They Finally Get It!

[sleuth]

(CBS/AP) The Democratic Party's sharp defeat in the 2004 election has already produced a round of soul searching.

The GOP recaptured the White House and strengthened its hold on Congress with powerful support from churchgoers.

Now some in the party are saying that the Democrats need to reach out to these voters with a faith-based appeal.

"I don't hesitate to stand up in a crowd and express how important faith is in my life. It is important to be able to express that in a way that is believable, and Democrats have to get comfortable doing that," Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., told the Washington Post.

...

Congressman Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., a former presidential candidate, told the New York Times that Democrats had failed "to speak to our faith, and to relate to people that we share their faith."

...

"We Democrats better think long and hard about what happened ... and how our party is going to connect with the hopes and aspirations of the people," Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., after watching Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., an 18-year Senate veteran, go down in defeat. "We have lost the ability to connect with people's value systems and we're going to have to work to get that back."

linkage: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/04/politics/main653667.shtml

Let's hope the Democrats get back to their roots.

Regarding this article in particular, I hope this is a realization on their parts that the 1st Amendment guarantees freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion.

 

[tlatchaw]

Amen!

 

[dems4me]

linkage: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/04/politics/main653667.shtml

Let's hope the Democrats get back to their roots.

Regarding this article in particular, I hope this is a realization on their parts that the 1st Amendment guarantees freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion.

I sure hope they do too...

 

[Toxick]

The Democratic Party's sharp defeat in the 2004 election has already produced a round of soul searching.

:eyeroll:

Soul Searching?


Does manipulating your image to appeal to a broader range of people count as sincere soul-searching?


With the exception of a very few (i.e. can count them on one hand), most of the liberal "soul-searching" that I've seen consists of the continued looking down of the nose at the "morons in the red states" and backhanded consession, only offered in the hopes of avoiding further reaming. This beligerant attitude will, no doubt, cause another backlash against out-of-touch tightasses who have nothing to offer but a morally and philosophically bankrupt agenda encased in an elitist and hypocritical attitude.


Faith based appeal, indeed. After these people are doing everything they can to alienate christians and "jesus freaks" they wonder why they've alienated them so badly.

Button your yap Gephardt. You're leaking stupid juice all over the place.

 

[Tonio]

Regarding this article in particular, I hope this is a realization on their parts that the 1st Amendment guarantees freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion.

I think your statement more accurately describes the extreme far-lefties rather than the party's mainline membership. The same goes for the Republicans--fundamentalist extremists like Gary Bauer doesn't represent the GOP mainline membership.

But I agree with the article's main point. Too many Democrats seem to equate personal opposition to homosexuality and gay marriage with Bauer/Robertson/Falwell hate-mongering, which is not the case.

 

[Hessian]

Faith without works is...dead.

The wishy-washy feel good "faith" of the Bill Clinton Dem. Party has about as much power in guiding behavior as Bill Clinton had over his libido.

THEY CANNOT talk of faith if their walk includes Gay "rights", abortion, cheap divorce, and free condoms to middle schoolers. They allude to the scriptures as a "moral book"...they deny its authenticity, they welcome Mullahs into their senate chambers to chant to a false god....this is the "Faith" of the Democratic party.

Thus...to start talking faith means...you must guide your life by a immutable laws and in subjection to His sovereignty--Liberals will be proven as false "beleivers " because they cannot accept that premise.

 

[Penn]

The wishy-washy feel good "faith" of the Bill Clinton Dem. Party has about as much power in guiding behavior as Bill Clinton had over his libido.

THEY CANNOT talk of faith if their walk includes Gay "rights", abortion, cheap divorce, and free condoms to middle schoolers. They allude to the scriptures as a "moral book"...they deny its authenticity, they welcome Mullahs into their senate chambers to chant to a false god....this is the "Faith" of the Democratic party.

Thus...to start talking faith means...you must guide your life by a immutable laws and in subjection to His sovereignty--Liberals will be proven as false "beleivers " because they cannot accept that premise.

Amen brother.

You can bet with certainty that after late Weds morning, the phone wires and internet lines were abuzz with allusions to this end.

