Dear Democrats
Mar. 19th, 2006 09:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
danalwynBecause I'm beginning to feel my temper fray just a little bit around the edges...
Dear US Democrats,
You suck. Seriously. You suck. No, you shut up.
Let me explain something. Just because a Republican does something does not mean you are required to dislike it. To wit, simply because the Republicans have a political strategy does not mean you have to forgo one yourself.
You have a Republican administration in office that is so incompetent that even their own supporters have deserted them more than once. You have a Republican party in disarray, a dozen burning issues to motivate your support with, and a party in control of the country that is vulnerable to attack on almost any conceivable issue. Yet, as far as we, the voting public can tell, the Democratic response has mostly considered of a long and studious act of fence sitting. I'm all for giving the other guy enough rope to hang himself, but you have given unto Bush enough rope to lasso the Titanic, and you're trusting the Republicans to make it into a noose.
First, stop bringing up the war in Iraq. Seriously, shut up about it. It seems that your media consultants told you that attacking the President on that issue would lead you nowhere and get nothing, that it would disqualify you in the eyes of the moderates. Fine, if that's your strategy then stick to it. And it seems that you don't want to put out a concrete plan of action about what you would do if you were in charge to improve the situation. Fine, I don't blame you for that. It's tricky. But if you aren't going to use the war to criticize the President, and you aren't going to propose an alternate strategy to attract voters, than stop bringing it up! All you've managed to do is mutter a few half-hearted complaints about the President and his conduct in the war without actually being critical. As a result, you give the Hawk camp plenty of ammunition without doing a damn thing to rally the Doves. You can lose plenty of battles in the campaign itself without bothering to lose them now.
Second, start promoting some vibrant, energetic speakers. I know you've got them, it's time to start using them. It says a hell of a lot about the party when the most exposed, vibrant Democrat is Obama who, to our knowledge, has not done anything yet. I know it, you know it, and he knows it. You must have someone in the party who has done things that are worthwhile-and has potential to build up a reputation-why not use them? The Republicans have the Presidency, they have someone who can speak for their party. The Democrats do not. Find someone.
Third, find a platform. Break into the offices of the Retired Democrats Home and steal their old platform. Borrow one from the Bull Moose party if you have to, but find one. Look, we know what the Republicans are, they have a wide array of social values that they embrace, from limiting abortion and increasing "moral values" (whatever those are) in public life on the social end, to reducing taxes and corporate-friendly supply-side economics on the economic end. Republicans may not share their all of their values, but they do know what it means to be a Republican. Being a Democrat at this point means not being a Republican. You tried the strategy of being not-Bush in 2004, and you failed. You blundered into a platform, made up by the loudest shouters, that you could not communicate to trained professionals, let alone the general public, and hoped that the fact that you weren't Republicans would do the job. You saw how that went. Don't try it again.
Look, all the real parties have platforms. Even the Greens have a platform. You have an administration that is tottering on the brink on so many issues. NCLB is vulnerable to attacks claiming that it does not deal with the welfare of children, and that it is improperly funded. The Roe v. Wade mess in South Dakota can be used to rally a huge baseline support for the party. The budget deficit is soaring so high that Fiscal Republicans have practically abandoned the party. Our Foreign Policy is a mess, made only worse by an administration that neither understands nor cares about the rest of the world. Our own economy is about to undergo the pains of globalization, and our entire workforce needs restructuring, something Bush refuses to do. We have a disastrous war in Iraq. Hell, for the first time you have a President who is deliberately violating human rights!
Do not become overwhelmed by the plethora of targets. He who aims at fifty million targets generally hits none of them. As it stands, some criticize here, others attack there. That won't do. Figure out what targets you're going to attack, and how you're going to attack them. Find out what issues you have to push, and then go out and push them. If Bush showed anything it was that a large portion of the American public responds well to what they see as plain language, clear leadership, and clearly spoken ideas. Steal Bush's playbook. You have the issues on your side. Use them.
