DNC Chairman Candidates Focus on South

[Florida_Geek]

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Southern-Democrats.html?oref=login&pagewanted=print&position=

anuary 9, 2005
DNC Chairman Candidates Focus on South
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 11:26 a.m. ET

COLLEGE PARK, Ga. (AP) -- Seven candidates for chairman of the Democratic National Committee promised Saturday to address the concerns of Southern voters, saying they had learned the lessons of the past two elections.

``You want to know my Southern strategy, show up,'' said Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor who dropped out of the presidential race during last year's Democratic primaries.

Dean and the other candidates seeking to replace Terry McAuliffe as the face of the Democratic Party spoke before a Southern audience at the first of several regional caucuses to give Democratic Party officials a chance to hear from them.

``You can't compete in just 19 or 20 states,'' said former Denver Mayor Wellington Webb, another candidate for national party chairman. ``You get better odds in Las Vegas than with that program.'

..more at AP ...

[BrainRants]

1. Meanwhile...

Wisconsin, Minnesota, and other light-blue states slip the other way. Gotta fix that shit too!

[coloradodem2005]

2. Who are all 7 candidates?

n/t

[sally343434]

3. More nonsense

Since Clinton and the DLC days, we've had a "democratic party" that essentially portrayed itself as, "just like the republicans, only a little less racist."

Now here we have someone's "brilliant idea" that what the democratic party needs to do is just scuttle any difference at all and become indistinguishable from the republicans entirely!

Here's an idea: Instead of falling over each other to kowtow to the lowest common denominator in our society, why not find someone who can actually lead? Instead of chasing after the votes of the bigoted, uneducated, selfish, and morally bankrupt of society, find someone who can lead these "values" (hypocrite) voters into a mindset of equality and justice for all. You know, someone who can effectively articulate true democratic values.

Of course, this might mean putting off that chauffeured trip to the tennis court or the dinner party. But sacrifices must be made.

[Eloriel]

15. WHAT the HELL are you talking about?

Really. I don't have a CLUE what your rant is about. Please explain.

You said: Now here we have someone's "brilliant idea" that what the democratic party needs to do is just scuttle any difference at all and become indistinguishable from the republicans entirely!

Where did you get that idea? I don't see it.

Further, if you want some real leadership, as you SAY you do, you need look no further than Howard Dean. Here's what his ideas for the DNC involve:

His speech on Dec. 8:
The Future of the Democratic Party
by Howard Dean
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1208-38.htm

and a briefer overview of his ideas:
Monday, December 06, 2004
Major Speech Wednesday
http://www.blogforamerica.com/archives/005625.html
Democracy for America Executive Director, Tom McMahon, sent this email to DFA supporters this morning.

Governor Dean will lay out a vision for the future of the Democratic Party this Wednesday at 12 p.m. Eastern in Washington, D.C.

He will outline not just a direction for our party, but a concrete destination: a party built from the ground up.

That means a party powered by millions of small donors, not millionaires. It means a party that speaks plainly and commits to concrete outcomes that affect real people. And it means a party that competes in every single race, for every single vote, in all fifty states.

You can watch live video of the speech on Wednesday morning at the Democracy for America web site:

www.democracyforamerica.com

Be sure to join us for the live webcast on Wednesday at 12 p.m. Eastern. Thank you.

Tom McMahon
Executive Director
Democracy for America

P.S. -- Since I last wrote to you, about the need to protect every vote in the Washington Governor's race, over 15,000 small donations poured in to put the Washington Democratic Party over the top -- they raised enough money to pay for a full hand count and ensure that every vote counts.

Democratic candidate Christine Gregoire's campaign manager wrote a personal thank-you to the Democracy for America community. Read his letter and all the latest news at the blog: www.blogforamerica.com

[tx_dem41]

18. So....you don't agree with Howard Dean? n/t

[radio4progressives]

21. Here ! Here! How about the notion of encouraging the CBC and...

the Progressive Caucus to break from the Democratic Party while holding office and create a Populist party with a bonafide progressive/populist platform.

Since, Senators and House Representatives have been known to switch parties or become "Independent" while holding office, now is the perfect time to create a significant party to lay waste to the phony Democrats who seem to be suffering from an identity crises, can't figure out that they're reallly traditional Republicans like Senators Lieberman, Kerry and Dianne Feinstein for instance. And it will certainly leave out the nut cases like Zel Miller .

[last1standing]

4. Dean was always right about the south.

It's a shame that some other candidates chose to attack him so fiercely about it during the primaries. I guess it's more important to score points than to be right in today's Democratic party.

The south and Midwest don't vote repub because they're racist, fundies, they vote repub because they think the Democratic party only cares about urban centers. That's what makes the grassroots effort begun by Dean so important. By setting up in rural locations and showing that Democrats actually care about the problems and issues that plague these areas (which aren't that different from urban areas) we can bring the south and Midwest back.

Sadly, only Dean seems to think of rural areas in terms of something other than a "strategy".

[Name removed]

5. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[TomClash]

6. When is the election exactly? nt

[Clark2008]

7. Looks like the start of another South-bashing thread

:eyes:

And Dean? He never showed up down here. Maybe if he had, he would have known why his comment about redneck truck drivers offended everyone from black folks to white progressives who grew up down here.

[QC]

8. Yeah, but alienating people whose votes we need is the DU way, apparently.

Sure, it's a guaranteed loser as a political strategy, but it's just so darn much fun to sit around congratulating ourselves on how superior we are to the hayseeds, you know, and isn't that what politics is really all about? :eyes:

[Clark2008]

9. LOL! n/t

[Ms_Mary]

12. Yep. nt

n

[radio4progressives]

14. Born and Raised in the South to Decendants of Slave Holders

Whether or not it was my family relations in and around Atlanta Georgia, or high school peers and neighbors in North Carolina, by and large, the majority were psychologically and emotionally (if not literally) still fighting the Civil War in the 1960's, one hundred years after the actual war. Too many to count, thumping their bibles to rationalize and justify the so called righteousness of white supremacy(and all that it implied)after that war a century later.

