I have a WONDERFUL idea for the 2006 and 2008 campaigns!!!

Everyday for 4 months, gather a decent sized group of Hawthorne Blvd radicals and Eugene anarchists around the bridges during rush hour with signs and rantings FOR the Republican congressional and presidential candidates! Get them on the opposite side of where we are on some key ballot measures too!! The wild eyed, black clad, eyebrow pierced crowd scares the hell out of folks.

Just a thought.

This is really topical: is our commitment to free thinking a political suicide pact?

You might want to check out my site: VichyDems.

I'm not trying to blogwh**e, but the need for D party unity is the whole theme of that site.

On a different note: Jay Inslee from Washington gave a short but important speech today on the House floor that's of interest to Oregonians in particular but should get much wider play in general. Info here.

I've been told repeatedly that I'm with the "racists" on this one.

I kind of think you knew without having to be told.

here is the thing, republicans fight with each other all the time just like democrats, well not like democrats because they do it behind closed doors and there is a winner and loser and the loser doesn't go out in public after they lost the argument and act like a week suck loser becasue they where either eaten alive already by the winners, or know they will be eaten alive if they open their winey mouths. we as democrats have too much respect for process and correctness and not enough respeect for victory. to be fair the republicans have the opposite problem they have to much respect for victory and not enough respect for anything else which is why they are now in the can and or about to be electoral losers. I do believe that while we can't allow our selves to go down the dark road of tom Delay we must find the happy medium where victory in conflict is RESPECTED and process and correctness survives.

One of the virtues of the American liberal is our individual capacity for making up our own damn minds. We think through the issues critically, unlike many of our redder fellow citizens. We can use sounder judgment, and be surer of our decisions, than the dittoheads who vote Republican, even when they know it is against their own interests.

You've got to be kidding? You really believe this? Or are you just trying to stimulate discussion? You don't think every Democrat blindly follows the union line, standing by quietly while unions promote based on senority instead of merit? Or how about the abortion lobby? When was the last pro-life Democrat elected in Oregon? Got to hand it to Teddy K...he has had the guts to actually stand up to the union muscle...one of the few times I've ever seen Democrats not fall right in line with the union.

You're dreaming if you think Democrats are any more independent thinking than Republicans. Both toe the party line...and I don't see any evidence that the D's think more critically than the R's do.

I don't think Democrats will ever make it back to the majority by claiming they are what their opponents aren't when it is quite clear that both parties are two peas in the same pod - captive to special interests and pretty unwilling to stand on integrity when the situation calls for it.

I believe that Democrats will be elected when they stop trying to counter the right-running Republicans by running more to the left. Those of us in the center are less likely, not more likely to vote for you, when your run further left. You can cater to your base all you want, but until you realize that your base won't elect you alone, you'll stay on the outside looking in. I'm sure you won't want to admit this, but the Republicans are in power because they are making a better stake on the center than the Democrats. Clinton got elected because he was able to do this quite well...staking out the middle. Gore almost did it as well...but that's another strange story. Kerry ran the other direction and predictably lost.

As an independent, I found your column quite amusing! Thanks!

"You're dreaming if you think Democrats are any more independent thinking than Republicans. Both toe the party line...and I don't see any evidence that the D's think more critically than the R's do."

[In keeping with the theme of the article:] Ditto.

interesting post with some great comments. i hope the far left will hold its attack dogs on those of us who are left of center but not ready to disown our parents as too bourgeois. i also hope they won't say, as they did with kerry, LOOK AT ME HOLDING MY NOSE AND VOTING FOR THIS LOSER!

because that didn't work very well. also, stupid iraq vote aside, john kerry is a very decent man.

A Republican Clinton would be unbeatable. The right’s self-fulfilling prophecies are for victory; ours, however, are for defeat.

Nonsense. There have been more "Republican Clintons" than Democratic ones. Remember the famous Liddy Dole Campaign in 2000? Anyone?

First, thank you Andy N for stating the obvious. You even excerpted the right passage.

