Uhh, yeah, right . . . reasons to dis DLC

The Politico reports ("Democrats dis DLC convention" - David Paul Kuhn - Politico.com) on various (unconvincing) reasons that not_one_single_Democrat_presidential_candidate (and there are a bunch) is attending the national Democratic Leadership Council convention this weekend. One reason: "the democratization of the primaries" which is to mean--purportedly unlike the College Democrat convention in SC where five of the candidates showed up, there's no pool of "activists" at the DLC convention who will volunteer in campaigns. I guess none of the folks mentioned--"Three hundred and fifty politicians," "key governors," and "ambitious state legislators, from almost every state"--have influence within the Party.

The backup reason offered is that the location of the convention--Nashville, is de-motivating because "Tennessee is not a swing state." I'm glad to hear that said, but this is awful stingy thinking given the daily reminders from Dr. Governor Howard Dean, M.D. that they have put DNC operatives on the ground in each of the 50 states, and the reality that they will have to win over voters in some like those found in Tennessee if they are to win in '08.

And lastly, they offer the real, less-flattering reason, "the nature of primary contests (campaign for the flank, not the center, of the party)."

And that's the rub . . . as noted in the article, the DLC was the greenhouse for all the winning Democrat ideas and presidential candidates (one, actually, Al Gore was a calculating, short-term Centrist) over the last decade or more. This isn't the Democrat equivalent of the "Mainstreet Republicans" or "Log Cabin Republicans" we're talking about.

It is interesting to note that Hillary (the most viable plus Centrist-sounding Dem candidate at this juncture) has the luxury of "appearing" at the event by sending the Surrogate Supreme, Bill Clinton. But I'm not sure of a better example of how very extreme is the primary voter in the Democrat Party . . . or at least of how such voter is perceived by the respective Democrat campaigns.