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The vast left-wing conspiracy
During the 2004 presidential election, veteran Washington reporter Byron York realized the Democrats had formed a vast conspiracy of party operatives, "nonpartisan" 527 fund-raising groups, liberal media stars such as Al Franken, and billionaire donors like George Soros to defeat George W. Bush. It was no secret. In fact, Democrats were proud of it. And as York says in "The Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy," the well-organized political movement that the Democrats created to outfox tough new campaign finance laws and bring them back to national power is going to give Republicans fits in future elections. I talked to the National Review's White House correspondent by telephone from Washington: Q: What's the book-flap synopsis of what you've discovered? A: It's the story of MoveOn.org, 527 organizations, George Soros, Michael Moore, Air America Radio and Al Franken, and John Podesta's think-tank, the Center for American Progress. It's how these people, often working together, created the biggest, richest, best-organized political movement in generations. Q: Was it just hatred of President Bush that got this conspiracy going? A: I really distinguish two wings of this movement. One is the emotional wing, which is MoveOn and Michael Moore. They are given to emotional outbursts, and they were very angry in the aftermath of the Clinton impeachment and in the aftermath of the Florida recount in 2000. Basically, they were angered by everything that George Bush did, including the look on his face. The professional wing is a very different group. They are the group that created America Coming Together, which was the largest of the Democrat 527 groups -- people like Ellen Malcolm of Emily's List, Steve Rosenthal, who used to be with the AFL-CIO, and John Podesta, who created the Center for American Progress. These were people who were more affected by two completely different things: One was the beginning of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law after the 2002 election and the other was the actual results of the 2002 election, in which they had to face the reality that Democrats controlled absolutely nothing in Washington. That's when they realized that they needed to build a new political organization. Q: This conspiracy didn't discover a new set of ideas or new ideological positions -- is it more about donations and money from George Soros and Internet donors? A: It's about communications. If you listen to any of them, from either the emotional or the professional wing, you will hear the belief that we -- meaning the liberals -- we are the true American majority. Their unshakable belief is that the real majority of Americans agrees with their positions on the issues. So if you believe that, the problem really becomes one of communications: Our ideas are right. People agree with our ideas. People just haven't heard them. We just haven't communicated those ideas well enough. So the essence of the "vast left-wing conspiracy" is really communications. It's creating a message machine to inject their ideas into the public discussion 24/7. Q: How will this conspiracy transform the way political campaigns are run? A: It has already to some degree. McCain-Feingold took away the unlimited contributions that had been the life's blood of the Democratic Party. A new way had to be found to conduct campaigns. McCain-Feingold exposed the dirty little secret of the Democrats' finances, which is that they were far more dependent on millionaires for their funding than Republicans were. In February 2003, just a couple months after McCain-Feingold took effect, the Democrats' three biggest committees collected about $4 million in contributions -- small, limited, McCain-Feingold contributions. The three Republican committees collected about $19 million. The Republicans had a lot more small donors than the Democrats. The Democrats realized that they had to find a way to get their big donors back in action .... So the 527s were born. That is a way in which power shifted away from the Democratic Party to outside groups. It also empowered people like George Soros, who were the enormous funders of these groups and who had a lot of say. Q: Is there anything particularly evil or sleazy about what this conspiracy is up to? A: There were a couple of incidents in the book in which I think ethical boundaries were crossed. Mostly it's a conspiracy in the sense in which liberals refer to a right-wing conspiracy, which is they wanted to create a powerful, well-oiled machine that could get its message out, could attack its enemies, and could spur political action at any time. Q: Will conservatives or Republicans learn anything from the Democrats' new ways? A: I think they should. I think the instinct of some conservatives has been to dismiss some of these people. For example, to think of MoveOn as crazy hippies, or to think of Michael Moore as a kook, or to think of George Soros as an eccentric billionaire. But these people created something pretty powerful, and they have a long-term plan. And they are in part basing it on what they believe conservatives did 40 years ago after the defeat of Barry Goldwater. Republicans and conservatives would make a really big mistake by either ignoring or minimizing these people. Q: Will this conspiracy put Hillary Clinton back in the White House? A: Well, it easily could. But what it's going to do is put an incredibly powerful new and creative machine behind whoever runs for president as a Democrat in 2008. Ooooh. Okay, everyone. Let's not be too dismissive of the crazies. Insanity is big juju... at least in certain circles. The National Review is one such circle Posted by: .com 2005-04-16 |
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