Bayh '08 - tough but necessary medicine

I know a lot of people will say Evan Bayh is too moderate, but lets face it, he just won an easy re-election in Indiana for a second term and has what we need to get back in power. He can help us make inroads in the midwest and would be tough for the evangelicals and fire-breathing conservatives to attack. Once back in power, we can then move to shift to the left.

A few more up and comers....

Salazar and Mary Lanerau (I can't spell Gajun),

We need to build a midwest, northeast southwest coalition.....

And, as Clinton embraced so well, it's th economy stupid!!!!!

Bayh is another DLC - dem lite candiate. We need someone who will stick up for our convictions. How about Schumer or Durbin.

Ashcroft is a nut way to the right of Bayh. We can't win with a "fuck the Bible belt" strategy - it forces us to have to pretty much run the table everywhere else and weakens us in the House and Senate. Durbin, Schumer, or Hilary will all face this same obstacle. We need to be realists and concede a northeast liberals chances of winning are pretty slim given the 130 electoral vote disadvantage they would get right out of the gate in the south.

Do you even know who Durbin is?

We went four for four in the south last night....

We lost all four senate seats and the fifth one is undecided...

That means gays, minorities, the poor have no Democratic
spokespeople in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia...


At the presidential level we didn't carry one fucking state south of DC...

If Schumer was on top of the ticket last night we could have watched Survivor instead of election results... He wouldn't have even carried ten states...


I'm tired of getting my ass kicked by Pugs who I spot thirty or forty I Q points...


P.S. And Schumer's not even pure... He voted for the IWR......

Do you want the Democratic Party to actually win, or do you want a continuous strategic retreat? Because that's what a Bayh nomination would be -- a fucking strategic retreat.

If you want to WIN, you must start the work of organizing the party. Rather than thinking about what politician can be your savior, start organizing and supporting good candidates on the local and state level. Run for office yourself. THIS is how we will build a viable Democratic Party over time.

The Republicans have been doing this for 40 years. They didn't all of a sudden spring up out of nowhere. They laid groundwork, committed money, and did the hard work necessary. If we want to win, we need to do the same.

40 years.....

Okay Moses, you got one thing right. Organize at the local level...

Run for Precinct Committee person. Take the time to find out what is going on and organize yourselfs at the community level. Take over your city, county and state parties.......

But in the meantime, do you really think that EB, if elected, would be worse than electing Jeb? And don't you think that if an Icon like EB was running, he wouldn't be able to help down the ticket.... Kerry pulled thorough SOOOOOO many democrats......

For chrissake, how far back do you want to retreat until we step back into the thick of things...

We are in the outside looking in and the best way to get back in the game is to get a major player in the game.....

That makes it a hell of a lot easier to organize at the local level...

Not because of the policies he would necessarily promote, but because of the significant damage he would do to the party as a whole by embracing a pro-corporate agenda. Also, I doubt you would get a tremendous amount of enthusiasm from the more progressive elements of the party by nominating someone who represents the more rightward elements of the party.

For the record, I also think that the Clinton years were very damaging for the party as a whole in the long run. They made a strategic retreat (a brilliant one, but still an overall retreat) out to be a "winning strategy", and helped to wed the party to corporate interests at the expense of economic populism, which is probably the best antidote to Republican "values" politicking that we could find.

You need the structure of the party to win...

Organize at teh local level. Everyone who posts on here should be a Precinct Committeeperson. The Precinct Commtteepeople elect the PArty Chairs. The PArty Shairs elect the State Chairs and that is how the Christian Right took over the GOP.....

They all backed Bush the Senior even though he was a corporate republican. And look what happened..........

How does one become a precint committeeperson?

The PRecicnt Committee position is an elected position. You take out a petition, gget it signed then walk around and talk to the registered democrats in your area.....

A substantial portion of the electorate hates national-level Democrats. The only way to change that is by changing the playing field. That kind of work takes years and it probably won't pay off in our lifetime but that's what needs to be done, if it's not too late to do anything at all.

Here's a lit of IWR cosponsors:
http://www.congress.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d107:SJ00046:@@@P
2 of them were already would be VP-s. Let's dig deeper.

I have one word for Bayh:

BYE!

:puke:

nt

It's not that I'm in love with EB, it's just we need someone who can get elected.....

Warner would be great....

Does anyone know? If he's pro-life, there's no way he gets the nomination in any year.

That's enough for me...

By virtue of their jobs, they have to make too many choices and compromises. The public does not understand nuance and trade-off. they only understand "strong" and "resolute". Governors are safer choices, because whatever controversial things they have done, can easily be justified because of their state issues.

