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What does it take to win elections?

Two articles point to the role that ideas and ideology play in electoral politics. What do you think?

Democrats urged to broaden appeal - Swing voters must be focus, study says.
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The Economist (not available online) says:

October 6, 2005

TALK about trouble coming not in single spies but in battalions. For much of his first term, almost everything that George Bush touched turned to political gold. He even managed to parlay a badly-handled war in Iraq into a vote winner. But now almost everything he touches turns to dust.

The Democrats are quietly jubilant. They are seizing every chance they can get—and there are plenty of them—to brand the Republicans as the party of “corruption and cronyism”. They seem to be recruiting good candidates for next year's elections. Some even wonder whether 2006 may be their equivalent of 1994—when the Republicans won 52 seats in the House and nine in the Senate, ending 40 years of Democratic rule.

They should hold the champagne. Parties don't win elections just because their rivals hit a rough patch. They win them because they win the battle of ideas, because they think ahead and cook up cogent policies, because they offer a positive vision of the future. Bill Clinton did this brilliantly in 1992. Tony Blair did it even more brilliantly in 1997. But, so far, not the Democrats.
By ntobi at 10/11/2005 - 07:08 | Elections | login or register to post comments | previous forum topic | next forum topic

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Can't beat the system til you beat the system

The current view that the Dems have no ideas is the mantra of the right wing talk show hosts. I always watch out for mantras: they are often propoganda. In this case it is propoganda to support the current reality of the takeover of our democracy by those with enough money and the power to do so.

1) Our election systems are not yet secure enough to deliver the voters what they think they are voting for. That is a fact that many people have trouble dealing with despite indisputable evidence. And because of this, we the people are never given the opportunity to vote for REAL people. Howard Dean was a real person. I think we are all grateful he wasn't literally assassinated, but assassination by the corrupt electoral media had the same effect in real terms.

2) Because we can not ever vote for real people, it is less an ideological problem than the quality of the candidate. The same tired old mainstream corporate phonies keep being trotted in front of us as though they actually present any choice. It is inconceivable to me that the powers that be think that Hillary Clinton is a perfect Dem candidate, just as I couldn't believe they pushed Kerry at us.

I am tired of being told I have to choose the lesser of two evils. I am tired of the plastic surgeried, botoxed phonies parading around with their congressional haircuts. (You know, they get those for free--i.e., we pay for them--that's why they all look alike.)

The truth is the Dems maybe did not do as much obvious damage as the Repubs, but neither did they do very much good.

Are we better off now than we were 5 years ago? Hell no. But after eight years of Clinton and Co. we were left fighting the same fights for health care rights; our jobs, environment, and economy were sold off to the global marketplace in the form of morally questionable "trade" agreements, the beginning of the end for the middle class was initiated in earnest, and the gap between the rich and the poor got wide enough to sail a thousand barges through.

Having said all this, I don't believe we the people have yet a real strategy for effecting change. The election protection movement might be the closest we come to that, but even that movement is splintered and non-strategic. I posted on our website an article that gets to it: the people in this country have not taken to the streets with one, unified, targeted, focused, message: "this is our country and we are taking it back." Until that happens, we will continue to be sold to the highest bidder.
By ntobi at Tue, 10/11/2005 - 7:23am | login or register to post comments