Okay, Dems, What Went Wrong? And How Can We Fix It?

Alright, it's all over but the shouting. We took a hell of a beating. We need to figure out what went wrong, fix it, then go back and retake the place, state by state, House seat by House seat. We've got 4 years, let's get started.

So, where did we go wrong? We had the money, we had a candidate who, if lackluster, was certainly head and shoulders above Shrub in the credentials and integrity department. And we had a sitting President whose record was a litany of disaster, mistake and misstep. Wha' happened?

You Repubs can go sit down somewhere else and gloat for now. There are other threads for your nonsense. I'm looking only for the comments of Democrats and those interested in maintaining a viable two party system.

The original posting.......... whatever.

Joe--

Lots of titles have Republicans or Democrats in the title. Very few attempt to refuse a group of people participation.

A bad precedent--divisive.

<Foreseeing all manner of exclusive threads, divisions and rancor in our future.>

Alright, it's all over but the shouting. We took a hell of a beating. We need to figure out what went wrong, fix it, then go back and retake the place, state by state, House seat by House seat. We've got 4 years, let's get started.

So, where did we go wrong? We had the money, we had a candidate who, if lackluster, was certainly head and shoulders above Shrub in the credentials and integrity department. And we had a sitting President whose record was a litany of disaster, mistake and misstep. Wha' happened?

You Repubs can go sit down somewhere else and gloat for now. There are other threads for your nonsense. I'm looking only for the comments of Democrats and those interested in maintaining a viable two party system.

If any party puts up a candidate that is both honest and trusworthy, said party would be commiting political suicide. American voters prefer adept liars every time. The only interesting note about this past election is that the voters picked the least adept liar.

You know, dys. My Irish friend once told me that he would rather have a smart crook than an honest dummy in office.

and then there are those who are neither--nor.

Where I think we went wrong is underestimating the religious factor.

Where I think we have an uphill battle is pointing out that the religious factor is not really religion at all but a con game that certain political people play to get their agendas across.

We also need to keep pointing just how dangerous it is to slide down into a nation that governs itself by religion. We need to say that by doing that we just become the other side of the coin of other religious nations. We also need to point out how enforcing your religious beliefs takes away from other who do not hold those beliefs and that is not the American way.

Even if it is not a winning thing; it is the right thing to do, in my opinion.

blacksmithn wrote:

Okay, so what's the thrust here? That we lost merely based on personalities? I find that hard to believe. Maybe I don't want to believe that folks can really be that dim, I don't know. And how does that explain the gains of Repubs in Senate and House races? Or does it?

The Dems lost because of their insisistance on staying with the same failed strategy. It was the message, not the personalities of Mondale, Dukakis, Gore, and Kerry that led to the serial defeats at every national and most statehouse elections in this decade, IMO.

Different messengers, same message, same result.

dyslexia wrote:

If any party puts up a candidate that is both honest and trusworthy, said party would be commiting political suicide. American voters prefer adept liars every time. The only interesting note about this past election is that the voters picked the least adept liar.

That is complete crap. This is a rank example of why the democrats lost because of the lack of patriotism and respect for the American opinion.

McTag,

Are the beliefs expressed in the letter of the unhappy woman from Cleveland yours as well? Appears to me that she has a somewhat jaundiced view of the country, and of the possibilitires in life as well. (I might feel bad too if I lived in Cleveland.)

Robert Wright is partly right. Yes, Kerry should have spoken?-and future Democrats must speak?-in moral terms. But not about Janet Jackson's bare breast, or about gays, guns, abortion, or school prayer, or even about the "evil" of Saddam Hussein and terrorists. The Democrats' moral language should be about social justice.

My recommendation to Democrats is not to become more religious. Religion is a personal matter. Nor should Dems move toward Republican positions on matters of personal morality . . . . . My recommendation is that Democrats offer somewhat fewer plans and policies and have more moral conviction.

Democrats used to talk in moral terms?-about fighting for civil rights, for example. What should Democrats say now and in the future about public morality? That it's morally wrong to give huge tax cuts to the rich while cutting social programs for the poor and working class?-especially when the gap between the rich and everyone else is wider than it's been in more than a century.