Depends on how you mean that. You can’t have it both ways here. Either the Senate and Congress were lied too…in which case the REPUBLICAN Senators and Congresscritters were ALSO lied too, or only the Republican Senators and Congresscritters were in on the big secret…and magically (in Washington) managed to hold onto this secret without leaks. Well, the other alternative is that while the data was over blown and exaggerated the Senate and Congress (folks on both sides of the isle) essentially looked at the same data and drew the same (wrong) conclusions. I go with option C, but YMMV. The point being its NOT (substantially) truth…so you are playing to the ignorance and anger of your potental voters.
Hell, I AGREE with you that it might work BG.
John Mace pretty much took on the substance of these. I’ll just give my over all big picture take. Ok, so you are bitching about a lot of things that the Republic have (supposedly) done wrong. Fair enough. But bitching about what they have done wrong doesn’t tell me what YOU would do that would be better…it doesn’t tell me anything at all in fact.
Thats why (IMHO) attempting to run a negative attack type race (Republicans are EVIL! We aint Republicans! Vote for usun!) won’t work. Bad as the other party may be, you haven’t exactly told us you would be any better. And from what I’ve seen in the last few years I have my doubts that replacing Republicans with Democrats would make much difference at all.
That said the best I myself can hope for is that the Dems regain control of either the House or Senate (or both) and so dead lock the government. Sure, nothing will get done, but hell…maybe thats for the best all things considered.
Admittedly I don’t share your political views, but I don’t understand how you can hold this view. A Democratic administration hasn’t been so corrupt, certainly since Calvin Coolidge, and arguably in the history of the country. How low do the Republicans have to go before you throw them out just on the principle that if you don’t, there will be no limit to their corruption?
Do you disagree that the war in Iraq is evidence of this corruption? Do you disagree that the FEMA catastrophy is evidence of this corruption? Do you disagree that the wire tapping and Gitmo are evidence of this corruption? We’re talking about the foundations of our country here: life, liberty, freedom. This is something bigger than Democrats and Republicans. How much corruption can you tolerate before you start to doubt that electing another of Carl Rove’s people is a good idea?
Again, how far does the name “Republican” go to excuse rampant corruption? 12 years? 16 years?
I’ve said before, and I’ll keep saying: the Democrats need a two-pronged approach. On the one hand, yeah: it’s important to keep this Administration’s ineptitude and corruption and disregard either for truth or for law in the forefront.
On the other hand, as John et al point out, it’s important for Democrats to offer an alternative. This is actually a great opportunity to offer a strongly liberal alternative: as near as I can tell, people are fed up with the current corruption and will jump at the chance to vote for something else, even if the something else is a little more liberal than what they’re accustomed to.
So have a real program:
-Sunshine provisions on lawmaking. We won’t repeat the Cheney Energy Commission nonsense.
-Tightened ethics standards for Washington. Yeah, this happens every decade or so, and things stay corrupt: but it’s still gotta happen, and now’s the time. Put forth some guidelines with real teeth, guidelines that’ll scare away the lobbyists and bribesters and other hooligans for at least six months.
-Education. Get serious about No Child Left Behind with a program to professionalize education in our country. Remember those jobs going to India? We’re going to look at the best educational practices in India, Japan, and other model systems, figure out which ones can work in the United States, and overhaul the system so that our schools become the best in the world. This could actually be the centerpiece of a pretty interesting campaign.
-Health Care. Although every state has some system or another that allows for children to be insured, those systems are underused and confusing. We’re going to make it simple: until you’re eighteen, your social security card is sufficient to get you treatment, without pay. This is a proposal that businesses can get behind, considering the huge costs of providing health care.
-Make the world responsible. Going into war almost unilaterally means that we don’t have enough money for our schools and for other vital domestic programs. We’re going to make the international community pay for peacekeeping: no more shouldering the lion’s share of the responsibility for dealing with rogue states. If others are worried about rogue states, let them pay the costs in money and in blood: w e’re not going to be doing that by ourselves any more.
Stuff like that. Make it visionary, make it liberal, and pound away at a couple of points of what you’re going to do, all the while that you remind people of the current incompetence and immorality of the folks in power.
Do you even know what my political views are…or are you making some assumptions?
Reguardless, you kind of said it here. Lets assume you are right and no Democrat administration has been so corrupt as the Bush administration is since Calvin Coolidge (its a debatable point obviously, but lets run with it, ehe?). Ok. But you see, the Bush administration isn’t RUNNING for re-election this year. In fact, not only can’t Bush run again in this universe but we aren’t even talking about PRESIDENTIAL elections at all. The races this year are for Congressional and Senatorial seats.
Now, obviously you want to lump every one who is a Republican into the same pot as Bush. Fair enough, you are entitled to your view. But…not everyone thinks this way. In fact, I’d say the majority of people here are more concerned with local issues effecting THEIR state than they are with the national issues. And I serious doubt whether many of the undecided fence sitters are going to say to themselves ‘We HATE Bush…lets vote out our Republican representitive!’. Only those folks who ALREADY aren’t likely to vote Republican are going to think along those lines.
