The Democrats in Iowa: Field of Dreams?

By Tom Hayden, AlterNet. Posted August 12, 2003.

DES MOINES -- Iowa during the presidential primaries seems like an oasis of participatory democracy. A couple of evenings ago, the populist anti-war crusader Dennis Kucinich marched in the State Fair parade with 70 followers. Down the street was Howard Dean, who rallied listeners in a courtyard to join Meetup.com., then chatted for an hour with anyone who wandered by.

As I watched, Fred Noon, a Vietnam vet who heads a laborers local, told me that past candidates would mow his lawn or wash clothes for his vote. I was beginning to believe Fred until he started chuckling. It was only half-true, he said. Meanwhile, the creamy-skinned teenagers seeking to be crowned county pork princesses were strolling by.

At Drake University, 150 Iowa progressives, led by three former state senators, were founding a statewide network to continue organizing around children's needs, tax reform, immigrants and the environment after the presidential candidates leave town next February. Every four years, they could be an organized nucleus for peace and justice advocates trying to influence the presidential debate.

Of course, participatory democracy has its limits in a plutocracy. But, for the moment, progressive networks are vibrant in Iowa, fueling a rising sense that George Bush can be defeated in 2004. The public everywhere is uneasy with the price tags and body bags from Iraq, trillion-dollar tax cuts, multi-billion dollar deficits, and the loss of two million jobs and counting. Polls showing that only 45-50 percent are ready to re-elect a wartime incumbent (with only 21 percent among the fast-growing Latino bloc), which must make Karl Rove more nervous than he appears.

Rove's dilemma is how to maximize turnout among the hardcore Republican base while still positioning the president as a compassionate conservative. Last time Rove fell short electorally, requiring the unseemly dispatch of Republican staffers on an Enron jet to physically stop the voting in Florida until a politicized Supreme Court could select Bush as president. White House pollsters know that Bush loses if he repeats his 2000 percentage in 2004, simply because millions of new voters, primarily Latino, will be added to the electorate. Bush lost to Gore by about 544,000 votes in 2000; if Bush gets the same percentage of the vote in 2004, he will lose by three million votes. (NYT, Dec. 20, 2002)

Rove needs to convince his base that a second term is a Second Coming. But that feeds a growing sense of fear and loathing, even hatred, among millions of Americans that could become comparable to the disdain toward Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon in the past. Those emotions could drive unprecedented numbers of voters to the polls next year, overcoming Rove's effort to keep his own base hyper-stimulated.

Back in 1967, an independent Democrat named Allard Lowenstein started criss-crossing America on a seemingly utopian crusade to dump Lyndon Johnson. Eventually, the unpredicted events of 1968 unseated the incumbent. Setting aside his well-known quarrels with the New Left, the country could benefit from a Lowenstein-style crusade this year, keeping the rainbow of Democrats unified in their rage against the neo-conservatives and right-wing Republicans perceived as usurping the White House.

Obviously, differences exist and will intensify among the Democratic candidates. I support Dennis Kucinich because he voices the progressive agenda most clearly and because he's there for the long haul. I also am heartened, even amazed, at the massive public support for Howard Dean's opposition to Iraq and to business-as-usual Democratic look-alikes. I can be convinced, like most progressive Democratic voters, to support a more "electable" Democratic nominee if the party can avoid dampening the enthusiasm of the grass roots in the name of "centrism."

This will require a dump-Bush campaign greater than the sum of its component Democratic parts. Efforts in this direction are being initiated by national labor, women and environmental groups, with a startling $75 million budget projection. The effort reflects a grassroots feeling, says SEIU president Andrew Stern, that "everything they have worked for all their lives is at stake."

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