When Joseph Lieberman proclaimed the Delaware Primary as the starting point of his 2004 Democratic Nomination Comeback, he was met with a certain amount of laughter and derision (“JOE-Mentum”, indeed!) But, it should be noted, that he was actually evoking the 1996 Steve Forbes campaign.

Steve Forbes, of course, didn’t get too far after winning Delaware, except a brief moment where he was ahead of Bob Dole and the indefatiguable Pat Buchannan in the polls. But, after watching, to one degree or another, four primary seasons I’ve come to the odd conclusion that whoever the party bosses want in will pretty well be the Party nominees, and there’s nothing anyone out here can do about it. Thus it’s Bill Clinton, Bob Dole, George W Bush (and not John McCain), John Kerry (not Howard Dean). Hillary Clinton is coming up, and I don’t know who the Republican Hierarchy wants yet.

Steve Forbes’s platform was a narrow one: Just implement a Flat Tax, and all our nation’s problems (those that we see and those that nobody sees) will be solved. It was a platform that attracted its following — (cult following? All politicians’ followings are cults.) — amongst a set of the public that believes whole-heartedly in the Wall Street Journal editorial page and considers the scribbling the “Laffler Curve” on a bar-napkin one of the Great Moments in American History.

Bob Dole pushed back Steve Forbes. Pat Buchannan hang around a while. Lamar Alexandar made bitter comments about how he was surging in New Hampshire (where he came in third) before Steve Forbes’s money drowned him in the next round of primaries. And nothing noticable came out of the whole mess.

In the next primary season, Steve Forbes realized that he could not win the nomination on Economic Righteousness alone. Thus, he remade himself into someone who particularly cares about Abortion and various Right-wing social causes. It didn’t really get him too far, and you really can’t just jump onto a cause without any past moment to consider — look back in the back issues of Forbes Magazine and list for me all the editorials hailing School Prayer or Excoriating Homosexual Marriage, and I’m guessing that it will be a pretty short list.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist must be trying to figure out how he can possibly win the Iowa Caucuses and New Hampshire Primary right about now… because, really, you do not want to have to rely on winning Delaware. He’s a politico of little charisma and not much personal charm (And, I might add, used to kill kittens*).

Establishing Pro-Life bonafides is Job #1 for him right now.

*I feel obligated to point out Bill Frist’s kitten-killing past with each and other mention of the man.

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