You want to stop losing elections? Try not beginning with the assumption that anyone who doesn't believe what you believe is either an idiot, or is unwilling or unable to think it through. Second, lose the conspiratorial thinking: the notion that they're being "tricked into voting against their interests." Having met these hypothetical people, where do you get off telling them what their best interest is? You might find they disagree with you.

This post was basically an exercise in talking down to the voting public, something that every "wing-nut" outfit tells the country liberals are doing every day. Do conservatives talk down to the public? I'd argue they do, most political speech does this. But there's a crucial absence here: conservatives always appeal to the generic voter, usually inviting him or her as a "real American" to join against the "liberal elites" and take back the country. Sure, this is Blue Oregon and it's supposed to be something of a "water cooler" where people can chuck out these kinds of red-meat rants. There's a place for that. But the self-congratulatory thinking here - "that only liberals think" - that's just comically arrogant.

Kerry lost because Kerry sucked. Outside the first and second debate, he lead with his considerable chin and was duly nailed for doing so. If you keep putting up people who can't articulate a message, no amount of "dittoing" will pull their asses out of the fire.

Jeff Bull says: Having met these hypothetical people, where do you get off telling them what their best interest is? You might find they disagree with you.

I look at 1) poor Republicna voters and 2) a wealthy Republican party that hates the poor. The best interests of the poor are not tax cuts for the wealthy and higher health care premiums, yet they vote for that anyway.

Then you say this, as if its my fault:

If you keep putting up people who can't articulate a message, no amount of "dittoing" will pull their asses out of the fire.

The point to this post is that very paradox: our candidates are always trying to champion every message, and they end up articulating none.

If liberals were dittoheads, we might not have this problem. Instead, we bicker amongst ourselves in the most vitriolic way, even when someone simply asks why it is that we bicker.

Great post Jeff,

Kerry lost a lot of votes when he 1) called his secret service agent an "SOB" when they collided on the ski-slopes, 2) said he voted for something before he voted against it, and 3) claimed he didn't drive an SUV as he railed against them...only to have it pointed out that there was one in his driveway...which he said belonged to his wife. I raise these points because they illustrate how politicians (yes, the Republicans do it too) talk as if they are so much superior to their opponents, in an elitist, arrogant way. To argue that the other side just doesn't think is elitist and arrogant on its face. The fact is, everyone has different values, and one of the things that bothers me the most is when Democrats claim how "tolerant" they are, while being intolerant of what other people think and beleive. Of course, the Republicans do this too, but to a lesser degree.

One of the things that frustrates me about the political process is how the Democrats and Republicans try to demonize their opponents...the R's did it to Kerry and the D's did it to Alito.

You're right Jeff, it is comically arrogant to assume superiority over your opponents. If the blue-types would try to argue policy instead of personality, I think they'd get farther.

Caelan,

Not to overly negative... prefer to call it more pragmatic, but most Americans can't think politically for themselves. Liberals and Progressives might, on average, think more critically then Conservativ dittoheads, but when it comes to winning elections critical thinking means very little. It is all about image and coming up with a narrow, well understood message that is simple enough for most drones to understand. You and I don't count... sorry.

Caelan, nice thought provoker. But I don't think it's true. McCain almost undid Bush in 2000. Rove and Ralph Reed had to hit the backwoods fundie phonetree and accuse him of miscegenation of the races, going nuts thanks to being tortured, treason in Vietnam and afterwards, his wife being a drug addict and you name it in S. Carolina to reverse McCain's momentum. Despite having been a Vet for Kerry I'm still amazed that Kerry didn't set up a war room to answer the Rovian-blitz of slime that starts as soon as his guy isn't up by double digits.

Andy N. Thank you for the civility and reason of your comments. We don't often encounter that from most of your party -- anybody heard CNN's Beck saying Carter is "a waste of skin" or Mary Matalin saying "I think these civil rights leaders are nothing more than racists. And they're keeping ... their African-American brothers enslaved" or Rush saying whatever he said today and all of em applauding Cindy Sheehan's arrest for wearing a t-shirt.

