TIME: 5 Myths About the Midterm Elections

[ProSense]

5 Myths About the Midterm Elections

Did the bloggers matter in the end? Are the Dems more conservative? Did Republicans lose on the war? TIME separates fact from fiction

Posted Thursday, Nov. 16, 2006

MYTH: Joe Lieberman's victory proves the netroots don't matter.
REALITY: The netroots had some key victories.

...Of the 19 candidates that three of the biggest liberal blogs (Daily Kos, mydd.com and Swing State Project) raised money for, eight of the candidates won. This improves on the blogs' record from 2004, when Daily Kos picked out 16 campaigns to strongly support and raise money for, all of which lost. This cycle, bloggers may have been most strongly linked to Lamont, but they actually donated more money to Jim Webb of Virginia. Bloggers also made "macaca" into a scandal that helped sink Webb's opponent, George Allen...

MYTH: Democrats won because they carefully recruited more conservative candidates.
REALITY: Democrats won because their candidates were conservative about their message.

...In the House, they include Kentucky's John Yarmuth (who supports universal health care and affirmative action), New Hampshire's Carol Shea-Porter (she was once escorted out of a Bush event for wearing an anti-Bush t-shirt) and Dave Loebsack (an anti-war liberal academic) in Iowa. The same is true of the Senate, where the new Democratic members include Vermont's Bernie Sanders, a socialist.

The fact is, voters by and large had little sense of where many of the candidates they elected stood on the issues. Democrats told voters far more about what they were against — the Republicans who run Washington — than what they were for...

MYTH: The losses Republicans sufferend this election were no different than what you usually see in a President's sixth year in office.
REALITY: Redistricting minimized what might have been a truly historic shellacking.

MYTH: The election was all about the war.
REALITY: It's the dishonesty, stupid.

Many Democrats have translated their victory into a mandate for change in Iraq; the day after the midterms, Sen. Harry Reid called for a bipartisan summit on the issue, saying "The President must listen and work with Democrats to fix his failed policy." But...

MYTH: Republicans lost their base.
REALITY: The base turned out, they just got beat.

more...

Three typical MSM statement:

"Bloggers also made 'macaca' into a scandal" (Translation: It's the bloggers fault Allen got branded is a racist)
"Democrats told voters far more about what they were against" (Translation: Dems have no plans)
"The President must listen and work with Democrats to fix his failed policy." But... (Translation: This is not the time for a dramatic shift in Iraq policy)

[slackmaster]

1. The shellacking Republicans got this year was a lot like 1974, after Watergate

And if Democrats aren't careful, we could easily see a repeat of 1980 in an election or two.

BTW - This is a duplicate topic.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2974259

[let us vote]

2. Youth Activists won big on Nov 7

Check out this article:
http://creativeyouth.net/victory2006.html


11/0806:
In California, youth activists helped secure the victory of Debra Bowen over Bruce McPherson for Secretary of State. The key issue for youth activists is the voting age, which has disenfranchised more than 72,000,000 Americans and resulted in approximately 400 Americans dying in Iraq before a first chance to vote in a Presidential election. Youth activists spoke with her at the 2006 California Democratic Convention and learned of her strong support for lowering the voting age. This propelled them into strong action. They distributed their own literature in support of Debra Bowen and let Californians know that Debra Bowen's election was the most important statewide election in America.

The youth activists won big in other ways. Youth rights supporters Dennis Kucinich, Maxine Waters, Lynn Woolsey, Pete Stark and Barbara Lee landslided to victory. Dennis Kucinich and Maxine Waters are our strongest Congressional supporters in our quest to lower the voting age. Both have been under heavy attack by the Bush Administration. The GOP made Dennis Kucinich their number one target in the 2006 election and spent a fortune on TV ads and literature. Despite these attacks, Dennis Kucinich landslided to victory. Lynn Woolsey also landslided to victory despite a stong opposition. Earlier this year, Lynn Woolsey and Pete Stark spoke strongly in support of youth rights in speeches opposing a bill allowing all school officials to strip search children.

One of the biggest wins for youth rights activists was the defeat of Michael Fitzpatrick (8th CD, PA). Fitzpatrick co-sponsored the strip-searching legislation and sponsored a bill to delete minors from the Internet. The idea behind the Intenet bill was to prevent future online organizing as occurred prior to the large immigration marches earlier this year. Youth activists also manager to unseat Mark R. Kennedy (6th CD, MN), Sue Kelly (19th CD, NY) and Curt Weldon (7th CD, PA), all of whom co sponsored both the strip-searching bill and the Internet bill.

The youth activists also worked to send a clear message to Congess that they will get the voting public to oppose any war agenda. With all the young Americans dying in Iraq before a first vote in a Presidential election, the current war agenda is part of an ageist agenda.

Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul, the two leaders of the opposition the war in Iraq and the planned war in Iran won landslides against heavily funded opponents. The GOP sent out literature with Osama bin Laden's pictures to Cleveland voters in an attempt to disuade them from voting for Kucinich. Democrats, doubting that the anti-war sentiment was strong enough, ran a pro-war "conservative" Democrat against Ron Paul.. Shane Sklar's (Paul's opponent's) campaign went after anti-war Democratic groups and tried to get such groups thrown out of the Democratic Party. They failed in that quest and in their quest to unseat an anti-war Republican.
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