why Dems strike out like the Cubs
BY ANDREW GREELEY
Copyright by The Chicago Sun Times
July 21, 2006
The national Democratic Party is just like the Chicago Cubs. Both organizations are lovable losers. Come to think of it, neither is all that lovable anymore. Both have become just losers.
For the Cubs we used to blame the Wrigleys. Now we blame Tribune (as it calls its corporate self). We used to blame stingy salaries. Now they pay good salaries and still lose. Through the years since Frank Chance, they have let people go to other teams, where they do better. Not only have they utilized all the traditional ways of losing, they have invented highly original ones -- like messing up young pitchers. They disgrace the city, their loyal fans (a matter of faith as Cardinal George once said) and baseball.
The Democratic Party has elected three presidents since the death of FDR -- John Kennedy, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton -- and only Clinton was re-elected. (Presidents Truman and Johnson were re-elected after succeeding presidents who died in office.) They have served up to the American people such losers as Adlai Stevenson, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, Al Gore and John Kerry. Carter won by a close vote (against the man who pardoned Richard Nixon) and became a loser the day he took office. None was very lovable, with the exception of Stevenson, who had to run against a war hero.
The Democrats sealed their doom at the 1972 convention when they threw out Mayor Richard J. Daley and union leader George Meany, cutting themselves off from their working class and urban ethnic bases. Since then Democratic leaders (mostly from the East Coast) have been so concerned with feminist activists, gay activists, African-American activists -- though not with Latino activists -- that they have lost any sense of their own identity. They don't ask themselves where the activists will go if they don't vote Democratic. Nor do they give a hoot about Catholics, the second largest minority in the party, because they conclude the "Catholic vote" is an anti-abortion vote.
Now they've apparently decided that the war is not to be an issue in the fall. Surveys show the Republican president and Republican Party are unpopular with substantial majorities of Americans. Almost two-thirds of Americans think the war is a mistake, a substantial majority believes it wasn't told the truth when the war started and about half favor an immediate schedule for withdrawing the troops. As the situation in Iraq deteriorates, opposition will grow. It is the critical issue on which the Democrats can win.
So what will the amiable losers do? They'll do their best to keep the war out of their campaigns. They won't emphasize the deliberate deceptions, the terrible mistakes -- not enough troops, inadequate training of the troops, lack of planning for the postwar months, incompetent U.S. civilian administrators, ignorance of fractured Iraqi society, torture, cover-up, numerous civilian deaths, rape, murder (sometimes involving soldiers who should never have been sent to Iraq), the decline of U.S. prestige around the world, the increase in the number of potential terrorists, the resilience of the Taliban because the Iraq mess has distracted American leaders from Afghanistan. Above all, the senseless deaths and maiming of young American men and women in a war that was doomed to defeat before it began, young men and women who were at risk because Mr. Cheney and Mr. Rumsfeld wanted a war to demonstrate American power and because the president didn't like Saddam Hussein.
Why won't they campaign on these issues? Because they fear that Karl Rove will accuse them of "waffling," defeatism, dishonoring the dead, pessimism, betrayal of promises, supporting the enemy, lack of patriotism and treason. Why won't they campaign against preemptive wars based on Cheney's 1 percent doctrine -- if there's only 1 percent chance of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, we take them out?
The flag-draped-coffins spat illustrates their propensity to lose. Republicans screamed that the ad was in bad taste, and the Democrats withdrew it. Is it not worse taste to pretend that Americans are not dying in Iraq in a futile war? Apparently not. Candidates who cave in at the threats of name calling or are afraid to fight back by telling the truth don't deserve to win. And they won't win. The Cubs have their billy goat curse, the Democrats are cursed by their own cowardice.
BY ANDREW GREELEY
Copyright by The Chicago Sun Times
July 21, 2006
The national Democratic Party is just like the Chicago Cubs. Both organizations are lovable losers. Come to think of it, neither is all that lovable anymore. Both have become just losers.
For the Cubs we used to blame the Wrigleys. Now we blame Tribune (as it calls its corporate self). We used to blame stingy salaries. Now they pay good salaries and still lose. Through the years since Frank Chance, they have let people go to other teams, where they do better. Not only have they utilized all the traditional ways of losing, they have invented highly original ones -- like messing up young pitchers. They disgrace the city, their loyal fans (a matter of faith as Cardinal George once said) and baseball.
The Democratic Party has elected three presidents since the death of FDR -- John Kennedy, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton -- and only Clinton was re-elected. (Presidents Truman and Johnson were re-elected after succeeding presidents who died in office.) They have served up to the American people such losers as Adlai Stevenson, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, Al Gore and John Kerry. Carter won by a close vote (against the man who pardoned Richard Nixon) and became a loser the day he took office. None was very lovable, with the exception of Stevenson, who had to run against a war hero.
The Democrats sealed their doom at the 1972 convention when they threw out Mayor Richard J. Daley and union leader George Meany, cutting themselves off from their working class and urban ethnic bases. Since then Democratic leaders (mostly from the East Coast) have been so concerned with feminist activists, gay activists, African-American activists -- though not with Latino activists -- that they have lost any sense of their own identity. They don't ask themselves where the activists will go if they don't vote Democratic. Nor do they give a hoot about Catholics, the second largest minority in the party, because they conclude the "Catholic vote" is an anti-abortion vote.
Now they've apparently decided that the war is not to be an issue in the fall. Surveys show the Republican president and Republican Party are unpopular with substantial majorities of Americans. Almost two-thirds of Americans think the war is a mistake, a substantial majority believes it wasn't told the truth when the war started and about half favor an immediate schedule for withdrawing the troops. As the situation in Iraq deteriorates, opposition will grow. It is the critical issue on which the Democrats can win.
So what will the amiable losers do? They'll do their best to keep the war out of their campaigns. They won't emphasize the deliberate deceptions, the terrible mistakes -- not enough troops, inadequate training of the troops, lack of planning for the postwar months, incompetent U.S. civilian administrators, ignorance of fractured Iraqi society, torture, cover-up, numerous civilian deaths, rape, murder (sometimes involving soldiers who should never have been sent to Iraq), the decline of U.S. prestige around the world, the increase in the number of potential terrorists, the resilience of the Taliban because the Iraq mess has distracted American leaders from Afghanistan. Above all, the senseless deaths and maiming of young American men and women in a war that was doomed to defeat before it began, young men and women who were at risk because Mr. Cheney and Mr. Rumsfeld wanted a war to demonstrate American power and because the president didn't like Saddam Hussein.
Why won't they campaign on these issues? Because they fear that Karl Rove will accuse them of "waffling," defeatism, dishonoring the dead, pessimism, betrayal of promises, supporting the enemy, lack of patriotism and treason. Why won't they campaign against preemptive wars based on Cheney's 1 percent doctrine -- if there's only 1 percent chance of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, we take them out?
The flag-draped-coffins spat illustrates their propensity to lose. Republicans screamed that the ad was in bad taste, and the Democrats withdrew it. Is it not worse taste to pretend that Americans are not dying in Iraq in a futile war? Apparently not. Candidates who cave in at the threats of name calling or are afraid to fight back by telling the truth don't deserve to win. And they won't win. The Cubs have their billy goat curse, the Democrats are cursed by their own cowardice.
posted by Carlos T Mock at 8:04 AM
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