Running more liberal candidates wouldn't have helped. That's the reality.

[DanTex]

I'm not a fan of conservative Dems, but that doesn't mean that they or the "Republican-lite" strategy is responsible for the losses.

The root causes, as I see them, were that the Republicans were able to make Obamacare and Obama unpopular, and that they avoided responsibility for gridlock in congress. It didn't have much to do with candidates running too far towards the center or too far left or any of that.

There are also the usual factors. Yes, a lot of voters are dumb, but we knew that. Yes, white working class men voted against their own interests, but that always happens. There's the gerrymandering, the fact that senate seats up for election were mostly red, along with the fact that both houses of congress structurally favor conservatives (the senate because low-population states have the same number of senators than high-pop states which lean blue, the house because liberal voters are concentrated into a smaller number of urban districts).

But those factors are persistent.

Of things that could actually have been done differently, I think Obama bears a good amount of responsibility. Not because of the way he's governed, but because of how he's managed the propaganda wars, throughout his presidency. He's the leader of the party and the nation, it's his responsibility to ensure that there are people and a strategy in place to make sure that Republican lies are rebutted persistently and effectively.

But it's an uphill fight. With corporate media and tons of money on the right, it was never going to be easy. Anyone who thinks there is a simple solution like (let's lets run "real Democrats&quot is wrong. Who knows if Obama could have done better. He did get re-elected, so he certainly could have done a lot worse.

[libtodeath]

1. Running moderates just lost us 7-9 senate seats and the majority

tell me how much fucking good that does for us?
If we are going to lose then lose in a fight not in a me too mush.

[merrily]

8. Who has donated to Sanders, the only one so far who has admitted to wanting to run for Pres. in 2016

provided he can raise the money and see evidence of popular support (which would help him raise money). Who has even written him a letter urging him to run?

[VanillaRhapsody]

26. you still believe that?

Then run Bernie as an Indie to prove it!

[DanTex]

12. But running moderates wasn't the cause of the loss. That's my point.

Running liberals wouldn't have helped.

[libtodeath]

16. How can we know and yes they were moderates

I want to see dozens of Senator Warrens running and let the chips fall.

[DanTex]

20. We can't know for sure, but we can look at the facts and try to reason.

Maybe running a bunch of Warrens would have lost us even more seats. Seems to me, with Obamacare and Obama's approval ratings where they are, and people not blaming Republicans for gridlock, there's not much that would have changed the outcome.

[TampaAnimusVortex]

22. The poster is right. It was against Obama, not because of "how liberal" the candidates were.

This was a referendum on Obama and his policies. That's why candidates were running from him and trying to be more centrist. More liberal candidates that weren’t running from him would have been trounced even worse.

On a good note, this is all cyclical... the metronome hand swings back and forth. This is only 1 tick.

[cali]

21. It's absurd to think that's why we lost those seats

because candidates weren't liberal enough.

[Eleanors38]

23. Yep, no bomb-throwers in that bunch.

[Le Taz Hot]

2. Yeah, keep running Republican-lite

'cause that's worked so well in the past, especially this time.

[merrily]

3. I thought the reality was that the entire system is FUBAR, from the Kochs and their pals, to

the corporate/establishment media, to vote suppression, to the uber-partisan, shameful SCOTUS, etc.

It all comes down to love of money and power, much as when former bureaucrat Julius Caesar decided he was God, as well as Emperor.

[unrepentant progress]

4. Neoliberal technocracy: winning hearts and minds since 1992

Or not.

[bemildred]

5. Sounds like speculation to me.

The reality is if you want to defeat Republicans, you have to run against them. Cowards lose.

[libtodeath]

10. X 1000

[DanTex]

11. Of course it's speculation. You're speculating too.

[bemildred]

13. Quite. nt

[Electric Monk]

14. Al Franken won his seat again, and that's not speculation. nt

[DanTex]

25. Right, but the conclusion that more Al Frankens would have done better in other states is.

And I don't think that conclusion is supported by the observable reality.

[Eleanors38]

6. Define or be defined. That is the question.

[maryellen99]

7. Don't forget too

That it has been drummed into people's heads for the past 30+ years that the Democratic Party is the party of no good lazy blacks and handouts and they believe that anyone who votes democratic is on government assistance. How do you overcome that?

[Dawgs]

9. Huh???

[unblock]

15. whatever the right strategy is, it has to address right-wing media control.

that's a huge, huge advantage for republicans. we have to recognize that our candidate and our message will be viewed through a heavily filtered lens and the image the voters have, especially in swing districts/states, will not be the view we here on du have.

one possible conclusion is that we might as well run ardent liberals, because they're going to be painted as such regardless, might as well appeal to the base, won't turn off the opposition any more than the right-wing propaganda is going to do anyway.

in any event, putting the blame on any one person or one strategy or whatever is certainly overly simplistic. getting good democrats elected is hard in this warped political environment, between the biased media and the ridiculous private cash funding.

[mazzarro]

27. True That!

And the left has no sugar daddy to puny up and buy a mass media company to balance out Faux Noise at least; hmmmmmmmmm!

[snooper2]

17. blah, old people are bored, old people vote, old people tend to be fundies

that is all...it isn't that complicated

luckily the crowd that watches Pat Robertson are dying off like he is soon so only another 10-20 years of idiots left then their numbers will be meaningless...

[hrmjustin]

18. We would have lost no matter who we put up.

[flamin lib]

19. This explains it:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025766505

[JonLP24]

24. Unlikely to win if they did

Democrats are not a midterm party, if Obama had higher approval ratings and middle class voters started feeling the effects of a better economy they'd have a chance. Also media coverage isn't close to what is seen in Preisdential years so messaging is diffficult, especially when Republicans are running 6 to 1 ads in races they're already heavily favored to win.

I still think it was a poor strategy depending on the races in question.

But the White House and congressional Democrats have in recent weeks launched a messaging offensive aimed at blunting the anticipated GOP barrage. Before the Memorial Day recess, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi distributed a 78-page binder instructing members on how to sell the bill in their districts, and White House officials ranging from Obama to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack highlighted the benefits of the bill in a spree of university commencement speeches.

In the special House election last month in South Carolina, Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch distanced herself from Obamacare (she supported it, but with major caveats). But that race, which Colbert Busch lost to former Gov. Mark Sanford, was an outlier because the district is more conservative than the typical swing House district.

At the very least, Democrats say, four years’ worth of scrutiny, bad press and political attacks have lowered expectations for success of the rollout of the new system. They figure a smoother-than-anticipated launch will play to their benefit.

“The reality is, this is coming on line,” said John Anzalone, a Democratic pollster who has conducted extensive public opinion research on the health care bill. “The expectations are so low that the Obama administration will meet those expectations and possibly exceed them.”

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2013/06/dems-2014-strategy-own-obamacare-92172_Page2.html#ixzz3ID6Lwbac

I will give you my thoughts on Krysten Sinema who represents a district that has Democratic ASU campus but heavily republican on the east. She was outnumbered in ads portraying her as a terrorist lover "she voted to give rights to terrorists!!!!" who wanted open borders. Her only ad just focused on helping veterans, no attack ads. She also had the benefit of having a half hour presenting herself when her opponent skipped out on the only televised debate claiming 'there were no ground rules agreed to by both parties so she choose to be with voters' was what her campaign said.