Why Dean would have lost this election [View All]

[fujiyama]

and Edwards and Clark would likely have lost as well...

This is why. There were two issues that democrats simply could not compete enough on. These were terrorism and "values". These issues were those centered on fear, and fear makes people do crazy things.

Fear of terrorism overrode people's concerns of the war. Dean and Clark could have repeatedly told people that this war wasn't going to make people safer.

It wouldn't have mattered.

People eventually didn't care about the war. Those that were upsetted enough by the war voted against Bush.

How would Dean have competed on the terrorism issue? What evidence is there that ANY Democrat would have been more competetive on this issue? Ultimately, Dean would have had to answer on his tax policy as well, which was in favor of completely repealing the tax cuts. AFter all, Bush still won on the issue of taxes. Dean would have been creamed on this issue (Gep would have as well). It's obvious that those whose biggest fear was the economy, health care, and the war, all voted for Kerry. That was all there was to be had.

The GOP was able to go after registered voters that had not voted in previous elections. These people were primarilly from rural areas and are mostly born agains and evangelicals. Dean wouldn't have appealed to them. To his credit, he is a secular person, but in TaliBornAgain America, people want talk of "values" - talk of how gays threaten marriage. But, I agree that "values" isn't what necessarily cost us the election. It really was fear, and that fear was mostly with terrorism.

People had it stuck in their heads that Bush responded to 9/11 with force. It was a mistake that people made, because Bush responded with attacking the wrong country. Kerry made this point but it didn't matter. I see no reason to believe it would have mattered if Dean made it either.

I think these "My candidate would have won this election" threads are extremely divisive and idiotic. I'd likely say it if Clark or Edwards supporters started them as well (and I think Clark MAY have had a slightly better chance). The Rove machine was well built. It was effective. I think many posters are making a mistake in looking at this election in terms of "issues". It wasn't about issues. It was about fear - fear of brown people and gays attacking America. It was an election based on irrationality. Dean was absolutely correct in stating that Bush won this based on exploiting people's fears....but as we saw with this election, being right doesn't mean you'll get elected.

We are either arguing about a three million plus margin or a 136,000 margin. If we are speaking of the latter, this conversation really doesn't make sense because it was so close. Kerry did come close in terms of the electoral college but Bush won the popular vote. It's difficult to see how Dean would beat him on either point. There is no state out there that Dean would have won that Kerry didn't, other than possibly Ohio. West Virginia, Missourri, and various other states that seemed close earlier on were BLOWOUTS. They were lost by near double digit margins. What was it that Dean said that would have appealed to West Virginians? Was it his anti war stance? What would it have been that would appealed to those in other southern states? Was it his insistance that they were voting against their interests? Once again, I agree with Dean on this point, but that doesn't make a difference to these people. To them, they were voting for their interests. They believe that creating a theocracy in the US is in their interests.