Why we're ALL winners after last night

This is Tomasky's take, and I think he's right on! This is also a reason I remain "undecided" at this point... kind of like looking at a dessert tray or menu and not being able to make up my mind. It ALL looks good!

Snip:

John Kerry was obviously Tuesday night's big winner. But as I flipped back and forth and back among the cable channels, I kept seeing another winner. More than 200,000 New Hampshire voters turned out Tuesday night. The previous record was about 160,000. That's a signal -- and you better believe that the president's campaign people noticed it -- that anti-Bush turnout could be stoked in November.

There were, obviously, differences among Kerry and Howard Dean and John Edwards and Wesley Clark. But what's most striking the morning after is what's similar about them: They're populists. Each of them, in his own way, is ripping into corporate special interests and even talking about class in America. Putting out such a message has been absolutely verboten for Democrats in the last few years. And the one candidate (Joe Lieberman) who ran away from populism as if it were a communicable disease finished a very un-Joe-mentum-ish fifth.

This was not, coming into this election season, the script that Democrats were supposed to read from. Think back: In 2002, when these candidates first started to dip toes into the water (and when Al Gore was still a candidate), the conventional wisdom was that Gore's brief flirtation with a populist message was a problem (a sentiment Lieberman echoed during his appearance at a Democratic Leadership Council conclave that summer). But now we have Kerry, Dean, Edwards, and Clark talking to voters in an explicitly populist way about the economy and, to some extent, about cultural issues as well.

Here's another interesting thing -- and it may well be the thing -- about the new Democratic populism: It doesn't really have much to do with organized Democratic constituencies. The unions and the other usual Democratic interests aren't driving this. Unions were for Dick Gephardt, who dropped out early, and for Dean, who came back in New Hampshire to some extent only. The fact that all four remaining serious candidates, three of whom have no organizational backing to speak of, are talking populism means that, this year, that message matters to regular voters.

More here: http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2004/01/tomasky-m-01-28.html

One kick, not for vanity but because I think he makes a great point: that it's the MESSAGE this year and we're blessed with at least 4 candidates that get it.

Kucinich and Sharpton who not only REALLY get it, but aren't afraid to say it.

(Was that the flame you wanted? ;) *g*)

What BS all those guys are bushlite trash!

Wait. Except my guy.

Trash. etc.


:hi:

I'm proud to have a real liberal winning for a change.