Transformative politics is not for sissies.
If you’re to really change political trends, and put bottom rail on top for a generation, you can’t be gentle about it.
You can’t cajole. You can’t seduce. You have to go right for the throat. And you have to be ready for the whole of the old order to come down on you for it.
So let’s be clear about this right now. Love him or hate him, Howard Dean is a master politician.
He’s not really a liberal, you know. He’s what used to be called a Rockefeller Republican, back in the day. He believes that budgets should be balanced, that alliances should be negotiated, that science should be respected, and that it’s possible for government to make life better for people if it doesn’t take itself too seriously.
He made it work in Vermont. He ran to the right of other Democrats there. He balanced budgets. He dealt amicably with Republicans. For his pains he was often called a sell-out by environmentalists, by the state’s left, even by its gay community.
He’s still the same man, but today Rockefeller Republicanism is called extreme liberalism. He’s only on the left because the center has shifted radically to the right. Our assumptions today are far to the right of those our parents held. Most people today believe government is their enemy. Most people are skeptical about science. Most people don’t care about budgets. This is reflected in their choices right down the line, from President to school board.
So how do you effect change?
Well, you don’t do it softly. No great change agent in American political history has worked softly. They have all had enemies. They have chosen these enemies carefully. They have deliberately made themselves the victims of these enemies until events moved their way.
They have often made enemies within their own political party. A minority can only become a majority after it grows a spine and tosses aside the spineless. This is how Republicans did it 40 years ago. It’s what they did to the Rockefeller Republicans.
And it’s what Howard Dean has been doing to the Washington Democrats.
He ran against them in the primaries. They defeated his bid, but they wanted his people, so they gave him the party apparatus.
And he’s running with it. Saying that many Republicans “never worked a day” or that the GOP is a “white Christian party” isn’t a gaffe. It’s red meat to the netroots. And the first step toward change is always energizing your base. This is precisely what the “conservative movement” did in the 1960s. They energized and organized their base voters. They got them enrolled in like-minded organizations. They kept calling them victims of a great conspiracy. They got into their checkbooks (via direct mail in this case), and where their money went their hearts and minds soon followed.
Getting criticized by the party elders is actually part of the process. The leaders of the permanent minority are always doomed to become followers of the new majority. Howard Dean isn’t interested in leading a bunch of losers. He’s interested in political transformation.
Transformation, however, is a slow process, even in the Internet Age. We’re talking about people here. We’re talking about what I call Moore’s Law of Training, because it doesn’t exist. The productivity gains of the Internet explosion that came about in the 1990s didn’t really become apparent until the following decade, after people and businesses felt forced to learn, and to implement change.
What’s true in tech is true in politics.
My criticism of Dean has little to do with what he says. I’m more worried about the fact that the technology at his headquarters doesn’t properly scale. The Democratic Party is not yet a two-way discussion. It’s still too much talk goes down and money comes up. The discussion happens elsewhere, in the blogosphere, and the party’s presence within that discussion – even Dean’s presence – is surprisingly muted.
There are legal reasons for this. Anything the party does must be paid for, full price, and a scaled political discussion encompassing 100 million would cost Dean’s entire marketing budget. So this discussion takes place elsewhere, at Dailykos, at the Huffington Post, at TPM, at Eschaton, at Liberal Osis, at 1,000 other “points of light” where Democrats gather around small virtual campfires to feel their shared victimhood and plot their political revenge.
And at the end of the day, those bloggers put up their links to Dig Deep for Howard and people respond.
The bloggers pay the bills. The bloggers flog the netroots. The netroots respond with money. And it is good. Just as Richard Viguerie was good for Ronald Reagan, so Markos Moulitsas is very, very good for Howard Dean.
Harry Truman famously said, in response to calls that he “Give ‘em Hell,” that “I just tell the truth and they think it’s hell.” It brought him victory in an election Truman had no business winning, in 1948, an election that really kept Democrats dominant for 20 years, despite the rise of suburbia, and made possible both the Warren Court and the Civil Rights movement.
No Democrat on Earth has Howard Dean’s political brilliance. No one else has his instincts. He’s not crazy, he’s not angry, he’s not mad. He’s giving people the truth, and those who hear it are responding.
Those who feed and depend on the current system, both Republican and Democratic – they just think it’s hell. Because when the time is right, and the inevitable contradictions between our assumptions and reality occurs, they’re all going to be thrown out of their Washington paradise.
Who will replace them? Those who hang on tightest to Howard Dean’s coattails will replace them.
You watch and see.
Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist for over 25 years and has covered the online world professionally since 1985. He founded the "Interactive Age Daily" for CMP Media, and has written for the Chicago Tribune, Advertising Age, and dozens of other publications over the years.
1. Mike Hickerson on June 11, 2005 03:30 PM writes...
Your comments about Howard Dean are remarkably clear and prescient.
Expect lots of hits; I just put links to this into the National Dean network.
Thanks for being among the few who "Get IT"
Permalink to Comment2. Paul Rosenberg on June 12, 2005 02:03 AM writes...
