CENTRIST DEMS CONDEMN LIB BUSH ATTACKS - ARE THESE THE NEW REAGAN DEMOCRATS?

Moderate Democrats are strongly criticizing their party for the attacks against the President over the wire taps for suspected Al Qaeda operatives in The United States. Stating that the attacks will further weaken their already weak party, centrist Democrats also realize that their parties stance loses credibility with the American people over national security issues. The recent move by Senate Democrats to block the Patriot Act also concerned moderates in the Democratic Party because the general feeling is that the party has taken the civil liberties debate too far when national security is at risk. "I get nervous when I see the Democrats playing this [civil liberties] issue out too far. They had better be careful about the politics of it," said Michael O'Hanlon a Democrat advisor from the Brookings Institute, who says the Patriot Act is "good legislation." Could this be the beginning of today's version of a Reagan Democrat? When President Reagan ran for office in 1980 and again in 1984 the Republican Party was not as strong in registered voters as it is now. In both elections Reagan won because of a significant number of what were deemed as, "Reagan Democrats." Moderate Democrats who were fed up with the direction that their party was moving in the late 70's and throughout the 80's. The significant number of Reagan Democrats gave the former President two landslide victories and helped President Reagan give birth and nurture the conservative movement that has been prominent in the Republican Party ever since. The move to the far left of the Democrat Party is creating today's version of the Reagan Democrat. It is not often that party members criticize their leaders especially when a Republican is in office. There is a growing disconnect between the party leadership and the elected officials both in the House and the Senate. Most of the disconnect is over the War on Terror and national security interests. These moderates in the Democrat Party understand that the nation is at risk from terrorism and that in this post 9/11 world we have to take the battle to the terrorists or they will once again bring it to our soil. They also understand that the President is legally using Executive powers to insure that all means available are used to hunt down and eliminate terrorists both at home and abroad. The political games that liberals, who are the leadership and core of the Democrat Party, is leaving a bad taste in the mouths of the centrist/moderates and this could very well be reflected at the poles in the 2006 mid terms. The liberal leadership is so disconnected with much of their own party and with the American people as a whole that in their arrogance they are actually turning their own supporters away thus once again insuring that their minority status will continue and the modern Democrat Party could very well become an insignificant movement in future politics.

Ken Taylor