Rebuilding: Part I

In the aftermath of the election season, a lot of the media has argued about the demise of the Democratic Party. Across the dials on television and radio, pundits argued that democrats are out of touch with American Values. They say that Democrats do not have a winning message. They label us with terms like liberal and soft--so much for the “liberal media bias”? These stories and arguments are not true.

Progressive Democratic ideas have been on the forefront of every recent debate. What it has taken a lot of these talking-heads time to realize is that our message hasn’t disappeared—its been hijacked. Democratic ideas and values have always been on the show room floor, but now they have new salesmen. Republicans across this nation have taken a “if you cant beat them, then join them” approach and have been successful at selling our ideas better than we can.

Take for example the recent attempt by George W. Bush and the Republicans in Congress to use a John Kerry campaign idea of adding $250,000 on top of the present life insurance policies for service members who die in the line of duty. (reported by Paul Begala on CNN’s Crossfire) When Sen. Kerry announced this plan is was met with disregard. Now it is seen as another example of the Republicans strong support for the military!

Looking back, at the core of Sen. Kerry’s campaign was a desire to improve our country by becoming a nation stronger at home and more respected in the world. The campaign spent months talking about ideas, such as the life-insurance increase, but for one reason or another people supposedly did not catch on. What happened was that the Republicans attacked not only the message, but the messenger, and people stopped believing the Kerry-Edwards team. It is hard for me to understand how this happened. For-Pete’s-sake, John Kerry earned three purple hearts in Vietnam, was a very faithful and religious man, raised a beautiful family and has years of experience. It is not to say that there are faults—every man has faults—but it remains truly amazing to me that people now actively criticize Democrats for being soft on the military and having no values.

Perhaps we should create the Democratic Homeland Security Department in order to protect our ideas from being hijacked and attacked. It brings to mind that old saying about “Don’t kill the messenger.” Well maybe it is time to expose the messenger for what he is and begin to take back our message and ideas.

A St. Pete Times editorial today begins to shed light on how Republicans distort the truth about Democratic proposals. As we all remember the 2002 campaign, although unsuccessful at electing a “human” representative of the Democratic Party, was very successful at mandating Democratic principals by passing Amendments 8, 9 and 11. The people of Florida loudly cast their vote to reform education by creating smaller class sizes and providing early education in the form of Universal Pre-Kindergarten and to protect higher education. During that campaign, the Governor came out with guns blazing against the Class Size amendment and successfully convinced Floridians that it would cost too much money (perhaps the demise of the McBride candidacy many would say). Today’s article explains how John Ellis Bush “paint[ed] himself into a corner with his budgetary gamesmanship [this year]. If class sizes can be reduced for a fraction of the cost he projected and without the tax increase he warned was necessary [during the 2002 campaign], then he can be accused of misleading voters.” Imagine the outcome of a campaign to reduce class size and a candidate for Governor, where the opposition told the truth? Would the Governor’s last name start with the letter M? Hard to say.

What is easy to see, is that the Republican Party has learned how to play the game by a new set of rules—and is winning.
If a Democrat comes up with a good idea and they like it—they steal it.
If a Democrat comes up with a good idea and they do not like it—they lie about it.

The Democratic Party is not on life support, nor without a message. There are over 4 million registered Democrats in the state of Florida, and volunteers numbering in the thousands. There is a lot of work that needs to be done to build a better organization and increase communication, and that work will continue. Democrats have a message of hope that we can do better. What we need to do now is fight back against attacks and misinformation by carrying that message. It is up to grassroots activists and local leaders to reform the front-line. The FDP will continue to evolve into a clearing house of information and to develop the tools and resources necsessary to arm you. Knowledge is power; and we must become the party of knowledge before we can become the party in power.

This is Part I of “Ideas on Rebuilding the Party”.
--Chris Petley, Poltical Director FDP