What The Heck Do Democrats Run On?

*Kris just forwarded this - it's awesome.

ON THE TRAIL

By Chuck Todd

NationalJournal.com© National Journal Group Inc.

Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2006

There's a growing realization within Democratic circles that the party is facing a tough hurdle when it comes to concocting a message that's "not them" to "why us."

The "not them" part of their message is getting written by the Justice Department and the slow-to-act House GOP leadership on a nearly daily basis. And for their part, Democrats have actually done a decent job of pushing the "not them" with their "culture of corruption" refrain.

Making the case for firing a political party or elected official is easy to do in campaign politics. Making the case to hire in lieu of is much harder.

Making the case for firing a political party or an elected official is one of the easier things to do in campaign politics. Making the case to hire in lieu of is much harder.

Let's just look back at 2004 and 2005 and note the number of campaigns that were more "not them" than "why us" and how many of them actually won.
John Kerry's entire campaign was built around "not them" and that was good enough to unite the Democratic base, good enough to make the presidential race competitive, but not good enough for the swing voters (mostly white, married women) to hire Kerry.

Doug Forrester's campaign for New Jersey governor in 2005 was exclusively "not them" as it made the assumption that the voters in the state had had it when it came to political corruption. But Forrester never made a strong "why us" argument and, of course, Forrester's opponent, Jon Corzine, had the resources to develop both the "not them" and "why us" messages.

Freddy Ferrer only had a "not them" message when it came to unseating New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg; and that "not them" was solely based on Bloomberg's party affiliation.

The parties or candidates who successfully "fire" or unseat a party/incumbent from office usually have a potent combination of the two. Some recent examples:

In 2000, George W. Bush weaved his "not them" and "why us" messaging quite effectively using his "restore honor and integrity" line without talking too much about how he'd govern differently than Clinton.

In 2004, John Thune had the benefit of two years to get South Dakota voters comfortable with the "why us" message and that gave him the luxury of focusing a "not them" on Tom Daschle. Again, as far as voters were concerned, they were hearing both "not them" and "why us."

In fact, as much as we talk about the "throw the bums out" mentality that can take hold of electorates, it appears that candidates who unseat incumbent parties or elected officials usually do so because of how well they deliver their "why us" message. Sure, the "not them" is important, but the "why us" is much more so. Just ask Jim Talent in Missouri, Norm Coleman in Minnesota or Mark Pryor in Arkansas. (By the way, Bob Casey Jr. needs to take note of this; his party has the "not him" down pat in regards to Rick Santorum but Casey still needs the "why him." But we digress...)

It seems the Democrats don't have a solid "why us" message yet. At best, their "why us" can be described as "not them but like they wanted to be." Take, for instance, Al Gore's Monday speech on privacy or Harry Reid's tour of the red states talking about fiscal responsibility or Reid and Nancy Pelosi talking about some extreme ethics reform that neither would have been trumpeting back in '92.

But all of these stances seem to mirror a more Republican philosophy or campaign tactic of old that may give the Democrats difficulty in firmly selling their "why us."

What the Democrats are missing is the big "easy to grasp" issue to be "for." In '94, Republicans used "term limits" among other issues as an easy way to underscore their change message. Granted, selling change based on 40 years of control versus the 12 years Democrats are trying to stop is easy. Still, "term limits" seemed like an idea that was bigger than just the congressional election. There were ballot-initiative campaigns all over the country trying to get various state legislatures to abide by term limits.

Of course, we can debate all day about whether the term-limit system keeps politicians from becoming power-hungry or emboldens lobbyists to truly run the asylum. (For what it's worth, we think term limits are a disaster on the state legislative level, as lobbyists have taken over multiple state houses and senates for the worst, but may be necessary on the federal level to clean up this current mess.)

So what is the "big idea" or two Democrats are going to pitch? Right now, it's a party that seems to fear the "big idea" because of divisions within its own ranks. Whether it's Iraq, health care, energy or education, there seems to be nothing but caution being put forth.

But the problem isn't just the lack of a "why us" message from the Democrats but the messengers themselves.

Take, for instance, the Sam Alito hearings where Democrats trotted out too many old, liberal lions and featured virtually no one under the age of 55. There was too much Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden and Pat Leahy. And no senators elected since 2000, senators who should/could be the face of the party for years to come, like Mark Pryor, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama or Ken Salazar.

What a contrast Lindsey Graham was for the GOP compared to Kennedy. This isn't to say that the Republicans don't have their share of tired faces, particularly on the Judiciary Committee. But somehow, they also had fresh faces to feature, while the Democrats had no one fresh even though there are some dynamic Democrats ready for their closeup.

A few weeks ago, Bob Novak made a very smart observation in the lack of "new Democratic blood" residing on the House side as well. He noted how reticent House Democrats are at churning out their ranking committee members, something the Republicans do more regularly. From Charlie Rangel to John Dingell to Henry Waxman to Tom Lantos, it's hard to find a major legislative lion among House Democrats that was elected after 1996.

In fact, it was one of the few Newt Gingrich-led reforms in how the House operates that's remained largely intact on the Republican side -– i.e., the six-year committee chairmanship term limit (though there has been some tinkering). We'd argue that, for instance, had the six-year term limit enforced on committee chairmanships been applied to leadership (particularly the speaker slot), we'd have seen new blood flow into their ranks a while ago.

And that's where the Democrats find themselves at the start of this election year. They have their "not them" message down pat (it was what 2004 was largely built on), but they can't communicate their "why us" thanks to a combination of no clear issue/idea to rally around and the lack of a strong team of folks to deliver the message.

-- Chuck Todd is a NationalJournal.com contributing editor and editor in chief of The Hotline. His e-mail address is ctodd@nationaljournal.com.