I say, let them go as far left as they want. Leftover from the primaries pic.
Posted on 12/09/2004 12:28:41 PM PST by KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle
This Saturday in Orlando, at a meeting of state party chairs, a parade of potential candidates are going to be making the case for why they should be the next chair of the Democratic National Committee.
I don't have a candidate. But I do have a litmus test: Anyone raising the idea that the party needs to "move to the middle" should immediately be escorted out of the building. Better yet, a trap door should open beneath them, sending them plummeting down an endless chute into electoral purgatory – which is exactly where the party will be permanently headquartered if it continues to adopt such a strategy.
Among those eyeing the position are Howard Dean, former White House aide Harold Ickes, Texas Rep. Marty Frost, former Denver Mayor Wellington Webb, former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk, New Democrat Network founder Simon Rosenberg, political strategist Donnie Fowler, and telecom exec Leo Hindery.
Although less than 450 people will ultimately decide who becomes the next party chair, when the DNC votes on Feb. 12, the outcome will have a profound effect on shaping the party's future. Will Democrats continue to toe the strategy line of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council that has brought them to the brink of permanent minority-party status? Or will they finally return to the party's roots and recapture its lost political soul – and the White House and Congress with it?
Welcome to the Great Democratic Party Identity Crisis of 2005.
Ever since the election, Democratic leaders have been crawling over each other in a mad scramble to the middle. Indeed, this is the worst case of midriff bulge since Kirstie Alley stopped by Sizzler's all-you-can-eat buffet.
"Things are accomplished in the middle. We have to work toward the middle. And I think that that's clear." That was new Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on "Meet the Press" this weekend. He didn't elaborate on what good was "clearly accomplished" in the middle over the past four years, but perhaps he was referring to the invasion of Iraq. Almost makes you long for the spineless bleating of Tom Daschle, doesn't it?
Last week's meeting of the 21-strong Democratic Governors Association was similarly an orgy of centrist groping, best summed up by Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who said, "This, for us, is our moment to push an agenda ... that is centrist and that speaks to where most people are."
If Gov. Granholm, a rising star in the party, really thinks the center is where the majority of people were located this past election, the Democrats are in even worse trouble than we think. Have these people learned nothing from 2000, 2002 and 2004? How many more concession speeches do they have to give – from "the center" – before they realize it's not a very fruitful place?
Putting aside for a moment the question of the party's soul and focusing entirely on hardball politics, running to the middle has been proven to be the single stupidest strategy the Democrats can pursue.
As cognitive psychologist George Lakoff told me: "Democrats moving to the middle is a double disaster that alienates the party's progressive base while simultaneously sending a message to swing voters that the other side is where the good ideas are." It unconsciously locks in the notion that the other side's positions are worth moving toward, while your side's positions are the ones to move away from. Plus every time you move to the center, the right just moves further to the right.
And if middle-of-the-roadism is such a great vote-getter, why don't we see Republicans moving there? In fact, framing the political debate in right-left terms is so old, so tired, and so wrong that we need to resist all temptation to do so. There is nothing left-wing about wanting corporations to pay their fair share rather than hide their profits in P.O. boxes in Bermuda, or in ensuring access to health care now rather than paying the bill at the emergency room later.
That's why the DNC race is so important. The party needs a chairman able to drive a stake through the heart of its bankrupt GOP-lite strategy and champion the populist economic agenda that has already proven potent at the ballot box in many conservative parts of the country. Just how potent is revealed in "The Democrats' Da Vinci Code," a brilliant upcoming American Prospect cover story by David Sirota that shows how a growing number of Democrats in some of the reddest regions in America have racked up impressive, against-the-grain wins by framing a progressive economic platform in terms of values and right vs. wrong. These are not "left" ideas; they are good ideas.
This strategy of economic populism coincides perfectly with what is the most significant shift in Democratic politics in a generation: the astounding growth of a grass-roots donor base. Thanks in no small part to the Internet, the Kerry campaign and the DNC raised between them over $300 million from grass-roots donors. Kerry alone raised over $71 million from donors who contributed $200 or less. What's more, the DNC experienced a sevenfold increased in donors – skyrocketing from 400,000 in 2000 to the 2.7 million who contributed in 2004.
This reallocation of power away from lobbyists and big corporate donors will finally allow Democrats to stop taking policy dictation from their corporate financiers and start offering up an alternative vision to compete with George Bush's. But only if the will is there.
Good, eh? Yeeeeeeaaaaaaahhhhhhhh!
Yes, Arianna! You must keep trying to move them left, way far left. Left of Hollywood, left of the NY Slimes. Keep talkin' baby! Go left, go left!
Prairie
Like the Monopoly game, "Go directly to jail, do not pass GO", this stance should state, "Go directly to Communism, do not stop at Socialism." The further left they go, the more of a minority they'll become.
Well..at LEAST Larry the Flynt had more experience running a business than she did.
LOL -- Zsa Zsa Huffington -- I love it!! She does sound like her!! She's kind of like Tah-Ray-Zah, too, dahling! Pass the raisins!
Soooo! Arianna Huffington is really a Republican and like my posts in the Dumb website, she is a plant trying to get them to go further left and out of sight. Thank you Arianna Huffington for your service. I just hope the left doesn’t find out about this infiltration.
GREAT tagline! :)
I say, let them go as far left as they want. Leftover from the primaries pic.
Flint - 17,446 Coleman - 14,235
You see, that is such a problem for them. Liberals think that lying to the opposition is okay in order to win. So therefore, everybody does it, especially Republicans. So then it is acceptable to lie to America, especiallyl Republicans.
But the GOP and conservatives usually don't lie like that. Your advice is heart felt and well meaning. Liberals and democrats think that if you (NOBV), a conservative, tells them to moderate their wacky out-of-touch tone, then what you really mean is that you are scared of them going hard left because then they will win.
Once again, the left demonstrating they learned nothing after 2002 and 2004.
I'm concluding that she must be Carl Rove's deep cover mole who's mission is to lead the Democrats to their Waterloo and finish that party off once and for all.
Huffington has become the new left wing idiots, poster girl.
She has now passed Barbra Streisand, and Susan Sarandon.
Ops4 God BLess America!
Nah, she know the witch is only kidding.
There really are so many ways that the Democrats, if they choose, could run to the right of the Republicans, that "coming to the middle" could be a serious head fake.
Immigration, and particularly control of illegal border crossings, balanced budget, "fair trade" versus "free trade", energy independence by embracing development of nuclear energy, and development of a program of supporting "family values" in education, defense of marriage and family support during times of personal crisis.
Dems raised more in official pacs such as the Dem Senate Campaign, DNC etc. That doesn't include the 527s, Micheal Moore, union expenditures, rock concerts etc..
They beat us legitimately in the money department.
Why was it necessary for her to say something nasty about Kristie Alley in order to make her point? Oh yeah, that's right, she's a democrat and can't help but say something nasty about someone!
LOL...maybe Zha Zha has the hots for Dean. She got tired of McCain?
They kid themselves into thinking that they represent people's economic self interests. Yet, I don't think that many Americans are fooled into thinking that hostility to corporations will improve the jobs picture. Health care? who knows? And that is it!
It is, truly it is. I feel for the Democrats much as I would for a down and out boozer who has surrendered his life to alcohol. My question to them, like to the alcoholic is 'Had enough yet?'
You have to think that maybe there are many dems who don't like the leftist-antiChristian-homosexual-antiAmerican shell of itself it is now, but are still loyal for whatever reason to the donkey.
Maybe they just need to hit bottom some more. I hope to help make that happen.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.