McGovern? Hart? Dems May Yet Repeat Sorry History

The postwar legacy of Democratic candidates is one of failure, Andrew O’Hehir writes in Salon, with so many lost campaigns that any seasoned observer could lay out sorry futures for Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Whether Obama and Clinton are McGovern and Muskie or Hart and Mondale, the party's "unresolved internal struggles have time and again undermined its ability to win elections."

The left is once again mired in internal strife, making all the analogies ring true. O’Hehir says Obama is a better match for 1984 outsider Gary Hart than for 1972 outsider George McGovern, the GOP’s preferred touchstone—but neither man became president. If one really squints at history, there’s nowhere Dems can turn where a path to defeat hasn’t already been mapped. (More Barack Obama stories.)