From the WSJ Opinion Archives
OUTSIDE THE BOX
12 Left Feet
The Democratic presidential candidates are out of step with America.
Oregon is one of America's more liberal states. It has voted Democratic in every presidential election since Ronald Reagan and has not elected a Republican governor in 20 years. But in a Jan. 28 referendum the people of Oregon voted 54% to 46% to cut state spending by $310 million rather than raise income taxes by 0.5% to balance the budget.
Shortly before the referendum the Democratic presidential contenders turned up in Oregon for Naral Pro-Choice's annual fund-raising dinner. No one doubts where the pols stood on the referendum: They all hoped Oregonians would vote for higher taxes. Howard Dean, John Edwards, Dick Gephardt, John Kerry, Joe Lieberman and Al Sharpton are all for bigger government and higher taxes.
Which suggests that the Democrat presidential hopefuls are badly out of sync with the people outside of the Beltway. If residents of a liberal state vote down a small tax increase, and the Democratic presidential candidates are all for big tax increases, well, there's trouble ahead.
Americans are not ultraliberals, but the Democratic presidential candidates are: All six candidates, with the possible exception of Mr. Gephardt, support an unlimited right to every kind of abortion (Howard Dean, a physician, says arguments against partial-birth abortions are "an issue about nothing"). They all support the University of Michigan's racial quota system and favor increasing income taxes. Every Democratic presidential contender in Congress at the time voted for Bill Clinton's tax increases and against George W. Bush's tax cuts. Mr. Gephardt and Dr. Dean want to repeal the Bush tax cuts that have already gone into effect. The Democrats stumping for the highest office in the land are also against sensible reform. They all oppose school choice, no matter how bad or dangerous the public schools the students are forced to attend. They also are against individually owned Social Security retirement accounts.
Some of the candidates have moved to the left to appeal to Democratic primary voters. Mr. Gephardt began his political career as an abortion opponent, his Naral speech, in which he spoke of "my own journey on the question of choice," had something of the feel of a coerced confession, and he didn't mention his recent support for legislation against partial-birth abortion. Mr. Lieberman has flip-flopped on a host of issues. He once backed school choice and private retirement accounts and opposed racial preferences, but abandoned these principles in his 2000 campaign
There seem to only be two issues on which the Democratic candidates dare to differ with one another: the death penalty and liberating Iraq. Messrs. Edwards, Gephardt and Lieberman favor capital punishment; Al Sharpton is against it. Dr. Dean is for it, but only for murderers of policemen and children. Mr. Kerry has, let us say, a highly nuanced view. He says he's against capital punishment because it's too lenient: "It is worse to take somebody and put them in a small cell for the rest of their life." But he also says he'd make an exception and allow capital punishment for terrorists.
As for Iraq, Messrs. Gephardt and Lieberman voted for the war resolution. So did Mr. Edwards, albeit with less conviction. Dr. Dean and Mr. Sharpton are dead set against using power to free Iraq, apparently agreeing with France's President Jacques Chirac who recently said "war always means failure." By French lights Mr. Chirac is a conservative, but antiwar Democrats are at the leftward extreme of American politics.
On Iraq as on the death penalty, Mr. Kerry is all over the map. He voted for the war resolution, which gives the president unilateral authority to go into battle against Iraq, but then argued that if President Bush "decides to go to war unilaterally," it would be "one of the greatest catastrophes and mistakes of our time." He also complained that Mr. Bush "has no plan for winning the peace." Clever: If the war goes badly, well, he was against it even though he voted for it; if it is successful, he voted for the resolution authorizing it. And if the war goes well, but post-war rebuilding goes badly, well, he can say I told you so. He's prepared for any eventuality, just as long as the voters don't notice his fancy footwork.
After Secretary of State Colin Powell spoke at the United Nations, Mr. Kerry added: "For those who look for a smoking gun, there is really a kind of a smoking gun. I mean, it doesn't have to be the gun itself that is smoking. It can be evidence that makes clear the effort to move the gun around before it is actually smoking." How can anyone see the smoking gun through all that fog?
In light of all this, it's hardly a surprise that the Democrats' leading polling firm recently found that voters trusted the Republicans more than they did the Democrats to keep the country strong, by a 50% to 22% margin. A similar number had more trust that the Republicans would keep the country safe: 47% to 16%.
At the Naral debate we had an opportunity to see the candidates together for the first time. Messrs. Lieberman and Kerry were easily the best, for they have done this kind of thing for decades. The long-faced liberal from Massachusetts looks just right for an establishment Democratic nominee--a little Kennedy and a lot of deep concern. But the establishment may be eclipsed by the party's leftward drift. Mr. Gephardt was his usual crafty-looking self as he underwent the difficult task of explaining his about-face on abortion.
Then there are the other three. Mr. Edwards may be a fresh face for the future, but today comes across as more of a high school debater than a presidential candidate. Dr. Dean was the supercilious prep school teacher lecturing on the moral standards expected of students. Mr. Sharpton was funny and clever: "We've been told we have three minutes. My good friend Sen. Edwards took five. So Sen. Lieberman told me in the name of affirmative action I could take seven." He wasn't kidding; parlaying the party's core black constituency into greater power is what his campaign is about. But in the substance of his remarks Mr. Sharpton came across as an aggressive radical, and not even liberal Democrats want that in a presidential candidate.
But the truth is that there is very little chance of defeating President Bush in 2004. Yes, the war and the economy could go wrong, and terrorism could take another bite out of our country. But the president is gaining deep respect as a moral, forthright and firm man, who like FDR and Ronald Reagan actually believes in things. Unless the administration makes a major mistake, Mr. Bush will be almost unbeatable.
The Democrats, of course, know this. So all the posturing now is really about setting the stage for 2008. Running for president is not easy; a warm-up run is valuable experience. Messrs. Lieberman (2000) and Gephardt (1988) have already had theirs; if they lose in 2004 they will be gone. Mr. Dean won't be back; Mr. Sharpton may be but with no better result. The wild card for 2008, of course, is Hillary Clinton. Messrs. Kerry and Edwards may simply be competing for the right to challenge her for the nomination five years from now. But if she runs, it really doesn't matter; for Democrats and the establishment media, a woman of the left is irresistible--especially if she's a Clinton.
Mr. du Pont, a former governor of Delaware, is policy chairman of the Dallas-based National Center for Policy Analysis. His column appears once a month.
