Guaranteed To cause heck...the New DLC Article on Swing & Base Voters

[Khephra]

snip..................

To be sure, it makes no sense to go to the opposite extreme and ignore common-sense get-out-the-vote (GOTV) measures that can get party loyalists to the polls in as large a number as possible. The obsession of political strategists during the 1980s and 1990s with spending every available dollar on television advertising often led to an under-investment in GOTV, apart from the heroic efforts of the labor movement that gave Democrats a perennial advantage in this area until 2002.

But subordinating the party's message to a base-mobilization strategy is another thing altogether. Deploying a message that is designed to work up partisans into a hate frenzy about the evil opposition may or may not increase core voter turnout, and may or may not succeed in increasing one's own vote more than it increases the vote of that hated opposition. But at least in this particular era, it is pretty much guaranteed to limit the perpetrator's appeal to swing voters. And once again, the whole idea of candidates campaigning this way misses the big opportunity of a message that can appeal both to the party core and to swing voters.

MORE...............

http://www.ndol.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=131&subid=192&contentid=252019

I bet this thread will easily get over 50 posts.

:evilgrin:

[Demobrat]

1. It worked for the Repukes.

Why not us?

[damnraddem]

9. The GOP has best served their most-extreme right wing.

The DLC has alienated the entire Dem's left wing.

What Dean offers is a moderate who can appeal to swing voters but who can also appeal to the Dem left. What the DLC offers is irrelevancy. A DLC-led Dem Party offers me nothing other than a target.

[bitchkitty]

27. Words out of my mouth -

Dean is attracting even Republicans. The DLC is way past its time.

[AP]

14. It only worked for the Republicans once: 1994, and that

was a very stealth, low turn-out year after two years of incessant lying about Clinton. And the Republicans paid for their overreaching in 1996 and in 1998 (if it wasn't for Bush's stolen election, the Republicans would be in a long term decline -- they've lost more Senate and Governors races than they've won since '94, by a significant margin, I believe -- the House is another thing...it has been gerrymandered to the point of stalemate.

In 2000, Bush ran on this meta-message (I'm quoting Bill Clinton): "we'll do everything the Democrats did, and we'll do it with lower taxes and a smaller government."

That's not the message of someone trying to turn the base into frenzied, angry voters.

[Bandit]

15. I wonder what happened in 2002 then.

Why is it the Senate is now in GOP hands?

[AP]

18. I agree with jiacinto on this one. 9/11 was the gift that kept on

giving for Bush. I think Senate Dems have done a nice job of stonewalling some of the worst things Bush wants to do without being in the majority.

[redeye]

2. The errancy of appealing to the middle rather than the base...

...is that picking up a centrist voter from the GOP gives the Democratic party a gain of two votes, but convincing a liberal to actually vote results not only in the gain of one vote (which might well be negated with some otherwise-Democratic centrists voting Republican), but in many cases also in the gain of a few tens of dollars in donation money and in the gain of one activist who'll get other Democrats to vote, make phone calls, etc.

[Iverson]

3. straw man, of course

Look at the part you placed in boldface. Nobody advocates political strategy in those terms. It is an effort to frame a competing vision in a misleading way so that the DLC will look sensible by comparison. Who will be fooled by it?

[w4rma]

4. After losing us Congress in 1994 and 2002 and giving Republicans

most of what they wanted in terms of policy (even between 1992 and 1994 the DLC failed with a Democratic Congress and President). These folks are irrelevant on campaign strategy until they replace their current leadership with some new leadership.

Besides, I think that the DLC may not really want the Democratic Party to do well. I also know that the DLC leadership doesn't understand or support the same things that the Democratc base supports.

[terryg11]

11. I'm in somewhat of agreement

if the dlc is so damn smart why are we coming up on the short end more often than not unless they don't really care and are afraid to actually pass effective legislation.

[jiacinto]

13. The 1994 loss was due to many factors

One of the major factors was the retirement of many Southern Democrats. In the late 1980s and in the 1990s many Southern Democrats elected in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, started to retire. Many of them represented seats that were Republican-leaning. When these seats were finally open they elected Republicans. Most of these seats had been voting Republican for president and statewide races for years, if not decades. What kept them Democratic was the personal popularity of the incumbents such as Sonny Montgomery and Jamie Whitten.

Secondly you had minority-majority redistricting. In the 1990s very well intentioned legislators, trying to create seats that would elect African-Americans, Latinos, and Asians, created bizzare looking districts that looked like parasites and organisms. These seats really helped the Republicans. These seats robbed the neighboring districts of critical minority voters. The surrounding districts became lilly white bastions of consevatism. In 1992 many of these Democrats barely survived or loss. In 1994 the Republican revolution wiped them out.

So blaming the DLC for those losses ignores the whole story. As for 2002 the results were going to be the same regardless as 9/11 was the gift that would not stop giving for Bush.

[terryg11]

5. ok article

I wonder though, if the republicans have a larger loyal base, then why did they lose the popular vote in '00? we need a uniter, eh?

