Don’t Like Bush?  Do the Right Thing

Adam Seitchik

December 2003

Everyone from Rockefeller Republicans to liberal Democrats has a vested interest in defeating George Bush in 2004 and if we play our cards exactly right, he will lose.  However the outcome is by no means certain.  In fact, if Howard Dean is the Democratic nominee then Bush is likely to be president until 2008.

It is a mistake to let the primary process play out from the sidelines until we have a Democratic candidate, because the nominee could be a big loser.  Dean’s campaign has been masterful, and I admire his forthright style and ability to bring young people into the political process.  I’d consider supporting him if he had even a 50-50 chance of winning.  But I fear he not only will lose in the general election, but lose badly.  In 2000 about 105 million people voted, and we can expect perhaps 110 million to vote in 2004.  I know it’s hard to believe, but about half of those people, say 55 million, currently support President Bush.  This is important to remember.  Dean is rightly proud to have gathered half a million names through his website, but he needs 100 times that many votes. 

My concerns about Dean’s electability build on a mixed bag of political experiences.  My earliest presidential campaign memory at age ten is an argument in 1968 between my mother, a passionate Gene McCarthy anti-war voter, and her pragmatic friend pushing for the more-electable Hubert Humphrey.    Mom had a history of voting for worthy losers such as her favorite politician of all time, the owlish Adalai Stevenson.  In the 1950s he lost and lost again, but mom’s principles mattered more to her than electoral success.  In 1968 no one could sway her from the anti-war McCarthy, who pushed Lyndon Johnson out of the primary race.  At the end of the contentious and tragic 1968 campaign we were stuck with Richard Nixon, whom she of course loathed.

My first volunteer experience was working for George McGovern in 1972, when I was 14 years old.  I was drafted into the campaign by mom, who to her dying day was a paleo-liberal with real compassion for those who suffer.  The only problem is that we had moved to Texas, which back then was not teeming with McGovern voters.  (Alas in the fullness of time it is still not teeming with McGovern voters.)

Positioned at the entrance to our suburban neighborhood holding signs for our man, mom and I were like erratic rocks carried thousands of miles by glaciers, misfits in the local landscape.  Fortunately we lived in an ex-urban sprawl so vast that there was a low probability of being spotted by any of my classmates from General Douglas MacArthur High School.  During the campaign mom was victimized by petty vandals who from memory defaced at least three McGovern/Shriver bumper stickers on her 1968 Volvo.

In the end McGovern’s 1972 vote count in Texas exceeded the number of Volvo drivers by about one million, but he still only got 33% of the vote.  This doesn’t sound so bad but consider that a convicted murderer received 28% of the vote not that long ago in an election in India.  In fact, somewhere around 30% seems to be a minimum baseline for a losing candidate, whether deceased, convicted of a capital crime or campaigning from jail.

In 1984 I volunteered for Walter Mondale, which turned out to be a great decision because I got to drive my hero John Kenneth Galbraith to a rally.  I remember vividly a massive gathering for Mondale on Boston Common just days before the election.  The view from the Common, and later from my precinct in Cambridge, was that he would win decisively.  And what was Mondale’s program?  He looked America in the eye and promised he would be honest with us, raise our taxes and do something about those massive Reagan deficits.  He was a straight-talking northern fiscal hawk, just like Dean.

Oops.  America listened, and America responded.  Mondale did a bit better than the dead and convicted, but not much.  Reagan landed almost 60% of the popular vote, with Mondale achieving a landslide in Cambridge and besting McGovern with 13 electoral votes (to Reagan’s 525).

I am proud to say that in 1992 I was an early Clinton supporter.  Fed up with losing, I saw in Clinton a skilled politician who could beat Bush the elder.  I was the only one in my precinct holding a sign for Clinton on primary day.  Paul Tsongas, a native son of New England just like Howard Dean, won New Hampshire and Massachusetts but lost badly elsewhere.  A southerner playing energetically and masterfully to the center, Clinton won a number of battleground states subsequently lost by Gore, including Colorado and Montana in the West, Louisiana, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and Georgia in the South, and Ohio, West Virginia and Missouri in the heartland.