Like Holy Shait! How did we fail to understand the depth, the enormity of these Bible-thumping evangelists out there in rural America?

Nobody told us they'd be such a - force to be reckoned with!

We gotta get on their bandwagon. Alright, everyone of you that ain't got something to do important, like spinning our way put of this one, GIT YOURSELVES OVER TO A BIBLE STUDY CLASS! WE GOTTA GIT RELIGION!!

 

[SamSpade]

I'm not convinced yet. Thus far, every Democratic analysis pretty much finds that their loss is due to underestimating some bad trait among those living in the red states. It's THEIR bigotry, THEIR stupidity, THEIR fear-mongering, THEIR selfishness, THEIR religious prejudice. Just as in the campaign, the issue is blame. It has nothing to do with building or creating anything. It's a matter of "we underestimated how stupid these religious nuts are".

SOMEHOW, the same electorate that voted Clinton in twice has now gone plum stupid.

Now I grew up with people like this. When they didn't win a contest or a game in sports, there was always the same reason - THEY cheated. They know the judges, they paid off the refs, their guys are over-age, they did SOMETHING because by gawd, we shoulda won!

So far, the most common reason I've heard is that the red state people are all a bunch of ignorant rednecks, gay-haters, religous bigots who like to leave their thinking caps at home in the closet. And they vote.

Did it occur to NO ONE that the constant barrage of Bush-bashing, vulgarity, headquarters shootings, vandalism and hysterics *probably* gained Bush some sympathy? Is it possible that things like forged documents and press stunts made people a little p*ssed that the party they always trusted - the Democrats - were every bit as dirty as the ones they vilified?

You know, whenever I LOST at a competition, I didn't beat myself up with self-recrimination - BUT I DID look at my mistakes, so as not to repeat them the next time.

The Democrats should look carefully and see - they gave this one everything they had - Springsteen, Michael Moore, "Fahrenheit 9/11", George Soros, demonstrations at the RNC, MASSIVE registrations of new voters, Rock the Vote. Kudos to them. They gave it everything they got.

We heard their message.

We didn't like it.

And we won't buy it the next time either if you keep telling us how STUPID we are.


Maybe it's time y'all heard *our* message instead of putting words in our mouths.

 

[Hessian]

"We heard their message.

We didn't like it.

And we won't buy it the next time either if you keep telling us how STUPID we are. "

This is perfect....well said.


Oddly enough...they think that if they just round up more of the disenchanted, the naive young, the minorities...and wag benefits in front of them, they win the election. THAT IS TRULY SHALLOW!!
Can you imagine the bitterness & distaught memos floating around "Rock the Vote?"...why didn't 95% of the youth vote for us??? We're so hip, so connected, so in touch???? Oh why?
Why? Because your hedonistic, self-glorifying, value-free message turns off youth that are motivated, patriotic, moral, and intelligent....that's why.

 

[rraley]

I am a proud Democrat and I am a proud, devout Roman Catholic. These two labels are not contradictory and the American people should understand that. My moral beliefs are guided by the Bible that I treasure so much and it has influenced much of my political thinking. It is because of the teachings of Jesus Christ that I place a high premium on caring for the poor, on providing all with equality, and on the value of all human life from the unborn to the criminal. If I were runnning for office or running a campaign, I would not be afraid to speak of my religious values because one cannot understand where I stand without doing so. Democrats and Republicans alike should only speak of their religion if it is a true guiding force in their politics. We, the public, cannot discern whether a candidate is truly guided by faith - but that candidate will have to answer to God if he is not.

For some of the comments posted in this thread...

With the exception of a very few (i.e. can count them on one hand), most of the liberal "soul-searching" that I've seen consists of the continued looking down of the nose at the "morons in the red states" and backhanded consession, only offered in the hopes of avoiding further reaming

I agree that this sort of feeling in my party (while not as prevalent, I believe, as you think) is incredibly detrimental to our success. We cannot view those in the red states as part of a "fly-over, backwards" culture. But the disdain of some blue staters is matched by the disdain of some red staters. There is a cultural disagreement in this nation and passions are strong on both sides. Some hardcore liberals will say that anyone in a red state is a Bible-thumper while some hardcore conservatives will say that anyone in a blue state is a godless, immoral soul whose gonna force your child to have an abortion.

