is the Democratic Party dead--not a negative post!

[davidinalameda]

what is the future of the Democratic Party

the only candidates that seemed to win yesterday outside the northeast and the far west were conservative Democrats--Joe Manchin in West Virginia and Mike Easley in North Carolina and Brian Schweitzer in Montana on the governor's side

is the Democratic Party going to have to move back to being a center-right party which doesn't stand for anything because that's what I'm seeing even with some of the more "liberal" members.

I want to hear people's opinion on this

My view is that progressives and lefties need to start re-evaluating our blind faith in the Democratic Party

I don't know--just my two cents

[dave123williams]

1. It's obviously dead; dead as dogshit.

[dryan]

3. No, it's not...

[HysteryDiagnosis]

Considering the heavily monied interests JK went up against... it is

pretty impressive that the numbers are what they are, what with shrubco playing off the fear of the people day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day, day after day,... for a long time.

[motely36]

2. Don't forget Obama in Illinois!

[LisaLynne]

4. If they move further right, they will be gone.

That has been their mistake. We will never out RW the RW. Why would we want to? This country would faint if it saw a real lefty, one who was really politically active. We need to start pushing back to the left and present a clear alternative to the RW.

[WheresWaldo]

5. REPUBS DID IT BY ENERGIZING THEIR BASE

why cant that strategy work for dems? Corporate strings attached to Republican Lite Dems and entities like the DLC? Daschle being from a bum-fuck state thats so conservative he cant even liberally apply conditioner?

Things will change now, big time. The debate for the next few days will be should dems swing to the center, or energize their base and go to the left.

[LuCifer]

EXACTLY!

This trying to be Repuke Lite shit MUST STOP. And enough of those wolf-in-sheep clothings like Zell Miller! If you walk like a duck, GO BE ONE!

WE MUST DEMAND A PAPER TRAIL FOR ALL VOTING MACHINES and DEMAND INDEPENDENT ANALYSIS OF ALL VOTING MACHINE PROGRAMING!

Lu Cifer

[Redleg]

18. If our base wasn't energized by getting Bush the fuck out of office

what will energize it? Bush is the antithesis of democratic values.

[Sterling]

32. The problem is is a lot of times so are our Dems.

I knew a lot of people that are part of the base that were motivated to vote against Bush but not for Kerry and the DLC. Maybe that undercut the enthusiasm?

[Redleg]

35. Possibly.

EOM

[Robbie67]

21. And the Democratic base wasn't energized?

Of course it was, it had nothing to do with energizing the base. It had everything to do with fear being used to manipulate people, and that won.

[Sterling]

30. Our leaders hate our base.

It's a fact. Just watch Carville and Begala rail on left wing conspiracy theorists and radical anto war crazies.

We must turn our backs on those people NOW. There are some good dems and we must either get them out of this disaster of a party or put them in leadership positions. Above all I encourage the DLCers to either start a new party that does not pretend to represent the disenfranchised or join the Republicans outright so we can finally have a party with an uncompromised and focused agenda.

[tokenlib]

6. No! ..Now the fight for our party begins...

The DLC and the progressive-liberal wing need to resolve some issues. Do we want to be repuke light--or will we return to embracing a leberal identity without shame?
We need to stay within the party and fight. The democratic wing of the democratic party needs to hang in there.

Should we begin the fight for a Senate Minority leader with a backbone?? I have my doubts about Reid and Dodd. Any chance of getting Durbin? If the party rolls over on the Bush agenda for the sake of a unity that does not exist--our party might as well be dead.

[IrateCitizen]

7. My view is that progressives/lefties need to start DOING SOMETHING...

... in the Democratic Party. And I include myself in that scathing condemnation.

I'm not talking about simply GOTV. I'm talking about getting intimately involved with the Democratic Party, taking over the foundation of it.

The current crop in charge of the party looks at elections as a sprint every few years. We need to transform that attitude, because it's a losing strategy. We need to take a page from conservatives like Richard Viguerie, and get up every morning asking, "What 4 or 5 things can I do today to help advance the progressive movement?" Then, we need to do those things. That's how we'll build a Democratic Party that is committed to progressive ideals, one that actually serves as a party of the people, and one that actually starts winning elections on every level again.

[fwiff]

11. You're right. Everyone here is right.

We (the party) let ourselves be redefined in the Raygun era and have never recovered- we NEED to do what Dean & so many others are talking about- start by building, bringing people in, merging beliefs of populists, social libertarians, progressives and traditional dems.
We have one minor advantage now to promote ourselves as the Fiscally responsible ones, and we need to frame the argument well.
Our hardest obstacle seems to be this rigid bullying mentality of imposing one's will one others. Any ideas for countering that?

