Sorry to be less than constructive (long day),  but I hate to see a good idea go to waste by not focusing on the details and following established conventions.

If they are still listening, I tell them that there is a movement to install Dean as the new Chair of the DNC.  And if they're not listening, I tell'em anyway.

As long as the media spin their spin, we can parse issues and frame all we want and it won't make a bit of difference.  The media will continue lying as they always do.

We must first of all free ourselves from their grip.   And then we must figure out a way to attack the corporate media directly.

Howard Dean for DNC Chair!  Let's really give the chattering classes something to talk about.

BUT...

I don't think Demorats are pro-abortion, if anything we are pro-humping. That is to say, we are in favor of family planning by promoting various forms of contraception that effectively stops fertilization from taking place, you know, before life is created in any sense of the phrase. Couple this with a healthy attitude about sex, facilitating a cuture of sensitivity to emotions, and a mind your own business outlook on life, I would say we are poised to take the lead on this issue.

Our culture has gone crazy corporate and it's okay for us to realize it, and "brand" the Party to compete in this world. What we shouldn't do is get too carried away with it. This should be viewed as ad gimmick to change how people think about liberals and Democrats...not a basis for pushing our core messages.

Both sides want to reduce the amounts of abortions. The Republicans want to do so by removing a woman's control over her own body and restricting the flow of information. Democrats want to do so by improving education, medical care and economic opportunity for everyone. There methods continue to be a resounding failure, ours a resounding success,

Put up or shut up. Their path is the path of failure, ours one of hope. Sounds like a good product to me.

Our problem isn't what we're selling, just our hesitancy of selling it.

Quit trying to split the middle. We sound weak. "Flip-floppy."

We stand for freedom. We stand for education. We stand for jobs. That's how you strengthen the American family. That's how you solve the problem. It's what we call the American way.

1. Women soldiers who are raped (by our own soldiers, in Iraq, or on military bases) and who subsequently get pregnant presently cannot end their pregnancies in a military hospital, because abortions are not permitted there.  Would you agree that women soldiers should receive treatment in military hospitals to end their rape induced pregnancies?  

2. There have been reports of "pro-life" pharmacists refusing to fill legitimate prescriptions for contraceptives.  They are supposed to hand the prescription back to the woman and direct her to another pharmacy that will fill it but in some cases, even that doesn't happen.  What about women who are trying to prevent pregnancy but can't get their scripts filled?

That is what will set us apart from the Republicans.

http://www.redstate.org/story/2004/11/23/21918/931

The last thing we want is to have it identified with internal party squabbles.  The whole point is to project a confident, unified party image.  How does attaching that to a "Dean for DNC chair" campaign (which is going to lead to some Dems saying "no thanks", which is going to lead to them trashing the branded pieces, which is going to lead to people making the wrong associations with the brand) advance this goal?

While the Dems didn't take the beating that Goldwater did in 1964, there is a lesson for the party in what the Republicans did in the aftermath. They installed a "nuts & bolts" pro, Ray Bliss of Ohio, at the RNC and focused on winning elections more than ideology. There may not be an obvious DNC candidate with similar credentials, but I have a lot of doubt that making the DNC job an ideological battle will be a good long-term strategy.

The issue for years has been that the liberals on the coasts have taken over the party and they have. I have no numbers, but I would daresay that moderates far outnumber liberals in the Party, they just have no voice in the leadership or media.

Moderate Democrats are progressive, but not liberal. The mistake liberals make is in labeling. It is true that more people than not are pro-choice, but they are pro-choice for VERY different reasons. The content of the pro-choice value is not uniform. If we considered many other positions that Democrats seem to jointly hold, we'd see that labels may be similar, but intent and content of terms or phrases differ significantly.

If you look at the Black community, the reason why republicans are not getting more Blacks is because of the historical context of overt racism. However, all things being equal, Blacks resonate quite well with a lot of conservative values. The only reason why the Democratic Party has the Black community in its pocket is not because Blacks are liberal, it is because the Party put its neck on the line for Black civil rights. That's the link.

I guess my point is that if you dice up coalitions in the Democratic Party, Blacks, Latinos, Unions, the hook is not liberalism, it is more political convenience. I think it would be a mistake to try to frame the party as a party of liberals, because moderates either leave or become inactive (I see literally dozens and dozens of these inactives, who are pro-life Catholics).

My take on what's been going on in lib blogsphere is that the left has felt marginalized and is trying to re-assert itself. Fair enough.

I think the frame should be more along the lines that Democrats believe in people, we believe that with help, from gov't or neighbors, people can rise and live the promise of the American dream. It seems that the bedrock of the Democratic party is in "being my brother's keeper." That in itself is the heart of progressiveness--"corporate" or "communal" responsibility. We fight for the environment because we are not simply out for our individual gain: we fight for civil rights because if you are not free we are not all free, etc.

I just feel there has to be a little more parsing out of the terms, i.e, liberal is not synonymous with progressive, and moderates and conservatives can also be progressive. And that the Democratic Party should not be framed as the liberal party, but as a coalition of progressives because more Democrats than not are moderate. IMVHO

This is a fundamental choice of anyone who wishes to be a good parent but lacks the resources to care for a child.

If Republicans want to decrease abortions, they ought to promote policies that help families, children, and the poor.  They don't.

Preserving a family's right to chooose when it can manage to bring a child into the world is a fundamental American freedom.  It is also the most core value of the Democratic party, and we can't ever back down from it.    

We have to slow down.  This is the slow time in Washington, D.C. and nobody is doing anything on either side of the aisle.   Things will start to heat up in January.  Let's see how the new team does before we just call for their heads.  I'd bet that, despite losing the Presidency, the Democrats are going to be more powerful come January than they have been for the last year.  

Remember from whence we came.  Last year at this time we were just waking up from our long post-9/11 slumber.  The nutcase Republicans currently at the levers didn't get there overnight and we won't displace them overnight either.  The path to electoral victory is a long, slow, boring one which is won day in and day out, not in the last five months of a Presidential campaign.

Where the hell you going to go anyway?  Nader?  He  got 1/3 of a percent.  The Greens?  Less than a third of a percent as well.  We Democrats be just gettin' started.

I am glad he is being attacked by the Right as "racist" for his comments about Scalia and Thomas. He deserves a buggering from every big fat idiot in this country.

And so do the Dems who elect a goddamn conservative their leader. When will they learn???