Divided They Fall
By Michael Kinsley
Consider the Republican Party. Many Republicans dislike John McCain with a passion that has lasted for years. Asked to explain, they refer to the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance-reform law (which they thought, incorrectly as it turns out, would bite Republicans more than Democrats), or his opposition (since rescinded) to the Bush tax cuts, or what they regard as his tiresome and preening routine as a maverick. They resent his mutual love affair with the press (which he jokingly refers to as "my base"). They remember a lot of foolish talk a while back about how McCain might switch parties and become a Democrat. And yet almost all of these McCain haters will vote for him in November.
Now consider the Democratic Party. The one-on-one rivalry between Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama lasted only about three months from beginning to end. Their policy disagreements are negligible. For many Clinton supporters, the chance to elect an African-American President represents the culmination of a cause they have been fighting for all their lives. Yet almost half of Clinton supporters tell pollsters that they will not vote for Obama. And Clinton's big-money backers are deflecting money and energy away from their party's presumptive nominee.
What is their problem? News reports suggest that disgruntled Clinton supporters are angry about alleged sexism in the coverage of her campaign, while other Democrats are upset at Obama's recent moves toward the center. The second complaint is childish. Securing your base and then moving to the center is the fundamental move of politics, like the basic steps of the fox-trot. And Obama is hardly responsible for Clinton's press coverage. But there is no easy way these folks can vent their anger at Chris Matthews. So they are taking their revenge on people without health care, women who need abortions, and others who they (if they supported Hillary) must think will be harmed by a Republican victory in the fall. That'll show 'em.
If you listen to a lot of right-wing talk radio (as I do), you can hear the troops being rallied. O.K., so maybe McCain isn't really our type. But he's our nominee. And consider the alternative! Obama is the most radical left-winger since the French Revolution. He is a fanatical leveler who hates rich people and despises success. Plus, he's an elitist snob. And his wife thinks she's better than everyone else because she's black. Truth to tell, the radio guys would rather have had Clinton to rail against, out of habit if nothing more. They spent most of their energy during primary season going after her. (Hillary nostalgia is surely one reason they are so obsessed with Michelle Obama.) But they have turned their guns on Barack Obama with remarkable ease and speed.
Democrats aren't like that. It's not that they're too nice or too principled, or too unwilling to be ruthless. The hatred of George W. Bush on the left--and the eagerness to see him gone--is at this point as extreme as anything the right has to offer. (I know this because I share it.) The desire to win for winning's sake is pretty deep, too. Furthermore, as I suggested in this space a few weeks ago, it is at least an open question as to whether Democrats this year will attempt to match the Republicans in their willingness to "swift-boat"--that is, to play dirty in what they regard as a noble cause.
But true, professional unscrupulousness--the kind of do-anything-to-win pragmatism that Democrats envy in Republicans--requires more than just working yourself up into a lather of dislike. Sometimes, in fact, it requires the opposite: putting aside your dislike, your disappointments, your anger, your feelings of betrayal. In the case of Hillary Clinton's erstwhile supporters, all of these feelings seem overwrought to me. But there is no point in arguing about this, or at least not now. Now is the time to just get over it.
Barack Obama has refused $84 million of government money for the fall campaign because he believes he can raise more privately. For the Democrats to find it easier than the Republicans to raise money is a recent development, and a somewhat inspiring one. Affluent people who give to the Republican Party are advancing their own class interests, whereas those who give to the Democrats generally aren't. This suggests an admirable seriousness about their giving. On the other hand, if they go off in a snit when their candidate loses the nomination, that will suggest that they aren't really in this out of progressive passion--they just find politics an amusing hobby, like racehorses or yachts.