The Centrist Mythos

If, for the sake of argument, we grant that the DLC are "centrists," it nonetheless behooves us to ask, "centrists at the center of what?"

Aye, there's the rub. When the center is defined as just left of John Birch, Ronald Reagan becomes a flaming liberal. So "centrist" is clearly a nonsense word without a frame of reference, sort of like "50% cleaner!" on a bottle of laundry detergent. The question is, 50% cleaner than what? Smeared bull shit?

Thats it! The DLC is at the center of a smeared bullshit stain!

Snubbing the Centrists? | The Trail | washingtonpost.com

The story line almost writes itself: Democratic president candidates snub centrists but plan to court liberal bloggers. Another sign of the party's leftward drift?

That's the easy and partially correct interpretation of what is happening this week. But not the whole story.

In the past two years, the Democratic Leadership Council's (DLC's) annual summer meeting has been a Mecca for would-be candidates. Two years ago, Hillary Clinton was there along with three Democrats who have since fallen by the wayside: Evan Bayh, Mark Warner and Tom Vilsack. Last year in Denver, Clinton among others was there again.

Today, none of the presidential candidates will be in Nashville to address the group that helped redefine the Democratic Party in the late '80s and early '90s -- but the man who did most to put the DLC on the map and who used it as a springboard to the presidency, Bill Clinton, will be.

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