Gay "rights", abortion, cheap divorce, and free condoms to middle schoolers

Could you define gay rights for me. What does that mean to you? After your response, I think that I could respond without taking your words out of context. As for cheap divorce, how are Democrats the only persons that created that. Democrats and Republicans get divorced, my friend. In fact, I think that the only president to ever be divorced was Republican icon Ronald Reagan. As for the condoms for middle schoolers...why hasn't President Bush stopped that if it was so terrible? I think that religious conservatives deserve an answer to that one. Or perhaps, there just isn't much of an issue there. Perhaps, the leaders of the religious right are using it to promote a thoroughly Republican agenda. I don't know, just asking questions and planting seeds for thought.

freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion.

Could you define what you meant by this? I don't want to take your words out of context, so clarification is good.

 

[Tonio]

they welcome Mullahs into their senate chambers to chant to a false god....this is the "Faith" of the Democratic party.

False god? The US government is supposed to be neutral on religion. The government isn't supposed to judge which religion is the "one true faith."

 

[sleuth]

Could you define what you meant by this? I don't want to take your words out of context, so clarification is good.

Freedom of religion vs. Freedom from religion.

The extreme left and the ACLU is largely against things like prayer in public schools, posting of religious figures and symbols in government buildings, religious symbols on state seals, etc. I for one disagree with this, and believe that religion is a major part of this country's history and these symbols should be viewed as tributes to that history.

Specifically, there seems to be a strong anti-Christian movement among the more liberal, most loud members of your party. They don't target all religions, only Christianity - take for example the case in California where the ACLU and others were fighting to remove the itty bitty cross from the state seal, but left alone the giant central pagan goddess on the seal, as well as a couple other non-Christian symbols, I think.

Those who were on that side argued that the prevalence of Christianity in our nation actually infringed on other religions within our country, and that justified the targeting of Christian symbols versus other religious symbols.

 

[SmallTown]

My question is this:
If people are going on and on about how someones religous background as well as their morals are why they won an election, what the heck was Bush Sr. doing during his re-election campaign? humping altar boys?

 

[Hessian]

We have Been Religious bias for generations:

Northwest Ordinance 1785...land organized west of the Appalachians. 8 mile grids...One center square was designated as a town center with plots to be sold to merchants & craftsmen...$$ was designated to build a school AND FUNCTION AS A CHURCH FOR THE COMMUNITY.

Jefferson insisted that the Govt printing office print his revision of the gospels to be distributed among the Indians.

Dozens of religious services have been held in the capital building well into the 1800's without objection...all of the services were protestant.

The Supreme court affirmed that this nation was founded and guided by Christian principles---in the 1890's!

Only revisionist liberal judges and pathetic leftist denominations have insisted on removing the presence of God & Christ from our public buildings...going so far as to drape curtains over scriptural engravings & moving statues with Christian themes.

Our history has testified in the belief in Scripture and the Judeo-Christian God.
Deny it if you will, history will quickly refute you.

 

[rraley]

In most instances, I do not understand why a person is so disgusted by the sight of a religious symbol in a court of Justice. The Supreme Court has an engraving above the bench of the Ten Commandents and many other courts and government buildings across the nation have the same thing. I have absolutely no problem with that. What I do think is excessive is the institutionalizing of prayer in public schools. First of all, there is no rule that prohibits prayer in school. I, for one, pray every day that I spend in Leonardtown High School; the thing is that I do not feel the urge to hop on top of a soapbox to do it. I am perfectly content doing in within the silence of my own heart. (Recall from Scripture, "whenever you pray, go into a room and lock the door."). If we were to institute school prayer, we would ignore the wishes of the minority of students who do not practice Christianity. Furthermore, if we were to decide that Christian prayer was all that we were to use, it would be difficult for us to even agree on that. I, as a Roman Catholic, would like it if we started our prayer with the Sign of the Cross and then say a Hail Mary. That wouldn't make too many Protestants happy I reckon. So school prayer, I believe, is a different issue than religious symbols in public places and is something that we should shy away from.

