After he wrote his piece last month on the "theory of change" primary, we realized Mark Schmitt had made a remarkably similar argument in his column from our April issue:
Under the normal rules, a candidate using the "fighting" message appeals to working-class voters and the standard Democratic interest groups to win the primaries, then makes a move to the center for the general election. Under the rules that won two general elections for Democrats in the 1990s, candidates must target the small number of voters who are considered to be in play: fiscally conservative, socially liberal, fairly affluent. Those rules, however, lead to a narrowing, limited politics that, even if successful, creates none of the enthusiasm or energy that a new president will need in order to promote ambitious policy change.But it's not the '90s anymore. The scorched-earth politics of the Bush era melted everything in its path. Democrats took a long time to understand the new rules. They should have been a better-organized, coherent, fighting opposition party in 2001 and 2003. Many of us will be angry about what happened in those years for the rest of our lives.
Read the rest (and comment) here. --The Editors