Seriously though, before we even start thinking about 08, we need to concentrate on media issues. It will be infinitely harder now, since there will be no reiinstatement of the fairness doctrine, and the media will consolidate even more now, but without some help in the media, we are in for an even tougher time..

Bush would have NEVER won without the "help" of radio & tv out there pounding away with the 24/7 propaganda..

and we MUST keep the moneyed people onboard..we need them to start up our own think tanks to at least try to counter the AEI's & the Heritages.. The conservos have "bought" thought, and are very good at preaching their side to anyone with a tv or radio.

Did the media massacre inflicted on him ruin any attempt at candidacy again for him? He worked diligently with his group Democracy for America and the Democrats made a net gain of 2 state legislatures this year, which is much harder than it sounds. He's shown the ability to generate grass-roots support; the fact that his campaign even existed was because of his ability to inspire individuals to action. We can pair him up with a somewhat experienced senator, say.....Byron Dorgan of North Dakota (yeah, it might be home-state bias on my part). Dorgan just won his 3rd term as a Democratic senator from an extremely right-wing state and it would be in an off-year for him so he wouldn't lose his seat. Dorgan's not a centrist, but he's not an extremist either. He seems to really relate well to the wishes of North Dakota and rural areas in general.

It'd be worth a shot, plus it's about damn time Dorgan gets some of the recognition that he deserves.

the dakota_democrat

would be Biden, Corzine and Feingold.

Realisticly, don't see any of them running. Not thrilled with Warner but he makes a load of electoral sense. Rendell is very intriging.

But the Dems will shoot themselves in the foot and encourage McGreevey to run. Why not.

:think:

Republican/Conservative than Bush in many ways.
And I live in Indiana

who got beat by an imbecile like Dan Quayle because he was too liberal for the Hooosier state....

Hell, why not just vote Republican or run Zell?

Running a "moderate" who denied any hint of being a liberal just lost the election. Didn't you hear?

Governors seem to do better.

No more repuke-lite.

Run a pro-working class candidate who isn't afraid to conduct the kind of campaign that makes Republicans scream in horror over the "divisiveness" of it all. Make THEM start scrambling toward the center, for a change.

Ted Strickland is a US rep from southeast Ohio, a rural district in the middle of Bush country.
His appeal: Great ratings from environmental groups, labor groups, agriculture groups, civil rights groups, he voted AGAINST the Iraq War, strong support from veteran's groups, pro-gun groups, he is an ordained minister and has a pHd in psychology.



The three issues that suppossedly killed us were "God, guns and gays"
Now, I have no desire to try and appeal to people by acting like gay-hating bigots. However, I do think we need to appeal to gun owners more, as well as religious people, without merging church and state. Strickland would take care of that, he has an A rating from the NRA and he's an ordained methodist minister. His constiuents are all in the area of OHIO that tends to go Bush. He could make huge gains among rural voters, and they are what put Bush over the edge. I saw him speak at an Edwards event and he is a very good speaker and very engaging.

Links:
http://www.house.gov/strickland/
http://www.vote-smart.org/bio.php?can_id=BC031984

and while he has a pretty safe seat, he's no "favorite son." Very, very few people outside of his district have ever even heard his name.

Or maybe we can get DeLay to run as a Democrat. Or, if Ariel Sharon is out of a job by then, he'd make a fine Democrat. But since we're now pursuing theocracy as a national goal, maybe Satan would be available to run as a Democrat.

Evan Bayh can fuck off.

Israel has a great social welfare system and gays can serve openly in the military...

Before we go THAT far, can we at least sit back and watch * implode as we know he will (and take the rest of the GOP with him). I can understand considering Southern and/or Midwestern Dems but it's not so bad that we have to put up anti-choice candidates.

conservative but has a liberal heart. Like Clinton was. Like Edwards is.

He's Southern. I like it.

If so, then the answer is HELL NO!

he's to the left of joe lieberman and not nearly as sanctimonious...



he'd be a decent candidate...


Bayh/Warner...

That's the ticket...


If it's another "fear" election than

Clark/Bayh

he's about equal to Lieberman, but is more electable than Joe..
http://www.ontheissues.org/Senate/Evan_Bayh.htm

this is where he fits:


compared to Kerry:


yeah, he's more moderate than Kerry, but we're not exactly in a position of power. If we go great in '06, maybe we can look for someone further left, but if not, Bayh seems the pragmatic choice.

and scored near Mandella and Gandhi but I'd support Bayh if he's our ticket to the White House..

voting records. Phil Breseden or Mike Easley run one of these lovable moderate southern Governors