John Kerry’s latest salvo delivered to state legislators in Washington state contains the seeds of an underlying dilemma for Democrats:
Sen. John F. Kerry told state legislators Friday the Democratic Party doesn’t need to undergo an extreme makeover, saying “the last thing America needs is a second Republican Party.”
After blistering Republicans on everything from Iraq to health care, Kerry said Democrats have an opportunity to rebuild nationally by simply addressing the concerns that affect people’s daily lives — energy, transportation, health care and security.
“We have to go out and fight for the real issues that make a difference in the lives of the American people and we don’t need some great lurch to the right or lurch to the left or redefinition of the Democratic Party,” the Massachusetts Democrat said. “The last thing America needs is a second Republican Party.”
And that’s the dilemma.
Mr. Kerry: there’s an old, wise saying “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.” You can’t apply that to today’s Democratic party.
Something about the Demcratic party’s pitch or appeal is not working. It isn’t true that the Democrats can just do what they’ve been doing and fight for issues. There has to be a realization that something about the party’s appeal somewhere has not quite worked. And it needs to be corrected.
People will differ on the direction — right or left — but unless the Democrats want to keep losing the elections some kind of changes need to be made. And if it wasn’t the party’s course, Mr. Kerry, than perhaps the kind of change the Democrats need is not to nominate candidates who use political consultants who have lousy track records in winning national elections. That in itself is a damning statement on the kinds of choices said candidate if he got into office might make.
But just keep fighting for issues the same exact way? Karl Rove would love your idea. MORE:
Kerry said Bush and the Republicans have used the terrorism issue to divert attention from issues that favored the Democrats.
In an arch comment about the president’s recent statement in favor of teaching “intelligent design” as an alternative to the theory of evolution, Kerry said, “I think we ought to be getting some intelligent design in our policy in Iraq.”
That’s a good quip. (We also have to admit we can’t believe the words “intelligent design” and “Bill Frist” can be used in the same sentence…)
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, writes a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.