Dershowitz' dilemma -- and ours

Not all that many years ago such sentiments were widely and even proudly shared by many Democrats or even most Democrats. Dershowitz is 84 years old and belongs to that era, but he’s one of very few remaining in the party with such a point of view. He’s been railing at the ACLU for years for similar reasons, saying that they’ve betrayed their original principles.

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The puzzlement is why Dershowitz is still a Democrat, when he obviously knows how dangerous their excesses are.

I think it’s partly that “birthmark” phenomenon I wrote about in a post way back in 2005, discussing Zell Miller …

I think that Dershowitz is also clinging to the idealistic liberalism he used to know. He can’t accept that he is nearly alone now. Even more importantly, I believe that he thinks he can use the power of his own example to guide the party back.

He cannot succeed; the Democratic Party is too far gone and the rewards for acting otherwise have been too great. But Dershowitz is probably correct that if he changed affiliations and became a Republican or even an Independent he would lose whatever infinitesimal amount of influence over moderate Democrats that he might still retain, and would be demonized further by the rest as an apostate who left the circle of the anointed.

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