Despite OH it looks like a win for GWB.
A victory would have been nice, but there’s a downside to it - cleaning up George’s mess in Iraq, Afghanistan and domestically with the economy. Not to mention having to fight the Congress and Senate every inch of the way.
Better to give GWB enough rope, now when there are no restrains and come up with a good candidate in '08. Someone who ain’t Not-Bush, but has a clear and attractive message.
I also think there will be lots of dissent withing the GOP between republicans who are for small government and fiscal restraint, and those who are on a crusade to use faith based politics to form a theocracy.
Also, Cheney won’t stand in '08, so it’s gonna be hartd for the GOP to get the next candidate into the limelight.
Time to soften Hillary’s image or starting to look for a new WJC. A democratic contender can’t be from new England and win.
If the leadership of the Democratic party is actually looking forward to Bush harming the country (from their point of view), it would explain much of what is wrong with American politics.
My sincere hope is that the entire leadership of the DNC gets fired today, and they start over againwith some people who know how to choose a candidate and run an election. Hint: Gore, Kerry, Daschle, Lieberman, Dean, etc. are not going to win a national election. Neither is Hillary Clinton.
I look at Colorado, a solidly Republican state. 1994 - Open senate seat, Republicans run an undistinguished veteranarian, Wayne Allard, for the seat. Dems run a slick, well conected lawyer-lobbyist, Tom Strickland. Result? Strickland gets killed. 2000 - Allard runs again with a record of doing nothing in Congress. Who do the Dems run? Strickland, again. Result? Same. 2004 - Open Senate seat. Republicans run a political neophyte but well liked guy, Pete Coors. Democrats reluctantly run Ken Salazar, a dumpy, bald, rough guy with a long history of public service in all parts of the state. Result? While the state votes for Bush, they cross over and vote in Salazar by a healthy margin.
The DNC needs to throw away the textbook they have been using and write a new one. The people are not as stupid as they presume them to be.
Well, I think the Dems are in trouble for '08 because they really have nobody who can win, IMO (of course it is still early). In a weird way, if the Republicans had put up a candidate besides Bush they would have won by an even healthier margin. SHodan, Sam Stone, et al are correct about the idea that the Republicans are far more in line with the American Voter (I just completely disagree that Bush was worthy of being allocated four more years). Rudy Guiliani? John McCain? COlin Powell? The Republicans have “stars” who will be very appealing in '08.
There are silver linings to this cloud. Iraq will continue to go downhill for four more years and Bush will have to attempt to clean his own mess. Bush will have to institute the draft. The Republican party is going to have infighting between the Neocons and the more mainstream faction. Four more years of record deficits will drive interest rates up which will be directly attributable to Bush’s failed policies. And the Pubbies really have no nationally known and respected successor to Bush.
After watching this election, I’ve realized that the American South is a lot like Quebec, as least politically.
How so you ask? Well, every prime minister that’s been elected in Canada in the past 4 decades has come from Quebec. (With the exception of Joe Clark, who lasted about 10 minutes in office before blowing a non-confidence vote and forcing a national re-election.)
In much the same way, presidents in the U.S. have to play to whatever issue dominates the rural South, and that’s “morals”. Look at the results, and you can clearly see that people voting Republican have bought into the idea that the economy doesn’t matter, health care doesn’t matter, spending more money at the end of each month doesn’t matter (as long as taxes are less then they were two years ago and barely affordable mortgages are being paid for). As long as the candidate is a righteous, god-fearing man who has the image of putting Southerners first, he’ll win. Even if he’s a false prophet
Hilary hasn’t a chance in '08, because she’s now a noo yawk yankee. Looking at the field now, the only way the Dems can take the White House is with Edwards/Obama in '08.
The RNC will run some evangelical I haven’t heard of yet.
No, no one is happy to see the country harmed, but I think the country will have to respond to the costs of the Bush tax cuts and the war during the next four years. Most likely, this will require a tax increase of some sort. If Kerry had won, the Republicans would have said, “See, see! John Kerry is raising your taxes, while we cut taxes under George W. Bush.” This way, Bush will have to raise taxes, though I suspect he will try to pin it on Congress. But given he’s got control of both houses of Congress, even that’s difficult.
Hillary hasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell to win a Presidential election. If after this election anyone thinks she does, s/he is clearly deluding her/himself.
The only candidate the Dems can put up in 2008 who would have a real chance of winning would have to be a governor of a southern state. Ain’t got none, right?
Hilary hasn’t a chance in '08, because she’s now a noo yawk yankee. Looking at the field now, the only way the Dems can take the White House is with Edwards/Obama in '08.
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Or Bill Richardson/Obama. This is what I’d like the ticket to be in 4 years but YMMV. Hell, I’m not even American so my opinion is probably way off base with the US. Seems to be on everything else…
I got a shiny silver dollar that says at some point over the next four years he claims he inherited his problems from the previous president.
:rolleyes:
And I’ll second the notion that very few democrats are actually hoping for harm to come to our country. But when ills inevitably befall the US over the next 4 years, many of us will take some comfort knowing that it will be a lot harder to blame it all on the nefarious liberals.
In my wildest dreams, I hope that the greater media grows some balls and starts holding the administration responsible for their actions and not just as a sounding board for their fear and lies.
Dewey Finn, I deliberately didn’t state my own political preference in my first post in this thread. My view would have been exactly the same if it had been Republicans looking forward to Kerry going down in flames so they could say “I told you so”
But there are posts like:
BobLibDem, do you really believe that a worsening situation in Iraq, a draft and a rising deficit are a “silver lining”? Comments like that are the ultimate expression of the bitterness of the country, and the reason why I despair over it improving any time soon.
It’s one thing to win an election, it’s another to govern. Kerry would be damned if he did and damned if he didn’t, had he been elected.
WMD and all the rest doesn’t matter at this point - I hope that the GOPers on the board can concede that Iraq is a mess right now, I know the Demmies do. So what would Kerry have done? Withdraw all the forces? Hardly. Keep policing the country with even bigger loss of American troops. That’s not gonna endear him with the liberal voters. Ask the UN for help? That’d probably be it, but it’s indirectly admitting defeat.
And what about homeland security? Roll back all the changes that were made and dismantle the organization? Keep it rolling? Damned if you do, damned…
And all this with a hostile congress/senate.
He’d get four miserable years and become another presidential footnote, much like Carter was.
I checked out the exit polls on cnn to see how the votes were divided. I assume that both the RNC and DNC were polling before the election and it’s amazing that the DNC didn’t see this coming. Faith, morality and security won the election, mostly because Bush got to set the agenda. If anyone could’ve used an October surprise, it was Kerry.
Ron Susskind had a very interesting article about GWB a couple of weeks ago in NY Times Magazine. It’s not available online for free anymore, but some blogs have it. I’m sure it’s some kind of copyright infringement, so I won’t lnk to the article called “Without a doubt”. It’s very enlightning, however and very well worth reading. There’s a passage towards the end, which should have woken up the democrats:
Preach it, brother. The DNC needs to get their heads out of their collective asses and learn how to run a campaign. Maybe in 4 years they can create a reality show, “Election!” where 10 enthusiastic contestants vie for the position of head campaign manager. (They’d pick up the youth vote anyway.) And they could hardly do worse!
