Dean is McGovern. Or so some say. By this, they want to say Dean is too liberal for America. They also want to predict a devastating loss for Dean and the Democrats.

This simpleminded analogy completely ignores that Dean isn’t nearly as liberal as his enemies and earliest supporters want to believe. Still, let’s extend this analogy.

Bush is Nixon. Now, at first blush, this is MUCH easier to accept. Except, don’t forget Nixon’s environmental actions — all of which Bush would undo. Ironically, Nixon is too liberal for today’s Radical Right. But the shifty eyes are similar, though Nixon never looked so blank.

Cheney is Agnew. Agnew was the original angry white male who did much to beat the Media into submission (those “nattering nabobs of negativism” are now thoroughly embedded by Bush). Agnew used “liberal” as an obscenity, though he was a pornographer of conservatism. Agnew, the petty crook, resigned in scandal if not shame. Cheney’s going to slip away in secret, laughing all the way to the bank.

Certainly, there is a very similar idea at work within the Republican Party 32 years later: fear is the key to power. Nixon told us to be afraid of crime and thugs (meaning people who wanted to end the war by taking to the streets). Bush is leading us in another endless war, not against poverty (what, are you a commie?) or crime or drugs but terror. None of this “we have nothing to fear but fear itself” (some Democrat said that).

Bush is Nixon. Let’s imagine Bush finally wins election. How long before the many, many things he has done in a secretive manner finally come to light? How long before impeachment proceedings? How long before the great shame comes again?

Iraq is Vietnam. No, we don’t have nearly the tolerance for dead (almost 500) or wounded (almost 10,000 — have you heard that yet?) or the willingness to just accept what the government says. Vietnam brought down Johnson. Maybe Bush is Johnson!

The big picture visionaries see more in our future-past: Bush’s (re)election will begin a Republican era to last as long as the Democrat’s New Deal-Great Society (the fruits of which are taking far less time to destroy).

Dream on. The Depression and World War II united Americans in support of their government. The Civil Rights Movement proved that government has a vital role in improving our lives, of assuring our rights that don’t seem so self-evident anymore. In the process, no one slandered “liberalism” as un-American.

Bush isn’t FDR. And the Radical Right isn’t the future of America. mjh

www.mjhinton.com/dumpbush/

Mark Fiore makes light (sort of) of Bush’s clear tendency to schedule potentially controversial matters when they won’t be noticed, like signing the equivalent of Patriot Act II on the same day Saddam Hussein was captured — who noticed? mjh

Weekenders 1/7/04

The Stump Speech: Edwards Promises a Positive Vision and to Change the ‘Two Americas’ By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD, NYTimes

Voters say, ” `You haven’t been in politics all your life, you haven’t even been in Washington that long, how in the world are you going to change this country?’ ” Mr. Edwards said here. ”Here’s my question to you: You think people who have been in politics all their lives, have been in Washington for decades, you think they’re going to change America?”

Mr. Edwards portrays doubts about him as the work of cynics and of the privileged whom he is campaigning against.

He says that when he was young, the son of a mill worker, the doubters said of him: “You really think you’re going to college? You’re going to be a lawyer? How in the world is that ever going to happen?”

“Then, when I walked into courtrooms and these armies of these big corporate lawyers, much older and more experienced than me, they would be in there and they’d say, `What’s that young fellow doing in here? What? Does he think he’s going to take us on?’ And over and over and over I won those fights.”

“How many times in your life has somebody said something like that to you? Think about that for a minute.”

Mr. Edwards cites his 20 years as a personal injury lawyer suing corporate America as proof he is tough enough to challenge Mr. Bush, seeking to answer doubts among some voters. “We need somebody who has been fighting these fights and winning these fights their whole lives,” Mr. Edwards said.

Op-Ed Columnist: The God Gulf By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF, NYTimes

America is riven today by a ”God gulf” of distrust, dividing churchgoing Republicans from relatively secular Democrats. A new Great Awakening is sweeping the country, with Americans increasingly telling pollsters that they believe in prayer and miracles, while only 28 percent say they believe in evolution. All this is good news for Bush Republicans, who are in tune with heartland religious values, and bad news for Dean Democrats who don’t know John from Job.

So expect Republicans to wage religious warfare by trotting out God as the new elephant in the race, and some Democrats to respond with hypocrisy, by affecting deep religious convictions. This campaign could end up as a tug of war over Jesus.