you mean this RED part???
Posted on 02/23/2005 6:28:48 PM PST by NCjim
RENO, Nev. (AP) - Sen. John Kerry lost the presidential election partly because Democrats "neglected rural America," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said Wednesday.
"I think around the country people just thought they could win in the cities," the Nevada Democrat told The Associated Press.
Reid said he expects new Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean to help reverse that trend, especially in the South and West, and he predicted Democrats will close the gap Republicans hold in the Senate in the off-year elections.
"We are going to pick up Senate seats in 2006, it's only a question of how many," Reid said at a Reno news conference before his scheduled address to the Nevada Legislature in Carson City.
"First of all, history is on our side. Secondly, George Bush is on our side," he said.
"I don't like to give grades to the president. It's kind of early in the term, but it certainly wouldn't be a good grade at this stage," Reid said.
Democrats lost three seats in the U.S. Senate in November and gained 76 among the 3,000 state legislative seats across the nation, Reid said.
But in the presidential race, Nevada was representative of what happened nationally as President Bush carried the state even though he lost the two urban counties that have 91 percent of the voters - Clark County surrounding Las Vegas and Washoe County surrounding Reno.
Kerry carried the urban counties "certainly by enough to win the election, everybody thought," Reid said. But the 9 percent of voters in Nevada's 15 rural counties "was absolutely dramatic in Nevada and around the country."
Douglas County turned out 94 percent of its registered voters and voted heavily against Kerry, he said.
"There is not one of those 15 counties that had a voter turnout less than 84 percent. Think about that. They went heavily against John Kerry and as a result of that, Kerry lost the state by 2 percent," Reid said.
"Same in Ohio. Same all over the country. We neglected rural America."
How do Democrats change that?
"All we have to do is be there and let them know we care," Reid said in an interview after the news conference.
"In the farm programs, we are the ones who support the farmers, (Republicans) support the bankers," he said.
"In the Medicare bill, that is Democrat stuff in there related to helping rural hospitals," he said.
Reid said he questioned during the campaign why Vice President Dick Cheney took time to make a personal appearance in Elko in rural northeast Nevada.
"Well, he got the last laugh on that one," Reid said, "He was gathering votes. They did a good job in rural America, we didn't."
Republican Rep. Jim Gibbons, who won a fifth term in Nevada's sprawling 2nd District, offered a similar analysis immediately after the election.
"I believe rural Nevada carried President Bush to victory," Gibbons said.
One of Kerry's worst showings was in Elko County, where 54 percent of the registered voters are Republican, 26 percent Democrat and 20 percent independent or third party. Bush won there with nearly 80 percent of the vote.
Cheney's visit to Elko - the first by a sitting vice president since Richard Nixon in 1958 - was tremendously important, Gibbons said.
"It showed the people of Elko County that this administration was serious about everybody's vote, every state, every county," the congressman said.
Reid, who said he talks with Dean regularly, expects him to help win the party votes in rural areas. Dean plans a visit to Nevada on Monday.
Reid said he told Dean that he was not his first choice for party chairman. Reid backed Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack early on.
"But I'm so impressed how he has taken the darts that were thrown at him," Reid said.
"Say what you want about Gov. Dean, he is an organizer. In the state of Vermont, they know what kind of person he is. He is not some wild-eyed, left-wing nut," he said.
"Gov. Dean balanced the budgets of the state of Vermont. He's been supported by the National Rifle Association in eight successive elections. He handled the same-sex marriage thing as well as has been handled any place in the country. ... with civil unions."
"We're off and running."
you mean this RED part???
If the dems are running on a "We guarantee you a good night's sleep" platform, it's working for me!
You didn't fail to deliver the message. They just weren't buying it.
And that, in a nutshell, is it.
Their message got here. We rejected it.
There hasn't been this level of suspense since the LA Times announced it would endorse a presidential candidate in 2004.
I think rural America got the Dims message. Rural America rejected the message.
I know he has to play the part but did he say this with a straight face.
We shouldn't be bashing them for being so dense, we should be egging them on. Guaranteed continuous losses.
"All we have to do is be there and let them know we care," Reid said in an interview after the news conference
I'm sorry Mr. Reid that's not "all you have to do". These RAT's just don't get it...it's not about appearance...it's about the substance.
We know you don't "care" and no amount of telling us you do will help. Go crawl back under your rock where all the RAT's belong.
What message? They have yet to have one. All they ever do is try to say whats wrong with everyone else (which is usually not true).
So when they're thrown out of office they'll become the Senate janitors? Would be honest work for a change.
Kerry had a message? What was it? "I served in Vietnam?" "I'm not Bush?" "I kill pretty birds?"
Oh, the message got to rural America Harry.
However, rural America can recognize Bull$hit from quite a distance.
Translation: "We need to expand our vote fraud to the urban areas."
"Same in Ohio. Same all over the country. We neglected rural America."
Same all over the country, Mr. Reid...............
You ignore the fact that the majority of this country "REJECTED" the 'Rat message.
Can't understand that, can you?
Sorry to say I live in this Dimwit's state.
Oh yea, I'm looking forward to the next 4 years of people whacking Nevada because of Reid.
Hey!!! - he just lives here says he goes to his hometown restaurant, actually a casino.
And solicits feedback from kids on skate boards........excuse me while I hurl.
I think I'll move to South Dakota, now that they have expunged their scourge.
LVM
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