We need a Barry Goldwater.

[leyton]

It occurred to me yesterday that the Democratic Party defined its entire platform this time (with a few exceptions, such as medicare) in relation to President Bush. Terror? Do what Bush says he'll do, but do it effectively. Iraq? Now that we're in there, we'll be more effective at it... but other than bringing in foreign troops, not many new ideas here. Education? Fund Bush's own bill, NCLB. Taxes? Repeal parts of Bush's tax cut, keep the rest.

We need a Barry Goldwater. We may lose again, but it will be worth it. Consider Barry Goldwater: he lost the popular vote by the biggest margin of any Presidential candidate in history, and yet forty years later, the Republican Party can thank him for the conservative ascendancy that has defined politics since Ronald Reagan. Goldwater lost the battle but instilled in the public mind a new conservative streak that paid off in spades for the GOP.

We need someone to run in 2008 who will run with bold new ideas. Government-sponsored healthcare. A progressive tax system. Strong protection of the environment. Fiscal conservatism. Raising up the poor. These may sound like perennially unpopular ideas, but if we frame them in moral terms, we can start winning back evangelicals who ought to be Democrats. We may lose in 2008, but in the long term it's better than trying to fashion ourselves into the GOP Lite.

[Zensea]

1. Hmm, I wonder who that could be?

I think I'll let someone else name names.

[leyton]

2. I was thinking Edwards...

while he's not my preferred candidate, he seemed to run the most idea-driven campaign in the primaries and he seems like the one to frame it all in terms of moral values.

Or Clark, I'm not sure?

[Tom Kitten]

12. I think we already had him around...

Adlai Stevenson...

[American Tragedy]

3. Perhaps, although the Republican party moved far beyond Goldwater ideals

Barry Goldwater had libertarian sensibilities. He said that every freedom-loving American ought to kick Jerry Falwell's ass, and publicly lamented the religious right wing's gradual domination of the Republican party. By the 1990s he was profoundly alienated and said as much.

[nixonwasbetterthanW]

4. This is not the party Barry Goldwater wanted.

Goldwater paradoxically began the party's resurgence, but the result is NOT what he wanted. He stood for fiscal sanity, international prudence and social tolerance via libertarianism if not government intervention. Those three values are unrecognizable in today's Republican base.

[itzamirakul]

5. Barry Goldwater was a RACIST!

What a slap in the face to African Americans that a Democrat would post such an idea. You might as well say, we need a Strom Thurmond, a bigot everyplace but in his penis.

[nixonwasbetterthanW]

7. Barry Goldwater was NOT a racist

Yes, he opposed the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Is that the basis of your claim?

[itzamirakul]

8. The man had a long history of bigotry, prejudice and RACISM!

Are you saying that he was not in favor of segregation or Jim Crow Laws because that is what the Civil Rights Laws brought to an end. So if he was against the civil Rights laws, then he believed in Jim Crow and segregation and no matter how you try to spin it, that is RACISM pure and simple.

He was a well-known racist in the south and did not even come close to mending his ways toward African Americans until near the end of his life.

This is one of the major problems with Democrats. They so willingly blind themselves to racism and try to pretend it either did not or does not exist.

That red swath of states you saw on election night was the result of RACIST votes - people fed hatred by Rush Limbaugh until they vomited it out on their voting machines and ballots. They were not voting against abortion, war, gay marriage or anything else. They were voting to give Bush a mandate to dismantle the Civil Rights Laws.

[nixonwasbetterthanW]

10. wrong.

I will not argue about interpretation over what voting for or against the 1964 Civil Rights Act means. It is ridiculous, however, to associate him with the racist venom of moral cowards like Jim Eastland and Strom Thurmond. It is a reflection on the stupidity of its nearly all-white electorate that 87 percent of Mississippians cast their ballots for him in 1964 just because he had voted against the act.

For he certainly was NOT in favor of segregation. He opened his doors to African-Americans at his department store in Phoenix LONG before it became a legal right. His personal life, indeed, shows nothing but contempt for racism. Among other virtues, he fought to desegregate the Arizona National Guard and voted for senatorial representation for D.C. residents.

He would have abhorred Rush Limbaugh's race-baiting.

[itzamirakul]

11. OK - Believe the revisionist history that you have been taught.

I don't know how old you are, but I lived through the Barry Goldwater period and I KNOW what a racist he was. If this is your idea of a hero, then by all means continue to support this kind of person. It just reflects the revisionist history so many of our citizens are taught to relieve them of any awareness of the cruelties perpetrated by people like Goldwater. Truly, I do not care WHAT you believe about him, now that I see that you are willing to battle tooth and nail for his falsified legacy. There are too many important things going on right now, especially concerning massive voter fraud to continue to discuss a dead man's living racism.

[leyton]

9. Geez. Way to not read my post.

I'm not saying we adopt Goldwater's ideas. I'm saying we need a candidate who will run a campaign of liberal ideas, so that in the next thirty years we can become a majority party.

[deadparrot]

6. I wasn't around until long after Goldwater...

but the more I read about his policies (though I disagree with them), the more I'm conviced that he's rolling in his grave right now for what has happened to the GOP.