Centerfield

Krugman's another feminist hellcat. He doesn't get it. We'll win by insisting louder on the losing story we've been sticking with.

Wrong. You'll win by finding out who the people are that used to vote democratic and now vote republican, and finding why they left. And fighting very hard to win them back.

It's comical to me that Krugman voices concern about the party not shifting in such a way as to lose its base, but he doesn't worry about the part of the base that has already left, aand has caused democrats to lose.

It's even more comical that he tries to cast someone who got 51% of the vote as a radical. Tully's right, the clue phone is ringing, and nobody's home!

All of these writers and DNC spokes people seem to think the Democratic base is still intact. It's obvious to me that it's not. I suggest they change the narrative.

And it's that insistent inability to consider why they lost that will keep them in the minority for the foreseeable future. I've been watching the reactions around the web and while initially, it seemed that the Democrats would look inwardly for what went wrong, the tinfoil hat crowd like Krugman and Drum seem to becoming the dominant force now.

Face it, Bush was a weak candidate with a troubled economy and a war that may not be going the way we'd like it to and he still won by a large margin. If I were playing a game with someone who I knew was weaker than I and I lost that game, the only place I could look was at myself. Why can't the Democrats do the same thing?

Scotch Drinker expresses my feelings exactly. Of course, you could say that this form of self deception is characteristic of the left ;). Throughout this campaign, the left demonized my moderate views by association. NOW their surpised I didn't vote for their canadidate?

Well, people who leave aren't part of their base, are they? I wonder what's going to happen if they really run with the "Gays cost us the election" meme... When Diane Feinstein says that publically, there's a problem in the ranks. I was shocked to read that Clinton had counselled Kerry to back the local anti-gay marriage amendments, and I wonder what that's going to do to his (and Hillary's) political capital with the gay activists. To some of my friends, this elections was as much about queerness as Iraq...

Gosh, Joshua, I hadn't heard some of the things you just wrote before now. It sounds like the short sighted Democratic leaders are trying to move to the right. They're running out giving mixed messages and trashing each other in their normal, disjointed manner.

I didn't think this election was about sexual orientation. But, it sure is shaping up to look that way.

The people I was referring to are the Democratic base, Joshua. Democrats can't regain power without them. That's why I talked about changing the topic as opposed to dumping on a particular segment of the population.

Divide and conquer works every time.

"Never forget and never learn." That seems to be the motto of the Democratic left.

I do think this election was, to a significant degree, about gay marriage. I think it was an underlying theme even though the Dems certainly tried to run away from gay marriage. But, let's face it; people who believe in gay marriage are clearly in the minority in this country. It's not just the yahoo religious fundamentalists that oppose this, its the broad middle as well. That disturbs me, but it is the truth.

That raises the question of whether the Democrats should try to advance this issue (which was really thrust on them by the Massachusetts Supreme Court) or recognize political reality. During the early civil rights era of the 50s and early 60s, the Democratic Party was not a force in general for advancing the civil rights agenda (although a weak civil rights law was passed when LBJ was Majority Leader). This stance showed little political courage, but in the long run, it allowed the party to its base until general public opinion was more accepting. But the Party never ran (other than the Southern wing) explicitly against civil rights.

I think gay marriage is a difficult issue. What you are really considering is not whether homosexual relationships are legal (most people other than Rick Santorum are, I think, willing to allow what goes on in people's bedrooms to stay there). The issue is whether gay couples would be eligible for the financial and legal entitlements conferred by the state on legal marriages. I think there are two dimensions here, a moral/policy one and a legal one. As a policy issue, I see no reason to distinguish between gay couples that want to be married and heterosexual couples. But I think the legal/constitutional issues are different. The state clearly has the right to determine who is entitled to benefits conferred by virtue of marriage. No one argues, for example, that roommates sharing a house or cohabiting heterosexual couples are entitled to marriage benefits. In my opinion (and I am not a constitutional expert), it does not deny equal protection for the state to decide that certain kinds or relationships are considered marriages for purposes of benefits so long as the distinction does not disadvantage people in similar situations (e.g., providing benefits to white couples but not to blacks). If this were the case, it would be effectively impossible to maintain any kind of definitional distinction among couples. The distinction does not prevent gay couples from having relationships (as did the southern prohibitions against miscegenation); it simply says that we will not confer specific benefits on these relationships. In this sense, I agree (legally if not morally)with some black groups who say that gay marriage is not a civil rights issue.

AGAIN, LET ME REITERATE THAT, FROM A POLICY STANDPOINT, I SEE NO REASON TO NOT PERMIT GAY MARRIAGE. However, it seems to me that this distinction (which the Democrats implied but did not really talk about during the campaign) might be a way for the Democrats to appeal to Middle America (they are never going to get the hard core fundamentalists that oppose homosexual relationships). I don't know. This does risk alienating important groups in the party, but unless we find some way to appeal to, what seems to be the majority position, we are going to be relegated to nothing but an opposition party. Just a thought anyway.

Was anyone asking the Democrats to surrender? Krugman still doesn't get it. It's not about "pandering" to the religious right. I wouldn't expect the Democrats (or the Republicans for that matter) to abandon "gays issues" to improve election results. I would expect a reasoned dialogue (as opposed to the knee jerk response of "there just religious bigots").

When you only have knee jerk response, the Church goers in the middle (who may in fact not agree with the hard right stances) will left to search for the candidate/party that they feel more at home at. And if that party/candidate speaks of prayer, faith and God they may get the attention of the Church-going middle. On the other hand if they're compared to the Islam fundamentalist terrorist they may shy away from that person.