[Sterling]

33. The leadership wil fight that tooth and nail.

It's not like we can show up and the DNC office and demand the keys.

[President Jesus]

8. no. it is not equipped to wage a culture war, which is what we're in

The DNC performed brilliantly in the blue states. It is not dysfunctional.

We're engaged in a culture which transcends party. Yes, the GOP leverages and exploits the war, but it does not lead it. the consevatives have more organization beyond party to wage this war, and it starts with churches. Liberals do not have an equivalent at the moment.

I don't see the republican party being anymore effective than the Democratic to be honest. If so, they would have made inroads into the ble states. They didn't. The GOP simply has the advantage that the people on their side are more organized and have more in common with each other BEYOND political interests.

[Patiod]

27. I agree

We came damned close to ousting Spector in Pennsylvania (he was a moderate without any major "problems", a six-term incumbant, and we came within inches). And we beat the polls at the top of the ticket.

We elected some great people in suburban Philadelphia counties where we are out-registered by Republicans, even beating some incumbants - I attribute this to an overwhelming effective GOTV effort.

I know this isn't a popular sentiment, but I was impressed with the Democratic organization in our area.

It's a culture war. Read "Bush's Brain" - Rove motivated the fundamentalist and hard-core Catholic vote, plain and simple.

[cally]

9. No, I don't think so

but we are dead for the next two years. The repercussions of a Republican sweep needs to be felt before the Democratic party has credence again.

We lost on 'cultural issues.' We have not defined the Democratic stance on these well. Gore has a deep faith, is very moral, yet was defined by the media as immoral. Kerry faced ridicule for his Catholic faith yet lost many Catholic voters on 'moral' issues. We lost this on our inability to define our message.

We also lost this on the women's vote. Dems did not get a high enough percentage of womens' votes. The campaigns dwelt on war, military service, terroism and didn't make clear distinctions on domestic issues. We didn't appeal to our base.

[UL_Approved]

10. You've got to sell it

I live in Montana, and unlike 2000, Democrats are really cleaning up here. I will post results in the state forums later today if somebody else doesn't do it, BTW.

People can't expect polar changes in political alliance in short order. Unknown to most, Montana has always tried for a two-party representation, at the same time. Back when we had 4 electoral votes, we always went for one Democrat and one Republican in both the House and Senate. We still have this today in our Senate candidates. In 2000, Eastern Montana got snowed in with a severe blizzard around election time, and Montana went heavily conservative across the board. In 2002, we regained a more even electorate. In 2004, I'm proud to say, Democrats have taken most of the state offices, and a lot of local representatives. Our state tries to balance things out more than you think, but I do believe that the Bush vote was a grave mistake. We will have at least 2 years to learn this, and our Democratic tendency has moved in leaps and bounds over the last 4 years. Don't forget that true moderates are MUCH more effective at gathering support nationwide, and that true moderates are more progressive than the right-wingers would like to purport. Change is slow, but certainly not gone.

[qanda]

12. They are terrible at framing and controlling arguments

The absolute worst!!!!!! The reason the media repeats the Republican talking points is because they are short, controlled, focused and easy to repeat. Then they resonant throughout the land without any good response from Democrats. I recognized this throughout the entire election process.

[President Jesus]

14. but how do you do that when your opponents are WILLFULLY ingorant...

...on basic facts?

Liberals do not accept blowhards and liars as their candidates. A person like that would not win the primaries.

Liberals have to find a common bond BEYOND political party, because that is what the conservatives have.

[Redleg]

19. Good point.

EOM

[rabid_nerd]

13. The big city majority liberals need to get their head out of their ass

(This is not directed at you, really at another post on another thread.. But it's relative I think)

There, I said it.

It's NOT EASY BEING ON THE BATTLE FRONT YOU WHINY ..... ARRRGH

I'm not center-right but I have to "sell it".

How does anybody where there is a MAJORITY OF PROGRESSIVES expect us where there is a MINORITY OF PROGRESSIVES to win?

Convince people?

Wake up! These people are BORN THIS WAY.

The Greens and Democrats here cooperate here _extensively_ in deep red PA. Even statewide in PA. That's why PA has been so successful lately.

Democrats in PA LOVE GREENS, just not Nader.

