The Iron Law of Unintended Consequences
Reap Turnout, Sow Division - How President Bush made Ned Lamont possible.
BY BRENDAN MINITER
Tuesday, August 8, 2006
WSJournal
[I]n 1968 antiwar activists rioted outside of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in part because the party refused to adopt, as part of its platform, a plan for withdrawal from Vietnam. [...] Today, amid another insurgent war, there is again a withdrawal plan on the table, and Democratic hopefuls will again be forced to decide between retreating from a foreign war and drawing fire from the most active members of their party. Antiwar activists are again a potent political force within the Democratic ranks, and this time it didn't take riots on national television to put them there.
Of course, this is President Bush's fault. In the past three election cycles--in 2000, 2002 and most notably for his re-election in 2004--the president put the Republicans on top by running a get-out-the-vote campaign. In 2004 Mr. Bush even managed to win with a record turnout, proving to both political parties that getting their voters to the polls was more important than winning over supporters of the other party. By freeing the parties from hunting for votes across the aisle, Mr. Bush has inadvertently increased both the power and the stature of the most active wings of the two parties. [Emphasis added].
Ironically for Mr. Bush, the net result is the rise in recent years of antiwar activists on the left and anti-illegal-immigrant activists on the right--neither of which serves his political goals. Nonetheless, in the coming years we're likely to see more [...] political groups targeting members of their own party who stray too close to the political center...
BY BRENDAN MINITER
Tuesday, August 8, 2006
WSJournal
[I]n 1968 antiwar activists rioted outside of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in part because the party refused to adopt, as part of its platform, a plan for withdrawal from Vietnam. [...] Today, amid another insurgent war, there is again a withdrawal plan on the table, and Democratic hopefuls will again be forced to decide between retreating from a foreign war and drawing fire from the most active members of their party. Antiwar activists are again a potent political force within the Democratic ranks, and this time it didn't take riots on national television to put them there.
Of course, this is President Bush's fault. In the past three election cycles--in 2000, 2002 and most notably for his re-election in 2004--the president put the Republicans on top by running a get-out-the-vote campaign. In 2004 Mr. Bush even managed to win with a record turnout, proving to both political parties that getting their voters to the polls was more important than winning over supporters of the other party. By freeing the parties from hunting for votes across the aisle, Mr. Bush has inadvertently increased both the power and the stature of the most active wings of the two parties. [Emphasis added].
Ironically for Mr. Bush, the net result is the rise in recent years of antiwar activists on the left and anti-illegal-immigrant activists on the right--neither of which serves his political goals. Nonetheless, in the coming years we're likely to see more [...] political groups targeting members of their own party who stray too close to the political center...
posted by Oroborous at 9:46 AM
3 Comments:
Why is the author so sure that the rise of the Kossacks doesn't serve Bush's political purposes? It seems like the perfect GOP wedge issue, making members of the Democratic Party either look like moonbats or targets for the moonbats.
Yes, it would have been much better had he not got the base to turn out and lost the election. That would have been a far wiser political move.
I understand that you have to make lemonade with lemons, but this goes too far.
Guess this guy never heard of the Solid South
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