On a factual level, your argument is lacking because while the result of the 2000 election was 50-50, the distribution of the vote was not random. The concentration of Democratic votes on the coasts demonstrates that the populace wasn’t voting at random.
On a theoretical level, what makes you think that an election with something actually at stake could not be as close as 50-50? If anything, I would think that an election with something at stake would be a closely fought one.
Sua
Thanks, Giraffe.
I wouldn’t take it that far, but it appears that way, because of the way they’ll pick up and drop issues according to the straws in the wind. From Harris Wofford’s win in PA (1990?) to the 1994 debacle, the Dems were riding universal health care. Since 1994, they’ve all but dropped it. Through the mid-1990s, they advocated a series of modest gun control laws, then shut up about that real fast when the 2000 results said it might be hurting them. And so forth.
I think that’s a side-effect of not knowing what their core principles are - if you don’t know what you stand for, you don’t know where to stand your ground.
I think part of it here is that the GOP simply has a much better network for turning petty scandals into major issues than the Dems do. But discussing the ins and outs of that would be another thread of its own.
They’ve criticized him. What they have too often failed to do is present their alternative vision to the American people. For instance, the Dems have criticized Bush’s tax cut, but (with a very few exceptions) they won’t go so far as to say the remaining cuts shouldn’t be allowed to take effect.
As well they should. The battle for universal health care is over; we lost. But health care itself is still a damned good issue for the Democrats, and all they’ve managed to do with it is babble incomprehensibly about “prescription drugs.” The party needs to identify what’s wrong with the current system (hint–everyone hates their HMO) and take a stand on what needs to be done. They absolutely cannot sit back while the Republicans control the agenda for the next two years and just respond to whatever they come up with. Seize some damn initiative, guys!
The tax cut is an example of one of the few issues on which the Democrats have said anything at all critical, but even this was timid and wishy-washy criticism at best. In most areas, during the election itself they stated little or no dissatisfaction with the administration, not even in those areas where the majority of public opinion has been against the administration (e.g. unilateral action against Iraq and the handling of the economy). Granted, this is part of not having any clear core principles to rally around, but it’s also unjustifiable passivity.
Voters already have candidates for congress who agree with everything the president does. They’re called Republicans. If you’re too afraid to take a stand on anything, you don’t belong in politics.
I don’t know who you were talking to about what, but I’ve responded to you in the appropriate forum. I’ll have nothing further to say to you in this thread; here, I’ll stick to responding to posts that are actually on topic.
I’m not so sure about that. Can you imagine a Dem commercial starting with a clip from those “Harry and Louise” commercials from 1994, where they talk about all the bad stuff that’ll happen under Clinton’s universal health care proposal? Then the voice-over: “As you know, the Republicans and the HMOs defeated national health care in 1994, and all that happened anyway. Shouldn’t we at least have gotten universal health care? We still can.” As I understand it, repealing the tax cuts that haven’t yet taken effect would be just about right. But the Dems would have to have some courage…which was where we started, of course.
Can’t argue with that.
Ay-fuckin’-men.
And amen to that, too.
I wasn’t surprised, when I opened up this morning’s paper, to find that E.J. Dionne, Jr. is on the same page:
Preach it, brother.
At an earlier point in this thread, we were talking about the Democratic stance on the military, war, and Iraq.
As some of you know, I consider the Washington Monthly to be the required reading for non-PC lefty political junkies. The current issue has several examples of why, some of which relate to the above issues.
A former speechwriter for Madeline Albright has a sobering and eye-opening piece on the Democratic establishment’s underlying lack of knowledge - and interest - in defense issues.
And Ken Pollack was Clinton’s NSC director for Persian Gulf affairs from 1999 to 2001. He’s written a book, The Threatening Storm, on why we really may find ourselves having to invade Iraq. While it comes down to nukes, he doesn’t exactly get there by anyone’s knee-jerk path. The review of his book in this month’s Washington Monthly gives a cogent summary of his case.
Those pieces are both worth a good read. And I highly recommend subscribing to the magazine. They’re as willing to skewer liberal sacred cows as conservative ones, and they’ve been doing both for threee decades.
I agree that the Democratic congressional leadership has no chance. Gore may look OK compared to them, but that doesn’t mean much. So here’s my prediction: The 2004 Democratic candidate will be a sitting governor. To find out who has a shot, make a list of all D governors, and start throwing out obvious losers like Gray Davis. Even if you’ve never heard of the people left on the list, any one of them could be our next president. Clinton was a complete unknown outside of Arkansas in 1991.
I think the Democrats are going to start grooming one of these people right away, copying the Republican strategy of annointing Bush Jr. early, making him/her the front runner and the national face of the Democratic party. Or perhaps more accurately one of these governors is going to seize that position. Gore will only run if there is a vacuum in the leadership. And this 2002 election is going to shake things up in the Democratic party. I can’t imagine the Democrats letting things coast until 2004. Gore will be the nominee only if the Democrats continue to implode. And I think they have too many smarts to let that happen.
