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

G-OB1 writes

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Perhaps what is happening here is that, on both sides of the issue, the protagonists are attacking caricatures of the other side representing its extreme and least defensible elements, instead of the concerns of the respective majorities. I suspect that this is an element with which the Democrats must grapple .as they try to find a way to integrate the interests of their various single-issue core constituencies into a palatable, integrated platform that might better appeal to the majority of Americans. Of course, I hope they fail..

Right now I am not all that happy with the Republicans either, but I do think the GOP has its principles pointed in the right direction even as it wavers in going that direction. The GOP M.O. is always going to put emphasis on empowering Americans to get it done while the DEM M.O. is always going to see government as the best way to get anything done.

I wish the Dems would get back to the party of Roosevelt and Truman at a time when people didn't look to government for their identity and sense of self worth. That would force the GOP to get off the dime and get moving again in order to compete. We would still have a clear choice at the polls, but without the 'the world as we know it is ending' mentality if our preferred candidate loses. In other words, I think competition between two good candiates/parties/platforms etc. would be a good thing.

However, the GOP is currently ruled mostly by its center and therefore has an edge at both federal and state level. The Dems are ruled by their lunatic fringe and can expect to not be attractive to the majority of people who see it for what it is.

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Foxfyre wrote:

However, the GOP is currently ruled mostly by its center and therefore has an edge at both federal and state level. The Dems are ruled by their lunatic fringe and can expect to not be attractive to the majority of people who see it for what it is.

I think you are correct in this observation. However wwe had a maxim in Naval Aviation that frequently comes to mind and which may apply here. "It's never to late to fail". The Republicans could very easily come to be dominated by their extremes, of the right or left. What is worse and more likely in my view is that Hillary could well succeed in morphing herself into a conservative mom from Illinois, and changing the rhetorical style of the democrat party. There could even be a "struggle" with the Democrat left (represented by Dean) which is "won" by the consrervative forces of "Hillary" just in time for the next convention. Meanwhile the Republicans haven't yet teed up any potential successors to Bush.

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thomas

That piece IS funny indeed. I think nimh is a wee bit off on this as well.

Reading george and fox's notions of what the dems ought to do has been a continuing source of fun for me. For example, a central notion that keeps popping up is that the modern Republican party simply possesses superior ideas, and that the proof of this thesis is the ballot box. Of course, this argument entails that Democrat ideas were superior ideas from 1992 through 2000. Or through all periods where Democrats held majorities in both houses...a conclusion I think unlikely fox and george would maintain.

If not ideas, then what? That require an analysis of what else the Republicans have been doing (and what the dems have not been doing, or doing less of, or doing less effectively) to increase their power and electoral gains (there isn't, in my experience on this board, a single Republican who actually seems to understand this history).

Unfortunately, equally slow to the mark on this have been most dems. Whether they'll be able to catch up within less than a generation is not clear.

As to the Intelligent Design movement, it's principles and its funding and its strategies, the following is a good short education...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A32444-2005Mar13.html?sub=AR

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Thomas wrote:

This debate is about what the best explanation of our origins is. And I am not aware of knowledge creationists have demonstrated on this issue.

I shall be happy to be corrected.

For correction in large quantities, you might want to consider attending the Creation Mega Conference in Lynchburg Va. July 17 - 22:

http://www.answersingenesis.org/events/megaconference/

List of speakers:

http://www.answersingenesis.org/events/megaconference/speakers.aspx

Evolutionism is going to lose in the United States. Even six or eight years ago I'd not have wanted to bet this one but I'd have no difficulty betting the farm on it today. Twenty years from now, evolution will likely still be taught in Evergreen University (if IDF bulldozers haven't leveled the place) and in Cal Berkeley and one or two other such places, but that will be about it.

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A recent CNN poll indicated that one quarter of the U.S. believes that 9/11 was prophesied in the Bible.

America: A septic tank cleverly disguised as a country.

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cleverly?

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ok--I overstated things a bit.

People here have asked me to be less harsh, so I'm trying to be a good "netizen"

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Quote:

Evolutionism is going to lose in the United States. Even six or eight years ago I'd not have wanted to bet this one but I'd have no difficulty betting the farm on it today. Twenty years from now, evolution will likely still be taught in Evergreen University (if IDF bulldozers haven't leveled the place) and in Cal Berkeley and one or two other such places, but that will be about it.

You have no clue what you are talking about. Seriously. But that's pretty much what I've come to expect from ya, Gunga....

Sheesh

Cycloptichorn

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Hi cyclo

I don't see Gunga's predictions as all that out-of-bounds.

The country is run by a born again fruitcake who won the election by galvanizing the pre-Enlightenment cave dwellers from coast to coast. These disease-carrying rodents poured into the streets by the tens of millions on Nov 2nd.

We already qualify as a near-theocracy.

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Quote:

We already qualify as a near-theocracy.

interesting observation, I wonder just how much of a theocracy we can become without a theological premise? Is the party the church or is the church the party?

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The President declares "a crusade" against "the evil doers" and explains that God "told him" to attack both Afghanistan and Iraq. His much-adored general Boykin in Iraq owes his battlefield prowess to divine largess.

Bush's former Attorney General prayed and slathered himself in Crisco oil before government functions and professed his conviction that dancing is caused by evil spirits---in short, a textbook psychotic who plainly belongs in a nut house.

The theology in question is a nauseating isotope of Christian hocus-pocus and Judaic holier-than-thou-ism, which accounts for the convergence of Jewish neo-con slime with the Pat Robertson serpent-handling gang.

..all in all, a dreadful country which should have been demolished with high explosives 100 years ago.

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I have posted this to keep your username out from the main page, so nobody can read it when visiting this website.

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Yes--we must protect the little lambs from the painful truth at all costs!

You are performing a valuable service for which our ex-attorney general (you know, the psychotic one), is sure to be grateful.

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Thomas Hayden - It offends me, as well. Really offends me. Obviously a bitter, disturbed person, possibly off his meds.

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Probably a recovering conservative.

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and still borrring...

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dyslexia wrote:

Probably a recovering conservative.

No dys - we disavow him.

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is that like excommunication?

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or "off the christmas card list" ?

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Excommunication from us. You can hang out with him if you wish. Its a disgusting, infuriating sentiment.

It may severely hurt someone visiting this site. There are parents of our service personnel here--and that name is a great disservice to them, and their children.

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

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