Landslide?

[coloradodem2005]

Breaking News! Pat Waak elected Chair of Democratic Party!

Grassroots activists oust incumbent Chair Chris Gates with landslide 3-vote win, 187-184.

Landslide? 3 votes is a landslide? When did this become a reality?

[ashmanonar]

1. it's like bush's mandate.

1% is a mandate?

and that seems about the same percentage...weird.

[Crunchy Frog]

2. Well, I hope that people will at least give her

a chance, rather than simply wallowing in sour grapes over the whole thing. I don't think throwing a huge tantrum over it is going to do anybody any good besides the Republicans.

I'm only sounding so negative because I looked through another thread on it in the Colorado forum and there seems to be an awful lot of rather pointless bitterness.

[coloradodem2005]

3. I agree.

I say that I hope she can make it happen. I hope to God she can. It's just that I feel that there have been sour grapes on the part of Mike Miles and his supporters ever since Salazar jumped into the senate race. I felt that there were a lot of sour grapes after Miles' loss in the primary and I have experienced that firsthand. From what I saw, that carried over into the race for state party chair. Based on things that I read. I don't have a problem with her. But I feel like there have been sour grapes from the Miles people. Not to mention talk of ideological purity, which in my view, makes us no better than Republicans. This is coming from someone who has supported Howard Dean for President and was really happy when he became DNC chair. But I also feel, with regards to the state party, if it ain't broke don't fix it. And we have a major task ahead of us these next two and four years just to hold our majorities in the legislature not to mention the governor's race, congressional races. We need to be ready. We need the savvy. We need to make sure that things get done and we may need to compromise a little to do it.

[Crunchy Frog]

4. I think there is some really legitimate resentment

over the way that Miles was treated by the party establishment. He was treated either as if he didn't exist, or like an inconvence and really rude things have been said about his supporters. Yes, I did support Miles, but I would have felt much better about his loss in the primary if things had been handled more even handedly

I did not support Miles out of ideological purity. In fact, I'm one of the biggest proponents on this board against excessive fixations on purity. Is it so hard to believe that some people actually preferred Mike Miles to Ken Salazar, and didn't like being treated like dirt for it?

I think that one of the biggest issues in our party is that we have to begin treating each other with a little bit more respect and not keep alienating people from the process. That's the biggest issue that I have with Chris Gates from the little that I know about the whole state Chair business. I took a little peak in the State forum and couldn't believe the level of anger and vitriol that was directed towards people who had the gall to attend the State Convention. All these posts dripping with contempt for the "Kucinich voters". Well, I attended the Convention and voted for Kucinich and Miles. Pardon me for actually getting involved in the political process.

You see, I don't think the party can afford to alienate a bunch of newly politically active people. It may be that those newly active people are part of why we did so well last year. I don't know how long Chris Gates has held his position, but I wouldn't necessarily credit him with everything good that happened, unless we also want to blame him for everything bad that's happened in the past on his watch.

At any rate, I think the issues here are alot more than simply "Miles supporters with sour grapes", and I hope that people don't resort to scapegoating and trying to create even greater wedges in the party.

Sorry about the length of this post, but I just woke up so I'm babbling a little.

I hope I don't get flamed for this post. I don't usually go into the Colorado state forum and from looking at it last night, I can see why. It makes the General Discussion forums look like regular Gardens of Eden in comparison.

[F.Gordon]

5. Gates basically served for one election cycle: 2004

His position, partially/largely due to CFR, did not grant him the power that those that despised him would believe he had. Since his only track record was chairing the State Party during the best election cycle this State has seen in...like...forever, then I hope you can see why I'm just a tad bit skeptical about the motivating factors behind all of this.

Let's take Miles off the table. What are we left with? Which candidate(s)? Who, specifically, was alienated? We are left with the one issue political activists. Given that Gates had to maintain a cohesive level in this State from the National level on down to the local level and balance the pressure of one issue political activists....I'd say he did an okay job. Apparently a few people would disagree with me.

You're confusing my "anger" and "contempt" with concern. I apologize for laying it on so thick. That fact that other Colorado DUers were apparently avoiding that thread like it contained the plague is representative of the type of thread it was. The same type I despise over in the Garden of Eden GD. In that regards, I am the hypocrite.

I would have rather focused on the good that happened in 2004 and seen how that could be amplified. AND I would have rather focused on any number of the bad things and worked to correct them. I didn't see Gates as a "bad thing" or a problem. My biggest concern was seeing the Party running in a dozen different directions and not staying focused on the task at hand: electing Democrats. The fact that Party in general did so well was...amazing. IMO electing Pat to the State Chair just added another dozen or so different directions that the Party will now run in.

I don't envy Pat. Building all those bridges to connect the alienated is going to be time consuming. I'll just support and work for the candidate(s) that the system decides on. Although a little voice in my head is telling me that the alienated aren't going to be happy with who the system picks. Round and round we go.

I'll say no more on this subject....

[coloradodem2005]

6. That's how I feel about it.

The probem I have is that we cannot go in a lot of different directions to make things happen. Furthermore, what will it take to un-alienate the alienated? We can't go with them 100%. It also seemed like a lot of Miles supporters expected that he would win the primary and while I agree with a number of his ideas, I don't think that he would have been a good candidate. Quite frankly, we got the job done. I fail to see how Dean or the DNC would have ordered Waak to "change the locks". I hope that Pat can continue to build the party, but I fear that we may truly fracture as a party.

[F.Gordon]

7. Since I've already broken my promise.......

Other than Miles, I'm not sure who the alienated are.

I know you were very active in the last election and what ever candidate you camp with next election should be very grateful to have someone like you working for them....
:thumbsup:

The reason I say this, other than an attempt at being less abrasive and more warm and fuzzy :), is.... I'm sure you were hit up by a few political activists. I was. I was always polite, but in the back of my mind I wanted to say...."ummm...there's like an ELECTION coming up and wouldn't your time be better spent....ummmm...working on the ELECTION." But I didn't. I was polite. Maybe Gates wasn't so polite.

There's a time and place for everything, and I was more than a little put off that some people tried to use the ELECTION as a forum for their INSERT ISSUE VENUE HERE.

[coloradodem2005]

8. I volunteered for Kerry.

I interned for Salazar. I did it because I felt it needed to be done. I think Miles was a little short-changed but I don't like being hit with sour grapes because of it. I don't agree with Salazar on his vote not to raise min. wage, but saying that he is as bad as Coors would have been is ridiculous. And now, for the other senate seat, Udall would be the best bet. And as much as the Miles people say he isn't liberal enough, he is more liberal than Salazar. The fact is, in order to win an election, you need to compromise. No politician will get elected because he/she agrees with me 100% of the time. I was hit up by a number of activists and I dealt with it politely, but I wanted to win. I did not want to lose because of rigidity. Thank you for the compliments.

[CODem]

9. Salazar voted for the Kennedy minimum wage amendment

Ken Salazar voted with the Democrats on the Kennedy minimum wage amendment and against the Republicans' phony minimum wage measure. Rick Santorum authorized the Republican's fig leaf language on this issue. Watch out for Santorum -- he's far to the right, very ambitious, and a likely Presidential candidate in 2008.

Here's a site where you can track Salazar's recent votes -- they are solidly Democratic and solidly pro labor:

http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/vote_menu_109_1.htm

I am very proud of Ken Salazar today -- you should be, too.