Political journalist David Broder says both candidates reach across party lines
The country may be at a turning point where partisan politics isn't so extreme, national political correspondent and columnist David Broder said in an interview with The Capital Times.
"It's been so bad, not just in Washington, but in a lot of the states including this one, where the Republicans and Democrats haven't done much except fuss at each other," he said before giving a lecture Wednesday night in the Capitol Theater at the Overture Center entitled, "Best Prospects for Progress in Bridging Political Divide."
The nation is lucky that the two people who have won their party's presidential nominations -- Democratic nominee, Barack Obama, and Republican nominee, John McCain -- are both leaders who have worked across party lines for years and are very comfortable doing it, Broder said.
The odds are, whether it's Obama or McCain, there will be a significant number of members of the other party as part of the administration, he said. And not just in token jobs, but in major jobs, he added.
"But beyond that, I think the main reason that I'm hopeful is that these candidates, and not just the presidential candidates, but candidates at all levels, have been out now for two years talking to people, and what they are hearing from the voters themselves is a very strong demand that they get to work on the country's problems and not just on their party's business," said the Washington Post writer and Pulitzer Prize winner.
It's no accident that coming out of the two recent conventions, which he covered, both candidates have said that it's their job to change Washington, he said.
"They didn't just make that up out of their heads. They heard that from now thousands of people who say, if you get elected, change the way that operation is going down there because people are very frustrated by it and understandably so," Broder said.
The country has real problems -- not the worst problems its ever faced -- but problems that affect people's lives, he said.
"And they want to think that their damn government is doing something about it, which it hasn't been for the last 10 years, really," said Broder, who came here during the Wisconsin primary of the 1972 campaign.
Broder brought his son, then a high school senior, who spent a day on the University Wisconsin-Madison campus. He was so taken with the UW, "particularly the idea that there was beer in the union," that he came to school here. Broder's granddaughter, Lauren Broder, is currently a sophomore here.
Broder said definitively that he is not supporting either candidate. He is a journalist first and columnist second.
Other columnists may do what they want, Broder said, but he is not allowed to support a candidate. "I'd be fired instantly," he said. "I'm a journalist. I'm not a political activist."
Asked whether Obama bring real change, Broder said that in comparison to Bush, there is no question.
"I think both of these candidates are very different from the incumbent and they are very different from each other, of course, which is why we will have an interesting campaign this fall. They don't agree on a lot of issues, it's obvious," he said.
"People have a choice. But we don't have to choose between somebody who's going to be a very conventional Washington politician and somebody who's not, because neither of them are conventional Washington politicians," he said.
The 2008 campaign is the best he's ever covered, Broder said.
The first one he covered was the 1960 contest between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon, which he had always considered the best.
"The first time you do anything it's very special," he said. "But it was also a very close, competitive race between two young men who knew that it was going to be close. Kennedy and Nixon ran flat out from day one," he said, adding that most of the excitement in that campaign came after Labor Day with the debates.
He remembers being in Madison that year with Kennedy. It was before campaigns were mostly conducted on television, so huge crowds came out to see the candidates. Not just for a downtown rally in the evening, but people would park their cars all along the route the candidate would take into town.
"It was very exciting, and we are seeing crowds again now like that for both of these candidates. In a way, it's like closing the circle for me."
Broder's talk kicked off Wisconsin Academy's three-part weekly Wednesday series, "Getting to Purple: Beyond the Red and Blue of Partisan Politics" at the Overture Center. The other lecturers will be George Mason University government and politics professor James Conant and UW-Madison political science professor Barry Burden.
Promotional photo
Washington Post writer and Pulitzer Prize winner David Broder stopped in Madison Wednesday to give his speech, "Best Prospects for Progress in Bridging Political Divide."