Fourth, shoot your grass-roots support. Or lock them up. Or do something. Look, the Republicans have a lot of power because they have a network of organizations that rally grass-roots support. They have a network of churches with the moral majority, a network of farmers who depend on Republican agricultural surpluses, and a network of veterans who tend to vote Republican. They use these groups to get their influence out there, to motivate voters, and who connect with the people on the street. What do the Democrats have?
The Right has a large group of organizations that have goals across the spectrum of issues, and are led by a canny leadership willing to adopt temporary compromises in order to achieve political goals. The Left has fractious, single-issue groups, led by ideologues for whom the word "compromise" is a mark of evil, who probably spend as much time fighting with each other as they do uniting. There are very few groups on the Left who can rally widespread support on a large number of issues. Nobody goes to Lesbian and Gay Rights groups to talk about the environment, nobody pushes the abortion fight on teachers unions. There is no unified group, or even an informal network, with some idea of which way things move, that has a membership willing to compromise their own principles for the sake of the greater good.
Republicans discovered that the key to grass-roots support is social issues. They've gotten more mileage in the voter league out of gay marriage and abortion than they have from their more pivotal foreign policies (excepting Iraq) and their fiscal theory. The Democrats need to capture that too, but that means that they need to find a counterpart to the Religious Right, an organization that has informal contacts in many communities and can be used as a communal place to organize local actions, express concerns, and create a following capable of making compromises without screaming about them.
Finally, you guys need to (to use the masculine term) grow a pair. For a long time, the democratic leadership has abstained from attacking the President because he was too popular, and they were afraid of seeming unpatriotic. Now that this constraint no longer seems to hold, they seem to have a reluctance to go stomping through the streets, rallying the troops, but they need to. The Democratic leadership needs to get out of Washington and start making moves elsewhere. It says a great deal to note that the President's most vocal high-ranking critic is John McCain.
If you, as a party, decline (as I fully expect at this point) to make an attempt at any of these changes before 2008, please tell me so that I can find a nice third party candidate to support. If I have to throw my vote away, I'd at least like to do give it to someone whose party line I can understand.
kthnxbye,
-danAlwyn
Dear US Democrats,
You suck. Seriously. You suck. No, you shut up.
Let me explain something. Just because a Republican does something does not mean you are required to dislike it. To wit, simply because the Republicans have a political strategy does not mean you have to forgo one yourself.
You have a Republican administration in office that is so incompetent that even their own supporters have deserted them more than once. You have a Republican party in disarray, a dozen burning issues to motivate your support with, and a party in control of the country that is vulnerable to attack on almost any conceivable issue. Yet, as far as we, the voting public can tell, the Democratic response has mostly considered of a long and studious act of fence sitting. I'm all for giving the other guy enough rope to hang himself, but you have given unto Bush enough rope to lasso the Titanic, and you're trusting the Republicans to make it into a noose.
First, stop bringing up the war in Iraq. Seriously, shut up about it. It seems that your media consultants told you that attacking the President on that issue would lead you nowhere and get nothing, that it would disqualify you in the eyes of the moderates. Fine, if that's your strategy then stick to it. And it seems that you don't want to put out a concrete plan of action about what you would do if you were in charge to improve the situation. Fine, I don't blame you for that. It's tricky. But if you aren't going to use the war to criticize the President, and you aren't going to propose an alternate strategy to attract voters, than stop bringing it up! All you've managed to do is mutter a few half-hearted complaints about the President and his conduct in the war without actually being critical. As a result, you give the Hawk camp plenty of ammunition without doing a damn thing to rally the Doves. You can lose plenty of battles in the campaign itself without bothering to lose them now.
Second, start promoting some vibrant, energetic speakers. I know you've got them, it's time to start using them. It says a hell of a lot about the party when the most exposed, vibrant Democrat is Obama who, to our knowledge, has not done anything yet. I know it, you know it, and he knows it. You must have someone in the party who has done things that are worthwhile-and has potential to build up a reputation-why not use them? The Republicans have the Presidency, they have someone who can speak for their party. The Democrats do not. Find someone.
