How many small towns can one presidential candidate visit?

[whometense]

This is a serious question.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2005/06/01/la_mayor_elect_dems_need_to_diversify/

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid says his party's presidential nominee, Sen. John Kerry, lost the 2004 election "because he ignored rural America."

Reid made the comments in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine that will be published Friday.

A spokeswoman for Kerry said the senator had an "aggressive" program for rural America during the campaign that addressed economic security and expanded health care coverage. Katherine Lister said Kerry looks forward to working with Reid and other Democrats on the issue.

Reid pointed to his own state of Nevada as an example of the campaign's shortcomings.

"Ninety-one percent of the registered voters are in Reno and Las Vegas, so you would think that someone who carries those two counties by a nice margin would be the winner," Reid said in the magazine interview. "Wrong."

Kerry got "slaughtered" in other parts of the state where the turnout was very high, Reid said.

Reid said Democrats can't win elections only in big cities. "We have to go to places like Elko and Carson City and Ely and let people know who we are," he said.

I like Harry Reid and all, but I'm really, really sick of seeing Kerry being personally blamed for this. Was Harry Reid campaigning for Kerry? How many small towns did he visit and how many hours did he spend introducing the people of his state to John Kerry? :grr:

[JI7]

1. Harry Reid is Conservative on many issues

that's how he gets support in certain areas. he is anti choice and he voted for the bankruptcy bill.

btw, why did the Dem Senate candidates lose in many of the states , especially in the South considering they were southerners and did campaign in those states.

[politicasista]

2. That's a good question

These were two excellent posts I found at Common Ground Common Sense that were interesting:

From clay,"You know when you have that felling you know it's right thats the way I felt about Kerry. His stance and record on the environment was almost perfect to say the least. Kerry was robbed. He was made a fool of. He was kicked around by bullies and called a baby killer. Many Dems stood by and watched and did nothing and some even joined in with the bullying and also
critisized Kerry and even reapeated the Rebubican gimme-gimme grab-grab white trash clan dance. The Dems next time better get behind one man and damn you if you f___k it up again. I've had it with the Dems that just wine
and complain and never even VOTE. God help us."


And another one:

"It is difficult, apparently, to remember the mindset at the very beginning of the election cycle. Bush had everything so tightly wrapped in the flag after 9/11 that to criticise the President was being called treasonous. The first thing Kerry had to do was get past that attitude, before he could even begin to campaign! And the "liberal bias" accusation was being taken quite seriously. I remember searching the 'net after the debates, and lists were made by the prominent main stream outlets of facts that had failed the "fact-check". In order to be "fair" they would list EQUAL numbers of faults for Bush and Kerry! As if that was the Truth! So Kerry would state a number based on a set of criterion to back up his point, and the site would point out that this was debatable. Bush would outright LIE, and that would be pointed to as questionable interpretation, and so it was all fair and balanced. Except you move to the next site, there is the same Kerry number stretch, and a different Bush lie! Through four or five sites! But with every appearance of fair and balanced reporting, making them seem equally truthful! When one MSM outlet tried to make the coverage truthful rather than "balanced" they were accused of liberal bias and playing politics and how could they defame our President in time of war! That Kerry fought through the mess and came within a hairsbreadth of actually defeating an incumbent in wartime, well, I am proud to have supported him. The press is opening up these days, you do not see accusations of treason when Bush is criticised. At least not in mainstream media. I don't listen to Limbaugh, so I can't tell what nonsense is going on with him and his ditto-heads. But the lies are wearing thin, and folks are starting to realize they have been played for fools. When the full story comes out, as I beleive it will in the next few months, the backlash will be huge! Kerry might even be seen as a hero by the time 2008 rolls around. Maybe not, but 2008 is a long way off, and so much dirt has been swept under the rug, everything will change by then. There is an Asian curse "may you live in interesting times". Whew! It's been interesting, for sure for sure!
Marggi in SoCal"

[Mass]

3. Edwards spent his time in rural America

Kerry is blamed for that all the time, and now they did not spend enough time in rural America.

Either Reid is saying Edwards was inefficient (which I doubt) or he is dead wrong. Anyway, where was he when he was needed, probably busy not being seen with Kerry in rural Nevada (who knows, people could have thought Reid was a liberal).

