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Tauscher joined the lesser-known New Democrat Coalition. By contrast with the Blue Dogs, the NDC's members hail not from rural districts but from suburban ones. While the Blue Dogs represent old industries, the New Dogs, as they are called, talk about the high-tech economy. They get excited about things like encryption law. Their constituents are essentially contented, libertarian and relativistic. While the Blue Dogs barely survived Clinton, the New Dogs pattern themselves in his image. They were his key allies behind enemy lines when he squared off against Richard Gephardt on the 1997 balanced-budget agreement. And unlike the Blue Dogs, their numbers are growing. The NDC boasts 41 members, almost half of whom are freshmen.
There's just one problem: money. It's all well and good to be a suburban, pro-business Democrat, but since the Republicans took control of Congress in 1994, business hasn't been donating that much to Democrats, pro-business or not. After all, every additional New Dog in Congress is a step toward corporate America's nightmare of nightmares: a Democratic House majority and Speaker Gephardt. The Democratic National Committee can't make up the shortfall because it's flat broke. That leaves the tender New Dog pups facing their first re-election next year dependent on labor. And that's why half the NDC opposed the President on fast-track trade authority last week, even though support for expanded free trade is supposed to be one of the group's core principles. If they had all supported it, fast track would have passed.
So Clinton has killed one brand of Democratic centrism, nurtured another, watched it bear fruit, and now has seen his ideological offspring turn on their maker. Not bad for one presidency.