Anyone with a substantive enough record to credibly run for president has a complicated past, one that opponents can easily spin into a one or two sentence negative caricature. When a candidate's record isn't that substantive, constructing the caricature becomes even easier-why, he's inexperienced.
This is why everyone who has run for president in recent decades, including the past several occupants of the White House, has had to live down one caricature or another. George W. Bush was a brainless, boozing son of privilege whose daddy's friends got him elected. Bill Clinton was a philandering draft dodger from a state nobody had heard of. George Bush, Sr., was a wimp whose only promotions came from Republican insiders after he had lost campaigns. Ronald Reagan was a brainless actor far right of the American mainstream. It wasn't hard to caricature candidates then and it isn't now.
The current Democratic field of candidates, quite simply, offers someone for everyone. If you think the party needs a presidential-looking candidate whose patriotism can't be challenged, look to John Kerry. If you think the party can win only with a charming southerner with humble roots, look to John Edwards. If you think the party needs to more forcefully stand up to Bush, look to Howard Dean. If you think the party needs an outsider who can't be challenged on national security, look to Wesley Clark. If you think the party needs to move back to traditional issues to build a coalition centered on organized labor, look to Dick Gephardt. If you think the party needs to move right, look to Joe Lieberman. And so on.
The current field includes Democrats to suit a wide range of individual palettes, and that's the way it ought to be. When Bill Clinton commented on the strength of the current field, this is what he referred to. We don't need to look too far into the past to remember the sham of a nomination process that elevated George W. Bush in 2000, and we don't need to look too deeply into the present to see how disastrous the result has been. The wide-open nature of this year's primary race is good for democracy, good for the Democratic party and good for the country. And Bill Clinton shrewdly realized this.
Did John Kerry do a thing or two in his life that signaled his political aspirations? Absolutely. But so has pretty much everyone ambitious enough to make the necessary sacrifices to run for president. To dismiss Senator Kerry's valiant service in Vietnam because of one or two trivial actions he took 25 years ago is absurd. And to dismiss him as falling "in with the fad of the times" by courageously speaking against a war he had fought in-one that was already lost but that Americans were still dying for-is even worse.
Was John Edwards a trial lawyer who sued big corporations? Absolutely. But his challenge to Bush is right-on, and one that will play well to a country tired of the special interests that run Bush's White House: "Mr. President, if you want to talk about the insiders you've fought for versus the kids and families I've fought for, here's my message to you: Mr. President, bring it on!" Some Americans might prefer a president who fights to loosen common-sense regulations over big industry than one who refuses to let corporations cross the line, but I don't think most would.
Is Howard Dean a left-of-center candidate from New England who fought to reform health care in Vermont? Absolutely. But he's positioned not only to attract the Democratic base, but also to compete for voters almost anywhere, because he is a budget hawk and member of the NRA. And let's not forget that Franklin Roosevelt was once considered too liberal and Ronald Reagan was once considered too conservative to ever get elected president.
For the sake of brevity, I'll stop the individual rebuttals there. But ultimately, the decision of picking a nominee is aided little by exaggerated caricatures and instead comes down to three factors. Who has the best policies? Who has the strongest personality and stature? And who has the political wisdom to weather the turbulence of a general election? Answering those questions is what the nomination process is all about.
Although caricatures carry little weight, the battle over them is important. That's why this discussion has made it into the opinion pages of The Student and pretty much every newspaper in the country. Something's happening here: the Republican National Committee is taking great pains to define our candidates over a year before the general election, and battle lines are being drawn. Make no mistake; these are the opening shots of the 2004 election.
But if they want to compare their caricatures of our candidates with the truth about their candidate-an irresponsible, reckless macho from Texas who's listened to all the wrong people and made all the wrong choices for the future of this country-then my response is a simple one. Bring it on.