The Problem With The Democrats…

In the current issue of his newsletter political guru and newsletter editor Charlie Cook, after summarizing everything that has gone right for the Democrats in the past several elections (fund raising, organization, etc.), observes that “No doubt a big part of the Democrats’ problem has been in candidate selection.”

Isn’t this rather like saying that a big part of the Democrats’ problem is … Democrats? But wait, there’s more:

Given the narrowness of the Democrats’ two losses in 2000 and 2004, one wonders how the party might have fared had they not nominated stiff, aloof candidates who would be uncomfortable at backyard barbecues in all but the very finest of homes….

John Kerry’s inadequacies as a candidate were hardly a shock to his Democratic Senate colleagues, many of who have always seen Kerry as a distant figure and questioned his ability to relate well to rank-and-file voters. One would imagine that in the days of the smoke-filled room, the judgment of peers would have carried more weight in this particular case.

But if Kerry was such a manifestly bad candidate (as, indeed, he was), what is one to make of Cook’s following assertion:

While many speak of the importance of a party picking a nominee quickly to allow time for nomination battle wounds to heal and to prepare for the general election, the pendulum has swung way too far in that direction. In 2004, the nominating process seemed to end almost as soon as it started. It is extremely important for two inexpensive, touch-the-flesh, retail campaign states like Iowa and New Hampshire to begin the process, but they should not also be the end of that process.

Since the “two inexpensive, touch-the-flesh, retail campaign states” of Iowa and New Hampshire picked such an inadequate touch-the-flesh, retail campaigner, perhaps the problem of the Democrats does not lie in their processes but in themselves.