Dean is Not McGovern, Part II

Liberal Oasis does a great job describing the latest DLC-CAF flareup, and fills in some more history on McGovern, to follow up on an earlier thread:
Part of the problem is that DLCers fear the ghost of 1972, where the liberal, anti-war George McGovern was trounced by Richard Nixon. And Republicans, giddy at the prospect, are feeding the DLC fears. But the McGovern story is not exactly a failure of liberalism. McGovern won a bitter primary, and the right-leaning Dems never got over it. That led to a divisive and comically mismanaged convention, depriving McGovern of a typical bounce. And McGovern, in an attempt to appease his intra-party opponents, hastily picked a VP candidate who was more moderate, Sen. Thomas Eagleton. It was soon revealed that Eagleton had received electro shock therapy treatments for depression. A media frenzy ensued. Eagleton was eventually dropped, but the damage was done. The missteps and the bloodletting were too much to overcome.

The lesson is not that a message rooted in liberal principles is a sure failure. The lesson is that if everyone stands strongly behind whoever the nominee is, there will be no repeat of '72.

And do a good background check.

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