My father broke that chain of white supremacy in our own family, by marrying someone of a different ethnicity, and self-identifying as an Athiest, in a rather "in your face" style by today's standards.

He frequently spoke out against the outrageous hypocrisy and ignorance of the "The Southern Man" .

But my father was also a career lifer in the Marines and served two tours in Viet Nam, and unfortunately for him, bought in completely hook-line- and-sinker to the BIG LIE used in the day to justify that evil war, (keeping the "Communists from invading our own back yard")

When I was young, naive and angry, I actually contemplated suing the United States Marine Corps for murdering my father, in essence by brainwashing the reasons to fight that war.

I digress.

I left the South 35 years ago and made northern california my home precisely so that I nor my future children would ever have to be subjected to the ignorance and hypocrisy cultivated there. I did not ever want to be legally bound to any law,'cultural rules' especially the "religious" tyrants who i see as extremely repressive, oppressive, bigoted, sexist, racists, homophobic, and often misogynistic.

When i came to California i discovered many communities located mainly within the interior valleys, develped by big Agricultural and Oil companies, using migrant workers from Georgia, Texas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma primarily during the dust bowl/depression era and with these communities, were born second and third generation "Southern Man" thinking communities here. Everyone has read The Grapes of Wrath or at least seen the film.

There are progressive thinking people everywhere, as well as the tyrannical, backward thinking people. It's imperative for all of our childrens sake, the sake of reviving our democracy and preserving our great Constitution, that the latter is promptly annihilated and given a final burial once and for all. There are plenty of reasons for bashing the South, and we're looking at the consequences of the actions of our own fore fathers.

So I would say to my Southern compatriots, this cross is ours to bear mostly alone, and we should carry that burden with utmost courage and conviction, with dignity and resolve.

[Ms_Mary]

17. What kind of freaks did you live around? I'm quite glad that doesn't

represent the majority of people I know. I won't deny that the attitudes do exist, but thankfully, they aren't that prominent.

Speaking of southern hypocrisy, I had a business trip to Greenville, SC and happened to pass by Bob Jones University yesterday. The lawn was meticulously manicured, but I didn't see any students out.

[radio4progressives]

22. Freaks?

I'm talking about the general population - who fought against civil rights, de-segregation, who fought against Blacks having the right to vote, to even SIT on the same bus, much less sit in the back. I'm talking about Preachers standing behind the pulpit deamonization of catholics and jews - (accusing catholicism as pagan and devil worshipers) as well as deamonization anyone that didn't agree with their pov.

in the fifties and sixties that was *most* of the population, and they didn't even have any media to echo their pov.

kind of like all those "freaks" that had shown up for Bush rallies, that turned out to vote in 2000 and 2004, and appearing on on television, with their nut case idols like Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity et al.

you know, those freaks..

[Eloriel]

16. I don't have any idea where your "HERE" is but Dean was IN

the South a lot. He was in Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina, Virginia, maybe others, Texas, as well as further out West and Southwest.

And for YOUR information, not everyone was "offended" by his remarks about the Confederate flag. People let him get away with it without objection for about a year, including his Deputy Campaign Manager, Andy Pringle, who'd been Carole Mosely-Braun's campaign manager. He got a standing ovation when he used that very line at one of the DNC meetings he attended.

And none other than Jesse Jackson, Jr. supported him thoroughly and defended his comments (tho I don't have that link), but I do have this -- please note the name RICE. Yes, this woman is a civil rights attorney and relative (cousin, I think) of Condaleeza Rice:

Published on Thursday, November 6, 2003 by the Los Angeles Times
Confederate Flap: Stand Firm, Howard Dean
by Constance L. Rice
http://www.commondreams.org/scriptfiles/views03/1106-08.htm

[high density]

19. Tell me again why the south can't vote for people from the Northeast?

(By the way, people think Bush is from Texas.)

[HereSince1628]

10. Roemer doesn't know enough geography or electoral history

to get my support...

"Roemer said if elected he would work harder to appeal to rural voters in the South and Midwest, two areas that have gone solidly to Bush in the last two elections"

[zulchzulu]

11. Focusing on "the South" is as vague as focusing on "the West"

There are many progressives in the South...the election was pretty close in a few states.

This whole notion of the "South" as being one big, tooth-challenged, Jesus-freak drawl y'all grandpa and his sister/daughter who love Hee Haw garbage is pointlessly off the mark.

When we talk about "the West", why isn't Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming and the Dakotas seen as part of the picture.

I've lived in the South and have been through the red Western states and frankly, the Southerners are nicer people and more open-minded for the most part.

We don't need to assume that Democrats have to appeal to the South by attracting rednecks, born-agains and KKK members. You'd find as many if not more in the red West states.

[Ms_Mary]

13. I agree. I've never been out of the south and I'm remarkably progressive.

[bluedonkey]

20. Ladi effen da

Now we hear about the South again! That's the only time they remember us,when they want to get elected!
If I wasn't a lady I would tell them:'Fuck you and the horse you rode in on'!

[FreeStateDemocrat]

23. NYT: Democrats Pick Campaign Chief

By THE NEW YORK TIMES
Published: January 10, 2005

WASHINGTON, Jan 9 - Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, a former senior adviser in the Clinton administration, was named on Sunday as the new chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. (CONTD)

http://www.nytimes.com