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by Todd Gitlin
The Democratic party is coming out of its coma, but the patient is still not walking so well. On 11 September, the Party leadership in Congress collapsed. Even before, the Republicans, losers of the popular vote in 2000, strutted around like winners, claiming a mandate as if to the White House born, while the actual ballot-box winners staggered around unnerved, and Al Gore vanished. Last summer, even some Democrats could not resist a vote for Bush's tax cuts, disproportionately wealth-friendly. Bush unilateralism aroused some vocal opposition on the environment, missile defense, and other fronts, but came 11 September and the Democrats enforced a gag rule on themselves. After a shaky start, George W. Bush walked away with the helmsmanship of a 'war on terror' whose rationale was as popular as its extent and precise goals were indistinct.
In post-World War II America, Republicans in power first grab, then relish the use of a bludgeon whose name is bipartisanship, while Democrats fail to be accorded any equivalent magic when they accede to the White House. Democrats feel they must tiptoe around Republican power, as if the Republicans held natural title to the flag. So the Democrats were - and continue to be - fearful of making too much of the fact that Bush's team, directly upon coming to office, derailed Bill Clinton's anti-terror programs. They clammed up on Attorney General John Ashcroft's anti-subversive measures - and the fact that he, too, as late as 10 September, preferred fighting pornography and other pet hates of the Christian Right to fighting terrorism.
Nor were most Democrats heard from about the post-11 September round-up of aliens, not one of whom, by the way, has yet to be connected with terror attacks past or future. Democrats were acutely aware that while they polled strongly on economic and environmental issues, this did not erode Bush's personal popularity, though Bush's team were often inept when it came to converting fuzzy feelings toward the commander-in-chief into hard achievements.
What summoned the Democrats back to life was economic distress - an inauspicious development for an administration proud of its all-business-all-the-time credentials. The Republican theme song, 'Market Good, Bureaucracy Bad', sounds more than a bit tinny when the 'market' turns out to harbor lots of crooked conglomerates, shell-games run for the enrichment of a stupendously greedy corporate aristocracy. Not only were crooks running some major companies, but giant brokerages, investment banks, and accountancy firms were so deeply enmeshed in the fraud as to take down the whole stock market with them. With more than half of Americans owning at least a few shares of stock, the corporate kleptocracy becomes the bête noire du jour. Trickle down was not supposed to trickle away. Democrats were slow to point fingers, but an administration heavy on corporate top-dogs - even the chief executive himself - was a target that targeted itself.
Now, a scant three months before the mid-term elections, Democrats don't feel so feeble after all. At least they can graduate from life-support emergency measures to - well, what? They're not sure.
As surpluses melted away and deficits returned after 11 September, Republican poll numbers tailed off, too. Smart party professionals, who had thought the Republicans shoo-ins to hold onto the House of Representatives in the mid-term elections this November, started doubting it. The Democrats now have a decent chance of holding onto the Senate, if by a narrow margin. Bush's personal popularity holds up, but this is hard to interpret, one of these polling mysteries whose consequences are imponderable. In any event, Democrats cheer themselves by recalling George Bush I's 89 per cent popularity at the end of the (first?) Gulf War, shrinking to a meager 38 per cent in the 1992 presidential vote 20 months later.
The American press remains reluctant to note Bush's less than impressive following abroad - anywhere - but they do enjoy scandal stories, and there is some real reporting going on, for a change. Major newspaper columnists have resurrected charges that Mr Bush had played fast and loose with his oil company holdings before ascending to the governorship of Texas. Although Democrats have been too deferential to dwell on the fact, Republicans remain (despite years of the Democrats playing catch-up) the party of Big Business - and, in particular, oil. After months of sycophantic coverage, during which the president's occasional delivery of whole sentences was treated as a sign of Mature Leadership, even inspiration, we have recently been treated to
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