The road to the White House--Back in 2004,

[hyphenate]

the voters in Iowa were the ones who made the final choice on who the Democratic presidential candidate would be, not the folks at DU. It was their choice to put their trust behind John Kerry, and regardless of all our entreaties, attempts at persuasion, and projected desires, it really didn't register with the majority of voters in Iowa.

It's like this: most people don't frequent a lot of the political sites on the web, regardless of whether the site is DU, Daily Kos, Huffington Post, or any one of a dozen other sites. And those that do consider themselves Democrats wouldn't go near Drudge, NewsMax, FreeP central, or any other far right wing site. Their interaction with the web is likely for entertainment, and not for education. And while some of the people might have a desire to see or read a website like DU, they just don't think they have the time to spend at such a site, considering that for a lot of people here, their first impression of DU is overwhelming.

Now consider this: for every 1 person who is politically aware, there are likely 10 more who aren't. And in a presidential primary, the majority of people who are going to vote are going to vote based mainly on a candidate's media exposure and familiarity.

That's why I find it difficult to become as contentious as some DUers get over candidates. We could debate until the cows come home to explain why someone is our chosen candidate, and extrapolate on what it is that bugs us about another candidate, and even if we reached a consensus, our choice most likely isn't going to be the candidate who wins Iowa, or New Hampshire for that matter.

I will admit that I was behind John Kerry in 2004, but a lot of that came from being a New Englander. The fact that Iowa confirmed my own choice was exhilarating, but I would have supported the outcome regardless of who was ultimately chosen. It was an imperative in the 2004 election that we ceased locking horns and stand united behind the final choice of the people of the U.S. Kerry had a lot of experience as well, and he's been courageous for a long time, speaking out against Bush right from the very beginning, something that most of the lily-livered congress members weren't, and in light of that, he was an excellent candidate.

I still have a difficult time here at DU when I hear people be disgusted when they sat that so-and-so supported the Iraqi War Initiative, but people forget that the original initiative was filled with lies of WMD, and that it was presented from the 2003 SOTU address in a way that made Iraq look completely complicit in the terrorist threats against the US. It wasn't revealed in ANY fashion that these things were lies at that time. We "trusted" the administration at the time, and had tried to be supportive, but once the truth came out, it was quite a while later, and by then we could see all the lies, the deceit, the neocon hand in the events leading to the war in Iraq. If this administration had been upfront, there would have been NO war in Iraq, and Halliburton, the Carlyle Group and other war profiteers would have been denied significant contracts and perhaps the people in the US would have been able to avoid all the shit flung at us over the past six years.

We gave in to the neocons because we (as a people, not as DUers) were afraid--the entire aftermath of 9-11 was to shrink from bold moves and stick to a practiced regimen. Security was more important than measures of freedom not because we were meek, but because it was the way that people died on 9-11 that made the difference--the stunning and horrifying scenes of people jumping from the twin towers, the thoughts that many were instantly vaporized and all the other terrible deaths were significant to fuel our imaginations and make us hesitate to question the resolve of the administration.

We were duped, and we know it now. Some of us were able to deny the goings-on to the point of wanting to speak up, but then we were also faced with additional pressure not to rock the boat. So despite our better judgement, we kept our tongues and chose to allow further erosion of our civil rights under an authoritarian administration.

Now, we know better, and more and more people are finally finding the truth, and the 2008 election will be viewed in a whole different way. It's not to say that we will have it any easier, though; the radical right has managed to find ways to cheat, lie and steal--however, some of their more willing agents are disappearing and that is a good sign. The integrity of the Diebold machines has now been questioned, and I think it will be more difficult to plan a coup based on the use of those machines. I know few will agree with me on this, but I think that John Kerry knew that fighting this issue in 2004 was not going to be acceptable to most people in the country, regardless of who they voted for--the contentious fight in 2000 assured that the divide in the country would continue until people could see the truth for themselves. As we already know, most people need to see it to believe it outright (except for those pesky fundies who will believe anything as long as it's not scientifically viable!) and now, even though it is too late for a lot of measures, people are finding out the truth and becoming more critical after seeing the evidence from their own eyes.

Here at DU we've been so vocal for so long, but the fact is we're only a small percentage of the voters in this country, and we cannot make up the minds of those who are simply not going to listen. And the Iowa primary is going to be the springboard for only one person who will ultimately end up as the candidate we will endeavor to elect.