Third, find a platform. Break into the offices of the Retired Democrats Home and steal their old platform. Borrow one from the Bull Moose party if you have to, but find one. Look, we know what the Republicans are, they have a wide array of social values that they embrace, from limiting abortion and increasing "moral values" (whatever those are) in public life on the social end, to reducing taxes and corporate-friendly supply-side economics on the economic end. Republicans may not share their all of their values, but they do know what it means to be a Republican. Being a Democrat at this point means not being a Republican. You tried the strategy of being not-Bush in 2004, and you failed. You blundered into a platform, made up by the loudest shouters, that you could not communicate to trained professionals, let alone the general public, and hoped that the fact that you weren't Republicans would do the job. You saw how that went. Don't try it again.
Look, all the real parties have platforms. Even the Greens have a platform. You have an administration that is tottering on the brink on so many issues. NCLB is vulnerable to attacks claiming that it does not deal with the welfare of children, and that it is improperly funded. The Roe v. Wade mess in South Dakota can be used to rally a huge baseline support for the party. The budget deficit is soaring so high that Fiscal Republicans have practically abandoned the party. Our Foreign Policy is a mess, made only worse by an administration that neither understands nor cares about the rest of the world. Our own economy is about to undergo the pains of globalization, and our entire workforce needs restructuring, something Bush refuses to do. We have a disastrous war in Iraq. Hell, for the first time you have a President who is deliberately violating human rights!
Do not become overwhelmed by the plethora of targets. He who aims at fifty million targets generally hits none of them. As it stands, some criticize here, others attack there. That won't do. Figure out what targets you're going to attack, and how you're going to attack them. Find out what issues you have to push, and then go out and push them. If Bush showed anything it was that a large portion of the American public responds well to what they see as plain language, clear leadership, and clearly spoken ideas. Steal Bush's playbook. You have the issues on your side. Use them.
Fourth, shoot your grass-roots support. Or lock them up. Or do something. Look, the Republicans have a lot of power because they have a network of organizations that rally grass-roots support. They have a network of churches with the moral majority, a network of farmers who depend on Republican agricultural surpluses, and a network of veterans who tend to vote Republican. They use these groups to get their influence out there, to motivate voters, and who connect with the people on the street. What do the Democrats have?
The Right has a large group of organizations that have goals across the spectrum of issues, and are led by a canny leadership willing to adopt temporary compromises in order to achieve political goals. The Left has fractious, single-issue groups, led by ideologues for whom the word "compromise" is a mark of evil, who probably spend as much time fighting with each other as they do uniting. There are very few groups on the Left who can rally widespread support on a large number of issues. Nobody goes to Lesbian and Gay Rights groups to talk about the environment, nobody pushes the abortion fight on teachers unions. There is no unified group, or even an informal network, with some idea of which way things move, that has a membership willing to compromise their own principles for the sake of the greater good.
Republicans discovered that the key to grass-roots support is social issues. They've gotten more mileage in the voter league out of gay marriage and abortion than they have from their more pivotal foreign policies (excepting Iraq) and their fiscal theory. The Democrats need to capture that too, but that means that they need to find a counterpart to the Religious Right, an organization that has informal contacts in many communities and can be used as a communal place to organize local actions, express concerns, and create a following capable of making compromises without screaming about them.
Finally, you guys need to (to use the masculine term) grow a pair. For a long time, the democratic leadership has abstained from attacking the President because he was too popular, and they were afraid of seeming unpatriotic. Now that this constraint no longer seems to hold, they seem to have a reluctance to go stomping through the streets, rallying the troops, but they need to. The Democratic leadership needs to get out of Washington and start making moves elsewhere. It says a great deal to note that the President's most vocal high-ranking critic is John McCain.
If you, as a party, decline (as I fully expect at this point) to make an attempt at any of these changes before 2008, please tell me so that I can find a nice third party candidate to support. If I have to throw my vote away, I'd at least like to do give it to someone whose party line I can understand.
kthnxbye,
-danAlwyn