Here is what Karl Rove is going to get the swing voter to believe about Howard Dean, purportedly his “favorite” Democratic candidate: Howard Dean is an angry, effete Northern snob from a state full of granola-crunching hippie escapees from New York.  He is a left-wing pacifist who dodged the draft with a “bad back” and then went skiing all winter.  He has that gruff style because he believes he knows more than you do, that government has a solution to every problem and that you need a tax increase.  Of course, all of this is grossly unfair, but when has that ever stopped Mr. Rove?

Al Gore arguably won the 2000 election, but things are going to be a lot tougher this time around.  The distribution of states won by Gore was exceedingly narrow: the West Coast, the Northeast ex-New Hampshire, five states in the Midwest, New Mexico and Hawaii – that’s it.    With the exception of New Mexico, Gore lost everything east of California and south of Illinois.  In fact the closest state geographically to Florida that he won was Illinois.  This is not good.

So we need a candidate who appeals to a cross-section of Americans, even those with air conditioning.  We have one: Wesley Clark.  Here are five reasons why I think he not only will be a good president, but can beat Bush in 2004:

1. Domestic policy: Non-partisan during his Army career, Wesley Clark is proud to have joined the Democratic Party and is a strong voice for equality under the law, a woman’s right to choose, protecting our environment and creating opportunity for all Americans.  Wes Clark has heard directly from Americans suffering from the loss of over three million private sector jobs during the Bush administration.  His jobs plan focuses on financial support to states and localities, incentives for small-business job creation, and fully funding homeland security.  The plan is targeted on job creation and is deficit neutral, paid for by rescinding President Bush’s inefficient tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.  He has developed creative, pragmatic policies in key areas, such as pre-school programs and health insurance for all children.  General Clark's economic strategy includes restoring long-term fiscal discipline, embracing the successful fiscal policy implemented by Bill Clinton in the 1990s.

2. Foreign policy: Wesley Clark has been the most articulate and bold voice criticising President Bush’s reckless, radical foreign policy.  Wes Clark believes strongly that dissent is patriotic.  He is a Democrat whose service to our country earns him the respect and support of members of the armed forces.  In foreign affairs he stresses international alliances and cooperation, refocusing our efforts on anti-terrorism as opposed to wars with nation states.  On a variety of issues including Cuba, North Korea and Afghanistan, his thinking is flexible, thoughtful and pragmatic.

3. Integrity, courage and character: After witnessing the government’s inaction in Rwanda, Wesley Clark saw it as his duty to push for NATO intervention in Kosovo, ultimately saving 1.5 million lives from genocide.  He is a retired four-star general who was awarded the Purple Heart for his battle injuries in Vietnam, as well as the Silver Star for gallantry in action.  President Clinton awarded Wesley Clark the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.  Wesley Clark has both Jewish and Christian roots, and is a strong advocate of freedom of belief and the separation of church and state.

4. Intelligence, excellence, experience and leadership:  Wesley Clark was first in his class at West Point.  He is a Rhodes Scholar with a master’s degree from Oxford in philosophy, politics and economics.  He is a lateral thinker who understands the complexity and interdependence of the modern world.  His effectiveness during a 34-year army career, culminating in his role as NATO Supreme Allied Commander, demonstrates his ability to build international coalitions and lead complex organizations.  He was an economics professor at West Point.  He is the former Chairman of the Board of WaveCrest Laboratories, a firm developing breakthrough electric propulsion systems that will aid in fostering energy independence.

5. Communication, charisma and electability:  Many members of the Draft Clark movement took notice of him as a commentator on CNN, responding to the clarity of his thinking and his ability to communicate effectively.  Wes Clark is an engaging and charismatic leader who can capture the imagination of the American people.  He appeals to a broad cross-section of voters and can win in the battleground states crucial to the 2004 presidential election.

Dean’s nomination is not a given.  Tsongas won New Hampshire in 1992 and lost the nomination.  So did John McCain in 2000.  Despite the blanket press coverage enjoyed by his campaign Dean has never polled higher than 20% nationally, and remains locked in a statistical dead heat with Clark.  Gephardt and Lieberman are not far behind.  The field should narrow after New Hampshire, and New England’s native son will be more at risk.

Despite some early negative press and a late start, recent polls show Clark leading in the crucial South Carolina primary.  He also leads in the latest Field poll for California.  It’s time for anti-Bush voters to use their heads.  Wes Clark isn’t superman, but there aren’t too many liberal southern Rhodes Scholar war hero generals around.  Sounds like something straight out of central casting.  This guy can win.