Along these lines, I just read an article at Slate. The author blames this election on the ignorance of the people in the red states.This condescending attitude is the problem on the left. I realize that sometimes one can see things so clearly that aggrevation sets in when others don't see it the same way. However, persuasion, not derision, will be the key to success. Red State voters could just as easily point out that districts with the lowest performing schools in the country went for Kerry. SO WHAT? People beliebe what they believe. To expect them to come to same conclusions based on completely different experiences is absurd.
As I have written here before: If you want more people in your tent, build a bigger tent. And maybe serve up some southern fried chicken!

Face it, Bush was a weak candidate with a troubled economy and a war that may not be going the way we'd like it to and he still won by a large margin. If I were playing a game with someone who I knew was weaker than I and I lost that game, the only place I could look was at myself. Why can't the Democrats do the same thing?

I'll take the exact opposite position to Mr. Drinker. Bush had all the advantages of incumbency, a semi-decent economy, and being a war leader. Plus, Bush's achievements with NCLB and prescription drugs for seniors undercut two core Dem issues, he handed out tax cuts without spending cuts, and he's a strong campaigner with an outstanding campaign manager.

By the economic models of voting I saw before the election, Kerry did surprisingly well. The Dems ought to appreciate that Kerry did not get crushed 55-45.

I'm starting to think these issues are smoke screens to keep us from demanding accountability on the war and the deficit.

We need to fight these issues behind the scenes and get them off the front page.

I think Oberon and Scotch Drinker each have it half right. bush's big plus was the war leader. But given that his unfavorables were high, it's hard to say that he had everything going for him. Today's economy is crappy compared to 4 years ago, and consumer confidence reflects this. Politically speaking, it doesn't matter how the economy is, it matters how people feel about it.

I do think Kerry did decently, but that his losing hand was that he wasn't the preferred leader in the war in Iraq and against terrorism. the last public opinion polls showed this crystally clear: Bush had a favorability rating below 50%, but he was preferred as the guy better suited to handle Iraq by something like 53%.

How many ways can I say it? It's foreign policy, stupid!

I think you guys are dead wrong. Gay Marriage is a red herring issue. Yes, bans won overwhelmingly on many state ballot measures but if you ask most red state voters how important it was in deciding upon which candidates to vote for I think you'll discover it ranks near the bottom of the list.

The reason why the Dems lost this election and have in general been loosing popularity for years now is a more basic issue of ideaology and values.
Kerry is an old fashioned, hard left, liberal that the Dems tried to repackage as a moderate.... and that repackaging job is the only reason why Kerry got as much support as he did.

The problem the leadership on the Left has is exemplified by Teresa Heinz Kerry. They simply can't accept that people can have different values, different beliefs and different approaches to solving problems without being "Neanderthals". So they dismiss an entire slough of the population simply because those people don't see the world through the exact same lenses that they do.

The bottom line is that this is a big country with alot of very different people in it with beliefs all across the spectrum. When thinking about what rules should govern how society works..... a successfull government must try to make a set of rules that as many people as possible find acceptable to live with.

To a Manhatten socialite who has never touched a gun in her life but has very real concerns about street crime something like the Assualt Weapons Ban may be a blatantly obvious position to support....but a rancher in rural Wyoming is going to view it through a very different lens. The Left Elite sees the socialites position, it resonates with them but to them that rancher is just a "Neanderthal". They don't even try to see the world through his eyes...they just dismiss him as unimportant. They may try to fool him by trying to keep a low profile on gun control or staging a pheasant hunting photo-op but at the end of the day they aren't sincere about considering his point of view...and that insincerity comes through....people have a better radar for it then most politicians think.

Some things might be impossible to find a compromise solution on...but the leadership of the Left doesn't even TRY to see things from the other guys perspective.... instead they just bemoan how ignorant everyone that doesn't agree with them is. That is a recipe for being marginalized.... which is what we have seen start to happen. It's rather ironic, the Left trumpets multicultrism and empathy for forgein cultures as an important virtue.....but that is the EXACT value they seem incapable of extending to red state voters.... and they are suffering for it.

For the record, I'm a conservative.... I don't even consider myself that moderate of one....and I voted for Bush. However I WOULD have considred voting for Lieberman or Clark had they nominated....by nominating Kerry the Dems's didn't even make me have to think....furthermore by going out of thier way to alienate me and denigrate my opinions...they made sure I would work as hard as I could to get Bush elected.

gay marriage IS DEAD
not 6-5
not 8-3

11-0
and not close

every time we take 3 steps to the left
it make it so easy to move the country to move 1 step to the right.
let us vote to ban gay marriage 100-0 get it over with and stop getting beaten over the head with it.Hillary will run FAR FAR away from gays.
The more we press this issue the closer we will become to being called criminals.Are we to call Bill Clinton evil because he gave Kerry good political advice.Also look at the results by county and you will see the country is not divided it is ALL RED with a few blue specs.

Counties don't vote. People do.

I think the Democrats need to be authentically who they are: liberal, progressive, inclusionary. The problem is they have allowed the Republican opposition to put them on the defensive by redifining what it means to be a liberal. Once you start letting someone else define what you stand for then you've lost. The Republicans are geniuses at reframing everything. The Democrats need to take their power back and stop trying to appeal to the moralistic extremist in middle america.

Thanks for that insightful comment! It makes interesting reading, especially when I need a cash advance.

Thanks for that insightful comment! It makes interesting reading, especially when I need a cash advance.