LAST WEEK, President George W. Bush gave his first major address to the nation. Framed as a speech on the budget, Bush gave a quasi-State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress. While he talked about broader, warmer and fuzzier issues like education, the president focused the majority of his speech on advocating his version of a tax cut.
House Democrats, content to leave Bush alone for the past few months, finally have decided that the tone of bipartisanship should yield to staunch opposition. However, if their first few weeks as the minority party are any indication, the leadership of the Democratic Party is going to need to adopt a different political posture if it hopes to score any victories in the upcoming months. Such problems have arisen because of ties to the former White House occupant, a lack of a political backbone, and not appealing to the party's own base voters.
Admittedly, most opposition parties concede a rather traditional period of 100 days to a new president as a honeymoon period. However, in the case of Bush, Democrats have not had a substantial opportunity to escape from the shadow of their former White House representative.
Amazingly, as Congressional hearings have examined the suspect pardoning of certain well-financed persons, a fair number of prominent Democrats have taken to condemning Clinton's behavior and use of the pardon power. While some of those Democrats probably have hoped that a quick mea culpa would allow the pardon issue to dissipate quickly, it has helped keep the issue alive as a secondary concern. The media has not pushed the hearings as a major story in the tradition of Whitewater, Travelgate or impeachment. However, with the Democratic Party lacking control of any federal branch of government and lacking any real symbolic leader, the antics of the ex-president likely will continue to prevent the party from establishing an identity of its own.
In the context of the pardon controversy, Bush has only had to breathe and speak English to cash in on some sort of ethical capital with the American electorate.
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Putting Clinton-oriented issues aside, Democrats have not done a particularly good job reacting to Bush's so-called "charm offensive." A key element of Bush's supposed ability to get people of the opposition party to like him centers around the bestowing of nicknames. Such nicknames include "Big George," for California Rep. George Miller and "Nellie" for Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson. In the face of such creativity and wit, Democrats have decided to poke themselves in their collective eyes with sharp sticks.
Such is the equivalent of deciding to advocate a tax cut. Typically, to win a political battle, one wants to find a way to prove that the opposition is fundamentally wrong about its approach to whatever policy is being discussed. In the battle over taxes, Democrats have responded to Bush's call for $1.6 trillion cuts by advocating tax cuts of half a trillion dollars. Yes, the affection for government spending, in the tradition of McGovern, lives on in the Democratic Party. Although most people with a basic understanding of numbers should see the difference between the two proposals, most American voters won't. They will see two parties advocating tax cuts greater than the gross domestic product of North Africa and will not care what Democratic leaders might say about why their cut is more humane or fiscally responsible. "Fiscally responsible?" John Q. Public will say. "Which one gets me enough for a 55-inch TV to watch 'The West Wing'?"
Aside from problems establishing their own identity and establishing that they advocate different policies than President Bush's party, Democrats seem confused on who makes up their core constituency. During his speech to Congress, Bush hammered away at education reforms, increasing education spending, and the like. Such a focus on education has been Bush's rather open attempt to court black and Hispanic inner-city voters whose school systems have failed over the past two decades. Bush's attempts to reach non-white, non-male voters have further appeared in the selection of a Cabinet more racially diverse than Clinton's.
The Democrats' response to Bush's Congressional speech was to put its leaders from the House and Senate on television. Missouri Rep. Dick Gephardt - one shudders to think of Bush's nickname for him - and South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle are middle-aged, white men from the Midwest. Despite their political acumen, the two leaders aren't exactly hallmarks for diversity or for outreach efforts.
Despite my own loyalties to the Republican Party, I admit Bush has vulnerabilities like any other national politician. However, to win any future battles, the Democrats are going to need to adjust their political approaches and stop making such elementary mistakes.
(Seth Wood's column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at swood@cavalierdaily.com.)
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