Read what Left Hand of Dorkness is saying carefully in the post just before mine. He’s by no means a Bush supporter…about the furthest thing from it. He’s a staunch Democrat in fact. He’s basically saying (better than I) what I’m trying to get at…that the Dems can’t simply bash Bush (or even simply bash Republicans in general) without offering up some attractive alternative. Now, LHoD and I would probably disagree WHAT those attractive alternatives would be…but I think we would both agree that the Dems HAVE to offer up SOMETHING besides ‘Republican is bad! Vote for US instead since we aren’t Republicans!’.
Yes, I disagree that the war in Iraq is evidence of corruption…at least as you appearently mean it. Yes, I disagree that the FEMA ‘catastrophy’ is specific evidence of REPUBLICAN corruption, which is what you are driving at. I think its evidence of GOVERNMENT corruption and stupidity but thats another story. No, I don’t disagree that the wire tapping thing is evidence that the Bush administration is pretty much doing as it likes…though I’ve seen no real evidence presented in the various threads that its necessarily illegal. It IS disturbing though, even if its tapping of foreign conversations to folks here in the US.
The problem is what you see as rampant corruption by the dreaded Republicans I see as a deeper problem that transcendes Republican and Democrat lines. To ME there really isn’t much difference between Republicans and Democrats…except the Democrats message is so old and out dated that they currently have trouble getting elected to the Executive branch…as well as being the minority party in the House and Senate. Other than that they look remarkably similar to me…‘corruption’ and all.
Well, yes, they are both whores, I suppose. Still, I prefer the one without any weeping open sores. One party exploited the ghastly circumstances without so much as a hint of compunction, readily and handily slurring the patriotism of any dissenter. They burst into patriotic song at the drop of a hat while they followed The Man Who Fell Up straight into the festering Shit Swamp. What little sanity displayed at the time was shown by such as Sen. Paul Wellstone, and a meager handful of others. Democrats, if I recall correctly. Perhaps you can remind me of the list of Republicans who spoke out openly against the madness. Take your time. No hurry.
I find your moral and political equivalence too generous by half.
Does anyone but me remember the whole congressional authorization debate? What I remember is Democrats scrambling all over themselves to vote to authorize the war to “get it off the table” for the elections. They were convinced that the war was going to be a highly popular repeat of Gulf War I, and wanted to get on record as voting for the war as soon as possible so the republicans couldn’t use it as an election issue, they didn’t want to have to explain their vote against the war to an electorate savoring another resounding victory over Saddam.
Of course, now that the war is an unpopular debacle with no end in sight, I can see how Democrats are a bit steamed…after all, they only voted for the war out of political expediency, not because they actually wanted the damn war.
And add me to the list of people who think a strategy of “We don’t need a platform, we just have to not be Republicans” is going to work very well. And in the 2006 election you’re not running against George Bush, you’ll be running against some incumbent republican senator or representative. Anything in particular the Democrats want to do, other than vote against George Bush’s Supreme Court nominees?
:mad: I am NOT a staunch Democrat! I vote Democrat because they’re better than any realistic alternative, but I’m closer to a Scandinavian or South American leftist in my political leanings.
I don’t know that this is true: the Democrats have not really been on message since 1996, as far as I can tell. Even in this thread there are plenty of Democrats who are advising against having a positive message at all.
The campaign needs to say: The Republicans have screwed shit up. Here’s how we’re going to fix it.
There’s a good way for the campaign to be a referendum on Bush: make it clear that Bush has screwed up in all these ways in part because there’s been no check on his powers, and point out that the specific Republican Congressperson in question has voted alongside with party leadership in xx% of cases (and mention specific cases). Explain that with a check on the Executive, the Democrats can kee the worst of Bush’s excesses from occurring, and can start enacting legislation that will improve the country, that will replace the failed policies of a corrupt, incompetent administration.
You’re right, but I’m not so concerned about the Republican/Democrat divide as the Carl Rove supporter/resister divide. I’m sympathetic towards Republicans who distance themselves from the current administration.
That said, I was just about to include John McCain in that group when I came upon this news story, describing how McCain and the Bush administration have become closer due to mutual needs leading up to the 2008 election.
Good point.
Again, I agree with you, to a point. But the way I see it, the Republican party has a weed growing through its ranks – pretty much everyone that is connected to Carl Rove’s political machine. Sure, all politicians are corrupt, but not to the degree that the Bush administration and its supporters are corrupt. Can we at least agree on that point? It may be that there are a lot of Bush supporters in the Democratic party; I’m willing to admit that. But to me, what matters is whether the candidate supports the rampant corruption, or resists it. To me, that is the most important issue in a congressional election, and I don’t understand why it wouldn’t be for most Americans. I take your point that many people are more concerned with local politics than national politics. But I’d like to think that most people feel a patriotic commitment to the values of our country, and would feel a drive to rid it of the people who support the Bush administration, for that reason.
