No. The discussion is why should you listen to independants about the future of your party. I’ll tell you why: There are more independants than either republicans or democrats. We are the ones who tip the scales and win elections. Ignore us at your peril.
That “they” are on the fringe, now you question? You were only questioning Dean at first, so I figured you were conceding the others. Are you seriously going to argue that Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy and John Kerry aren’t on the left fringe of the American political spectrum? If so: Who is?
There doesn’t really need to be. The democrat party chose a chairman who is basically known for being a huge Bush basher who has great appeal to the lunatic fringe of the party and not the center. I’ve already admitted that, yes, his actual policy decisions from when Dean was a governor are hardly ultra-liberal. But, that was a long time ago in political terms. When he was chosen for the position that leads the direction of the party they knew what they were getting: a verbal molitov cocktail thrower who would fire up the party’s base and alienate the center. This is indicitive of how far outside the mainstream the whole party is that they actually think this guy would do more good than harm to the party.
Bullshit, yourself. Please show some quotes by Gingrich or Rove that are equivicable with the hate speak that Dean has thrown out there in the past year.
It certainly wasn’t done by the rest of your post there.
Do you really think the Democrats are closer to the center on national defense and public displays of religion? Please explain how they are. As for law and order, a reaction to liberal sentencing reforms instituted by liberal judges and racially based policing by Democratic mayors did serious damage to the Democratic Party, even leading to Republican gains in the cities. Such things would have been seen as unthinkable in the old machine politics days.
No, it isn’t any different.
If it makes you feel any better to say, “Republicans didnt actually win, they just got more votes”, fine, then Republicans didn’t win. Or, if you are saying, “I’d rather be right than President”, also fine by me. It is certainly likely that eventually, Democrats will regain the White House or control of one or both houses of Congress. But I rather think the “BushSux” campaign strategy will also not succeed terribly well in 2008.
If you are talking about me, that is not exactly what I have been talking about. What I have been talking about is that Republicans in the last couple of elections are a bit more in touch with what the majority of the electorate thinks. Not liberals. And this is what liberals on the SDMB seem to not be able to get.
That is what is astonishing. Not that I (or Bricker) picked the winner in the last election. That it was so clear, and so obvious, and so irrefutably true, and beyond any question whatsoever that Bush was the worst President evah. It had been proven, with absolute certainty, a thousand times over, that he was the weakest possible candidate, lacking any qualifications whatever. The war on terror was a complete, unmitigated disaster. The economy was in shambles. Bush’s positions were radically, horrifically out of sync with the American mainstream. There was simply no question about it. We shouted down everybody who disagreed, so it must be true.
And then he won.
And the nine months since have been a sustained effort by most of the Usual Suspects to try to find a way to deny this. It can’t be that the Democrats lost. It can’t. Therefore it must have been the Diebold machines, or election fraud, or, or, something.
It should have been a cakewalk, and it turned out to be a loss. Again. But you don’t think that shows any lack of insight by one side.
OK by me, as I have mentioned before. If you want to say, “Republicans didn’t win, they just control the White House and Congress”, I am willing to accept the loss.
And hope for an unbroken string of such losses for the next twenty years or so.
Regards,
Shodan
What a not-so-stunning complete misunderstanding of the point. I’m sure LHOD will be along shortly to clarify. I’ll just put it plainly. HE WAS SAYING YOU AREN’T “THE ARCHITECT.”
Headslap in five…four…three…
In my view, Pelosi, Dean, and Kennedy are guilty as charged. Kerry - not so much. While his record as a Senator certainly invites that view, I’d say it also shows a march rightward, with - unsurprisingly - a sharp spike in progress as the Presidential election rolled on. But as a candidate, Senator Kerry was reasonably main-stream and centrist, and I don’t think he qualifies as “left fringe.”
The more content-free, eloquent BS elucidator spouts, the less point he has. That’s a tip, kids. Write it down.
It doesn’t do you any good to try to deconstruct “religion in the public sphere” and point out the flaws of implementation if the goal is to show how the Democrats are closer to the public mainstream on the issue. The points you raise are certainly useful to determine if the policy is wise, or practical, or workable. It means little in a discussion that’s simply asking what the general public’s view is in relation to the platform of a particular party.
So, too, with national defense, although this is a closer question, because I think the Democrats’ actual views are closer to the mainstream than the public’s perception of their actual views. In other words, the Republicans have done an effective job in painting the Democrats as weak on national defense by exaggerating that weakness. Here, you can at least argue that what Joe Average thinks the Democrats stand for is not what they actually stand for.
He did try hard to hide his liberal nature when running. He didn’t do a very good job of it, though. I thought it was very clear that he was a liberal in moderates clothing.
This is an interesting point, actually. When Kerry was running there clearly was an effort to appeal to the middle and tone down an obviously liberal candidate. (I’m saying liberal based on his voting record. He was the single most liberal senator in the US, remember?) His handlers had him out there hunting geese, even!
However, since the elections, the Democrats seem to have given up on even trying to fool the voters into thinking they are moderates. You see it all the time in mesg boards such as the SDMB “We need to stop being republican lite and actually stand for something! Yaaaarh!” The selection of Dean for DNC chairman and Pelosi as minority leader seems to be the party at large going with this attitude.
