I am a recovering conservative. As some of you may know from my prior posts, I am a Christian who is very involved in social justice. In the last several years, especially with this war, I have come to realize that the Republicans give only lip service to the teachings of Christ. Their policies are often diametrically opposed.
So do I become a Democrat? I am not opposed to the idea. But Howard Dean makes me go yuck. I find him annoying and a hack. Maybe being a hack is his job as chair of the DNC. But I think he plays well to the hardcore Dem base, but why appeal to them? Sure, he has to keep the far left from going Green or whatever opposition party is going to emerge. But wouldn’t the effort be better placed in appealing towards moderate conservatives sick of Bushco? Isn’t that where the largest possible swing exists? If a Greenie decides they cannot vote Dem, they certainly aren’t going to go 'Pub. But a frustrated 'Pub is likely to vote Dem, doubling the bang per vote.
But back to my main point. Howard Dean is a hurdle to me making this decision.
No, because those are the people who will fall back into the GOP fold when the “fear, smears, and queers” campaign starts up.
The Democrats can get the small margin they need to get over the top out of the 50% of registered voters who don’t vote. They don’t need to win over a single Bush voter to win in either 2006 or 2008. The Republicans didn’t get where they are by winning over Democrats; they won it by getting their base interested and organized enough that they all came out to vote.
Nobody cares about the party chairs when they actually vote. What the chairs really do is raise money and they can do that most effectively by throwing red meat to their bases. The job of the cairs is not to get people to vote for their candidates but to get people who are already in the party to write checks.
If you ever get any fundraising literature from the RNC (I get it from the RNC all the time for some reason. I’ve never gotten a thing from the Dems and I’ve never registered for either party), it’s so over the top in the other direction (keywords are “terrorists,” “gays” and “evolution”) that it almost seems like satire.
It’s a reason not to join the party (and so is avoiding having to be spammed with constant solicitations for donations) but you shouldn’t let it affect how you vote. That’s just how they shake down the true believers on either side (who are the most likely to donate money) for spare change.
I think you can safely ignore the speeches of both the RNC and DNC chairpeople. Their job, especially in an off year election, is to toss out some red meat to those likely to donate large amounts of money.
Yep. That and get the less wealthy members of the base to volunteer their time. It’s the candidates themselves that have to worry about going for the moderates.
It’s his job. Why would Dean or Ken Mehlman have any impact on how you feel about any issue? If you don’t like them personally, I understand that, but their job is by nature a sleazy one (in my opinion).
Not that I’m an expert, but it seems to me that Dean is doing a very good job. He does what he needs to, and doesn’t believe that the Democrats should just surrender all the ‘red’ states. He says he wants to build a 50-state party infrastructure and get candidates elected in all the states, and I think he is doing it.
I’m just wondering what Dean has done to prompt the OP. AFAIK, he hasn’t been in the headlines lately. And his long-term plan of “leave no state unchallenged” makese sense for political planners of any stripe, IMO.