[wtmusic]

6. The author of this tripe

doesn't have the guts to provide a byline, but a solid guess the first name would be either, "Al", or "Bruce", and a last name might be "From", or "Reed", or maybe both!

What say this. What say we provide a candidate which offers principles instead of strategy, and go on the crazy assumption that Americans might be able to discern right from wrong this time.

[jiacinto]

7. You need both the base and the swing voters to win

It's a tough balancing act.

[AP]

8. renie408 made this point (for the first time at DU, AFAIK)

a few days ago. It's important that the Dems run someone who doesn't freak out Republicans so much that they get energized to vote against the Dem nominee.

[Eloriel]

10. These DLC folks ought to actually hear one of his speeches

Don't you think? It's embarrassing for them to toss out innuendo clearly aimed at Dean that has no basis in fact.

Speaking of which (fact, that is), they really ought to learn just a little more about who Dean's supporters really are. Yes, the base. Yes, former base (non-hard-core Greens). Yes, brand new voters and the newly politicized. Yes, Independents. Yes, Republicans.

And these are just the "early adopters!"

Sounds like Dean's campaign IS a GOTV effort, all by itself. (Can we say coattails a mile long??? A little too early to tell, but that's the way it looks to me.)

Bwaaaahahahaaha. Those poor fools are so OVER. They're toast. Delusional too. That "20th Century Politics" is looking more dated every single day.

Go, Dean! Welcome to the REAL 21st Century!

Eloriel

[AP]

17. coattails for whom? Green candidates? Dean is running against

the democratic party. How many candidates in state and local races fit that bill? I can see many of those new voters Dean is attracting, in the event Dean gets nominated, going to the polls and voting for Dean as a vote against the status quo and then not voting for any other Dem on the ticket, again as a vote against the Dem party.

[sangh0]

26. Yeah, that'll do the trick

I'm sure those hard-bitten politicos will just swoon after one of Dean's speeches. He's just irresistable.

(Can the "cult of personality" get any worse?)

[corporalclegg9]

38. I agree with you...

Dean's appeal reaches far beyond hard-core liberals. For some reason, he's been painted as way out in left field, and I honestly just don't know where that reputation comes from. If you look at his platform, he's only way out in left field when it comes to social issues. I'm not saying that as an insult, I'm just saying that relative to the American public, his only really leftward lean is on social issues such as civil unions, abortion rights, etc, etc...

His gun stance, death penalty neutrality (am I correct about this?), and in particular, his balanced budget stance should really attract moderate and conservative voters.

I consider his war stance and health care stance to be leftist, but not extreme leftist.

So, on one hand, I agree with that DLC article 100%. Myself being a moderate, I can't stand when politicians only reach out to the party core. However, I can certainly understand that the party core doesn't want to be abandoned. Thus, I think the DLC hit it right on the nose with this article.

However, I also think that Dean fits that picture more than any current DLC candidate.

[Walt Starr]

12. This is the same strategy we used to win the House and Senate in 2002

It's the only way we will continue to hold onto our majority in Congress and take....er...um....


Those who forget the lessons of history are condemned to repeat them.

I smell a whigging coming on...

[loudsue]

16. The DLC is a 'bought & paid for' whore of the repug party

They aren't fooling any REAL Democrat with their "no money to a candidate with a populist message" nonsense.

Dems can be bought just like repukes (look at LIEberman, and Georgia's what's-her-face Majette)...the leadership of this nation has become a brothel of whores, and we need to throw a good 75% to 90% of them out of the country..not just out of office.

What's it going to take before that "swing-vote-majority' wakes the hell up and takes to the streets, because they FINALLY SEE what has happened to our Democracy, economy, and legal foundation, while they were busy "swinging" with their votes. (They don't even know that they don't HAVE a vote anymore!)

It's not going to be a pretty sight when the sleeping masses finally wake up and smell the LACK of coffee.

:kick:

[CWebster]

19. geez, are they at it again?

Talk about not getting it....time for them to recede into the horizon..

[ewagner]

20. What the Repubs were good at

was energizing the base! The swing voters came along for the ride.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with energizing our base and bringing swing voters along with it.

[ulysses]

21. here's an odd thought

If I simply declared myself an independant, would I be considered no longer a member of the party base (to be largely avoided) and a much-coveted swing voter? Maybe the problem is all semantic.

[PAMod]

22. The DLC have been part of the problem, obviously

I can't wait to gauge how hard they work for Dean, if (when) he is the nominee.

[shatoga]

23. republicans are being told to contribute to Dean

like picking the dog who will lose the fight?

what IS their motivation for putting Republican money where Dean's mouth is?

[prolesunited]

31. I haven't heard about this

Do you have a link or some more facts about this?

[BiggJawn]

37. DLC won't work for Dean.

LIEberman's their guy, the man who can put as ReTHUGlicans to sleep with his droning as he can Soccer-Mom "Swing Voters"....

Just watch, the DLC will become Rove's "Fifth Column", just watch...

[StandWatie]

24. They don't get it..

This election will not be about the middle. Everyone knows this, the candidates know it. Bush knows it. Events have catalyzed opinion in this country in sharp and nearly equal directions so both sides will cater to the base if they want to win. DLC "triangulation" bullshit will be worthless in '04 because this won is going to be all about GOTV.

