Is There An Establishment to Tilt to Mitt?

Noam Scheiber has an interesting article in The New Republic (TNR) about how at least some parts of the Republican establishment are tilting toward Mitt Romney. Scheiber focuses on the support for Mitt that's developing among the evangelical establishment (Jeff Sekolow, Gary Bauer, and some people associated with Focus on the Family). But Scheiber also could have mentioned Wall Street where I recall that Romney's been cleaning up in fund-raising.

While acknowledging that Romney has received support from some parts of the Republican establishment, I don't believe that the Republican nor the Democratic establishments have been cohesive enough to create favorites for 2008. Since 1976, the Republican establishment has anointed favorites and had the muscle to push their candidates through the primaries. Democratic elites are much less cohesive than the Republicans but the Democratic establishment has been able to get their candidate nominated in 1984 (Mondale), 1988 (Dukakis), 1992 (Clinton), and 2000 (Gore). Paralyzed by the Bush ascendancy and the war in 2004, elite Democrats worked for several candidates as John Kerry pushed toward the nomination.

This year, the Republican establishment seems to be just as paralyzed by Bush's decline and the various candidates seem to be free to recruit consultants, financial backers, and local supporters on their own.

But the Democrats might have an even more interesting situation. They have three strong candidates, but my impression is that the Democratic establishment of Beltway figures, newspaper editors, DNC figures, and Hollywood money people don't particularly like either Hillary (too divisive), Obama (too black), or Edwards (too much of an insurgent). This isn't to say that any of these candidates don't have partial backing from the Democratic elite. However, I believe that the Democratic establishment as a whole would have preferred "safer" candidates like Evan Bayh or Mark Warner.

One of the outcomes of the 2008 election might be a president that much of the Democratic elite doesn't like--sort of like Jimmy Carter in 1976. That would be interesting.