Memo to liberals: Get tougher on Bush in 2005

MIDDLETOWN, R.I. — Except for the glorious victories of the Red Sox and the Patriots, 2004 was a disappointing year. But bad years offer useful lessons. Here are a few.

Relentlessness Pays Off. President Bush won re-election by ignoring the conventional wisdom that vicious attacks on your opponent don't work and turn off voters. As soon as John Kerry won the Democratic nomination, Bush's campaign went on the attack and never stopped. It worked.

Kerry got painted as arrogant and privileged compared with an arrogant president who was far more privileged.

Kerry was made out to be a flip-flopping liberal, and never mind asking how someone can be both a flip-flopper and an ideologue. Kerry, who shot people in battle and got wounded himself, was painted as less strong than Bush, the guy who said he supported the Vietnam War but was not willing to fight in it.

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http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/editorial/outlook/2973012

I completely agree.

and I loved our local letters to the editor today at www.idahostatesman.com in which a wounded vet called Bush the inarticulate boob in the WH.

is going to end up taking the exact opposite lesson, will decide that they have to jettison core Democratic values and be even more accomodating to Bush and the RW agenda than they already have been.

I hope that I'm wrong about this, but not very confident. At this point I'm just watching to see what ends up happening.

I gave to Dean way before I gave to Kerry. Dean had the guts to stand up to the Lieberman's and even the Gephardt's and the Daschle's who backed Bushie.

The mainstream dems go right, they'll do it without grassroots.

the hacks who are running the DNC who make decisions about the the party's direction and who seem very unresponsive to the grassroots. The same people who are trying to scapegoat Michael Moore for the Democratic party's failings.

If they have their way with moving the party to the right, I won't be sticking around.

Oh, and Dean wasn't the only one to stand up and energize people. Clark was the one who energized me, and I gave him alot more money than I ended up giving Kerry. I guess that was just as well, since Kerry ended up not spending a large portion of the money that he raised anyway.

Yes, they do, but the only people learning the lessons are people on this board.

The people who need to learn the lessons -- Dem leadership -- haven't even begun to learn any of it. They are still worrying about what they will look like if they raise even a timid voice to the Pukes. What is with that??? How can this happen? We poor slobs out here, one step away from losing our jobs, houses, etc., are supposed to be more courageous than the big shots with millions stashed in the bank? THIS DOES NOT MAKE SENSE. IT CANNOT BE A MATTER OF COURAGE.

To me, it looks like one of two things:

1. They are in on the rape and pillage and are pretending to be an opposition party.
2. They each personally love whatever puny powers they get by being in D.C. and are not willing to give that up.

This is not pretty, folks.