[NYTr] Democrats Need "Conviction Politics"

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

[Actually, they need some convictions to start with. They ain't got
none, so what's the point? -NYTr]

Consortium News - Aug 15, 2007
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/081507a.html

[Editor’s Note: Karl Rove's resignation as George W. Bush's chief White
House political adviser may mark a significant personnel change, but it
almost surely doesn't mean a reversal of the Bush-Rove strategy for
amassing presidential power and seeking continued Republican domination
of the U.S. government.

In Election 2008, Republican campaign advisers -- almost all Bush-Rove
proteges -- can be counted on to use the same cutthroat tactics as
their mentors. In this guest essay, political analyst Brent Budowsky
warns that the Democrats will need their own version of "conviction
politics" if they hope to wrest away the White House.] 

Democrats Need 'Conviction Politics'

By Brent Budowsky 

The Bush-Rove vision is so daring it is breathtaking.

George Bush and Karl Rove seek one-party domination of American
politics, with executive domination over the legislative and judicial
branches of the American government.

They move to pack the Supreme Court with unitary power believers, bully
the Congress into submissively accepting executive branch
encroachments, destroy the system of checks and balances, and impose
radical changes in the American government that are the antithesis of
what the Founding Fathers intended.

They seek to change the very psychology of Americanism, pounding fear
into the American people, courts, Congress and Democratic leaders since
Sept. 11, 2001.

Posing the choice as submitting to Big Brother or being exterminated by
mushroom clouds, they have pummeled the republic for six years with a
non-stop, 24/7 propaganda campaign of fearmongering that is
unprecedented in American history.

George Bush is a lame duck? With an iron will, Bush negated the 2006
election by pushing through an escalation of the Iraq war, expanded
executive powers over Congress and new powers for foreign and domestic
surveillance.

Congressional Republicans were reduced to sycophantic supporters while
they groused in the cloakrooms that Bush could destroy their party.
Prior to the Memorial Day recess, congressional Democrats offered
unconditional surrender on the Iraq escalation, and just before the
August recess they followed with unconditional surrender on
eavesdropping.

Bush and Rove are conviction politicians with an iron will to turn
their convictions into policy and power. They are fearless when pushing
their program even in the face of the American Constitution, federal
law and national elections.

By contrast, Democratic leaders surround themselves with cadres of
consultants, pollsters and career operatives who are not conviction
politicians, but are tactical maneuverers without any core of substance
or steel.

The Democrats’ leading presidential campaign strategist [Bob Shrum]
lost every presidential election from 1972 until 2004, and has advised
a long list of major Democrats to send to troops to die in Iraq for
reasons of political calculation.

If national Democrats disclosed the private advice of their consultants
and operatives over the last five years, who would be more embarrassed
— those who offered this advice or those who followed it?

Even today, it is the breed of Democrat who advised leaders to support
the Iraq war in 2002 who advise them to support the escalation into
2008.

Democrats lost in 2000, 2002 and 2004. They finally won in 2006 and
immediately began surrendering their authority, unable to resist one of
the most unpopular presidents in history, with the predictable result
that the Democratic Congress is one of the most unpopular in history.

Democrats need a Karl Rove, someone who can outline a grand vision and
pursue it with the toughness, tenacity, courage, fearlessness and will
to win that Rove possesses.

Democrats need what Americans want: a conviction politics that is
principled, fearless and tenacious and projects confidence and strength
to voters hungry for change.

The vision is clear: a realigning election in 2008 with a Democratic
president and Democratic Congress to establish one of those great eras
of American optimism and reform.

Democrats could run a national “Morning in America” television ad that
attacks the Bush failures and abuses, the Republican obstructionism
that blockades change; and offers an uplifting panorama of the America
that will be, with change.

However: Leaders lead, and the battle must be waged on the floor of
Congress with a courage and tenacity that is lacking today.

Democrats can defeat the politics of fear and inspire the nation to
bravery, but only if they demonstrate bravery themselves and challenge
Americans to be larger and more noble than the darker impulses of the
Bush and Rove era.

A Democratic Rove would know that it is not enough to oppose the
falsehoods; it is now imperative to trust the people with the truth.
For Democrats: no more surrenders, no more fear, no more retreats, no
more maneuvers.

Democrats represent a majority of the country, with a majority in the
Congress. If they fight with the focus and determination of Bush and
Rove, they will win a victory worthy of Kennedy and Roosevelt.

[Budowsky was an aide to former Sen. Lloyd Bentsen and to Bill
Alexander, then the chief deputy whip of the House. A contributing
editor to Fighting Dems News Service, he can be read on The Hill
Pundits Blog and reached at brentbbi at webtv.net. [This article first
appeared in The Hill.]