I have repeatedly expressed my intention to vote for whomever the Democratic nominee turns out to be. But boy, oh boy, is Gephardt testing my resolve on this.
I am beginning to think that Gep would find something objectionable if Howard Dean said that the sun was yellow. Today's entry: the confederate flag.
Here's what Dean said:
"I still want to be the candidate for guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks. We can't beat George Bush unless we appeal to a broad cross-section of Democrats."
Gephardt fires back:
"I don't want to be the candidate for guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks. I will win the Democratic nomination because I will be the candidate for the guys with American flags in their pickup trucks."
Dick, if that's your strategy, you're going to get your ass kicked by Bush. The confederate flag-wavers are out there, and there is every reason to believe that they overwhelmingly support Bush. Are you really going to ignore those voters and the issues that make them vote for the other party? You're going to ignore voting Americans because they don't share progressive views about things like the confederate flag? If so, you're not qualified to be the nominee. The Democratic nominee must be prepared to challenge Bush for the support of every voter. Dean is prepared to get in the trenches and do that. Are you?
The issue here isn't the confederate flag anyway. What Dean was saying was that he would be making an attempt to reach the white southern voters who have responded affirmatively to the GOP's race-baiting tactics in southern states by making the case that the Democrats offer a better alternative to Republican economic programs that have kept many of those states at or near the bottom of the scale in so many important economic categories.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am a Dean supporter. In that regard, I would be inclined to come to Dean's defense in any case. But what Gephardt has done here is to take a point of economic policy that Dean made vis a vis one segment of the voting public and attempt to paint Dean as a supporter of the confederate flag.
In essence, he's using the same divisive tactics that the GOP uses to curry favor with the voters Dean spoke of. If Gephardt is so desperate to win votes that he's willing to distort Dean's comments in a vain search for a wedge issue, I would respectfully submit that he isn't up to the challenge of unseating George Bush in 2004.