[ulysses]

25. !

I bet this thread will easily get over 50 posts.

Two days and only halfway there? :boggle:

[Q]

28. Just who are these mythical 'swing voters' the DLC...

...is willing to trade for the base of the party?

-

[IrateCitizen]

29. See the recent issue of The American Prospect

It's not on the web, but they had an EXCELLENT series of articles on the need for the Democrats to get a real message out. One of the problems we've faced is that we end up being a hodgepodge of individual interest groups, rather than presenting a real VISION. While the right's vision may be misguided, at least they have one -- "Keep government out of our business!"

On the left and center-left, we need to do the same thing. One step would be to take back the framing of issues. Another would be to tie everything back to a couple of basic themes -- namely "children" and "family". Yet another would be to tie all of the issue stances up with one common denominator -- one I read a while back was, "We're all in this together!"

But the LAST thing we need to do is to embrace the Republican agenda in order to win. I am certain that many people will say, "But that's how Clinton won!" They may be right, but I would counter in saying that this strategy for the short-term did incalculable harm to the party overall in the long-term, as we are now seeing.

[StandWatie]

30. it was a totally different race

totally different issues and a public that was more or less bored of politics. This stuff is hot now and this election will be won by who can generate the most energy.

[KoKo]

32. Steam coming outta my ears! Spitting fire! First, the tone of this

article is so "top down" and condescending.....it was hard for me to even read it....... Second, I kept having vivisions of Tom Daschle in front of my eyes as I slogged through it.........and third, I understood that they are basing everything on their polling instead of the heart of the people who are Democrats and have been Democrats but have been so turned off they count themselves as independents rather than say one way or the other. My hubbie is a total liberal Dem. but is so sick of the pink tutu's that he just answered a poll the other day saying he was an Independent!

Anyway: this poll from the article explains why in the DLC view we need to get those pink tutu's out for the coming campaign season. By their reasoning 76% of the Democratic party prefers "Pink." The rest of us (33%) are the fringies who aren't important to beating Bush. They just don't get it.........:grr:

EXCERPT:
The Democratic Party is a coalition of liberals, moderates,
and even conservatives, while the Republican Party is
much more ideologically homogenous and thus more
amenable to sharply polarized political messages.
According to a recent Gallup survey, 33 percent of
Democrats identify themselves as liberals; 43 percent as
moderates; 23 percent as conservatives. Fully 60 percent
of Republicans consider themselves conservatives.

[Iverson]

33. couple more problems with that article

"To name the most conspicuous recent example, President Bill Clinton found a way to use new ideas to both unite and expand the Democratic Party."

I can't agree here. I argue that Bill Clinton attracted voters more with his manner than with policy positions. He was very skilled at presenting himself and at least offering liberal rhetoric that appealed to many, even if it was not matched by policy. If the foregoing is true, then Clinton's ideas were not the foremost element of his success.

"Democrats no longer have an advantage over the GOP in numbers of party loyalists, as they did from the New Deal until the 1980s. In fact, the most recent numbers show a small plurality for self-identified Republicans."

I argue that this is a result of turning away from the base, which is the whole ideological basis of the DLC. Using this logic, there will never be a moment of halting the shift to the right. It is a mirror of right-wing Republican administrations creating deficits in order to plead poverty when it comes time to fund social programs. It reeks of insincerity.

[KoKo]

34. Good points Iverson.......turning away from the base.....look at Daschle/

Reid. Look at the Dem leaders who have turned their backs on the party base......Repug Lite!

[IrateCitizen]

35. One minor quibble, Clark...

I argue that (losing numerical advantage) is a result of turning away from the base, which is the whole ideological basis of the DLC.

I do actually think that the degeneration of liberalism has something to do with that -- we made it easy for the RW to depict us as "pointy headed intellectuals in an ivory tower", because in some ways, that's what we became.

A case in point: school busing in the 1970's. This was a program advocated by many liberal politicians. However, these same politicians were insulated from its effects, as they either lived in affluent white suburbs or sent their kids to private schools. The working class people who were subject to it resented it. Thus, a policy that was borne out of a desire to do something positive ultimately backfired because it was implemented by those who had become out of touch with those who would be affected by it.

But the moral of this anecdote is not to denounce liberalism, rather it is to embrace its guiding principles that once ensured its success. Those would be: if you work hard you shouldn't be poor, society works best when we help others to help themselves, opportunity should not be determined by uteran lottery, and that the fairness of the system depends upon stringent government oversight.

All of this requires being able to tie together policy recommendations into a single, coherent vision. The authors of the above article do not realize this, instead continuing to focus only on narrow "voting demographics" and trying not to offend their benefactors in the corporate world. It is a recipe for disaster.

[Iverson]

36. yes, sort of

Busing is a fine example, yet if it was not that, it would have been something else. Being against the VietNam war stood rather larger than busing, for example.
A ruthless opponent will always have a rationale for opposition.

As far as a recipe for disaster, I quite agree with you.