Hackett Withdrawal Presages Liberal-Left Split?

UPI's Martin Seiff suggests it's a possibility:

Paul Hackett's angry decision to withdraw from the Senate race in Ohio is a devastating blow for the Democratic Party and may even have profound long-term repercussions on American politics.

It opens the door to the very real possibility that opposition to the war, and to any possible conflict with Iran, will focus on a new Third Party populist movement that could reach the scale of the H. Ross Perot movement in the 1990s but be far more passionate. And that could cripple the Democrats' hopes, and even expectations of regaining the White House in 2008.

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Political blogs across the nation are red hot with debate over Hackett's withdrawal.

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The Hackett fiasco may well doom the Democrats to losing the Senate race in Ohio this November. But it also highlights the broader pattern of the party's liberal Old Guard refusing to open its doors to the new generation of angry patriots like Hackett and Sheehan who had offered their services to it. Far from benefiting from anger against the Iraq war and other policies of the Bush administration, the national Democrats may be fated to become targets for it. If that happens, their many critics will certainly say they have no one to blame but themselves.

Bush-hatred isn't enough to paper over serious differences between the moderate and left wings of the liberal party.

posted by Ace at 12:24 PM

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