Discussion for article #229896
“They were so focused on independents that they forgot they had a base,” Collins said in a session with reporters assessing the election, according to CNN. “They left their base behind. They became Republican-lite.”
He’s 100% correct. Embarrassed and ashamed yet, Dems? Are you going to wake the fuck up, grow a fucking spine and learn to stand for something now or do we get to watch you run around with your fingers int he air for the next 2 years throwing 2016 into the fucking trash as well? The whole mealy-mouthed, fence-sitting, amorphous pandering bullshit is pathetic and the myopic, tunnel-visioned card-playing with issues like abortion, contraception and immigration, to the exclusion of other issues that are clearly higher priority to the people whose votes you want, is inexcusable. Grow a pair and get a clue or fuck off.
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be sure to read the steve israel piece in the nyt… he’s sooooo beaten up, the poor thing, but his colleagues are rallying around him that he did the best he could…
thankfully he’s removed himself from reappointment; but wants to remain in a leadership position. one would think displaying leadership would be a requirement.
but the one positive he saw was that now he has more time to finish up his novel.
(can someone explain to me how these ohsoputupon members of congress seem to produce highly ignored novels that are nonetheless published).
I hate to agree with them, but they’re right. Anytime a republican says you SHOULDN’T do something in a campaign, you should do the opposite.
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I say no more money to the DNC until they bring back Howard Dean. I want someone competent in charge for a change.
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They literally spent the whole run up to the election trying to convince people to vote for them who were never going to vote for them.
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Funny seeing articles like this on TPM, because just five days ago, when people like me would make this exact same argument, we got shouted down by people desperately trying to justify that red state dems can’t run as progressives. Now that the results are in, we can see how very wrong they were.
Remember, this is how we got President Bush in 2000. Gore forgot his base and cut Bill loose when he should have had Bill out stumping for him. He spent so much time talking about the “bridge to the new millennium” he forgot to point out all the very real progress that was made in the 90’s. Time for the Dems to run as proud progressives, or we will wind up with President Bush in 2016 again.
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In November of last year, I predicted that the Dems would keep the Senate because Obamacare would become a net positive by August. I was exactly HALF right. People seem to forget that’s it’s actually possible to EDUCATE an electorate while your busy campaigning. If anyone had the stones to run WITH Obama, we wouldn’t be dealing with post-mortems now.
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Well, I feel the same way. I’ve noticed that any time a Party runs away from their record because of manufactured outrage out of the other party, they lose. Time for Dems to stop being cowards.
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Charlie Pierce over at Esquire has been saying it, and so has Bill Maher, the economy is better, gas is cheaper, healthcare (while not even close to perfect) is more affordable and easier to get, Bin Laden is dead, etc. Democrats didn’t even try to run on their accomplishments, which were many, and simply tried to rely on the inherent craziness of the Republican positions. The problem with that strategy is that it ignores the base, and doesn’t show Independents why voting for the Dems is better! Meanwhile the Republican leadership coached their candidates into keeping a lid on most of their more insane positions, and they walked into Congress.
And its really bad when after the election, the Republican strategists are openly scratching their heads as to why the Dems didn’t go with what is obviously a better course. Might not have helped some senators in traditionally red states, but damn sure would have kept seats and governorships in the traditional blue!
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GOP strategists said they were baffled that Democrats had focused on issues like abortion rather than making an argument about the economy – and using Obama as a surrogate to do so.
It’s the economy, stupid.
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Hey GOP - Thanks for not rolling out Bush/Cheney in your campaigns - it would have been a real disaster for the Dem’s then.
Dean did an amazing great job and Obama kicked him to the curb. A mistake of hubris. In fact, hubris is the defining mistake for the whole Obama experience. You are taking an enormous risk with your customer when you promise them world peace, roses, sunshine, and lollypops. Sort of reminds me of the story of the Titanic, the unsinkable ship.
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It’s the same thing the Blue Dogs did in 2010, and they got their asses handed to them, for some reason they thought that strategy would work differently this time. If you look at who actually got voted out of office in 2010, it wasn’t the liberals (with a few exceptions like Alan Grayson, who got back in office 2 years later, and Russ Feingold), but was mostly conservative Democrats.
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Conservatives rarely make sense, but this is one of those times. The Dems ran as far away from Obama as they could and, in doing so, forfeited the right to talk about the significant achievement they had made, including the economy…and, yes, the ACA. I am ashamed for all of them. Let them burn in hell.
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The primary question (pun intended) in any election is asked by the base and it is this:
WHY THE FUCK SHOULD I GET OFF MY ASS AND VOTE FOR YOU?
When all the candidate does is run from everything the base believes in and wants to fight for, it answers the question in this manner: YOU SHOULDN’T.
That’s remedial politics right there and a fucking brain damaged mental patient should be able to understand it. These idiots need to learn to put all the polling sophistry and conventional wisdom and beltway dogma and MSM bobblehead punditry vomit aside AND JUST SAY WHAT THEY MEAN AND MEAN WHAT THEY SAY. Period. We have the better positions. We have the historical record, the data and the facts. We have the experts’ agreement. We have the science and the evidence. MAKE THE FUCKING CASE!
It’s not fucking rocket science. It’s not 12-dimensional chess. It’s not something that requires Harvard-degreed think-tank douchenozzles to figure out, plan and execute. It’s talking to people and telling them what you want to do for them, can do for them and will do for them and making them believe you mean it and can get it the fuck done. It’s trusting them to see your sincerity, understand your arguments and see that you are right. The Dems did NONE of that this round. NONE. And they reaped exactly what they sowed: nothing.
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It’s a good point, but I am detecting a bit of cold feet syndrome.
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I stopped sending money to the DNC because of Howard Dean.
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He’s kind of right.
Obama has accomplished quite a bit. Why democratic candidates ran away from those accomplishments is a mystery to me.
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he’s right
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