Warrior for the center

Columnist and commentator E.J. Dionne Jr. talks about his new book, Bush's lost 9/11 opportunity, John Kerry's strategy and what the Democrats must do to reclaim the abandoned American middle.

By Mary Jacoby

Jun 4, 2004 | Sure, liberal Democrats are enraged by President Bush. But when independents and moderate Republicans find themselves shaking with the same sense of outrage, that's when you've got a potential political realignment on your hands, says Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne Jr. in his new book, "Stand Up, Fight Back: Republican Toughs, Democratic Wimps and the Politics of Revenge."

Dionne, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and author of the 1991 bestseller "Why Americans Hate Politics," contends that Bush squandered a historic opportunity to unite the country after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Americans who put aside differences to rally behind Bush after 9/11 -- and in return got an invasion of Iraq and two-fisted partisanship in the 2002 midterm elections -- now feel like suckers, Dionne says. "How," he laments in the book, "has a fundamentally middle-of-the-road country gotten a politics characterized by so much meanness and division?"

In Dionne's view, most Americans are neither far left nor far right; they are moderates who have been left bound and tied on the train tracks by an increasingly radical and all-powerful GOP. Dionne desperately wants Democrats to come to the rescue, but he fears his heroes' knees will knock: "The party that once galvanized a nation by declaring that there is nothing to fear but fear itself had become afraid," he writes. To repair the party, Democrats should "stop talking about what they are not" and instead announce what they are for: economic justice, fair play, strong communities, tolerance and public service, he writes. They must take back the language of morals and religion from Republicans. And they must fight not only harder but smarter than Republicans. Otherwise, this historic opportunity to return America to equilibrium will be lost, he argues.

Dionne, who is also a professor at Georgetown University and a regular commentator on National Public Radio, chatted with Salon recently about his thoughts on the political scene.

The title of your book is "Stand Up, Fight Back." Whom are you urging to action -- the Democratic Party, or the moderate center of the American public? Because independents and moderate Republicans are a vital part of that center.

When you ask the question that way, that is indeed the way I think of it. In the first instance, I had in mind the Democrats. But then there are also moderates and, to a large extent, that section of the Republican Party that's been frozen out of authority. I think the American people should be fighting back against a kind of divisive politics that is not serving anybody.

One of the core themes of this book is that after 9/11, President Bush was given an enormous opportunity to reunite the country and create a new kind of politics. And we were very united for a while. But I think when historians look back on this period, one of the strongest criticisms they'll make of Bush is that rather than using this moment to put aside the worst kinds of divisive politics -- he divided the country on a homeland security bill, for goodness sake -- he has pushed through more tax cuts and he pushed through the Iraq war. So I have the sense there is a reaction in the country not only to the failures [of the administration] but also to a divisive tone [that] people are subscribing more and more to the folks who currently dominate the Republican Party.

Next Page: "I am a liberal in my politics but a moderate by disposition. For me to feel this level of anger and alienation is surprising"

• View blog reactions