Reply #101: While I have reservations about each candidate [View All]

[salin]

I personally find getting overly invested either in a love-fest or a hate-fest rather unproductive. Most important to me is a) ending the Bush era (and if possible having it be done so resoundingly that the same cabal can't slime back up in 4 to 8 years); and b) stemming the rightward lurching in so many areas of public policy. Some candidates will do better on a) and others with b). In the end, however, whoever gains the nomination the love fests and the hatefests (and each candidate has them, and I have seen many of the behaviors and concerns that you raised leveled against various candidates) will harm the cause of a).

There is no "saviour" out there. No human candidate can be our "salvation". A president can put things back a bit - but so much damage will have happened in four years that it will be like humpty-dumpty. Those expecting a candidate to be able to put the egg fully back together will be disappointed and quickly disillusioned.

Folks would be wiser to take a play book from the GOP in the eighties. They had a lock on the presidency, no chance at the house, and the senate kept slipping in and out of their fingers. They worked to change majorities in statehouses, control redistricting and take congress.

We would do best to be prepared to take care of Bush first, but not to expect the new president to be able to "solve everything". We have to come up with new strategies to take back local and state politics which will enable us to repel the achievements of the far right in congress.

In short we need short term and long term strategies.

For all of your dislike for Dean, here is what impresses me - and what other candidates, if they are going to have a shot at Bush will have to learn.

Dean did not invent the cause of going for small donations as a means to compete (Brown did that in 1992 with an 800 number). He did not invent using the internet to raise money (McCain did that in 2000). His folks have figured out how to harness internet activism beyond fundraising and turn it into developing statewide networks and infrastructure - that reaches folks who may not be connected to the internet.

Why is this significant?

In the past, campaigns have to raise a certain amount of limited dollars and put statewide (costly - though mostly volunteer) campaigns in place in the two opening contests, and then (due to limited dollars) strategically invest in a handful of the next round of primaries. That has meant writing some off (eg candidate A may not have the appeal in the south as s/he has in the rust belt - so invest in two key rust belt states) and investing in a few others. Lack of showing in the key invested states and the candidacy is over (re: Tsongas in 1992). Surprise showing in one of the uninvested states and the money starts rolling in, because of the gained momentum - this can save a campaign that is predicted to fold - and catapult said candidate to front runner status after a few more primaries.

The thing is - the republicans from top to bottom have increased their ability to outfund raise democrats. That leaves two alternatives to democrats. One is to go after some of the corporate money (Clinton was good at this - but by now with three branches in GOP control this becomes a steeper and steeper hill to climb), this is in part what has led the DLC to become powerful - their strategies (re: influence in campaigns) are geared towards attracting centrist corporate dollars. In my opinion, we saw in 2002 that this hogtied some candidates regarding what issues they could raise which seemed to impact the races where there was little room to vary campaign themes. The other option is to create a completely different game plan and change the entire rules of the game. The first part (the money) as I said before was pioneered by Brown and McCain. But going further - and creating statewide low-cost organizations - folks who put in the time to go door to door and can combat on a local level the impact of slanted campaign ads and pushpolls - that is where the new battle ground, in my opinion, will be. Dean's folks have turned this meet-up thing, into an organizing tool. He is taking a national strategy rather than a pick and choose, because they have harnessed organizing that is much more lower cost and more reliant on energized volunteers.

Any candidate who will have a chance against Bush will need to learn from the Dean campaign - and out do the Dean campaign. Because Dean has set a rather high bar on that front - if any candidate out does them - they will be far better prepared to harness this organizing for the general election. That is a good thing.

But again - that is the short term issue.

There are media issues that need to be attended to over the long haul (one can not downplay the impact of incessant rightwing influences over the airwaves that have changed the public's sentiments on views of economics {supply side and deregulation have sometimes already demonstrated disasters, but while both were viewed with skepticism 20 years ago - even by republicans - they are accepted as universal truths today - even by democrats}.

There is the issue of state control of legislatures and taking control of congress.

Those things will have to happen - over the long haul - in order for the country to be moved onto a different track. The president alone can not do this.

One could say that without such a strategy, after Clinton won (and he initially made more liberal noises than he did after key defeats after losing Congress), that congress was lost, and that the best any democratic president could do under those circumstances was to thwart rightwing efforts and attempt to modify righwing agenda items (with the assist of public sentiment swayed by rightwing media) that had so much speed (ex "wellfare reform). That is no way to be able to alter the direction of long term policies in this country.

Thus - we have to think short and long term. We have to be willing to see the virtues of various candidates because we don't know who will win -ane for the short-term we HAVE to get the presidency back. We have to be realistic in recognizing that campaigns HAVE to change - not on issues but on how campaigns are waged, the republicans have the advantage under the current 'rules of the game'. So far, Dean's campaign has taken this route and found surprising success. Clark's initial momentum suggests that his movement/supporters have learned from Dean and are working to develop similar strategies. There isn't much evidence that the others are able to harness this in the same way - but the primaries have not yet begun, there is still time.

But, I say again, this can only be viewed as a small step along the way. We have to work on shifting public dialogue. We have to work on balance in the media. And we have to be in a position to take control of legislative agendas. Who ever becomes president can help on these fronts - but they will not be able to achieve these things. That takes US.

The bickering, and looking for Rove behind each candidate, the vilification of the DLC (I think they are losing their influence, btw), will not move us forward. Indeed it seems to keep us stuck in the old campaign structure that focuses only on how policies are spun and manipulative soundbite ads. As we saw with Gore (who won) we will LOSE that kind of campaign regardless of the candidate. Heck Bush will probably double the fundraising that he had race against Gore. We have to get to the twentyfirst century campaign - before the GOP figures out that they, too, will have to adjust to be able to win in this new type of more democratic (at the people instead of the top) campaign.