Don't forget, battles and elections lost & won are part of a larger longer

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

struggle.

One thing that struck me reading David Brock's "Blinded by the Right" was how the important victories gained by the right (by hook AND by crook) often had their seeds in prior defeats, and that the battles in which the Right were defeated often were the starting point for the battles that they won.

Even though Clarence Thomas was confirmed to the SCOTUS, the wingers felt it necessary to further trash Anita Hill and denigrate her reputation as part of legitimizing a close, controversial appointment and as part of their larger movement.

Even though the wingers were not successful in removing Bill Clinton from office with the various smear campaigns and investigations, the negative associations left over from those campaigns were instrumental in keeping the election close enough for the 2000 outcome to happen. Without all the continual media and RW noise machine bloviation about Whitewater, Travelgate, tinfoil Vince Foster and Tyson speculation, and of course Monica, there's no way the shrub would have been anywhere near Gore after the kind of prosperity enjoyed during the Clinton years.

So it should be considered that as painful as they were, close campaigns such as those by Kerry, Paul Hackett etc. should be explored and used to find the seeds of the victories to come.

[rockymountaindem]

1. Apparently, we in the Democratic party

prefer to throw our losing candidates, even those who lost by narrow margins, under the train so as to excise the shame of losing. Learning doesn't seem to be on the top of the list, sadly.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

2. I forgot to put it in my original post, but another thing that struck me

in Brock's book was that the Gingrich led wingers did in fact SEE the various victories and defeats, large and small, as part of the larger strategic picture, for all their moral and other failings.

[LiberalPartisan]

3. The lesson to be learned from the radical right is

Never let up. Constantly keep up the pressure on all fronts and on all the important issues.

[blm]

4. What they do is STICK by their guys no matter what - GOPs will stick by

a lie from one of their own better than Democrats will stick by the truth from one of theirs.

The same with the RW message machine and the left media. RW media is more effective sticking up for GOP lies than the left and objective media can stick up for Democrats.