We need a Moderate candidate in 2008.

Russ Feingold's pretty moderate.

:rofl:

if teh democratic party wants to run to teh right -- fine with me.

i'll vote for my reps -- barbara lee.
feinstein if there's no one more liberal to vote for.

and a big blank if i'm forced to choose someone that i can't live with.

i'll continue to give dean and pda money and working for the things i love -- other than that...
fuck it.

FeinGOLD, not FeinSTEIN.

I want the kind of moderate who would actually read the Patriot Act & vote against it, one who would be the first to propose a timeline for withdrawal, etc. You know, a Wisconsin-style moderate.

I'd heard about all that fog in the Bay area, but...

i'm just saying what it's about for me.

just like you said what it's about for you.

feingold.

if i don't like him/her this time around -- the box stays empty.

No offense to Russ Feingold, but he's never really hit many buttons for me. It just cracks me up to see so many people here insisting that absolute victory is guaranteed by a (pick one: moderate, progressive, liberal, conservative, left handed, communist, suicide dove, werewolf) candidate. I don't see that working. Though admittedly, the people who start these threads are usually pulling for suicide-left candidates.

The first thing that I would look for in a candidate is whether they've got the chops: smart, capable, wise, skilled, and a good leader. There's more than one way of getting things done, and if we got a good president I wouldn't be too worried how they were identified.

But in what world would you ever consider him a moderate?

hadn't been bent & twisted beyond recognition by 30 years of exposure to far-right extremists.

OK--I admit it. I'm a civil-libertarian Old Hippie.

...strong left. The people whom will be voting in the primaries tend to be more politically concerned (Activists) than the general population, and they will not be in love with any moderates.

Of course, it is a long way from now to 08, and many things can happen.

I am TIRED of Dems being "Republican Lite." We need to be Democrats! DEMOCRATS!

On what issues is Senator Feingold a "loony leftist"? His stances seem to be pretty goddamn common sense to me.

...."Republican lite". BUT, I DO agree that we have to start standing for what we believe. But remember this. Somewhere around 70% of the American citizenry calls themselves moderate or middle of the road. The Bush Fascism Party swung many of those votes by lying to them. However, they will not swing, if dealt with honestly, to either extreme. I DO believe, though, that a LARGE majority of that 70% would believe that we should be taking care of poor Americans before poor Iraqis....that we should build American schools, not Iraqi schools....that Homeland Security should START at our borders, then spread from there, not start with pre-emptive war and worry about our actual homeland later....that our public schools are in the long run, as much a matter of Homeland Security as anything else, because without a good education, our children won't be ABLE to govern, much less protect themselves....hell, without a good education, they will ALL turnout to be GEORGE W. BUSHS, without the silver spoon!!!

We need someone who stands for something honestly and fervently and by their life story.

Not some schmo with a finger in the wind.

Not some bozo who labels himself.

Not some politico who has had more 'remakes' than Madonna.

I'm not saying any of this about Feingold. I **am** saying this about the person who will get my vote.

Is someone who wants to preserve what's left of the gains that workers and women won in the 20th century--is that "left"? It sure seems so to some Dems...do we simply acquiesce in this process, as the DLC wants? And let's have no nonsense here--that *is* what they stand for. They might want to do it a little less malignantly than the GOP would, but they essentially want the Dems to help in breaking the unions and turning the country back to the 19th century, something which is obvious if you've ever talked to some of these DLC types privately, as I have. I think an aversion to union-busting is--should be--a minimum requirement for anyone calling themselves a "Democrat". The ability to organize is as basic a right as the right to vote--or it should be. The same thing applies to the long, hard-fought gains women won in the 20th century. And let's not kid ourselves--if the Right manages to destroy the gains of labor and women, with the aid of a complaisant Democratic "moderate" party, then blacks will be next. Look at Ohio, look at Florida. The DLC philosophy might--or might not--be tactically advantageous in any given election cycle--but it also reduces the Democratic Party to the status of the Whigs, simply a Designated Opposition willing to administer injustice a little more humanely than the real fascists...is that what we really want?

So is Dennis Kucinich, if you overlook his New Age ramblings.

n/t

old FDR moderate: Kucinich!