Party-switching sob stories

Somerby has more on the sad story that Matthew Dowd cried to the Times on Sunday.

What’s the actual story behind Dowd’s party switch? It’s hard to provide real reporting on that; in 1999, Dowd still wasn’t a big enough player to merit profiles in Texas newspapers. But another party-switchin’ Bush honcho, Mark McKinnon, already was—and it’s easy to see, from the real-time reporting, what was actually going on when McKinnon switched from Dem to Rep in the mid-to-late 1990s. Duh! As the Texas Dem Party died on the vine, good hustlers knew it was time to switch—especially with a brand-name Texas governor leading Republican polls for the White House. Result? High-minded consultants like McKinnon and Dowd switched sides, offering silly sob stories about their high motives as they made the career-making move. Today, Dowd is offering these same sad stories—as he tries to disembark from the ship which has gone on the rocks.

Somerby's larger points are two-fold:

1. Why didn't it occur to the Times scribe to do, you know, some reporting on Matthew Dowd. Perhaps Dowd is telling the truth and in the wake of divorce, loss of one child, and the imminent deployment of another to Iraq, he's had an epiphany. Or, just as he did to Texas Dems in 1999, he's seen the future and the team he's on ain't looking too good.

2. Somerby's second point is further illuminated today. Guys like Dowd tell these stories and we child-like liberals fall all over ourselves to anoint them as the latest St. Paul's to be blinded by the rightness of our cause and the wrongness of the Mayberry Machiavellis they've abandoned. Why, if a guy like Dowd says what we want to hear -- that George Bush, Dick Cheney, etc. are "bad," then he must be sincere. Never mind that Dowd was a key part in the machine that put them on the throne to begin with. But as it becomes clear that not only history will judge this administration as the worst ever, but that the public sees it that way now, suddenly they sincerely agree.