Not many Democrats realize it, but today is an important day for
their party. Years from now, election-watchers could look back at
June 13, 2006 as the moment Democrats rediscovered anti-war
veterans — or as the day they finally discarded the gimmicky but
potentially Earth-moving idea of running war heroes as candidates
to seem stronger on national security.
Virginia primary voters head to the polls today to select either
James Webb or Harris Miller to challenge Republican Sen. George
Allen. It’s just one primary, but it pits arguably the most
attractive “Fighting Dem” against another emerging candidate
archetype — the Mark Warner Democrat — in a red state. Miller is
far from the perfect moderate “Warner Democrat,” of course. He is
more like a solid liberal. But this probably will be the strongest
test for a “Fighting Dem” this cycle outside Tammy Duckworth’s bid
for Rep. Henry Hyde of Illinois’ longtime Republican House
seat.
Democratic Party leaders — including Sens. John Kerry, Chuck
Schumer, and Harry Reid — have taken the unusual step of endorsing
the former Republican Webb, a Marine, author, and onetime Reagan
Secretary of the Navy, in the hopes of boosting his anti-war,
populist candidacy against the party loyalist and lifelong Democrat
Miller.
If Webb shows he can compete in Virginia, others anti-war vets
could follow in a range of moderate-to-conservative states
including Illinois, Kentucky, New Hampshire, Ohio, and probably a
dozen other states in 2008, 2010, and beyond.
Of course, if it doesn’t work, this will represent another
boneheaded miscalculation by Howard Dean’s obsessively anti-war
party. If Webb flounders, party loyalists, moderates, and
supporters of the Iraq war will be particularly irked. That’s
because Webb is viewed by many liberals as having sauntered into
the party after a career as a Republican and got immediate
attention from the highest ranks. Meanwhile, workmanlike Dems such
as Miller are ignored because they don’t inspire thrills.
A failure here would have other implications, too, beyond 2006.
It would deal a blow to party leaders’ vision of a new and dovish
Vietnam generation to fight Republicans and hawks.
WEBB’S ENDORSEMENT by so many top Democrats is risky, and comes
amid the fickle and even downright cynical treatment of other
prominent military-veteran candidates. While Illinois’ Tammy
Duckworth is still a party darling, over the last few months,
Democrats have ignored or summarily dropped — many say betrayed —
most other veteran office-seekers after romancing them last year
for this year’s races.
Most notable is Paul Hackett, the rising Democratic star and
fierce Iraq war critic who narrowly lost a 2005 special House
election in Ohio to Republican Jean Schmidt. The Democrats dumped
Iraq vet and lawyer Hackett four months ago as a Senate challenger
to Republican Mike DeWine to accommodate Rep. Sherrod Brown. This
suggests party leaders have cooled on running anti-war veterans in
2006 — at least when so doing impedes the aspirations of longtime
party figures like Brown.
Of course, Webb’s sheer appeal might explain things. Webb is not
just a war hero but a demigod to several servicemen I know. He
authored Fields of Fire, an acclaimed best-selling
fictionalization of his Marine service in Vietnam. An estranged
Republican, he resigned as Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of the Navy in
1988 to protest budget cuts and grew progressively unhappier with
Republicans until turning to Democrats this year. He is an
unimpeachable military man who happens to share the Democrats’
disdain for Bush and anger over the Iraq war.
Many Democrats are suspicious of Webb; he endorsed Allen as
recently as 2000 and seems too late a convert to trust fully. (He
is also a successful filmmaker: If you saw Rules of
Engagement, the 2000 court-martial drama starring Tommy Lee
Jones and Samuel L. Jackson, Webb wrote the story and
executive-produced the movie.)
Miller is not nearly as sexy a candidate, but he is undoubtedly
committed to his party as an insider and policy expert. Formerly
president of the Information Technology Association of America, a
lobbying powerhouse, he is running as a “Mark Warner Democrat,”
which is Virginian for a moderate liberal who appeals to
conservative voters. In reality Miller is an unabashed liberal. But
elements of his platform conform to Warner’s model. He has raised
more funds than Webb by approximately 2-to-1. The Washington
Post endorsed him last week as “better briefed” and “more
thoughtful” than Webb.
Webb’s endorsement by so many top Democrats will be revealed
this evening as either a bold and potentially very successful move
to unseat Senator Allen with a dashing anti-war veteran convert, or
as a thumb in the eyes of Democratic loyalists. It would be hard
for this to shake out anywhere in between.
There are some in the Democratic leadership who see a future of
John Kerrys and John Murthas in people like James Webb or Tammy
Duckworth. These leaders have pounced on this race because it is
their best chance to make “Fighting Dems” work. Looking back at the
Vietnam generation, they see a group of ex-servicemen who changed
American history. They want to repeat that in the wake of Iraq.
James Webb just might be the man to do it. But if not, it is
hard to imagine Democrats finding a more fitting man (or woman) in
uniform who shares their view of America’s place in the world. And
their dream of another Vietnam generation would be weakened.
Brendan Conway is an editorial writer at the
Washington Times and a 2006 Phillips Foundation journalism
fellow.
