The Angry Left takes on a moderate Democrat

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Once More Unto the Breach

The Angry Left takes on a moderate Democrat--and loses.

BY JONATHAN GURWITZ

Thursday, March 16, 2006 12:01 a.m.

SAN ANTONIO--More than one political venture has met an unseemly end in the hardscrabble landscape of South Texas. It was here, in 1948, that Box 13 gave Lyndon Johnson a dubious 87-vote primary victory, crushing former Gov. Coke Stevenson's Senate aspirations. It was here, two years ago, that a bitter primary fight for a House seat shattered a friendship between two Hispanic Democrats. And it was here, this month, in a rematch of that contest, that a blogger-led quest to defeat a mainstream Democrat and drive the party further to the left smashed head-on into the realities of local politics.

One figure in that contest was Henry Cuellar, a centrist Democratic lawmaker from Laredo. He'd figured prominently in the Republican Party's outreach to Texas Hispanics; he crossed party lines in 2000 to support then-Gov. George Bush's presidential candidacy and later served as secretary of state for Mr. Bush's successor, Rick Perry. That didn't prevent Mr. Cuellar, however, from running a highly competitive race in 2002 against GOP incumbent Henry Bonilla for the District 23 congressional seat. Mr. Cuellar received crucial support from Texas Democrats, including long-time friend Rep. Ciro Rodriguez of San Antonio, the incumbent in neighboring District 28.

Part of Tom DeLay's notorious Texas redistricting in 2003 sought to shore up Mr. Bonilla, the only Hispanic Republican in the state's congressional delegation. The controversial map, now under Supreme Court review, lopped off Laredo from District 23, moving it and Mr. Cuellar into District 28, which now reaches from the outskirts of Austin in the north, through parts of San Antonio to Laredo and a stretch along the Rio Grande. Its residents, largely rural, Hispanic and poor, characteristically are hardworking traditionalists.

In 2004, Mr. Cuellar made the difficult decision to challenge his old friend, Mr. Rodriguez, a decision many Democrats regarded as an act of betrayal. Mr. Cuellar capitalized on his San Antonio opponent's detachment from the southern part of the district; an anemic campaign by the incumbent, whom Cuellar supporters referred to as "Zero" Rodriguez, made the primary extremely close. The initial results showed the incumbent with a 145-vote victory. But two contentious recounts produced previously undiscovered votes for Mr. Cuellar in two border counties, including his own Webb County. After five months of controversy and legal challenges that ended at the Texas Supreme Court, Mr. Cuellar emerged with a primary victory by a margin of 58 votes out of 50,000 cast district wide. He went on to win the general election with 59% of the vote.

Once in Washington, Mr. Cuellar continued to display the independence and bipartisanship that had distinguished him in Texas. He is among a handful of Democrats who voted for repealing the estate tax, against meritless lawsuits and for the Central American Free Trade Agreement--a vote that made perfect sense to the son of a city that has enjoyed an economic boom from free trade. But what made perfect sense in Laredo was merely more evidence of his perfidy to Democrats who hadn't forgiven him for taking down Mr. Rodriguez. Where Mr. Rodriguez's legal fight against the results of the 2004 primary ended, his campaign to regain his old House seat in 2006 began.

The campaign was long on sentiment but short on funds. By the end of December, Mr. Rodriguez had raised only $170,000 to Mr. Cuellar's $655,000. Then, in January, the conservative Club for Growth endorsed Mr. Cuellar, its first ever Democratic endorsement. And as President Bush entered the House chamber for the State of the Union address, cameras captured his hearty embrace of Mr. Cuellar. The endorsement and the image were widely disseminated, igniting a nationwide liberal campaign to defeat Mr. Cuellar. Influential bloggers Markos "Kos" Moulitsas and Duncan "Atrios" Black led the charge, joined by kindred Web sites. As much as $500,000 poured into Mr. Rodriguez's coffers during the final six weeks of electioneering. Liberals touted the effort as the ultimate mobilization of the "netroots"--the indomitable synthesis of grassroots organization with digital potency.

In the March 7 primary, Mr. Cuellar won with 53% of the vote to Mr. Rodriguez's 41% (a third candidate taking the rest). He increased his margin of victory over Mr. Rodriguez in 2004 in 10 out of 11 counties, besting his principal opponent by nearly 5,600 votes--despite the efforts of the netroots activists. "A lot of energy and money was wasted in the Democratic primary that could have been used to defeat Republicans in November," says Colin Strother, a general consultant for Mr. Cuellar's campaign. "The netroots people took their eyes off the ball--taking the House back from the Republicans," he says. "They only knew one picture .  . They knew nothing about the district."

Blogger Moulitsas is unapologetic. "So we didn't kill off Cuellar," he wrote in an entry on his blog, "but we gave him an [black] whooping where none was expected and made him sweat. That's the reason why Lieberman is sweating in Connecticut," referring to another netroots challenge against another centrist Democrat.

So far, threats like these seem the best the Angry Left can muster. They now have a disastrous 0-17 record stretching back to 2004. The netroots leaders resemble nothing so much as World War I commanders, who after each successive setback maintained that victory was tantalizingly close, and lobbed more artillery shells and threw more troops over the top. Similarly among the netroots, the article of faith is that victory is only a matter of trying harder, upping the rhetoric and raising more money.

Despite the lack of tangible electoral results, the netroots effort could have a devastating effect on the increasingly thin ranks of moderates within the Democratic Party. Mr. Cuellar suggests his victory should force party agitators to rethink an ideological agenda that pits so-called progressive yet marginal candidates against mainstream Democrats. "This little election," he observes, "has repercussions for the Democratic Party."

Mr. Cuellar remains unfazed by the netroots intimidation. "People ask me, 'Are you gonna change, did this scare you?' No. I don't mind bucking the system if it's the right thing for the district." Whether Democrats will tolerate such independent thinking is the great challenge facing their party.

Mr. Gurwitz is a columnist and member of the editorial board of the San Antonio Express-News.

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