Pitching health care reform as “universal health care” simply falls into Republican hands, enabling them to play on the same “Government bureaucrats controlling your doctor!” scare tactics that killed it in 1993 and would kill it again today. Besides, not even Hillary’s mess of a proposal actually provided for universal health care. It would have let plenty of people slip through the cracks. Nope, what they need to do is identify the biggest problems with the current system (second hint–nobody likes their insurance companies) then become strong advocates for fixing them.
But dammit, they need to do something coherent. Give the candidates a message they can take to the voters, not just a bunch of amorphous, wishy-washy nonsense. :mad:
I’ll try to get to your defense links later.
Lemur, I would not count Gore out yet. If he actually commits himself to running an aggressive, populist campaign instead of playing not to lose, he could be a formidable 2004 candidate. He gave a pair of speeches–one on domestic policy, one on foreign policy (including the same criticism I’ve been making about Bush re: Tora Bora)–a couple months ago, and they were direct, confrontational, and well-received. He’s also untouched by the failings of the Democratic leadership over the last two years. I’m not committed to the guy, but he’s definitely not to be counted out.
In general I am very surprised the Dems haven’t been able to stitch together a coherent economic populist platform when the general situation seems to cry for it, You have:
1)a poor economy and stockmarket
2)a vanished surplus
3) many business scandals
4) A President and VP with CEO backgrounds and shady-looking business histories.
All this in the background of a massive tax cut ,titled towards the rich, which was supposed to stimulate the economy.
The Dems should have been able to tie this together and appeal to the sense of economic anxiety among the electorate. They appeared to be trying to do this at the time of the Enron scandal and then inexplicably they gave up. My guess is that the immediate poll numbers suggested that the corporate scandal issue wasn’t that hot. But this is where you have to take a risk and believe that the underlying potential of the message is there and that if you repeat it eloquently for long enough it will make an impact. As mentioned here the Dems don’t seem that kind of political stamina and just flit from one message to another according to the latest poll.
The other thing that the Dems don’t seem to be good at doing is framing the debate. The perfect example is tax cuts. The GOP frames the issues as tax cut or no tax cut. Either the government keeps the money or the “people” get it back. The Dems should counter by changing the debate to who gets the tax cut. The fact is that the Bush cut (income and estate tax) would give 40% to the top 1%. In fact the Dems could easily have constructed a bigger tax cut for 99% of voters by sharply reducing what the top 1% got. Then they should have put the GOP on the defensive and got them to explain why they put such a big priority on giving the super-rich a big cut.
Again the Dems did talk about the distribution of the tax for a while last summer. Then they gave up. They should have hammered the message again and again for a year and a half especially in conjunction with their attacks on corporate scandals.
The more I think about it the more I am amazed at the incompetence and timidity of the Democrats. They really deserved what they got.
Thanks for the cite. The second link in my post links to a rather more bizarre version of the same story; hence the tongue-in-cheek comment about him having CIA connections.
I suspect Bob is probably enjoying the quiet life outside politics anyhow, and if so, more power to him.
Those who believe in the viability of universal healthcare as a campaign issue would do well to look at the fate of Measure 23 in Oregan. Promised universal healthcare, and got crushed at the polls (less than 25% support, IIRC) two days ago.
This does not mean that the idea will not pick up mass support at some point. But it does suggest that that point is not now.
YES!!! It’s like they’re afraid of the right wing’s boogeyman of “class warfare.” It’s time to take a little class warfare and shove it right down their throats.
You want a tax cut, Pubbies? Fine, here’s your tax cut: Cut the marginal rate on the first tax bracket in half, from 15% to 7.5%. It is absolutely disgraceful that the Bush tax cut didn’t reduce taxes on the lowest incomes even one tiny bit. Then cut the second marginal rate from this year’s 27% to 22%. All the others stay the same. End result is that the working poor and middle class get a very hefty tax break, not just the insignificant bullshit Republicans have been selling them for decades. “Oooh, a $300 check! Thanks, President Bush!” :rolleyes: Meanwhile, the marginal tax rates on the higher income brackets (mine included, incidentally) stay exactly the same. Hell, maybe we’ll even raise 'em a couple points on marginal income over a million dollars a year, just on principle.
Not in my state (MN). Second highest turnout in state history, and we elected a Republican governor, Senator, and new Representative.
And RTFirefly, I have responded to your Pit post as best I can.
Regards,
Shodan
I think everyone completely misinterprets “Universal Health Care.”
The fact is, UHC as a concept does have a great deal of support. The problem is trying to actually come up with an actual implementation and detailed plan of UHC rather than “we should all have free health care” that things go awry.
As a metaphor- or possibly simile, as I can never keep the two straight- Football has massive support among Americans. This does not mean that a plurality of Americans, or even football fans, would be happy with the Dallas Cowboys winning the Super Bowl.
Blasphemer!
Ah, but I guarantee I’ve won over RT with that argument.
I should’ve split the difference and gone with a moderate and bland choice like the Chargers, but figured I should actually make a strong stand in the hopes of energizing my base.
All your base are energized!! 
minty green:
That again? minty, in the “Predictions” thread, I showed you two cites that prove that over 75% of Americans are satisfied with their private health-care plans.
If your refusal to believe this is representative of Democrat thinking, it’ll be a long time before they and a majority of Amricans coincide on issues in a meaningful way.