Abandoning the center

Much note has been made of the fact that none of the Democratic candidates for the presidency visited the annual convention of the Democratic Leadership Council which once boasted the leadership of Bill Clinton and Al Gore as it achieved victory in 1992. Instead, they all trooped out to the Yearly Kos meeting and participated in a debate there. Since the 1960s, the rule for politicians seeking the presidency has been to run to the extremes in the primaries and then skirt back to the center for the general election. Perhaps that is what will happen again this year. But in this environment of 24-hour cable news, C-Span election coverage, internet blogs, and youtube, it is going to be very difficult for any candidate to change much from the primary season to the general election. There are just too many opportunities for a video of a candidate saying one thing to emerge and come back to bite the candidate as he or she tries to achieve some sort of "nuance" for the general public.

Kimberly Strassel talks to Harold Ford, the head of the DLC about his fear that the candidates are deceiving themselves by thinking that they can capture the presidency while still catering to their far left wing at Annual Kos.

No doubt the ultimate nominee will backpedal and finesse these points for the broader national audience. Just how much finessing goes on--just how far the candidates come back to Mr. Ford's "middle"--will be the ultimate test of whether groups like the DLC have a role in the future of the Democratic Party. Mr. Ford, for his part, has dark warnings for those activists selling the line that last year's election is proof that their liberal ideas are now "mainstream," or that Democrats' reputation on national security and the economy is so secure that the candidates run no risk going left. "That's called short-term memory," he says, with a few references to Carter, Mondale and other ghosts of failed Democrats past.
As he does his convincing, Mr. Ford is going to be holding up a few key facts, ones that no belligerent blogger has yet been able to refute. The party's most impressive gains last year all came from politicians straight out of the DLC cast. Four governors spoke at the DLC convention this year; all four had beat Republicans. The vast majority of the pick-ups in the House came from DLCers in red states in the South and Midwest. The Senate wouldn't be in Democratic hands were it not for Montana's Jon Tester.

"The reality is, without the DLC, and without candidates who subscribe to our platform, Democrats wouldn't be in the majority today. If we abandon that group, we will lose the majority and we will lose the White House," says Mr. Ford.

There will be a struggle for the path of the Democratic Party that will play out over the next year and a half. So far, the DLC is losing. Hillary Clinton was warmly received there last year when she spoke and earned much derision from the leftist blogosphere. Whether she or one of the other candidates can bridge that gap will be an intriguing questions for us to observe in the coming campaigns.