Posted on 02/10/2005 9:11:37 PM PST by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former President Bill Clinton (news - web sites) encouraged Democrats on Thursday to rally around the party's leaders and said doomsayers who predict the party's demise needed to "get a life and look at history."
Clinton told Democratic activists gathered in Washington for a two-day meeting, which concludes on Saturday with the expected election of former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean (news - web sites) as party chairman, that "better tactics" and a clearer vision would foster a swing in the political pendulum and a Democratic revival.
"We need to stop saying that in order to win the White House something magical has to happen," Clinton told a dinner honoring outgoing party Chairman Terry McAuliffe. "All that has to happen is we've got to have a clear vision, a plan for the future, good campaign tactics and fight like the devil."
He added, "When all these people tell you that we are about to be buried, tell them to get a life and look at history."
Clinton said Democrats also needed to quit bickering among themselves and develop "better branding" that would give voters a clearer sense of what they stood for.
"There were too many voters who didn't really know why we were Democrats except we were against the president's policies," Clinton said of the 2004 campaign.
Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites), whose November loss to President Bush (news - web sites) in a bitter White House race set off a flurry of doubt and second-guessing among Democrats, said the party was poised to win in the future.
"This great party of ours doesn't need a makeover," Kerry told the dinner, adding he came "within inches" of winning the presidency. "This great party of ours doesn't need some massive shift."
KERRY PRAISES DEAN
Kerry offered praise for Dean, his former rival for the Democratic presidential nomination whose campaign could not sustain his early momentum.
"This is the beginning of something special," Kerry said of the leadership of Dean, who is unopposed for the post of Democratic National Committee (news - web sites) chairman after a half-dozen rivals dropped out of the race in the past few weeks.
Dean visited several Democratic groups earlier in the day, including state party leaders who gave his candidacy for chairman a crucial boost last week with an endorsement.
"What we are about to do is to restructure the Democratic Party," Dean told the meeting of the Association of State Democratic Chairs.
"We really are going to push the party down to the grass roots. We are going to build what the Republicans have done so successfully in order to compete with them," he said. "We cannot succeed at the national level unless we succeed at the state level."
Dean roared to an early lead in the 2004 Democratic presidential race with record-breaking fund raising and blunt criticism of Bush, but faltered when the voting began.
He told the state chairs he would spend a "disproportionate" amount of time trying to build Democratic support in Republican or "red states" -- named for the color used to identify them on television maps.
"That's where we really need the attention," Dean said.
Like what else is she gonna say?
Well, one out o' four ain't bad.
They certainly DO fight like Satan himself.
rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic
Piece of cake. What are they worried about.
Slick should reconsider telling people to look at history, especially the history that includes himself. He's done a marvelous job on his own of burying his party.
We do need to monitor the Dem progress in going to the grassroots.
If they have good success, our achievement with the 72-hour plan will be counteracted.
WELL, that part shouldn't be TOO difficult.
GO DEAN!!! YEAAAAARGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
I really hate that song now.
Kerry's right. It's not an election, it's a game of horseshoes.
"This great party of ours doesn't need a makeover," Kerry told the dinner, adding he came "within inches" of winning the presidency.
Exactly. If Clinton and his evil wife were for real they'd have taken the center in those eight years and got Gore elected. But Gore being president wasn't in their power grab crystal ball.
What Bill is trying to say is the same lame crap MacAwful and others keep saying, "we just need to get our message out".
Ah......sorry! It got out. Are the attention spans of sheep so small they forget Bill ran as a centrist and then moved sharply to the left in just the first six months in office? You'd think idiots that worked to bring down Nixon would have not taken his political instinct as their own when it comes to "moving to the center" in a general election.
And since one of their anthems is "A Time's They Are a' Changing" they'd actually listen to the words and learn. It's not 1992.
Kind of spooky. The Shrill may very could be elected as a 'popular' president, but be assured folks, she'll never be elected as Commander In Chief. Stand down.
Bill, Bill, Bill, you left out the most important one. You know, "Pretend that we are everything that we're not; and, that we are not anything that we really are."
Then chuckle and give a few examples, like... "Just check out Hillary's sudden pro-life stance...straight out of Hollywood." Allow for laughter.
"And, what about that American flag on her lapel? Sort of makes people forget what she said about what the flag stands for, doesn't it? Pause for some nudges and winks in the audience."
Then repeat for clarity.
"Pretend that we are everything that we're not; and, that we are not anything that we really are."
Coming to an MSM near you.
.
A good place to start is "The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party" by Michael Holt.
Come the '08 elections, they will have triangulated values and be able to out-value anyone else.
"better branding"=product
BTTT
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