Reply #6: This is silly... [View All]

Mr. Trippi seems to think that the problem the country has is that Democrats are "ignoring their base". In fact, 2004 will be long remembered as the year of the poor rural cultural conservative who put his hatred of gays and "Arabs" over his own pocketbook. Or, in the South, replaced his hatred of blacks (and Lincoln) with hatred of gays and Arabs.

Some other things he says make me understand why Gov. Dean fired him. To wit:

Instead of a DLC in Washington, Democrats should be holding Democratic Grassroots Councils in every county.

There are already such "councils". They're called County Parties, where grassroots Democratic precinct leaders go all year, every year. Mr. Trippi's ignoring of these organizations is exactly what led to Dean being trounced in Iowa.

A party that ignores the needs of state and local parties is doomed. ... It's already occurring in many southern states.

I'm in those "ignored" parties, and I can tell you that we had plenty of support in terms of visits from the candidates. What else do we need? The #1 thing state and local parties need is local volunteers, and it's absurd to expect that from Washington.

Insofar as the continuing alteration into GOP "Red", he's got to be kidding himself if he thinks supporting local parties are going to change that. In Alabama, they couldn't even pass a repeal of racist language in their constitution! DO we really want to add a bunch of Dixiecrat Zell Millers to our farm team?

In a world in which companies like Wal-Mart pay substandard wages with no real benefits, our party has got to find innovative ways to support organized labor's growth.

What we need is for poor rural voters to finally decide that the GOP is so awful that they'll vote for us despite the fact that we don't hate gays. I wish I could put it differently, but that's basically it.

Democrats should lead the way by placing stricter money restrictions on candidates than the toothless Federal Election Commission does.

This doesn't jibe with raising cash over the Internet to be competitive, obviously. Frankly, I like the OLD-Trippi, who came up with the idea of eschewing matching funds to stay even with the GOP.

Finally, What is the purpose the Democratic Party strives for today? What are our goals for the nation? You couldn't tell from the 2004 election.

"Stronger at home. Respected in the world." Seems like a pretty clear summation to me - in six words no less. It's the Economy AND the Foreign Policy, Stupid. If Trippi can't tell what our goals are, he wasn't paying attention, or isn't being honest.


- C.D. Proud Member of the Reality Based Coalition