We wanted Kerry to be like Howard Dean & he couldn't do it

[Jersey Devil]

That's what I believe happened. We wanted a candidate to come right out and say Bush lied and people died. Kerry hesitated doing it, always trying to defend his vote on the Iraq war resolution, using all kinds of awkward, unconvincing distinctions between voting for war and voting to authorize war that sounded like pure bullshit.

Then "I voted for before I voted against" and then saying he'd vote the same all over again knowing there were no WMD. Then saying we have to win the war instead of saying let's get the hell out of iraq as soon as possible.

I voted for him anyway and would have voted for any Dem instead of Bush but I was not happy with him.

The result is that the core Dem voters did not come out for him. Look at blue states like NJ & Calif where he underperformed Gore by large numbers. NJ - Gore won by 12 and Kerry by 6. California - Boxer won this year by 2 million and Kerry by 1 million. The numbers are the same accross the board in all blue states.

[polpilot]

1. You can't beat Bush by being Bush lite.

.

[Jersey Devil]

3. Exactly - but the DLC wanted finesse and not fire

Dean was rough and raw and they thought that would turn off voters. But he was highly principled and in the end I think people appreciate honesty more than a display of stature and intelligence. K certainly was formidable but his principles were in question.

[porphyrian]

43. Fuck the DLC. They're fucking fired.

I'm sick of their pandering bullshit ruining our party. How do we get them the fuck out?

[Eloriel]

47. Did a rough and raw Bush turn off (enough) voters? n/t

[JI7]

2. i didn't want Kerry to be Howard Dean

i supported Kerry in the primary and wanted Kerry to be Kerry which he was.

and Gore was vice president running against a governor at the time with a good economy and most things being good.

Kerry is the challenger and Bush has the advantage of being an incumbant. especially in wartime it's beneficial.

and Kerry won New Hampshire which Al Gore didn't. Kerry's overall vote count was higher than Al Gore's.

[Jersey Devil]

4. He was flawed as was Edwards

They both were handicapped by their votes on the Iraq war resolution and could not pound Bush the way Dean could.

Kerry spent most of his time answering questions about how he could now criticize Bush when he gave him the go ahead to go to war in the first place.

It just could not work.

[bklyncowgirl]

9. Every candidate is flawed

We acutually don't know what Rove would have thrown at Dean--although I think that the Democrats during the primaries pretty much exposed whatever dirt there was on him. I think perceptions of his temperment would have been an issue as they were in the primaries. In addition, Dean's lack of experience in media politics showed.

I was undecided between Kerry and Dean in the primaries (I'm from Jersey so my vote doesn't count) and was happy to support Kerry. Kerry brought alot of strengths to the campeign as well as some weaknesses. He had a boatload of dirt thrown at him. He made some mistakes, but I'm convinced that the fix was in in Florida and Ohio and that he would have had to win massively in order to have overcome that.

[Jersey Devil]

21. But Kerry was flawed on the basic issue of the election - war

He could not be as clear as Dean could have been or any other candidate without a flawed history on the war. I am not saying Dean would have been better, just that anyone would have been better who could say without hesitation that the war was wrong and Bush lied.

Instead we got a bunch of lawyer-like explanations for Kerry's vote FOR for war and then against the 87B.

BTW, being from NJ also, that is what we have to change. It is stupid to allow wheat farmers and ice fishermen in Iowa and NH to choose our candidates (the way DLC wants it so they can manipulate the process) and the blue states like NJ & Ca have nothing to say about it.

[candy331]

5. Still in denial I see, trot out some more of the same for 08 and get

the rest of your your ass handed to you.. Go over to DFA and join the many who are fighting for a change.

[Jersey Devil]

6. Yes - Dean's honesty is what endeared him to us

but the DLC didn't want that. They wanted a candidate of great stature and a war hero to compare with AWOL.

Clinton was no war hero and he had a history of "bimbo eruptions" yet he kicked their asses every time. Why? Because he could look voters in the eyes and tell them he cared and connect because he really meant it.

Kerry could not do that and Dean could have.