A good example of somebody not drinking the cool aid is Hillary Clinton. Although I do think she is a big government liberal at heart, she seems able of grasping the concept of appealing to the middle at least in appearances to gain popularity. However, right now she seems to be the exception rather than the rule.
I’m reasonably convinced that the results of the election were not due so much to the issues, as to the success of the Republican Party in instilling memes such as this in the electorate. Kerry has always been a hunter.
I’ve always been a hunter, and I found Kerrys attempts at portraying himself as a hunter silly. He had some quotes out there about deer hunting that were laughable. It was clear from hearing him talk about the subject that he didn’t know the first thing about it. Further, Kerry actually voted to pass many anti-gun laws.
It was a good thing, though to see candidates from both sides of the aisle kissing ass of hunters, even if one of them didn’t mean it. It’s good to know that even if an anti-gun politician is elected he will at least have to go back on his word to pass laws against guns and hunting when in office. It’s nice to see gun owners and sportsmen getting the respect they deserve from all candidates during an election.
I fail to see why see why someone can’t be pro-hunting and also support laws controlling military weapons that are useless in hunting game.
Well, I wasn’t really conceding them, but I singled out Dean because I knew his position offhand on various issues and they weren’t particularly liberal. I am much less familiar with the other three’s position (yes, even Kerry’s, part of the reason he failed in his bid - nobody knew what the hell his position on stuff was).
But, yes, please show me specific policies that show the other three are on “the fringe.” You made the claim, you back it up. And a few verbal jabs don’t count as policies.
In other words, you concede that you can’t name a single policy or position that he has advocated that is on “the fringe.”
From Gingrich:
“The Democrats in the Capitol building get up every morning knowing that to survive they need to do only two things: they lie regularly and they cheat.”
From Rove:
“Al Jazeera now broadcasts to the region the words of Senator Durbin, certainly putting America’s men and women in uniform in greater danger. No more needs to be said about the motives of liberals.”
I’m not claiming to be the architect, shit-for-brains, I am claiming to be a Republican. You know, a member of the party who won the election. Also a Doper who has pointed out in the past that the SDMB is often no more than an echo chamber for the extreme Left.
I am also claiming to be one of those who snickers under his breath when some clueless dolt demonstrates his “insight” by predicting a big win for Kerry.
Sitck your head slap up your ass.
What are you referring to? Kerry has voted for many gun bans that were not “military weapons”, whatever that means.
Cite?
Oh, I understand now. The pattern is:
Someone: Shodan, you’re wrong in some way.
Shodan: <giving some reasons, but missing the point> No, not really.
Someone: Yes, look at this.
Shodan: Fuck you! <no more reasons>.
OK. Good luck with that.
I’ll get back to this with cites in a minute.
No. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I’ve clearly stated why the selection of Dean as DNC chairman is indicative of the party moving in a loony leftward direction. You can agree or disagree, but please don’t pretend that I haven’t made a solid case. This much is clear to any reasonable person. It’ll be more clear to you when Dean’s insane rhetoric costs you votes in the next election.
Great. You found one quote. Do you have a cite for this? When did he say this? Was it when he was a leader of the party or later when he simply works for Fox News? Did he say this in a prepared speech or did he simply say it off the cuff in a conversation?
This is a more recent quote. Rove has an excellent point here. This quote is quite true. I don’t read him to be talking about all liberals, but liberals like Durbin who make statements that can be used by our enemies against us.
Don’t forget what remarks of Durbin Rove was talking about. Durbin compared American actions at Gitmo to Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot. Rove’s response to this is hardly one hundreth as offensive as the original statement by Durbin.
In any case, a couple of quotes by a couple of Rebublicans certainly do not put them on the same level as someone like Dean who has made a point of bashing Bush and republicans at every speech he does.
(Mods: I’ve reproduced just about the whole page here, but the copyright at the bottom says that I’m allowed to.)
Oh, and answer my question: What are you referring to?
Look, dummy. LHOD was never contending that Republicans did not win the election. His point, you stupid stupid motherfucker, was that Joe Republican can make no claim to speak as an expert at how to win elections merely because they voted for the team that won the election.
Go ahead and compound your foolishness by missing the point yet again. YOU ARE NOT THE ARCHITECT. YOU ARE MERELY A VOTER. You have no special insight into how to win elections because you voted for a winner.
Now, you may not be the Architect, but you do seem very much like a turd blossom. Without the blossom, of course.
Under your breath? Don’t be a pussy; just come out and do it outright.
Gee, did I turn out to be wrong? Wow, I guess I should acknowledge that somewhere.
:smack:
cite:
Based on his position on issues Kerry is the most liberal member of the Senate, and Kennedy is not far behind.
Clearly Nancy Pelosi is on the fringe left. This is the woman who was chosen to lead the party as minority leader.
It’s rather silly to even deny that these people are far to the left of the mainstream. It’s widely accepted as the truth for good reason. It really just betrays your own bias if you cannot see it.