Ed Rendell is at it again. And I'm sick of it.
Rendell's behavior on the national stage is right out of the Joe Lieberman school of self promotion. The Pennsylvania governor has a history of intentionally undermining national Democratic Party positions in order to boost his own independent, maverick image. And that's unacceptable.
So I wasn't at all surprised when I heard Rendell's advice being used as a bludgeon to attack congressional Democrats on Meet the Press yesterday. Thanks again, Ed.
Below the fold: Governor Rendell tells Judy Woodruff that Democrats should stop playing chicken with Bush...and flashback: see DNC Chairman Rendell betray Al Gore following the 2000 Presidential election theft, and recoil in horror as Ed joins George W. Bush in attempting to privatize Social Security. Plus, a quick action item!
So Judy Woodruff is babbling away on Meet the Press, as she is wont to do, about how the Democrats find themselves in yet another difficult bind. It is the dilemma of rather to "blink" or "not blink," Judy explains, that congressional Democrats face when submitting the Iraq supplemental to President Bush. GOP hack Kate O'Beirne joins in and agrees that Democrats are in trouble:
MS. O’BEIRNE: No one wants to play chicken with funding for the troops. But Nancy Pelosi has a real problem on her hands. If that supplemental bill moves some to the right, she loses 40 or 50 House Democrats who will not vote for a supplemental that doesn’t have deadlines and funding tied to deadlines. Republicans in the House are anticipating she’s going to have to negotiate with them in order to get a funding bill out of the House.
MS. WOODRUFF: And I talked to a Democrat outside of Washington over the weekend, Ed Rendell, governor of Pennsylvania, who says the Democrats can’t do this game of chicken, because that, he said, the blink vs. no blink, yes that’s the choice. But he said if they do that, the Democrats aren’t going to win in the long run. He said what they ought to do is say, "OK, we’re going to give you the money for the war, but we are going to have—with a new president in the White House—a strategy to end this war." And he said that way the Democrats can pull this out.
Screw you, Ed. We don't need your concern-troll bullshit. If you have a problem with the policy or strategy of congressional Democrats regarding Iraq, or any issue, place a phone call to Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi or Bob Casey. Don't gripe to Judy Woodruff, trying to pose as some kind of moderate by undercutting the rest of the party. Stop betraying Democrats at this critical time.
Not to mention that Rendell's advice is ridiculous on it's face: Democrats should do whatever Bush wants, but promise to end the war in two years when we have a new president. Yeah, that's brilliant.
But this is nothing new for Ed Rendell. I remember watching in shock on Election Night in 2000, when Rendell ripped into Al Gore literally moments after Florida had been called for Bush (prior to it reverting back to undecided status later that evening). That would have been bad enough if Rendell had been just another Democratic official, but he was Chairman of the Democratic National Committee at the time! Here's Tucker Carlson deriding Rendell a month later, but prior to the Supreme Court decision that awarded the presidency to Bush:
CARLSON: I've got to ask Democratic Party Chairman Ed Rendell a question.
Welcome back, Mr. Chairman.
On election night, I was watching television very closely, and at one point, as we know, it seemed clear that Al Gore was going to lose, and you appeared on the tube with a little after-game analysis, and -- unfortunately, we don't have the tape here, but, essentially, you said Bill Clinton should have campaigned more for Al Gore.
Two questions. Has the Gore campaign ever called you to scold you about that? And, B, do you still think that Clinton should have campaigned and that Gore would have won had he?
RENDELL: Well, actually, what I said -- it was with Peter Jennings, and I said, "Look, there are two divisions of thought. They said -- the campaign -- that if Bill Clinton campaigned, we'd lose undecided voters in states like Pennsylvania and Michigan." The undecideds broke heavily for us in those states, so maybe they knew something that I didn't.
I always believed -- and I told the vice president -- that we ought to use President Clinton in selected states by himself to really spur turnout and to make the case because he made the case for Al Gore brilliantly. I think he should have been used in states like a West Virginia and Arkansas, certainly like a Pennsylvania and a Michigan and Ohio, but I said that night I could have been wrong.
Ed Rendell doesn't seem to understand the problem. It's not about if he was right or wrong on these strategic issues. The problem is that it was inappropriate for the DNC Chairman to launch this attack on Gore minutes after the election was called, and it's outrageous that he was still questioning Gore's strategy a month later when the recount was ongoing and the election wasn't yet decided.
But it gets worse. On December 13, 2000, the night of the Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Gore, Rendell was at it again. Here's Jonathan Karl reporting on CNN that evening:
(Democratic National Committee Chairman) Ed Rendell himself has come out and publicly said Gore should concede. That prompted a rapid response from the Democratic Party saying Rendell speaks only for himself [...]
The response to the Ed Rendell comments was left to the DNC and to his co-chairman, Joe Andrew, who came out immediately after Rendell's comments and said Ed Rendell speaks only for Ed Rendell.
Mark Fabiani, a spokesman for the vice president, when asked about Rendell and other Democrats who have come out saying similar things, said "In every party there are people more interested in getting on TV than in being fair and reasonable."
Nice. The DNC was forced to distance itself from its own chairman's comments. Ed Rendell's behavior was disgraceful and self serving.
Rendell was busy undermining his party again during the national debate over Social Security privatization in 2005. Josh Marshall:
Gov. Rendell went on Hardball on the 29th, when Andrea Mitchell was subbing for Chris Matthews. And when she asked him about Social Security and his advice to President Bush, here's what he said ...
If you`re looking at Social Security, there, there's got to be room to compromise. The work that Senator Breaux did and Senator Kerrey did with some of the moderate Republicans really is a road map for us to solve Social Security. And maybe we do what the president wants to do, private savings accounts as a pilot program and see where it goes, something that is more fundable and doesn't run up the national debt.
In the words of the great Rodney King: "Can't we all just get along?"
Please.
And people wonder why Dems are always getting rolled?
I think it's clear why Democrats are always getting rolled -- hacks like Ed Rendell and Joe Lieberman. And guess what? Rendell's name keeps coming up as a possible VP pick for the 2008 race. Screw that!
It think Ed Rendell needs to hear loud and clear that he's not going to get away with undermining the Democratic Party any more. He needs to understand that from now on it is own credibility that will be questioned when he tries to dis his own party.
Contact Ed Rendell's office and let them know that you don't appreciate the kind of chat he had with Judy Woodruff last weekend:
Governor Rendell's e-mail form.
Call Governor Rendell at (717) 787-2500
Snail-mail:
Governor Edward G. Rendell's Office
225 Main Capitol Building
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania 17120
Contact information for Governor Rendell's regional offices.
Please be polite.