Nation-Building >> Dean: The Democrats' Reagan? | return to front page

Funny how columnists keep writing about Dean as a "McGovern-type" candidate. A few have begun to pick up on the fact that he may actually be the Democrats' Ronald Reagan. A highly popular (if polarizing) figure who revives his party by aggressively and unabashedly pursuing core party principles. Reagan was able to reach people in the middle - remember Reagan Democrats? - just as Dean is reaching out to budget hawks who recoil at the Bush Administration's lack of fiscal discipline. Dean Republicans, anyone?

George Will writes about this, and about why an energized base matters in this frontloaded primary season in his column in today's Washington Post (although he draws the comparison not to Reagan, but to Goldwater who initially re-energized conservatives and set the stage for Reagan some twenty years later):

'To those who call him "polarizing," Dean can respond: How do you polarize a polarized electorate? Some in the White House believe that true independents -- those whose votes really are up for grabs, as distinguished from those who call themselves independents but almost always vote one way -- are only about 7 percent of the electorate.

If so, the 2004 election, even more than most elections, will turn on the parties' ability to turn out their committed supporters. And some in the White House are beginning to worry about Dean because he understands that venting may be a practical precursor to governing: Venting energizes the party's base.'