[Jersey Devil]

8. What is "DFA"?

?

[Kolesar]

13. Democracy for America, my friend!

One of the most impressive grassroots organizations of the left (along with www.moveon.org ). Dean for America morphed into Democracy for America.

www.democracyforamerica.com

[Jersey Devil]

15. Thanks, I will check it out (nt)

x

[polpilot]

16. Kerry was/is Kerry. The current cover of The Economist describes him

in one word 'incoherent'. Incoherence doesn't win elections. Tell me in one sentence 'Was Kerry for or against the Iraqi war?'

[Jersey Devil]

17. That is my impression as well and it drove me crazy

that throughout the campaign he never managed to be clear about any aspect of the war.

[Eloriel]

48. LOL -- the answer to your quesetion:

'Was Kerry for or against the Iraqi war?'

Yes.

:evilgrin:

[ScreamingMeemie]

29. ...and then Kerry walked out on us. Yaaay for your guy.

48% approval rating and still wins...says it all.

[RafterMan]

7. Kerry's war rhetoric

was completely impenetrable.

I found myself paraphrasing him to Kerry-doubters many times and having people ask me, "Well, why doesn't he just say *that*?"

And I didn't want him to be Dean -- I thought his most lucid moment on the war was in the NYU speech, when he adopted the Clark/Clarke/Graham position on the war. It got rave reviews here on DU and in the MSM, but it was late in the game and he seemed to get stuck defending it more than using it as a weapon, which was its real value.

Without absolute clarity on this issue, his promise to run a less muddled war than Bush just couldn't resonate.

[Jersey Devil]

12. Perhaps you have stated it more accurately

His explanations, particularly of his votes on the resolution and the 87B were painful, seemingly inconsistent and fed into Bush's line of "You know who I am and what I stand for" while voters looked at Kerry and couldn't figure out exactly where he stood.

You knew exactly where Dean stood. I didn't mean literally that we wanted him to be Dean but that we wanted the honesty of Dean on the war, the simple message - I am and was against the war, bush lied and let's get out.

[Kolesar]

10. Bush defined the war issue for Kerry and the Dems

The lead up to the Iraq war was designed to split the Dems in 2002.

I think that Dean had some "missing" attributes in his candidacy. I did not hear him make a broad, compelling arguement for how he would have dealt with Saddam. A candidate with as little military experience as Clinton was a dangerous choice for a nominee.

[Jersey Devil]

18. Why "deal" with Saddam at all?

He was surrounded as he had been since 1991. There was no need for war at all and it was all based on Bush's lies.

[Kolesar]

26. You are right

Unfortunately, the right wing media & bush defined the issue for all the Democrats, including Dr. Dean

[wheresthemind]

11. I did not want Howard Dean...

We would have lost even bigger because they would have tore us down even worse...

Aside from the Iraq war Kerry had a more liberal record the Dean, and Dean wasn't forced to vote on it.

[Jersey Devil]

14. You misunderstand due to the way I stated it

I meant we wanted him to be "like" HD with clarity on the war statements. He was not. He was trying to use lawyer like distinctions on the resolution and it sounded clumsy and contrived.

[DemonFighterLives]

19. Kerry never knocked them off message

Dean at least would have kept them fumbling. Also conceding in the midst of voting irregularities is not a way to fight.

[Jersey Devil]

20. Kerry was handicapped from the beginning with his war vote

and then he tried to finesse it instead of just saying he voted that way because Bush lied to him about WMD. Why the f--- didn't he just say that?

[DemonFighterLives]

36. It was definitely muddled

The IWR was not really supposed to be the last call before war. It was supposed to be a preliminary step before the unnecessary war.

[Julien Sorel]

22. Actually he did.

They went from "Gas tax" to "flip flop," to "Massachusetts liberal," to a positive campaign in the final days.

Kerry was never knocked off message except by the Swift Boat frauds, and that for a short time, and only because of weak-kneed Democrats who couldn't take the heat, and whined and pissed and moaned about it. Other than that, he had the same essential message from start to finish.

