Reply #71: Washington Monthly: the DLC "squawked when Bill strayed." [View All]

[madfloridian]

This is from a source quoted above. The Washington Monthly critiques and analyzes Kenneth Baer's book, Reinventing Democrats. Again, my point is that the group kept Bill Clinton on a tight rein apparently. This article seems to verify the other one, and I was just surprised to find this out. I am always being told they just think up stuff, but I still contend they do much more than that.

So if you are going to talk about me at other forums, do it fairly. Do updates, be fair.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/books/2000/0004.pomper.html

"How did a group of elite politicians and operatives transform a political party?

First, they gave themselves a little bit of distance. After several unsuccessful attempts to influence the party establishment from within, the reformers formed the DLC as an extra-party organization in 1985. This avoided what Bruce Babbitt referred to as the "Noah's Ark problem"---the need to satisfy diverse constituents by taking representative positions on behalf of each one. They could also raise their own money (which DLC honchos like Virginia's Chuck Robb were notably good at), start their own think tank (the Progressive Policy Institute), and publicize their own views without tangling with the cumbersome Party bureaucracy.

Second, they worked the rules. They pressured the party to create a new class of "super delegates" consisting of state party leaders and elected officials who, they hoped, would balance out the interest groups that had come to dominate Democratic conventions. They also lobbied to cluster Southern and Western state primaries on "Super Tuesday," so that candidates who were strong in that part of the country (especially conservative Southern Democrats) would get an early boost that could offset a poor showing in more liberal Iowa or New Hampshire.

Third, they aimed for the top. After the Dukakis/Bentsen defeat in 1988, the DLC decided to groom their own hand-picked candidate for the White House. Baer reports that in 1989 Al From flew to Little Rock and told then Governor Bill Clinton: "Have I got a deal for you... If you take the DLC Chairmanship, we will give you a national platform, and I think you will be President of the United States."

And finally, they squawked when Clinton strayed. Baer describes the rising fury within the DLC when Clinton spent his early political capital on "Old Democrat" issues like gays in the military, Lani Guinier, and universal health care. After the disastrous 1994 elections, Dave McCurdy (an Oklahoma congressman who had lost his job) denounced Clinton as a "transitional figure" and PPI began working on a "Third Way Project" that might be the basis for a third-party movement. An embattled Clinton mended the fence by "triangulating" toward more conservative positions and pushing ahead on welfare reform---and by the 1996 elections, the DLC was confident they had him back in the fold."