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Article: Why democrats must be populists: and what populist-phobes don't understand about America.
- Article from:
- The American Prospect
- Article date:
- September 9, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2002 The American Prospect, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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THE DEMOCRATIC LEADERSHIP COUNCIL (DLC) can take credit for many of the Democratic Party's successes in the 1990s. It was instrumental in deflecting Republican charges that Democrats condoned crime, favored welfare over work, and backed higher deficits and taxes. But since the November 2000 election, the DLC and its leaders in Congress have waged a scorched-earth campaign against "populism" in the Democratic Party. This campaign, if successful, would deprive Democrats of what historically has been one of their most important ideological assets, and make it more difficult for the party to win back the majority that it lost to conservative Republicans in 1980.
The ...