All very true, but one little niggle. They aren't Christian. They are hypocrites, scribes and pharisees.
I'm not a Christian, either. But I respect true Christians, and the GOP is not Christian.
So, give'm hell, Howard. But keep tweaking the message. You've still got a way to go.
Permalink to Comment3. SnarkyShark on June 12, 2005 05:20 AM writes...
I love this...All Dean..all channels...all the time.
I hate that I lost respect for Billmon over this, but I luvs me some Howard Dean.
Permalink to Comment4. ReasonableGuy on June 12, 2005 12:44 PM writes...
There may be a method to Dean's madness, but isn't a bit hyperbolic to say "No Democrat on Earth has Howard Dean’s political brilliance?" I mean, when it came to an actual election, the guy got his butt handed to him by John Kerry, of all people, in a DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY. With a president as vulnerable as this one, Dean would be the president right now if he was as politically skilled as the author claims. Bill Clinton, last I checked, is still a Democrat, and Dean isn't even in the ballpark with Clinton in terms of political skill.
Permalink to Comment5. B.Jeany on June 12, 2005 07:51 PM writes...
The Democratic Party is not yet a two-way discussion. It’s still too much talk goes down and money comes up. Thanks for that. I couldn't shake a feeling of futility as I e-mailed Biden, Richardson, Obama, and Edwards this past week, asking them to consider the party and phone the chair rather than vent to a microphone. They have no idea who I am or how angry I was with them, not for the opinions they held, but for who they chose to tell.
I'm not much of a groupie/joiner sort, but I think the country is in a dire situation, and I'm counting on the Democratic party to get its shit together, and that means all of us, and change the direction we're going in.. So the deal is this, anyone who might ever want my support, which includes my vote and much more, had better be playing on the same team I'm on. I think that trashing the chair is trashing the party. Maybe it's not, but that's what my senses tell me, and I'm on red alert this decade. I'm not looking for Democrats to get mad at, but I notice when ambitious senators and governors elbowing their way to the mic only to sound like wounded Republicans. That's not what they want me to notice about them. I particularly hope Edwards and Obama can follow the logic of my argument, because I have a reservoir of respect for them. Biden doesn't have a chance, and Richardson just lost his, in my world.
I can understand that what Howard said might
Permalink to Comment6. B.Jeany on June 12, 2005 07:51 PM writes...
The Democratic Party is not yet a two-way discussion. It’s still too much talk goes down and money comes up. Thanks for that. I couldn't shake a feeling of futility as I e-mailed Biden, Richardson, Obama, and Edwards this past week, asking them to consider the party and phone the chair rather than vent to a microphone. They have no idea who I am or how angry I was with them, not for the opinions they held, but for who they chose to tell.
I'm not much of a groupie/joiner sort, but I think the country is in a dire situation, and I'm counting on the Democratic party to get its shit together, and that means all of us, and change the direction we're going in.. So the deal is this, anyone who might ever want my support, which includes my vote and much more, had better be playing on the same team I'm on. I think that trashing the chair is trashing the party. Maybe it's not, but that's what my senses tell me, and I'm on red alert this decade. I'm not looking for Democrats to get mad at, but I notice when ambitious senators and governors elbowing their way to the mic only to sound like wounded Republicans. That's not what they want me to notice about them. I particularly hope Edwards and Obama can follow the logic of my argument, because I have a reservoir of respect for them. Biden doesn't have a chance, and Richardson just lost his, in my world.
Permalink to Comment7. Meta4Life on June 13, 2005 12:03 PM writes...
Hey folks -- if you haven't been there already, there's an online petition started by some Kossians that's already got almost 10,000 signatures. The text of the petition, simple and plain, reduces down to
Howard Dean Speaks for Me.
They'd like to get this delivered to the wimps on Capitol Hill as well as the DNC offices -- if anyone knows how to help, please drop dlr_mn at yahoo dot com an email to let her know how you can help.
Permalink to Comment8. Common Sense Mom on June 14, 2005 02:45 AM writes...
Right on! Dean is the reason that I am a full time activist now after years of contributing nothing to democracy, but voting.
Here is some food for thought:
My local paper, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, has run FOUR A-section news stories in the past week about the same "outrageous" Dean quotes, but there have been ZERO news stories on the Downing Street Memo in the past month. Isn't Rove getting away with a little "fake outrage" smoke and mirrors here?
Just when I thought it was over, an op-ed appeared last Sunday criticizing Dean that was truly a new low in journalistic analysis. They didn't just repeat the Republican talking points on Dean without investigating their validity as fact or fiction. They actually MADE UP QUOTES meant to illustrate the outrage better as an analogous "what if" argument of opposites.
Tell me if you think this is as hideous as I do:
http://tinyurl.com/abmn2
So, now the media isn't just repeating GOP spin, they are going to the trouble of creating fictional evidence to support Republican myths. WOW! That has got to be a new low. And the Post-Dispatch editorial board is generally liberal. What could be next?
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