You can't win a fight by not fighting.  

On a national level, for example, we know that the Democratic Party outsourced a lot of their attack ads to 527s.  I don't know whether the same is true at the Senate or House level, but it points out that, without an analysis of what the independent groups did, we can't have a full picture of each sides' tactics.

Kerry allowed BushRove to define him; he never made a serious effort to define himself; he didn't make a serious effort to define Bush; he never offered voters a positive message, other than he was a competent Not-Bush Bush-Lite.

John Kerry had a plan for everything -- except defeating BushRove and winning the election.

That said, he was probably our strongest candidate. Edwards / Clark might have done better, but the terrorism x factor worked to Bush's advantage.

The first big mistake Kerry made was retreating after his "crooked liars" off mike comment; if that had been the first salvo of an all out effort to tar Bush, Kerry might have won the image wars -- and cruised to a 10 point victory.

The last big mistake was going to his health care talking points during the last debate, when he was asked about the Bush Administration's responsibility for the flu vaccine shortage. If ever there was fat home run pitch served up to John Kerry, that was it; all he had to do was tell the American People that the Bushies were told of the problem in August, and ignored the warnings.

I switched to Dean from Kerry in the Summer of 2003, because of Kerry's inability to hit anything except bunts and singles; in the end, that timidity (and lack of planning) did him in.

The last irony -- in late September, Kerry said he was taking the gloves off. Meaning, he was wearing boxing gloves in a gun fight, and now wanted to go bare knuckle.

Sad to say, the DCCC followed his lead.

I'm not in the field of marketing, but even in the scope of a campaign, which was maybe 2 months, these ads built upon a common theme...her taking money out of a corpse's pocket, her taking money out of soldier in the midst of and "encounter" with bullets flying, and her taking money out of (I think) kids pockets.  This was superb...along the lines of really slick ad campaigns like IBM's that run on similar themes.

Some might be thinking, hey, but Matsunaka lost.  It bears mentioning the demographics of the CO district they fought for....let's just say, it's not CA or the Pacific Northwest here.  I never thought Stan would come that close.  NEVER.  And I think he spent far less than  Musgrave and Rep to keep her seat-which was on the order of 5-6 MILLION.

It ought to be payback time.

I am in Connecticut, we are in a blue state, surrounded two-deep (!) by other blue states.   And yet we return a majority of Repubs to the house.  It has got to stop.

1. Come up with a list of the thirty most unsavory Republicans in Congress (John Sullivan from OK would be one), and hammer them on their lack of ethics.  Call the list the "Dirty Thirty" and publicize it (Wanted posters?).  Make certain that people know that THEIR congressman (or woman) made the list.  Have good, solid citizens run as an alternative.  Recruit them, if need be (Hey, Republicans recruited many, many new senators).

2. In blue states especially, point out the members of Congress who voted for bills supported "Red-state welfare," the giving of tax dollars from one wealthy state (say, NY) to a rural, dead economy state (say, Mississippi).    This reverse Industrial Revolution (Industrial DEvolution, if you will) would certainly anger hard working citizens in Blue States. "We pay $1 in taxes and yet get only 43 cents back.  The rest goes to support tobacco growers in South Carolina, or unneeded federal construction in West Virginia, or oil and gas polluters in Oklahoma. Your congressman (woman) is literally selling you out."

http://blog.dccc.org/mt/archives/001606.html

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/poll_no_mandate_for_bush.php

"Bush managed to win the election by appealing to fear and by making the vote about things other than his performance in office. Americans still aren't happy with that, a new poll found. The Institute For America's Future conducted a post-election poll and found that, by a margin of 51 percent to 41 percent, Americans are unhappy with the direction the country is going--even among those who voted to return President Bush to office. By 49 to 45 percent, Americans said the war in Iraq has made us less secure. Even more telling, voters favored major reform of the health care system by 72 to 24 percent. The poll results show that America is indeed in tune with progressive values , said pollster Stan Greenberg."

Jeez, if we'd only had a candidate that articulate an idea in ten words or less.

being right isn't enough

From Michael E Gerber, author of The E Myth

I spent a long time writing about this here

I hope its worthy of discussion

Also no contests in CA -CA could have redistricted but didnt IL may still be able to but Blago and Madigan refused last year . IL could add 3-5 more seats with a Texas like redistrict.
There are 2 iowa seats -3CT seats
NM might be able to redistrct too
What is the deal in NJ?

And what to say about the response from the DCCC?  'Oh, we did go negative'?  As if they are proud of that?

It's all pointing to something else - the 'moral' issue, the negativity, the 'mandate' - all pointing toward a common cause.

I'm just not sure what that is yet.  My gut tells me that it has to do with how Dems define (or don't define) themselves.  

1. Pick a fight. Sounds simple but it is something Congressional Democrats have repeatedly failed to do since 1994.

2. Run a national campaign. While all politics is local and there are issues that can turn the election that are particular to a given CD or state the GOP has been running a national campaign for the Senate and House since 1994. We need to do the same thing. Come up with a Democratic version of the "Contract with America", urge every Democratic canidate to run at least in part on that platform. Of course to do so we have to have an idea of who we are and what we stand for as a party. The platform needs to re-enforce the Democratic "brand".

3. Leave no GOP incumbent unchallenged. I don't care how deeply republican a district is, make damn sure every single one of them has a credible challenger. Throw a little national, state, and local party support to even the no-hope canidates. Use the campaigns to rebuild state and local Democratic party organizations. Use congressional campaigns to support Senate, Governor, and legislative canidates. Use Senate campaigns to help down-ticket. Make sure all of the Democratic canidates are part of the same choir and are campaigning on some of the same points. Again this re-enforces the Democratic "brand".

4. Pick a few high-profile longshots. There should be strong campaigns with lots of national backing against a few key GOP incumbents even if chances are slim we will beat them. The targets should be the GOP House and Senate leadership and high-profile idiots like Musgrave. Even if we lose it helps re-enforce all of the points above and generates plenty of free media for a national Democratic Congressional and Senate campaign. The GOP goes after Democratic House and Senate leaders hard, we should do the same.

5. Leave no attack unanswered. Our canidates must respond quickly and forthrightly to all negative smears against them. It shows we are willing to fight and that we won't take any crap. For example Sen. Patty Murray responded in many the same day to negative ads run against her by George Nethercutt and independent groups. The response should not be whiney or defensive, but should either go on the attack or be of a "let me set the record straight" form.