 

[vraiblonde]

My question is this:
If people are going on and on about how someones religous background as well as their morals are why they won an election, what the heck was Bush Sr. doing during his re-election campaign? humping altar boys?

Ding ding ding! The news tards act like everyone who voted for Bush is some fundamentalist or something.

 

[rraley]

Ding ding ding! The news tards act like everyone who voted for Bush is some fundamentalist or something.

I don't think that they are insinuating that...I think that they are stating the obvious...religious conservatives came out in greater numbers this year for President Bush than in 2000. They are also stating that opposition to gay marriage by President Bush helped to attract more support from African-Americans and Hispanics.

In 1992, the economy was in serious recession and was provided much higher premium than in this election. Social issues, while important for some, was not as important as 7% unemployment and decreasing wages to most voters. In this election, many people were solely driven to vote because of Adam and Steve getting married in Massachusetts while others, like minorities, were given another reason why they should break their historical loyalty to the Democratic Party.

 

[vraiblonde]

In this election, many people were solely driven to vote because of Adam and Steve getting married in Massachusetts .

My advice to those people is, don't congratulate yourself too much over thwarting Adam and Steve. I am 40 and I KNOW I will see legal gay marriages in my lifetime. It just takes some getting used to before the masses will go for it.

I do not remember a time when a black person couldn't sit down at the table next to me in a restaurant. I guarantee, Rraley, that your children will not remember a time when gays couldn't be married.

 

[FromTexas]

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/n...,2157220,print.story?coll=ny-nynews-headlines

Can you believe the crap a few of those said? Its symbolic? Or, my favorite...

"This election is devastating to all who believe in democracy."

Clue bat meet clueless.

 

[SamSpade]

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/newyork/nyc-suic1107,0,2157220,print.story?coll=ny-nynews-headlines

Can you believe the crap a few of those said? Its symbolic? Or, my favorite...



Clue bat meet clueless.

I can recall some intense times in college. There was this long running legend that someone, after failing a freshman test, climbed to the top of the Engineering building (the tallest on campus, about 8 stories) and dove off head forward screaming "I'm a VECTOR!". (Some time later, an old grad student informed us he also heard that story years earlier, when he was an undergrad - but there was no Engineering buiilding then, so it was the Architecture building).

At times I fought the same urge myself. More than once or twice, I went to the roof of the Engineering building and thought about that "F" I just got in Thermodynamics. But some things occurred to me.

Life was more valuable than any grade in Thermodynamics, and world is full of successful people who have failed miserably at some point in their lives. I simply had to de-emphasize the life and death passion I had attached to grades. This was a time in my life for education; there would be others to come.

I think when you're passionately involved in politics, it's easy to see the current election as the pivotal moment in history of good versus evil. Certainly people felt that way when Nixon beat McGovern, or when Carter beat Ford, and I KNOW they felt that way in both Reagan elections. The end of the world was coming for certain; Reagan would start WW3 with the Russians.

It didn't happen.

We didn't "get lucky" and God wasn't watching out over us to prevent him from destroying the world. The simple truth is, the stakes were never that high EXCEPT in our minds.

The world won't end with Bush, and it wouldn't have become Paradise with Kerry. We'll all go on, and if we don't get swept up in it, we'll all realize that most of the time, we don't even notice what goes on in Washington. Life isn't about who's in the White House, the latest political scandal or what grade you got in Thermodynamics. It's more important than all of that.

The Democrats have a bitter pill to swallow, one they've tried to avoid for years - the nation has never been behind their ideas anywhere near as much as they'd like to think. They got Clinton in twice (albeit with a spoiler like Perot) and they tell themselves they got Gore in. Other than that, they've had ONE very slim win in the past forty years. They're massively in denial, and they're having a hard time accepting defeat.

My only advice is: this IS democracy, and losing is proof of it. If you always won, there wouldn't be much point in voting, would there?