The Dish

Sorry to be flip yesterday. On a more properly serious note: the Gore endorsement is, I think, a Very Big Deal. Above all, it reveals the real struggle within the Democratic Party. In 2000, Gore broke decisively with Clinton and the center. Some say this was pure expediency or just Shrummery. I actually think it was genuine. Gore has emerged in these last few years as a real left-wing populist. He wants to soak the corporations, enlarge the welfare state, raise taxes and stand up for minority civil rights. He’s also a Bush-hater for understandable personal reasons. A man who has spoken for MoveOn is a natural Dean supporter and his endorsement, when you think about simply the issues, is an obvious one. What you are seeing among the Democrats right now is therefore a classic right-left split, with the Clintons representing the right (and the party establishment) and Dean emerging as a left-wing threat to their power (using the web to foment his peasants’ revolt). Gore ran against Clinton last time (it’s what lost him the election, in my view); and it makes perfect sense for him to join the anti-Clinton insurrection now. Hillary’s positioning as a hawk might even have been a pre-emptive strike against Gore-Dean. So we have a real ideological split here, and the future of the Dems as a mainstream party is at stake.

THE POLITICS: What’s in it for Gore? As John Ellis points out, a lot. You have to remember that just because almost everyone else on the planet thinks Al Gore’s political career is over, Al Gore doesn’t. By endorsing Dean now, he stands to get a major job in a potential Dean administration. Secretary of State? Supreme Court Justice? Who knows what elaborate scenarios Gore has been contemplating in his own mind. And if Dean goes down in flames (which must surely be the likeliest eventuality), Gore has allied himself with the energized, leftist Democratic base, and could position himself in 2008 as the real soul of the party – unlike that centrist opportunist, Senator Clinton. In fact, the minute after a Bush re-election, the Gore-Clinton struggle for control of the party begins again in earnest. To my mind, this is somewhat delusional of Gore. No sane political party would ever give him another chance at the presidency, after he threw it away with such spectacular incompetence in 2000. But all politicians have to be a little delusional; and Gore is nothing but a politician. For Dean, this kind of endorsement helps build momentum toward inevitability. And it also marks the first time that a major establishment figure has essentially blessed the new forces of web-based anti-war upper-middle-class activism that has propelled his candidacy. Gore, of course, helps with blacks, for good measure, a group now indispensable to any chance the Dems have next year. So there you have it: the left-wing take-over of the Democrats continues apace. And only the Clintons can stop it.

Of course, one problem with the Gore-Dean juggernaut is that it makes an anyone-but-Dean candidacy more likely to emerge at some point. Clark was the obvious option, but he’s so bad a candidate I can’t see him pulling through on a centrist message (especially since he’s been getting shriller and shriller on the stump). Kerry … oh, never mind. Lieberman could have done it, but Gore’s knifing him in the front rather knocks that scenario into the delete file. Edwards? He’s run by far the most appealing campaign to my eyes, but he cannot hope to compete in the big leagues yet, especially with the kind of flattening momentum Dean now has. So Gore manages both to set himself up for 2008 and dent a few potential rivals at the same time. Smart and bold.

THE EMAIL SCREW-UP: TNR gets sent a pitiful email from the Kerry campaign, with an aside meant for campaign staffers only. Can they get any more pathetic?

INDYMEDIA STRIKES AGAIN: A new design for the American flag.

“The decision by Mr. Gore seems likely to help Dr. Dean rebut what has been one of the biggest charges raised by his opponents: That he is a weak candidate who would lead the Democrats to a devastating defeat next year. Mr. Gore has repeatedly said that his top priority next year is helping the Democratic party defeat Mr. Bush.” – analysis from The New York Times.

If that doesn’t stop the Dean campaign in its tracks, what will? Did Gephardt put Gore up to this? Did Kerry? Did Soros?

Here’s an enterprise that obviously needs some pork.

He may have killed 61,000 people in Baghdad alone. The moral calculus for intervention was always overwhelming. It still is.

PEACE-LOVING, LIBERAL EUROPE: Just chock-a-block with hate crimes and violence.

It’s that time of year. Most of you have heard the spiel before but it’s actually very simple. This website is reader-supported. 95 percent of all our income comes from you. We don’t have an advertizing staff or marketing team or a big corporate sponsor. But the flip-side of this wonderful independence is that we depend on you to keep us afloat. Every year we make a pitch for the next year’s funding – an appeal that last year managed to pay all our debts and provide a modest way to support me, our Letters Page editor, and all the expenses of a blog that now has the traffic (and also the costly bandwidth) of many well-funded political magazines online. It takes an enormous amount of work – around the clock, day in, day out – to keep this site full of content and links; and you’re our only means of support. If you visit here regularly, we ask for $20 for the next twelve months; if you come every day or more than once a day, please consider giving more. Without it, the blog won’t survive. With it, the next year – with an election at home and a critical transition in Iraq abroad – could be a bumper one. So please, please give what you can. All the details are here. The future of this site, in the last resort, is up to you.

RUGBY 1. CHOMSKY 0: You want to know what a big march in London looks like? Check this out. Forget war and peace. This is what red-bloeded Englishmen and women really care about.

New York Magazine picks up on a theme pioneered by the blogs.

QAEDA SHIFTS TO IRAQ? An interesting piece in Newsweek suggests that bin Laden has decided to pull some troops and resources out of Afghanistan and deploy them in Iraq. Newsweek, natch, spins this as bad news. In fact, it’s a good development. Right now, Afghanistan is more dangerous and unstable terrain than Iraq. We have the military resources in Iraq to counter al Qaeda. Bin Laden understands the fatal threat a successful democracy in Iraq would pose to Islamo-fascism. A second front helps us and weakens the enemy. Flytrap may be working, after all. (Hat tip: Lt. Smash.)

LEAVE THE CONSTITUTION ALONE: A new website for conservatives opposed to the religious right’s Federal Marriage Amendment.

The Washington Post’s ombudsman doesn’t buy the idea that the ceremonial turkey story aspect of Bush’s visit to Iraq was up to scratch:

I don’t think the story made the case that this was “a small sign of the many ways the White House maximized the impact” of the trip. Maybe it was planned, maybe not. It would have been better just to record the known details of the saga and let the reader figure out whether it meant anything.

But then Mike Allen wouldn’t have been able to have a bash at Bush, would he?

“Greetings from the Hillary-hating right sector of your fan base.
I realize the focus of your piece is political strategy and politicians’ efforts to manage public perceptions of where they stand on the political spectrum. Nevertheless, the question of Hillary’s sincerity as an Iraq hawk deserves more than passing mention. There’s no maybe about it; her posturing in this regard lacks any shred of real (as opposed to political) credibility. I’m reminded of the age-old Soviet clamoring for “world peace.”
Yes, her attempt at deception concerning her views on Iraq poses a danger — which I suppose is an underlying theme of your piece. If she maintains this strategy well into a Bush second term, it will be wrenching, yet amusing, to watch the establishment-Left, root-for-failure-in-Iraq media trumpet her hawkishness to aid her 2008 candidacy.
Let’s hope few voters are so inept at the identification of flying creatures as to mistake this circling communist witch for a national security hawk.” – more friendly feedback on the Letters Page.