Stand Up Fight Back: Republican Toughs, Democratic Wimps, and the Politics of Revenge

by E.J. Dionne Jr.

Book Overview

One of our most visible, trenchant, and witty political commentators, the author of the bestselling Why Americans Hate Politics, offers a tough critique of President George W. Bush and the Democratic opposition on the eve of a landmark presidential election -- and points to a way out of cynicism and defeatism.

With passion, clarity, and humor, E. J. Dionne describes today's political atmosphere as the bitterest he can remember...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0743258584
• ISBN13: 9780743258586
• Release Date: June 2004
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.4" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Great Book

Clear, insightful, E.J. Dionne puts things together that you may have had a gut feeling about, but haven't actually thought thru.

Taking the Fight to the Opposition

E.J. Dionne is a mild-mannered, highly erudite Oxford graduate who pens reflective and intelligent political opinion pieces for the Washington Post. This book is a wakeup call to liberal-progressives that the battle so long thought lost by so many is far from that; the seeds for victory are at hand as long as the case is correctly made. Dionne tackles the proposition that, because of a well-financed Republican spin machine, which has sought to demonize the word "liberal" and put forward the proposition that those who follow the philosophy's principles are misguided or worse, too many progressives have backed away from the fight and often taken apologetic positions. Dionne believes that any posture of defensiveness should be abandoned for an aggressive campaign. Dionne points out that, while moral fiber and patriotism are trotted out as staple Republican core values, the record tells a different story in instances where tax cuts are sought to please a wealthy coterie of party supporters and traditional beliefs about war and peace are turned upside down by neoconservatives who all too frequently seek to attack first and ask questions later. A reporter who took the Howard Dean movement seriously from the beginning and was on the scene during key periods of the Vermont populist's presidential campaign, Dionne quickly noted that the fresh new face on the block was attracting a large support base by tackling the issues and asserting hard-core progressive positions on taxation, health care, and the environment. While Dean might not have won even one primary, Dionne was perceptive enough to notice that other more successful Democratic candidates, including John Kerry, began adopting a position of "We're fed up and we're not gonna take it anymore" rather than the more vanilla brand of "play it safe" politics earlier prevailing. By being afraid to tackle the bloated Republican special interest culture the twin dangers of 1) losing voters to the sidelines through apathy, or 2) losing them to Ralph Nader and Green Party candidates based on conviction are more likely to be realized. A solid agenda needs to be projected to counter an increasingly sharpening rightist Republican tilt. As Dionne notes, when this happens people become engaged, as was the case with the Dean movement. Dionne believes, as does conservative political author Kevin Phillips, that the Republicans have abandoned the vital center. While they attempt to attack Democrats as being out of step with mainstream American voters, Dionne believes that the opposite is true, that the Democrats have the vital American center in reachable co-opting distance, and what is needed is the resolute tenacity and clarity of message to take control of mainstream America at the polls. Dionne argues that it is time to stop being timid and come forward with alternative proposals to a current Republican philosophy of hard core rightist rigidity that is a far cry from the conservatism of Senator Robert

A Well-Written and Thought-Provoking Call to Arms

The recent death of Ronald Reagan inspired many recollections of the former President's remarkable talent for disagreeing without being disagreeable. Even his fiercest political opponents found him to be an amiable man who did not take political differences in a personal fashion. Sadly, politics today is played by a different set of rules. To see how the game is played today, one need only start with a current list of some of the bestselling books from either side of the political spectrum. Bookstore shelves yield discordant titles such as DELIVER US FROM EVIL: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism and Liberalism by Sean Hannity; BIG LIES by Joe Conason; TREASON: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism by Ann Coulter; and THE REPUBLICAN NOISE MACHINE: Right-Wing Media and How it Corrupts Democracy by David Brock. These are just a few of the representative titles found in the politics section.STAND UP, FIGHT BACK by E.J. Dionne, Jr. is a call to arms to those people who, regardless of political views, are troubled by the fiercely personal nature of American politics and the growing tendency to make every political debate partisan. Dionne worries that one side in the current political climate, liberals and progressives, have lost the will to fight for traditional principles supported by the vast majority of Americans. The current political atmosphere, Dionne argues, is damaging not only to democracy but also to important political institutions as well.At other moments in our history, revenge has been an important theme in American political life. From the era of Andrew Jackson to the post-Civil War period to the rise of Senator Joseph McCarthy, American politics has experienced cycles in which each side depends for victory more on mobilizing its loyalists than persuading the uncommitted. So divided are we along party and ideological lines that we cannot even agree on what event triggered the current cycle of revenge. Some believe it started with Watergate, others point to the confirmation battles over Supreme Court nominees, and still others would suggest that the Clinton Wars were the commencement of the battle. Regardless of when the struggle began, there has been no peace in American politics for many years.One of Dionne's core themes in STAND UP, FIGHT BACK is that an opportunity was squandered to once again unite the country and create a better political atmosphere in America. After September 11th, President Bush had the opportunity to reunite the country. Indeed, for a brief period of time, the country was unified. But instead of building upon that opportunity to avoid divisive politics, President Bush chose to divide the country on issues such as homeland security, tax cuts and the war in Iraq. Dionne firmly believes that historians will not judge the President well for his conduct.But Dionne does not limit his disapproval to the right wing of American politics. Liberals and progressives have both been unable to articulate an ag

Memo to Kerry Campaign

Dear Mary Beth Cahill,As a supporter of the Kerry campaign, I ask that you assign this book to all of the staffers and take E.J. Dionne's analysis and suggestions to heart. I've been sitting back in Wisconsin and watching this campaign unfold, and while I believe that things are going pretty well, I feel that we could be doing better. "Stand Up and Fight" should be adopted as a manual for the Kerry campaign, and other Democratic campaigns across the country.In Stand Up and Fight, Dionne makes several points that I think you would do well to pay close attention to: 1.) as Democrats we are allowing the opposition to frame the issues that matter, we are adopting their language. 2.) We are not doing a good job of presenting our arguments: poll after poll reveals that the American people agree with us on issue after issue; if they do not know that they agree with us, it's our fault and it's a huge problem. 3.) Most importantly, we need to adapt our arguments for the 21st century and we should not apologize for our past. As liberals we are by nature tinkerers, some of our experiments have gone awry: megalithic public housing projects, for example, seem to have been a failure. However, it's our principles that matter and they are good, American principles. We should acknowledge that large housing projects like Cabrini Green in Chicago were a bad idea, but we should stand by the principles that lead us to try them out.I urge anyone involved in or interested in Democratic politics to read this book and to read it ASAP. Time is of the essence, and while I wish that Mr. Dionne's publisher had been able to get this book out earlier, I am deeply grateful that it came out in time for it to make a difference.

Stand Up And READ

In addition to delivering a insightful view of where the left and right are today, Dionne offers a slogan the Democrats (and yes, liberals) wold be wise to use: "Patriotic Progessives."For too long, conservatives have pushed the center to the right and railed against those who have dared disagree or didn't reflexively fall in line.