THE WIDENING GENDER GAP

Not the one the press has conditioned us to think about. There's another one, and it's growing rapidly. I'll let a Democrat sum it up:

Stanley B. Greenberg, the pollster for Gore in 2000 and Clinton in 1992, agreed. "Younger, married white men are disastrously, overwhelmingly Republican," he said. "They are trending more Republican over time. Everything about George Bush speaks to them."

So how "disastrously" Republican are us white guys?

In an ABC/Washington Post survey released last week, white men preferred Bush over an unnamed Democrat in 2004 by 62 percent to 29 percent, a head-turning 33-point margin; by contrast, white women gave Bush just a 10-point lead.

The press can talk about coalititions and interest groups and the other gender gap all they want, but since white men make up 40 percent of the vote and white women make up just over 40 percent too, most of the action is obviously with the majority of the vote. And the tilt there is heavily Republican, thanks mostly to the fact that W has led us through two successful wars to defend our civilization and has the forces of Mordor generally on the run.

I don't see how Dean, a Bobo peacenik who thinks the Bush administration is the most dangerous administration is his lifetime, can convince enough white men that he's right about that. I just don't see it happening.

It's like this: on one side you have a president who has won two wars, set up a blockade that has netted a little terrorist fish while caging a big one, and has the economy humming along at breakneck pace. And he bagged Saddam Hussein. How can Dean convince anyone who doesn't already hate Bush that he should be replaced?

MORE: Steven Den Beste comments. The card game Hearts is involved. I would have thought the board game Go made a more apt comparison, but leave it to Den Beste to come up with something that on its face seems unlikely to convince, but ends up all the more convincing anyway.