I know and like Ben Price. He was my congressional candidate in 2002 and I even had him at our Democratic County Committee meeting at risk of violation of by-laws.

[detroitdem77]

15. honestly???? there's no way in saving the democratic party

democrats are too soft and think that minorities,women and independents are gonna fall in line. i want to say lets start a new party but thats a long shot. after the last 24 hours I'm angry and tired of the democrats. this should have been a cake walk, now with Kerry rolling over, I'm wondering why even bother with supporting candidates who wont fight back. i just need a few days to seriously re think about being a democrat right now.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

16. Not quite dead. But, it must change or die.

Being the "moderate" wing of the Republican Party hasn't worked except in the red states where such creatures are tolerated.

It will either move to the left or be relegated to an even more ineffectual and irrelevant adjunct of the Repugs that only whimpers in protest and then signs on to their agenda. Just as they did with the IWR vote.

[Union Thug]

26. Agreed. Dump the moderate bs. Look how great it worked!

And yet the repukes move so far to the right that it borders on, if not embraces, fascist ideology, and they win.

We need to go left, go traditional liberal and take no shit from anyone, verbally or physically.

[mdmc]

17. RIP -

[Crago]

20. One-Party Nation

The Democratic organization did everything possible to win this election. The problem is, the country is now a right-wing country. We now are a one-party country. Hey, that worked well in The Soviet Union and Nazi Germany...didn't it?

Osama is laughing his ass off right now.

[shraby]

22. The Democratic Party is not dead. It's irrelevant now. n/t

[erpowers]

23. No!

At this point we need to regroup and get new leadership. First, we need to get rid of Terry McAuliffe and other DLC members. We then need to go back and look at John and Robert Kennedy and George McGovern. We need to go back to our roots and begin to fight for the things the Democratic Party used to fight for. I recently started reading Ariannia Huffington's new book. I think what John and Robert did during the Vietnam era was a great thing. John wanted to remove our advisor from Vietnam. Robert came out a said that in his term there would be no more Vietnam. We need Democrats to come out and say no more Iraqs.

Also, we need to come up with alternative ideas to the Republicans ideas. For years now we (the Democratic Party) have not really stood up and fought agains the Republican ideas. We will have to come up with our own ideas about policies to help America move forward. Another thing we must do is explain the policies of the Democratic Party. We must let people know that they cannot have tax cuts, balanced budgets, and all types of social services at the same time. We have to tell them that if a Republican tells them they can that Republican is lying. After all this we must bring our base together.

In conclusion, the Democratic Party is not dead. We just have to get up and fight. We need strong leadership that is willing to stand up to Bush and the Republicans. I think if we work hard we will be able to bounce back in 2 to 4 years.

[Nicky Scarfo]

24. No just in the ICU and on life support, the Party is waiting on organs

for transplant-- "leadership", "vision", "long-term strategy", and "organization". If the patient doesn't get these organs quickly, he will expire soon. If the patient dies, we need to start looking for someone else with these vital organs to lead the long war against fascism in this country. But we're the doctors, and if we keep our heads buried in the sand as regards the health of our patients, we'll all die from the same right-wing plague. If the patient doesn't get the required organs soon, Dr. Nicky Scarfo is writing the death certificate and will look to organize with the healthy to stop the plague.

[Val]

25. Where is William Rivers Pitt???

I must read his words.

[Sterling]

28. I was getting ready to ask the same question.

I think if we are ever going to get out of this mess the party as we know it NEEDs to die. I dare say even if it means losing the next 5 elections we are better off starting to rebuild a new party out of the ashes now.

At the rate we are going we are like frogs boiling in a pot unaware of the nearing end. The road we are on leads to no where. There is no point trying the DLC route anymore, it is completely pointless and discredited.

[K-W]

29. Blind Faith? What cave have you been living in.

I dont remember seeing any blind faith. In fact I remember seeing the exact opposite.

The fact that the party is dead means so much for the future of the progressive in this party, but in the exact opposite way you think.

The party is in shambles, just waiting for a progressive movement to organize and take control over it.

[Mr_Spock]

31. Nah, even the Repukes know they are nothing without us

How can you be the dominant party if there is no significant opposition? We will drop losing issues and move on to many victories in the future - it'll take time, but we've got plenty of that!

[ibegurpard]

34. Stop looking at it in terms of labels

engage with people on the local level. Build it from the ground up. We can't duplicate the success of the Republican macine from the top-down. That's not how THEY got where they are.