February 6, 2006
Democratic lawyers
As the NSA hearings are getting underway, Noah Feldman's overview from yesterday's NY Times magazine makes me really hope tha t we have great Democratic legal minds thinking through all of the legalities of this thing. We don't, and we risk getting caught off-guard by a White House that has.
, Democrats
June 6, 2005
The Death of Political Persuasion
Matt Miller asks whether political persuasion is dead. I'd say it's very dead and I'd find it hard to argue that it was anywhere near not dead. One of the root causes is something I like to harp on -- the remarkably consistent insistence of our would-be persuaders, politicos and bloggers and the like, to act like we're absolutely right about absolutely everything. And the flip side -- that those on the other side are so bloody wrong on each issue every single time.
That goes for big things (like Social Security, but we're right on that one) and little things (like what to make of some ambiguous data point in a news story.) The way things are now, we take stands on just about everything with the confidence of an infallibility heretofore possessed only by the Pope. That doesn't ring true with those of us who have neighbors and bosses and especially parents with whom we agree sometimes and disagree other times and still think that they are decent people with whom we can get along with all right. Which I have to think is most of us.
And this hurts Democrats more than it does Republicans because credibility is a lot of what we run on.
, Democrats
June 2, 2005
Primary Calendar
Senator Levin gave a speech at the most recent DNC meeting on the primary process
that I thought was just excellent. He makes the point that giving preference
to New Hampshire and Iowa every damn election cycle runs counter to what the
Democratic party is supposed to stand for -- opportunity for all, not preference
for some based on tradition. As the process stands now, the vast majority of
Democrats are so far distanced from the process of picking out a nominee that
we end up with somebody that may be appealing to the Democratic voters of New
Hampshire and Iowa but who potentially lacks the momentum to go anywhere from there.
LEVIN: Our voters, our Democrats, want to be relevant, and they want
to be heard. They want an equal shot at this process, and that is all
inspiring. ... What's at stake here is nothing less than a struggle for
political equality and for political relevance. That's what the issue
is here, whether or not this party is going to be open enough so that
we can tell the public out there, tell the potential voters and current
voters that we hear what you want, which is to be relevant, to be heard,
and not to be irrelevant and not to be ignored. And this party can make
a major contribution to winning elections as well as to responding to
that voter's need and that citizen's need to be relevant. We can't do
it under the present system.
The present system simply does not respond to that need to give the American
people a chance to be involved, to be heard on an equal basis. This is
an egalitarian party. This is a party which is supposed to treat people
equally, treat states equally, to treat voters equally and not to give
disproportionate power to any person or any particular state. That's what
we're all about. We call the Republicans the party of privilege. We're
the party of the people. We've got to end the privilege which exists that
two states have if we're going to live up, number one, to who we are as
a party but also if we're going to open up this process to new voters,
to people who feel left out and who can be attracted to the political
process if they feel it's open, that it's reaching out, that it's not
closed, that it doesn't give a preference to certain states or to certain
individuals.
Rock on, Carl. More here.
, Democrats
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