Dean-Hatred?

Jonathon Chait returns.

A while ago, we met Chait when he was extolling the virtues of hating President Bush in the New Republic.

He's turned his apparently boundless supply of ire on Howard Dean now.

And it's pretty darn good.

In this piece, he assails the cloistered cluelessness exhibited by so many Dean supporters, including many pro-Dean bloggers:

One of the most disturbing things about Dean and his hard-core supporters is that they give the impression that they know nothing at all of why President Bush is successful, and therefore what it takes to beat him. Read the pro-Dean blogs, and the you come away with the view that Bush is strong because he's ruthless and has lots of money, and therefore if the Democrats are also ruthless and raise lots of money, they can beat him. This ignorance is compounded by the fact that many Deanies seem to exist in a isolated cultural milieu in which everybody is secular, socially liberal, and antiwar. They can't fathom why those things might hurt Dean in a general election because they don't ever talk to or read anybody who thinks differently. Dean's Internet networking--which has had lots of positive effects on American politics--has probably intensified this cloistering, by creating intellectual ghettos on the web where true believers can interact, undisturbed by those who don't share their faith.

A perfect example of this phenomenon comes from the liberal blogger Atrios, who attempts to rebut Frank Foer's blockbuster TNR cover story on why Dean's secularism would doom him in a general election. His own predisposition on this topic can be seen in his profession that he was embarrassed when Democrats gathered on the Capitol steps to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. (I'm not saying this disqualifies him, only that it's a distinctly minority view.) Atrios's prescription on this is that, since "there's literally nothing [Democrats] can do overcome that image" of being secular, "Stop playing defense on these issues, and stop letting the other side write the script."

Atrios, of course, assumes that the majority of Americans will be interested in a "script" that is Aggressively Secular - that is, one that actively divorces faith not only from public life, but from all discourse related to it, one that cloisters not only the faithful but faith itself into a convenient hour block on Sunday morning that is conveniently isolate from the rest of life.

I'd like to see the Dems try that - it's accelerate the McGovernization of the party.

(Via Sully )

Posted by Mitch at December 29, 2003 04:35 AM