Dean: Courting the Confederate Metrosexuals

Just What IS Howard Dean's Southern Strategy?

This is kind of a weak opinion piece from a slightly conservative viewpoint but it raises an interesting issue:

Campaigns are embarrassing to every candidate. Everyone says something blisteringly stupid at some point. You spend all day talking, and your mouth is moving while your brain is off wondering when you might flee this damp, hot hall and find the restroom.

President Bush won't have this problem. He isn't trying to fight his way out of a pack; he doesn't have a glib nervy guy from his own party knocking him. It's scripted appearances from here on, with a dull debate at the end. No more misspeakerating.
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Howard Dean, however, is fun. He's like Tigger. Always bouncing. Always something to say. And that's the problem.

Perhaps the biggest news Dean made in recent weeks wasn't for a Bold Policy Initiative, but his declaration that he is a metrosexual.
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You can imagine his brain's reaction when his mouth let that one go: I step away for six seconds and you lose the entire NASCAR dad vote.

The piece goes on to discuss why Dems don't get the votes of white southerners. "When it comes to the swing voters, you have two groups: Social Moderates Who Don't Want Their Daughters to Wear Burqas for Bush, and Dixie Pedicure Enthusiasts for Dean."

When they're thinking about this?

I mean...we survived bimbo eruptions and Whitewater and still won easily!

Howard Dean seems to be doing just that.

It is not a "Southern Strategy" per se.

Running around the South to present a different face to them is a sure way to make them feel singled-out or lied-to... and to lose their vote. The very assuption you need a "Southern Strategy" is divisive conservative-Democrat thinking.

But realistically we're not going to win every state there, just like we're not going to win Wyoming and Idaho.

Is writing off Wyoming being devisive or realistic?

the right to throw feces at us from thier imaginary moral high ground.
It puts their BS in even higher relief... Newt did more to harm neoconservatism than almost anything else I can think of.

He really says too much.... except when it comes to apologizing. That's when he gets quiet.

I know, I know, it's a serious business. But, thanks for a good chuckle, anyway. Can always use one.

Someone PLEASE oblige me. :evilgrin:

:shrug: those confederates and metrosexuals.

To win, a Democrat will need to win some of these states: Indiana (Dems won control of the Indianapolis Metro council for the first time in 25 years: http://www.indystar.com/articles/5/090503-5975-092.html), Nevada (probably not going for Bush because of the Yucca Mountain issue), Colorado (this *could* be a Democratic State), Florida (Obvious), Virginia (Democrats gained seats in the House of Delegates for the first time in 25 years: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A841-2003Nov4.html ), Louisiana (a state that Gore shouldn't have written off).

Pennsylvania is not in play next year, as Democrats swept the statewide judicial elections (for the first time in 15 years), and won big in the Philly Mayor and Pittsburgh County Executive races. In Pittsburgh, the Democratic Challenger beat the incumbent Republican by 16%. (http://www.postgazette.com/election/20031106dems1106p3.asp ). Jim Roddey was a big Bush fundraiser in Pennsylvania. He will be less effective because he is now out of power.

About the only thing that the Republicans won on Tuesday was the Kentucky and Mississippi Governorships. Those states are not likely to elect a Democrat anyway. The real winners on Tuesday were the Democrats. Success in states like Indiana and Virginia shows a chink in Bush's armor.

Some southern states are important. I think Louisana might go Democrat, same for Arkansas. Given some strange circumstances, I could see North Carolina or Virginia voting Democratic. But if the Democratic nominee spends his or her time trying to win Mississippi and Alabama, that nominee will lose in a landslide.

To help build the party in those regions. Dean's visits to Idaho aren't going to give him Idaho's electoral votes, but in 2008 they may go Democrat. The party needs to constantly recruit, build bridges, enhance the party structure in exactly those places that we don't consider to be Friendly to Democrats.

That is why having the convention in Boston is assinine. That doesn't represent outreach, that represents entrenchment. We are losing governorships in the South, we need to reengage Southern Democrats.

I agree a Boston convention is not a good move. It will lead to the northeast liberal label, and it will be hard to shake during the campaign. Pittsburgh would've been a better choice.

If we were going to have the billion plus dollars that Bush is going to spend next year, I would agree, we should go down to the south, and make it harder for the Republicans to win there. But we're not going to have even half of Bush's money. That means we have to target our resources into areas where we can win. There are a few southern states that could go Democratic. But wasting our resources on places like Mississippi (that aren't going Democratic no matter what) would be a bad move. Democrats have a very narrow margin if we want to beat Bush.

Beating him requires spending in the right places, and not going down south and flushing our limited toilets down the toilet.