Tim Roemer, the Kind of Democrat That Republicans Love

Josh Marshall has up a new post about former congressman Tim Roemer, judged by some to be a leading contender to grab the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee away from Howard Dean. Marshall notes that both Democratic minority leaders, Reid in the Senate and Pelosi in the House, "improbably" support Roemer. Why? Marshall wants to know, considering that Roemer:

1. Favors privatization of Social Security.

2. Opposes abortion.

3. Voted against the Clinton budget of 1993, the budget that passed by just a single vote.

4. Voted for the Bush budget of 2001 and was one of only nine House Democrats to vote to make the Bush tax cuts permanent in 2002.

Marshall then writes:

"As I've said many times before, with a very few exceptions, we shouldn't view a politician's entire career through the prism of a single vote. But those two votes are awfully significant. They frame the mammoth fiscal challenges the country faces today. And they are at the root of the Democratic party's current claim to be the party of growth, equity, fiscal responsibility and economic stewardship. To me at least, that's a very important part of what the Democratic party stands for today.

"When Democrats claim credit, as they rightly do again and again, for bringing the country from perpetual deficits to surpluses in the 1990s, a major part of what they're talking about has to be the 1993 budget bill. When they denounce the Republicans as the party of deficits, fiscal recklessness and enemies of Social Security, in an equal measure, they're talking about President Bush's 2001 bill.

"Yet both of those arguments, by definition, are one's Roemer simply cannot make because he was on the other side of the issue both times. At best he would be a mockery whenever he debated Republicans on anything to do with fiscal policy since he consistently voted with them and not his own party. And no doubt they'd point that out...."

With Democratic party chairmanships to be filled soon, from the local county level on up through the state and the national leadership, we're apprehensive about people like Roemer. We would have to rethink our own commitment to a party that seems intent on going "red." Why not just make Newt Gingrinch chair of the DNC? We hear he's between jobs. And shares Roemer's policy positions.