It's not our choice--and we need to remember that. We all have our own choices, we all have our own desire to bring our own priorities to the fore, but unless something drastically changes over the coming year, the choice will be the citizens of the first half-dozen states with their caucuses and their primaries. As we found in 2004, a crowded field will eventually be whittled down over time, until only those with the largest votes and the confidence of the American people will be the one person we must accept to lead us up from the degradation of the far right.

The field is already crowded now, a full year from the primaries and the real campaign. But as we look at the potential candidates, so, too, will the potential voters in our country. And with some luck, many more people will find ways to learn about these candidates, and garner some information about their positions, their agenda and their personalities in order to make even a semi-educated judgement call on them. So while we might hope that our own choice is the popular choice, we must also accept that they might not be the future president, and we will need solidarity to go along with the person chosen by the general public.

As such, I would like to see less petty fighting over candidates, and I'm sure that many others here, especially those who lived through the 2004 debates over candidates, want to see a more restrained effort of supporting all candidates, even while we name our preferences in debates. In the end, it's a matter of being a united front against the terrors of the far right.

[XemaSab]

1. Hasn't Nevada moved ahead of New Hampshire?

You might see a lot of Californians going over there if the race becomes heated.

[hyphenate]

4. Yes

the schedule has changed:

On July 22, 2006, the DNC Rules Committee recommended a change in the primary calendar for the 2008 Presidential election. Approved on August 19, 2006, the DNC set the primary schedule as follows: January 14—Iowa Caucus; January 19—Nevada Caucus; January 22—New Hampshire Primary; January 29—South Carolina Primary. The DNC also enacted penalties for states that did not abide by this calendar by saying any delegates from a state that did not go by the calendar would not be counted at the DNC National Convention and thus would not count for the Presidential nomination.

[Olney Blue]

2. Excellent post. DU is just a tiny sliver of the nation's Democrats, and

we need to keep this in perspective.

[hyphenate]

3. Thanks

It always upsets me to see people arguing and throwing flames when a little restraint can result in a superior debate, but it also is annoying to see people act as though their candidate is superior to another when it really doesn't matter much in the end.

An example is Howard Dean--Dean is an wonderful human being, and was largely credited with helping to build a great grassroots campaign, and that's great. But it didn't help get people outside of New England or non-politically aware folks to know him better and see him in a vein that led to a nomination. It was only after the primary that we could finally put our faith in a few major potential candidates and cull the list to a more reasonable size.

[Olney Blue]

5. I like the way you think, hyphenate. Kick again. Great post.

[hyphenate]

6. A kick?

Just want more people to read. :)

[Olney Blue]

7. One more nomination will get this on the greatest page!

[NanceGreggs]

8. EXCELLENT ...

... excellent, excellent!

:kick: and a REC!

[truedelphi]

9. Is it we who decide? Or the Mainstream Press

I liked the reasoning behind every single word of your OP. Even the portions that I disagree with were rational.

I thought you were on target regarding many of your points.

But you mention that post 9/11, how we were stampeded into choosing security over common sense and liberty. To the extent that we accepted lies. (Actually a lot of members of DU didn't - just our Senators and our Congressional Representatives beleived the lies and rushed themselves into voting on the issue.

So how will the next twenty months be different from campaign trail '04??

Will we be stampeded into choosing whatever candidate the main media wants us to choose?

Will the talking heads become ever more shrill over the Iranian threat?

Is whatever mechanism that was in place to stampede or move or even nudge us into line still an operative mechanism?

And God forbid if there is another "terrorist" attack...

Also >As we found in 2004, a crowded field will eventually be whittled down over time, until only those
>with the largest votes and the confidence of the American people will be the one person we must >accept to lead us up from the degradation of the far right.

I contest the idea behind your above words. Some of us see those candidates that the old-line Dems fawn over as being nothing more than repukes in sheep's clothing. And viewing the situation as such, it is hard to support those that one truly believes are as Neo-Con as the repukes. If you don;t understand what I am talking about, we are faced with the conundrum of I see an old hag, you see a lady in a hat (Standard freshman psych ground-foreground demonstration.) We end up at "Never the twain shall meet."

I happen to put Dianne Feinstein and Hillary Clinton in the wolf in sheep's clothing heap.