[Dr Ron]

4. Anyone look at the math?

It does seem hard to believe that winning where 91% are wouldn't be enough to win. I wonder how "nice" the margin really was.

If it is really true that Reno and Las Vegas have 91% of the registered voters and a Democrat can win them by a "nice margin" then Democrats should be competitive there.

Without using this to bash Kerry, it is worth looking for ways to reduce the harm in the rural areas, and perhaps find another area where a Democrat can win.

[TayTay]

5. I am leery of this excerpt

Reid is a realistic guy. I should think that he would be more interesting in 'next time' than in bashing one of the Dems he is in charge of 'herding' in the Senate. I have a subscription to Rolling Stone so I am going to wait and see what the article actually says.

I keep thinking of the Bill Bradley article in the Times a couple of months ago. It could be that Reid is making a 'structural' argument for the Dems again. (Dems need to have a permanent structure in place for the long term. This includes an in-house GOTV effort and all the other built-ins that Dems need to have for a sucessful platform for a Dem nominee to stand on.)

I don't trust AP Excerpts. They tend to want to emphasize division where none may actually be. After all, Kerry's own PAC is dedicated to a 24/7 50-state effort for '06. I think there may be way more agreement here than disagreement. (I have seen Reid and Kerry disagree, but it never struck me as anything serious.)

[whometense]

6. Article is now online.

Link: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/_/id/7371967

Why did Kerry lose, and what do Democrats have to learn from that?

Everybody says it was about values, but I don't buy that. Senator Kerry lost because he ignored rural America. Take Nevada as an example. Ninety-one percent of the registered voters are in Reno and Las Vegas. So you would think that someone who carries those two counties by a nice margin would be the winner. Wrong. Kerry carried those counties -- but he got slaughtered in the other nine percent, where the turnout was huge. The rural vote went five-to-one against Kerry, and he lost the state by two percent. Democrats can no longer win elections in big cities. We have to go to places like Elko and Carson City and Ely and let people know who we are. Until we do that, we're going to continue to lose.

I like this quote:

What differences do you see in Bush now that he's in his second term?

This first five months of the second term, he and his folks have become even more pushy than they were in the first four years.

[sandnsea]

7. That is the locals' job

If Elko and Ely didn't know Kerry's politics, that's because the local politicians ran away from the national platform. That's the biggest problem the Democratic Party has, in my mind, we keep blaming our national candidate instead of the locals. I suspect Harry Reid was more interested in keeping the mining vote than clarifying Kerry's views on mining and the environment.

Carson City is ten minutes from Reno, btw. That was just a stupid thing to say.

[whometense]

8. Thanks.

That's what I was thinking, anyway. But what do I know? In MA, except for Kerry Central and the NH spillover factor you wouldn't have known there was a campaign at all. I don't presume to know what was happening elsewhere, but I have my suspicions...

[sandnsea]

9. My extremely liberal Congressman's campaign

"As Independent as Oregon". That's how he runs. He ran on the prescription drug plan, social security, veterans benefits. I don't recall him running on the environment, because that would have meant explaining why he voted FOR healthy forests. So how was Kerry supposed to run against it when every Dem in Oregon voted FOR it? You didn't know that back east I bet. I wasn't thrilled with our rural campaign in Oregon either, but I also could see the complications when you're trying to keep your state senator and 4 out of 5 Dem Congressmen. Some of these local people are going to have to go out on a limb and explain the local issues honestly, if we ever want to win nationally.

[whometense]

10. That's really interesting.

For all the joking around we do here about our senators, one thing that's just about unique in MA (I think, anyway, I haven't researched the numbers) is that we're sort of a mirror image of the national tv media. All our national congresspeople are dems and our state legislature is massively dem. Our repugs are marginalized, and the local "conservatives" are more blue collar dem than anything else. So we don't see the dichotomy you have around here. I mean, there's some of the, but not much.

I can certainly appreciate that a local pol would need to swing rightward a bit to get re-elected. But it's unfair in the light of that to blame Kerry. I think there was a huge amount in his background and resume that could have been brought out to appeal to a more conservative constituency.