[DemonFighterLives]

37. All the pubbies can do

is take someone elses words and spin them out of context. They have no ideas of their own.
That swift boat sh*t really did damage to Kerry and he should have forcefully got in their face and asked more about dubbies disgraceful record.

[seaglass]

23. I didn't. I hope you know that you along with many others

are turning potential Dean voters off. But then again, Deaniacs didn't get that they were doing this during the primaries, so why would they get it now?

If Dean wants to have any chance in 2008 - his supporters need to figure out why they alienated so many Democrats. Start by listening.

[Jersey Devil]

24. I am not a "Deaniac"

What I said was that we needed the straightforward message that Dean could have offered as a candidate free of the baggage of having voted for the war, not Dean himself. There are other candidates who could have filled that slot as well as Dean. Kerry had too much baggage to be able to deliver that message.

[seaglass]

38. I didn't say you were a Deaniac - I have no idea who you

supported in the primaries. I was responding to your putting Dean up as an example of why Kerry didn't win and I don't agree with your assessment.

We didn't need more votes in blue states - we needed more votes in red states. If blue voters in red states did not know what was at stake in this race and didn't show up - that is their fault.

We need some personal responsibility here. I'm sure Kerry is taking responsibility for his errors, those who did not vote for Kerry need to take responsibility for theirs.

[LuminousX]

28. That isn't the point, Dean won't run in 2008

The point is, as a Dean supporter myself, I wanted the same plain spoken efforts by Kerry to some degree. It became obvious after Iowa that Dean didn't have teflon and was ineffective at countering any potential 'Gore-ing' the media may try, so Dean was not a good choice for the Democratic candidate. I believe the 'process' worked and we got the best guy we could. I just happen to think if he threw harder punches and gouged with his thumbs once in awhile he could have picked up a win.

[Jersey Devil]

30. Thank you for understanding what I was trying to say

I agree with you completely.

[Eloriel]

49. Hold on

You are WAY off base. The kind of shit slung around here by Kerry and Clark supporters far outweighed anything Dean supporters handed out -- and in fact it was the Clarkies who started the damn war (which the Deanies finally joined out of self-defense). The lies about Dean fromt hese two camps were unbelievable and utterly disgraceful -- and I STILL see hangover from DUers who uniwttingly bought into the damn lies. Clark supporters even organized elsewhere to purposely disrupt by bashing Dean (again, with lies) -- and this was well-documented at the time. Things got so out of hand that a pretty big handful of DUers left (me included), started their own board and a good many of them have NEVER returned (and probably won't).

And just for future reference, the very LAST way to get ME to listen is to mischaracterize and patronize. If you want any "listening" to go on, perhaps it's YOU who should start.

[davepc]

25. If Kerry was like Dean he would of done it.

"I still want to be the candidate for guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks. We can't beat George Bush unless we appeal to a broad cross-section of Democrats."


He got it.

Nobody else did.

[AntiCoup2K4]

31. I agreed with the Confederate flag statement when the Doc said it...

...but in the end, it seemed all those guys in the pickup trucks with Confederate flags cared about was "makin' sure them goddamn faggots cain't get married". Other than the DLC, the biggest problem right now is the right wing corporate whore media.

[davepc]

33. thats not true.

Those guys went out to vote for the guy who they identified with. The Texas rancher type (bullshit as WE know it is, the pickup truck owner doesn't know or doesn't care)

We didn't even give them a chance, and the few bones we threw them (duck hunting photo ops) they laughed at, which I don't blame them they were pretty transparent.

We need to go back to our rural roots, and bring thoes people HOME.

[GOPFighter]

27. Very, very few Dems could have beaten Bush this year.

Not Dean, not Clark, not Kerry. Clinton is the only one that comes to mind that might have been able to beat him. Our country is going through a phase of national anger, insecurity, and mass hysteria which the Republicans are masters at exploiting.

Kerry, and the DNC, did a pretty good job IMO, not perfect, but certainly better than 2000 and 2002.

We're still babes in the woods when it comes to combating the evilness of the GOP, but we're learning.