And if that means getting rid of some Democrats too, then I’m all for it.
BTW, guys, Silent Cal was a Republican. Maybe most corrupt since Grover Cleveland?
I agree that the Dems need a positive message also - but I don’t think it hurts to remind voters in each district how often their Republican congress critter voted with the President. Get all those handshake pictures out, since many Republicans are running away now.
For Iraq, it’s easy. Who cares what happened before the war started. Today we’re in a quagmire, the place is on the verge of civil war with us in the middle, the fool in charge is saying stay the course, and the majority is letting him do it.
For outsourcing, just say that they’re committed to keeping jobs in the US - and play the tapes of various administration people saying how good it is for the jobs to go to India. You can put the specifics of education and tax policy in the white papers where no one will read them.
They could say that they’ll appropriate money for armor for our troops, and run against Rummy. Nixon got big cheers by saying that if he was elected Ramsay Clark would no longer be AG - as if any democratic AG would stay. They might also say they’d turn back cuts in veterans benefits. They could say they’d stop selling out land to the very popular oil companies.
Krugman’s column yesterday makes me think they’re already starting to tie McCain to Bush - good move, and very true.
Excellent question. If they do, they need to do so with a plan, ideally a plan that has the support of several retired generals (Wesley Clark, I’m looking at you). If they don’t, they need to run on some sort of plan, and that plan needs to clarify how it is substantially different from the past few years. It won’t be enough to say, “We won’t give no-bid contracts to Halliburton!” or, “We’re going to work with the rest of the world!” It needs to explain how it’ll result in fewer American deaths, first and foremost, how it’ll wrap up our involvement son, and how it gives Iraq at least a chance of not descending further into bloody chaos as soon as we leave.
Personally, I think we should prepare to be in Iraq long-term. Treat it as an aircraft carrier in place. It’d be good for the US, on a logistical basis.
That said, I also think we shouldn’t leave. We had almost won in Vietnam when we left. (I think we were on the wrong side of the war, mind you, and were prosecuting it in a wrong manner.) The Tet was a crushing defeat for the North, and we could have rolled them up if we’d followed through properly.
I think that a firm presence in Iraq will, eventually, make a stronger and peaceful Middle East, if we have the strength of will, as a nation, to follow through on our responsibilities.
I’m not sure I agree with this position, but it’s certainly defensible. If the Dems adopt it, they need to be clear either:
a) that they agree with how the war has been conducted so far, and that they don’t fault Republicans for that; or
b) that our future presence in Iraq needs to look substantially different from our presence so far, and offer a plan for enacting changes.
If they don’t have a plan, Republicans will mock them for that lack of a plan, talk about how Democrats have no positive ideas. And voters will listen.
If they do have a plan, Republicans will mock the plan, deride it, talk about how it’ll ruin the country. Democrats can respond with, “Look, we know how bad your plan has been. This plan is going to be far better than the catastrophe that you guys have made.” I hope that voters will listen.
“The War in Iraq is a failure!” is not a campaign platform. “The War in Iraq is a failure, and here’s what I’m gonna do to fix it!” is a campaign platform.
If you don’t have a proposal to make the problem better (withdraw troops, send more troops, whatever), then how are you different than the other guy who doesn’t have any idea how to make the problem better?
We know the Republican answer…stay the course. If Democrats think staying the course is the wrong answer, then what’s their answer? You say they don’t need an answer? Does that mean they’re going to vote to stay the course too, just a bit less enthusiastically? Then why vote for them over a Republican? Just because Moe drove the bus into a ditch doesn’t mean you want to hand the wheel over to Curly.
Although you all have made some excellent points, I must disagree. We (Democrats) don’t need a national plan for Iraq because this is not a national election. Nominate someone in 2008, and things change. This is 2006, and the Dems need to do whatever it takes to win. If your state or district is anti-war, then trumpet your opposition to it. If you had voted for that pesky war resolution, tell them you took Bush at his word and that you were voting for peace.
Play that snippet of Bush ad nauseum over the summer if that’s what it takes to neutralize your vote for the resolution. If the war is popular in your district and you voted for the resolution, trumpet that. We don’t need a national Democratic policy. For those voters for whom Iraq is the number one issue- they’re going to vote you in or out based on Bush’s policies no matter what you say on the matter.
There are too many other targets to let Iraq break your campaign, if you’re a Democrat. Play up to the rising price of gasoline and the ungodly profits of the oil industry. Point out that Bush’s “energy plans” are always tax breaks for these companies. Point out the incredibly impotent response to Hurricane Katrina. Point out the indictments of everyone from Delay to Scooter Libby. Talk about the cuts Bush has made to the college grants and loans for middle income students. If the voters are angry enough about Iraq to vote you in just for that, fine. But there is no need to take a position on it that would cost you votes.
Agreed that an alternative plan would be a plus, but not necessarily a requirement. To complete your analogy – if Moe is a blithering incompetent, he needs to be fired. It doesn’t matter who his replacement is.
