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Jewish World Review Feb. 8, 2001 / 15 Shevat 5761
Philip Terzian
Into these unpromising precincts stepped an ambitious freshman senator from Oklahoma named
Fred Harris. Harris, a sometime protege of Lyndon Johnson with slight leanings toward his
party's left, saw himself as a bridge between the Old politics and the New, and sought to use
the DNC to advance his prospects for the presidency. It was a forlorn hope. The Democrats,
under the leadership of Sen. George McGovern, were about to "reform" their nominating process
into electoral oblivion: McGovern, himself, would be the first beneficiary of the new McGovern
Commission rules. And Harris, while energetic and audacious, had no plausible support outside
the DNC apparatus.
The New Deal coalition had fractured over Vietnam and urban riots; Richard Nixon's Southern
Strategy was pulling Republicans out of permanent minority status.
A little over a year after Harris's ascendancy I entered the scene as a DNC intern (no
jokes, please). The Democratic National Committee offices, at that time, were barely
distinguishable from what they had been a generation earlier: A research organization devoted
to churning out press releases and position papers. The place was full of tiny offices crammed
with books, papers and metal filing cabinets; old Johnson/Humphrey retreads toiled in stunned
obscurity. Harris had imported a few comely secretaries to brighten the atmosphere, but by
early 1970, it was obvious that somethng had to be done to inject some life into the party.
That something was to prompt the members of the DNC, led by the aged Col. Jacob Arvey of
Chicago, to persuade the old Kennedy hand Lawrence O'Brien to abandon his Wall Street exile --
no great loss, to O'Brien or Lower Manhattan -- and revive the moribund DNC.
Out went Harris and his dreams of the White House. In came O'Brien and his protean
assortment of veteran hacks, harbingers of youth, and well-groomed money men, notably Robert
Strauss, the new treasurer. The DNC never looked back.
I was reminded of all this by the election over the weekend of Terry McAuliffe as the new
Democratic national chairman. When a party holds the White House, nearly anybody can function
as chairman, and McAuliffe's predecessor (a harmless nebbish named Joe Andrews) fit the
description. But when the party is in opposition, and its "titular leadership" seems divided
between Bill Clinton and Al Gore, the chairmanship has some relevance. It is, perhaps,
significant that either Gore surrendered whatever lingering influence he wields, or Clinton
exercised his bullying tactics; but in any event, McAuliffe is very much Bill Clinton's man at
the DNC, with all the strengths and weaknesses that implies.
The strengths, as it were, are largely financial. McAuliffe is a real estate mogul who had
raised untold tens of millions for the Democratic Party during Clinton's tenure, and promises
to raise even more. In 2000, for the first time ever, the Democrats succeeded in raising more
soft money for candidates and issues advertising than the Republicans, which should make the
forthcoming debate about campaign finance reform especially interesting.
But McAuliffe's weaknesses are profound. He seems possessed of a political tin ear, which
was especially evident in his victory speech excoriating George W. Bush for "stealing" the
election with a litany of "complaints -- many of them sharply disputed or otherwise
unsubstantiated -- about alleged voter intimidation in Floria and elsewhere" (The Washington
Post). At a time when the new president is earning points for bipartisanship in Washington, and
disarming his critics, Mr. McAuliffe seems intent on practicing the kind of scorched-earth
politics Americans profess to abhor.
Then there is the sleaze factor. If there is one thing that former President and Mrs.
Clinton have come to represent in party politics, it is a particular corruption of the process
of fund-raising. And no one personifies that better than Terry McAuliffe, host of the Lincoln
Bedroom. Mr. McAuliffe remains vulnerable to criminal inquiries about his activities during the
1996 presidential campaign, especially the union money-laundering schemes that have tarred the
AFL-CIO and yielded an indictment against former Teamsters president Ron Carey. Whatever
millions Terry McAuliffe conjures up in the next several months must be balanced against his
bumptious rhetoric and reputation for sharp practices.
No one ever accused Fred Harris of crooked behavior, but when push came to shove, his
removal was swift and surgical, leaving no scars. Terry McAuliffe should be so
02/05/01: Their brother's keeper
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