[MUSTANG_2004]

35. Where's Lawton Chiles when you need him?

Well, he's dead, but where's a handy stand-in? Bush would have lost to a moderate Southern governor.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

32. Whatever happened to "The most electable candidate"?

Seems like the "most electable" wasn't.

[lynintenn]

34. Bush ran an anti-intellectual campaign

[wadestock]

39. About a month and a 1/2 ago....

I began lobbying strongly here, directly to congress, et al about addressing the war issue specifically in the context of "where was it taking us in the future".

Kerry wallowed in the present, which showed no real distinction from W in the minds of the average, uninformed, dumbed down American.

In order to create the appropriate VISION of the future....I laid out these specific key points:

1. With Bush, you have the vision of democracy in the middle east. It ain't gonna happen, for obvious reasons. It is a profound joke that ignors culture, religious convictions, etc. Kerry should have hammered home convincingly that we were creating another Israel. That would have resonated with people.

2. Kerry's point would have been to END the war, AND THE LONG TERM ENDLESS OCCUPATION. IN OTHER WORDS, WE ARE NOT GOING TO BE LONG TERM OCCUPIERS OF THE MIDDLE EAST IN GENERAL. THIS IS NOT AMERICA. This IS the profound difference between Kerry and Bush in reality. Kerry would have found a way to get out. He would have left WITHOUT the guise of trying to implant democracy there.

The real truth in all of this is that Bushco sees a meca industrial complex of the future in Iraq....holding unlimited potential for capitalistic exploitation. As bad as we all feel about this election now....you'll see the real truth come out when the great Iraq experiment in capitalism implantation falls flat on its face.

It will possibly take that for Americans to finally come out of their Vietnam stuper, their kick ass mentality, and finally be a true great giant of freedom that doesn't abuse its power, but uses its power with great passion and restraint.

[Snivi Yllom]

40. Kerry's nuanced multuiple postitions on Iraq did him in.

In a way, Dean did Kerry in by expressing a true Anti-war voice that pressured Kerry to put on a faux anti-war mask leading to the indefensible "I voted for it before I voted against it line".

We wanted Dean but did not pick Dean. We did not get Dean.

[Toucano]

45. STEP AWAY FROM THE KOOL-AID

Kerry had one position on Iraq.

[Eloriel]

50. Really?

If so, it was an overly nuanced one.

Or, actually, let me take a step back: His "one" position on Iraq still validates and supports the immoral, illegal preventive war doctrine that many people refer to (inaccurately) as "pre-emptive war."

[yellowcanine]

41. Kerry got 48% against a sitting wartime president and he is a senator

and if he had won Ohio he would have won the election. I for one do not believe Howard Dean would have done as well. Rove beat us in Ohio and elsewhere by turning out the fundie vote. Dems are never going to win if they keep blaming the candidate and don't look at some fundamentals. One fundamental is we have to figure out how to appeal to moderate rural and suburban voters with strong religious values but not necessarily anti-gay, anti abortion values. Yes the anti-gay referenda passed in 11 states. But many people who voted for yes on the referenda also voted for Kerry. So it is not the only issue for many voters. The pundits made a big deal that it was the most important issue but it still was stated so by about 20% I believe. The truth is most people aren't single issue voters. The other point is that Dems are making gains in the Southwest and mountain West (Colorado) If Dems can add the Southwest and Colorado to the Northeast, upper Midwest and the West Coast they CAN win without the deep South, particularly if they can eventually be competitive in places like Virginia, North Carolina, Missouri, Tennesee - which they definately CAN. Demographics are in our favor if we play it smart. Playing it smart means cultivating good candidates at the local and state level as well as national level. Also we must push for redistricting reform and election reform. It is still too difficult to vote and it is the minorities who are not voting because of the hurdles (many deliberate but not all, some just incompetence). This is a good government winning issue and the Dems should run with it.

[WI_DEM]

42. Actually to his credit Kerry did several times accuse the president of

misleading and lying to the American people.

[Toucano]

44. No "we" didn't.

If we had wanted Dean, we'd have chosen Dean.

[RinaJ]

46. Thank you