The Right is Catching On...

Glenn Reynolds (aka Instapundit) is started to take Dean seriously, and notes that many on the right think Dean will get the nomination and “could give Bush a tough ride in the election.”

From the same post, Reynolds links to OxBlog, a conservative blogger who calls the NY Times out on its overly slanted portrayal of the Dean juggernaut. The money quote from the Times article, of course, is the assertion that the people at Dean’s NYC Sleepless Summer stop were “aging flower children and the tongue-studded next generation.”

In case you haven’t noticed, we’ve entered the “they’re all white” phase of the campaign. First was the “he’s the anti-war candidate,” then we moved on to “he’s the pacifist candidate”, then “the angry candidate”, then “the unelectable candidate”, then “the poor candidate”, and more recently, “the insurgent who’s peaked to early candidate”. None of those have stuck, so now the press is eager to find another angle. And many of them are observing that many of the throngs showing up to hear Dean speak are caucasian.

Uh, ok. Point taken. But as everyone else points out, we’ve got some time before the primaries. If the articles were pointing out that the missing minorities were attending rallies by one of the other top-tier candidates, I’d be worried.

They’re not. It’s early. Stay tuned.

(And for those keeping score: the seeds are already sown for the next attempted characterization: “the flip-flop candidate.” I’ll comment on that next week; it should start showing up in earnest around the time Clark gets in the race.)