Quote Of The Day: Howard Dean’s Real Problem

13 Jun, 2005 by John Hawkins

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Lefty Howard Fineman explains the real problem with Howard Dean’s (the Republicans are) “pretty much a white, Christian party” comments — if the Republicans are the party for Christians, what does that make the Democrats?

“But Dean’s real problem may not be his mouth but his mind-set. He and his aides seemed genuinely mystified at the idea that his characterization of the GOP was a political mistake. But by labeling the other party a bastion of Christianity, he implied that his own was something else—something determinedly secular—at a time when Dean’s stated aim is to win the hearts of middle-class white Southerners, many of whom are evangelicals. In a slide-show presentation at the DNC conference last weekend, polltaker Cornell Belcher focused on why those voters aren’t responding to the Democrats’ economic message. One reason, he said, is that too many of them see the Democrats as “anti-religion.” And why was that? No one asked Dean, who wasn’t taking questions from the press.”

Translated, that means how are we ever going to trick these Christian evangelicals into voting for a party full of people who are hostile to them if you’re saying things like this in public? Be more careful or you’ll never fool those rubes!