Kos' endorsement of John Edwards and his likening of Kerry to Dole caused me to pull out something I was noodling on this weekend. For your consideration:
An incumbent president elected with less than a majority of the votes.
Public confidence in the incumbent waning in the election run-up under the weight of public embarrassments and the persistent suggestion of personal scandal.
An opposition party wrapping up its nomination by March, proclaiming the virtues of party unity behind a time-tested nominee with a distinguished war record and decades of service in the United States Senate.
Sound familiar?
It should. It happened just eight years ago.
Americans are famous for short memories, but Democrats, at least, would do well to heed the lesson of Bob Dole and 1996. Because those who forget history are doomed not just to repeat it, but to get bitten in the backside by it.
In 1996, the Republican Party had just come off one of the most stunning off-year election triumphs in American history, taking control of the House and Senate. The revolution was not, however, sparked by longtime trench-fighters such as Dole, but a brigade of partisan, energetic Baby Boomers, led and personified by then-Speaker Newt Gingrich. Their "Contract with America" became the centerpiece for a partisan election sweep not seen since the post-Watergate election of 1974. If ever there was a party that was positioned to unseat an incumbent president, it was the Republicans in 1996.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the White House. A collection of candidates laid claim to the Contract mantle--Steve Forbes, Phil Gramm, Lamar Alexander, Pat Buchanan. For a time, it seemed as though one might prevail. Buchanan won the New Hampshire primary. Forbes won Delaware and Arizona.
Shaken, the GOP establishment reached back to its clothcoated past and rallied around the safer, more reliable Dole. By mid-March, the challengers were swept aside. Story after story followed proclaiming unprecedented party unity.
It sounded great, but for one thing: Dole did not represent the visionary Republican future the country had just chosen two years prior. Dole personified the grumpy, stodgy Republican past--more Richard Nixon than Newt Gingrich--that even Republicans had rejected. Small wonder he didn't catch fire among Democrats and independents, either. Seizing the generational opportunity, President Clinton proclaimed his re-election campaign a "bridge to the 21st century," and romped to an easy win. For his service, Dole was relegated to late-night pundtiry and pitching for Pepsi and Viagra.
By 2000, the Republicans figured out it would be better to run as they actually are, in the moment, not in the past. They rejected more moderate candidates in favor of a candidate who would embrace the Congressional majority base.
And we got George Bush.
Fast forward to March 2004, and enter John Kerry. Kerry is not Dole. But neither is he Gingrich. And that may be a significant problem for Democrats should he become the nominee.
Exit poll after exit poll shows Democrats are not voting for Kerry out of any particular conviction. Rather, they see him as an old reliable to defeat an increasingly unpopular incumbent. It is as if Democrats are saying, "Anyone should beat this guy. Let's pick the safe one we know best."
But, like Dole, Kerry has his political roots in a party that is barely recognizable today. One can no more imagine a Democratic politician in 2004 throwing military medals on the Capitol steps than a presidential nominee who voted against the weapons systems used successfully in numerous conflicts since, or a lieutenant governor who approved a prison furlough system that placed more faith in institutional rehabilitation than in individual histories.
When Kerry did those things years ago, they did not seem so radical. They may even have been right for their time. A few decades on, however, they are shocking.
The nation today is uneasy. Domestic and international events have shaken its long-held sense of economic and international security. An increasingly bellicose administration (Charles Pickering and Bill Pryor, anyone?) appears to talk over the heads of all but its fund-raising base. Americans, and not just Democrats, are looking for a vision that will change their country and their lives.
One doubts we will find that vision rooted in 1987. The John Kerry of the 1970s and `80s is no more representative of the Democratic party today than the Bob Dole of the 1970s and `80s was representative of the Republican party in 1996. Indeed, Senator Kerry will no doubt argue that the Democratic Party of the 1970s and `80s, does not define the John Kerry of today.
If that argument worked, however, you wouldn't have to turn on a Super Bowl ad or Larry King Live to see Bob Dole. You'd find him at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, where, after eight years in office, he would be polishing his administration's place in history.
History. Funny thing, that.