Sharing lessons for fellow Democrats

Rep. Chet Edwards says he feels like "a survivor of the Titanic."
The only one of five targeted Texas Democrats to win re-election Nov. 2, Edwards sees lessons in his victory for his party as a whole: Put support for the people of his district ahead of support for President Bush. Respond quickly to negative attacks. And don't cede the "family values" debate.
"I got 64 percent of the vote in President Bush's home county even though almost every ad run by my opponent for six months was that she wanted to go to Congress to work for George Bush," the 52-year-old Waco congressman said last week.
"Our message was, 'I'm an independent-minded, effective member of Congress who'll fight for jobs and better schools in our district and a strong national defense and homeland security at the national level,'" he said.
He opposed some of the president's tax cuts "because I felt that the country can't afford them." But he backed Bush on energy and education policy. And he indicated he might oppose Bush if the president reads his re-election as a mandate for sweeping changes in Social Security and the nation's tax system.
"The president deserves tremendous credit for winning this election," he said. "But it wasn't a mandate for specific reforms in taxes and Social Security because those issues were hardly debated in the presidential campaign."
A need for Bush
If Bush hopes to pass sweeping changes, Edwards said, he will have to reach out to Democrats far more than Republicans have been willing to do so far.
"Not every Republican is going to vote to partially privatize Social Security," he said, noting the politically touchy issue was put off two years ago at the behest of House Republicans wary of the fallout.
He said he opposed Social Security privatization "because I haven't heard anyone say how they'd pay for the $1 (trillion) to $2 trillion it would cost to work through the transition."
Edwards, who largely avoided the presidential race, acknowledged that John Kerry would have been president "with a shift of less than 250,000 votes throughout the country."
At the same time, he added, "the Democratic Party should not minimize the loss" or the challenge it faces, both philosophically and geographically.
"If Democrats aren't trusted on homeland security and national defense, people will not listen to us on education and health care and tax fairness," he said.
"We cannot be a national party by just representing the population centers on the East Coast and the West Coast of the United States," he added. "And we should keep Republicans from having a monopoly on family values."
Ever since he first sought a congressional seat more than 25 years ago, Edwards said he has stressed the same goals for all Americans: "a good job, a decent home in a safe neighborhood, affordable health care, quality education for their children and retirement security."
"Democrats need to be pro-active in defining family values as including all those values," he said. "Family values are not just about abortion and homosexuality."
Finding solace
In assessing the election, Edwards said he took some solace in an old dictum that "in every victory are the seeds of defeat and in every defeat the seeds of victory."
"People love the idea of less taxes and smaller government," he said. "It's been a great sound bite for the Republican Party for 20 years. But now the rubber is starting to meet the road.
"In the 1990s, [former House Speaker] Newt Gingrich didn't have the power to implement revolutionary cuts in government, and Austin Republicans didn't have the authority either."
But when they began to implement that philosophy, "Texans -- including conservative Republicans in my district -- didn't buy into the idea of cutting 159,000 children off the Children's Health Insurance Program."
That was a major issue for Edwards against his GOP opponent, state Rep. Arlene Wohlgemuth, who sponsored budget cuts responsible for that action.
Edwards survived with a slightly higher margin than in his old district in 2002. Still, he recognizes that GOP efforts to eliminate him are likely to continue.
Asked if he plans to take any time off, he smiled and replied: "Time off? I'm looking at 2006."
XCarl P. Leubsdorf is Washington bureau chief of the Dallas Morning News. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune.