The DNC's New Chairman

The irascible Howard Dean is at it again. Recently, he told a Houston crowd that House Republican leader Tom Delay should "go back to Houston, where he can serve his jail sentence down there courtesy of the Texas taxpayers." Never mind that Delay has not been convicted of anything, much less charged. But Dean is also infamous for another quote, in which he urged Americans not to "prejudge" Osama bin Laden's guilt, and that he should first be tried in a court of law. So it's okay to prejudge Republicans, but not terrorists. Tim Russert nailed Dean today on this, among other things.

But sadly, Dean is only all-too-representative of his party, which increasingly views the Republican Party as a greater threat to America than are bin Laden and his minions. While Dean's remarks may warm the hearts of the rabid Democratic faithful, I doubt it will win any converts to the Democratic side. As long as the Democrats use harsher language to describe their domestic political opponents than they use to describe our nation's foreign enemies, they will struggle to gain the electorate's trust on national security.