At one time Eastern Oregon and most of "rural America" was solid Democrat country. Something has changed because that is no longer true. Baker County is 2:1 - Republican:Democrat. Yes, the Republican machine can be mean and they're good at getting out a message, but that's not the whole story. These folks are not voting against their "interests" out of some masochistic lunacy, the problem is that their interests go across more of a spectrum than tax breaks for the wealthy. They do have interests that don't cost the Republican elite a dime to support unlike realistic taxes . What economic interest is threatened by supporting the Second Amendment? It's easy to say, fairly easy to do, and free. Pick a few of your own after you stop to think about the issues that play. There's no reason the Democrats have to be Republican Lite to win, but some respect for those voters is essential. I live with these folks, they're not mean narrow minded rich bigots and they're Republicans, so something is amiss with any analysis that suggests it.

I'll use the 2nd A as an example only because it's the most egregious one. If you can be reasonably portrayed as an opponent of the 2nd A, what those voters hear is that you think that they are too stupid, reckless, careless, and criminal to have something like a gun. Maybe they're insulted, and maybe they find that frightening. Pick an issue of your own and put it to the insult test.

I keep making this argument and...oh well.

I'm taking this to the Democrats of the 2nd CD and we'll see if it makes any sense to them, if it does, I get to take it to all the 2nd CD voters.

Andy N.-

Are you serious? You recommend the Democrats continue the same pattern that's got them in the situation they are today: out of power in all three branches, and inefffective in promoting any policy change?

The centrist approach by the Democrats heralded by the DLC traded short-term results- Clinton's election victory in 1992- for long-term results, beginning with the 'Republican revolution' in 94 to the mess we have today, where your so-called 'moderate' voice gets lost admist the sqwaking.

Democrats need to stop portraying themsleves as the "we can be just as good with business as they can" party. In doing so, they have turned their back on their real base- the working class, rural voter that once made up the party of Roosevelt. As more working class voters become Republican, the more they question unions- which explains the decline in both union membership and the middle class's quality of life. The Democrats need to re-engage in discusing economic issues, embrace what conservative pundits dismiss as "class warfare", if that's what it takes to win.

Oh, and for the record, the Senate Democratic leader, Harry Reid, is anti-abortion. If you're interested in getting anti-abortion Democrats in power- which you aren't, because we know you're about as independnet as Karl Rove- why don't you contact Ward Ricker at the Oregon Democrats for Life chapter: oregon.democrats for life

I wrote a paper on Democratic strategy in 2008, specifically if the Republicans deserve a free pass on the issues of terrorism and homeland security. I don't believe they do, and here's a little bit about what I wrote. (The rest can be found at my blog):

The Democrats need to take the initiative to re-frame the issues of the war on terror and corruption. For example, the question should be asked why no one has been tried and charged for any terrorist attacks, specifically 9/11. Voters should be reminded that terrorists were tried and sentenced under Democrats for the 1993 World Trade Center bombings and the prospective Y2K attacks. A coordinated, pre-emptive approach between the United States and its allies to capture and prosecute terrorists will actually prevent terrorists from ‘attacking us on our soil’. Britain didn’t choose to invade a country to capture those responsible for its bombings, and thus saved billions of dollars and many lives of its young people. Can Democrats be trusted to fight a more effective war on terror, with qualitative results? Recent history shows that they did.

Democrats need to champion openness and transparency on the issue of corruption in Congress. If Democrats are committed to true campaign reform, even if they’re the minority party, voters will pay attention. Democrats should champion public records between lawmakers and lobbyists, free television airtime offered to candidates, and publicly financed elections. Tom DeLay has come out against publicly financed elections. Democrats should use quotes from the indicted former House leader to support the argument that Republicans cannot be trusted to take the lead in the fight against corruption in Congress.

Democrats need to make principled stands in this election. Their stances on issues got confused in the process of delivery to the voters during the 2004 elections. This portrayed an image that Democrats lacked coherence and credibility. When principles make up a candidate’s stance, and they refuse to go back on those principles, it makes it harder for their stance to get confused or diluted in the media machine. That said, I encourage the Democrats to avoid using members of their party, such as John Kerry and Hillary Clinton, who have taken numerous stances on issues to promote the party’s platform. Instead, focus on younger rising up-and-comers from within the party ranks: Barack Obama, for example, and Paul Hackett, the Senatorial candidate from Ohio.