The Fallacy of the Vanquished Democratic Party

DirectorBlue's blog ^ | 3/12/2005 | Directorblue

[directorblue]

There appears to be a new GOP meme wafting through the new media that goes something like this: the Democratic party "has been completely intellectually vanquished". That "we [continue] to tally up the 'I told you so’s.'". Reveling in the seeming surrender of the MSM with their refrain that, "maybe Bush was right." And, of course, celebrating victories over partisan hacks disguised as unbiased newsmen.

But I think it's a mistake. There are legitimate opportunities for the Democratic party to excel, albeit on issues not quite so critical as national defense. Here are four issues on which I believe that the GOP is increasingly vulnerable...

[thoughtomator]

Anyone with basic knowledge of the Democrat party knows that there are no opportunities for them in Social Security or Medicare, or for that matter, any New Deal/Great Society program. They are nailed down to the status quo because huge segments of their base won't permit any discussion on those issues at all.

"Reliance on Oil" is a non-starter, because there's nothing any political party can do to replace oil as an energy source at this point in time. We'd need technologies we don't have yet, and those would come with their own drawbacks as well.

The bankruptcy issue might be a good one, except a large part of the Democrats were also on board with it. That's a two-party scam, not owned by the GOP.


There's two really, really obvious ones that you missed. I'll let you take a few guesses before I tell you what they are, if you can't figure it out.

[satchmodog9]

I laugh every time I hear the Rats are dead. They still influence the Unions, media, government workers and most of the poor. They still have their friends in the MSM and they will never cease to get the message out through Hollywood and TV. If we don't watch ourselves, we could be in for another edition of Clinton time.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

On top of the democrats normal blather of we won't starve the old people like the republican want or a chicken in every pot with two for each female who has killed an unborn child.

They still have the kicker "A free cell phone and free cell phone minutes".

[directorblue]

Immigration is an obvious one, but that's already a hot-button issue (even fragmenting the GOP even as we speak).

I'm not coming up with the second one...

[Congressman Billybob]

There's only one slight problem with the idea that the Democrats can win on these issues, or any others. They have to DECIDE what they believe on ANY issues, and then campaign on them.

I wrote this week on this precise subject. The "Plan" of the Democrats is all process, and no content. It's like male-pattern map disorder: When you don't know where you are going, drive faster to get there sooner.

Click below for more on this.

Congressman Billybob

Latest column, "NASCAR Lessons for Democrats"

[thoughtomator]

The second thing I was thinking of is a principled opposition to international free trade as it is practiced. We get ripped off for immense sums by our plethora of disfavorable trade agreements.

[investigateworld]

Good article. I see the danger to the continued success coming from some of our 'economic purists'. As we saw from the vote on the bankruptcy bill last week, some people can only make money through 'Washington Ability'.*
I've had clients take a powder on me through BK, but I didn't have the political clout to go whining to Washington. I suspect this bill's passage will come back and bite us. We are supposed to be the Party of self responsibility, yet the banking industry wants us to minimize their losses when they bet wrongly when issuing credit. And if that's all the Party stands for, then I'll vote Libertarian or Green or whatever. *Source: Atlas Shrugged.

[NutCrackerBoy]

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