That year The Democratic party won:

3 open senate seats PLUS defeat 9 incumbents;

101 Republican House seats for a total 313 House seats;

and of course, 472 EV for President.

I realize with redistricting this is realistically out of reach, but I think we can take back both Houses. Engineering a realignment would go along way towards that goal. So what's the plan?

We need to remind people that Democrats saved Social Security from an idiotic Bush plan, that Democrats favor taxing wealth not work (borrowing from John Edwards), that Democrats are for a strong safety net and for a strong Medicare program that doesn't include huge giveaways to big drug companies, etc.

**I'm not even sure we need a major platform adjustment or roll-out.***

We get raked over the coals by almost every news agency out there for this kind of thinking. Oh, Bush is doing bad, and that is enough for us to take back Washington.  What is this fear that the Democratic Party seems to have of actually taking a position?

It is cold hard fact that illegal immigration and a pourous Southern Border are severely hurting the average Middle Class American.  Why not take a position that we are going to secure our border and return to their countries of origin all illegal aliens within our border?  Such a move if enacted and implemented would increase the Average Middle Class Americans income base by almost ten percent, and that beats any tax cut Bush wants to throw on the table.  OH!  Let me guess, such a stand is politically incorrect?  Who cares, may not be politically correct, but it is the only fair thing to do for those of us in the middle class.

How about a platform that calls for raising the minimum wage across the board (without exemptions) to say $8.50 and hour, with a ten year goal of seeing it reach $12.00 and hour.

How about a law that requires corporations to pay benefits to ALL EMPLOYEES, be they part or full time?  Using Walmart as and example, they have deliberately created a corporate policy that keeps most of their employees working at just under the full time status, which is why over 600,000 of their work force do not have health coverage.  Surely this is a goal we could have in our platform that would win over a majority in almost every state in the nation?

Social Security Bailout...how about a platform that promises the system will be bailed out, and those of us between 30-55 will not lose the retirement income we have planned on since we started working.  (At 50, the current plan to solve the solvency issues with Social Security would be devastating to my and my wife's retirement plans.)

The numbers are in favor of making a serious move, lets not miss the opportunity by trotting out the same old pablum.

It's not quite 1968; that was more geographic than this one. It's not quite 1992-4, that was more cyclical political jiggering, an extremely talented Democratic politician, and continuing geographic fallout of Southern realignment. It's closer to 1980, but the collapse of the GOP looks to be more spectacular because they are starting from a less strong position. But it has elements of all of them. If the Democrats play things about as well as they are doing now, and the GOP continues on the same path, it could be a perfect storm politically, a truly epochal realigment leaving the GOP shattered. I know it's hard to believe something so grand ... but I really think it's happening. I mean, Bush is already the lamest of lame ducks, and we've got three more years of the guy.

There's so much out there that it's likely at least one or more of the following sends him sliding further:

Iraq (you name it)
Fitzgerald (several ways this could get worse)
Cheney
Chalabi revelations
Abramoff
heating prices/frigid winter
inflation
GOP congress spins out of control
Alito revelation (not impossible)

What am I missing?

He needs to do something drastic...

New on EWM: "Rove out, Rover in."
Scaled down Bush agenda includes a "war on gingivitis" and plans to occupy Aruba.

The Bushies have done exactly what Saddam Hussein did. They've used chemical weapons. They've committed mass murder. They've invaded another country for oil.

But we as Americans are too biased to evaluate these facts. Let's stand for having the less-biased ICC adjudicate it, and be prepared to pay any penalty they demand.

Only then can the U.S. rejoin the company of nations.

Maybe we can't get that on 60% disapproval. Maybe it will take 70% or 80%. Whatever it takes, we have time to get there, if we keep hammering these bastards every single day.

All we need to stand for as a party is to acknowledge our existing treaty obligations, and to sign existing treaties. Extradition will be the natural result.

"So where does all this lead? We busted through the 40 point floor a long time ago. We have now busted the 60% disapproval ceiling. What's next--29% disapproval? Is that our goal? And after that, is it another arbitrary number? Or is Bush's resignation / impeachment our goal?

In a word, no"
_________________

A Democratic victory in 2006 and 2008, should be about more than just "Yay, team!!"  Your use of this public platform to dissuade fellow progressives from the task of impeaching and removing Bush/Cheney from power, is a disservice to our cause, that is the cause of the United States of America.

We owe a duty to the Nation to impeach Bush and Cheney, and to make them the first two removed from office for high crimes and misdemeanors, if not treason, as well.

We owe a duty to future generations to show the type of conduct that will not be tolerated: lying to get us into wars we cannot get out of; playing GI Joe with other people's kids lives, when you were too cowardly to serve yourself, and when your own children do not serve; outing CIA agents; robbing from the poor and giving to the rich, etc.

I could go on and on.  Anyone on this blog could, as well.

Impeachment/removal will be America's answer to South Africa's Truth & Reconciliation Commission.  The South Africans put an end to their evil (apartheid), by means of that device.  Impeachment and removal will be our device to put the evil of the Bush years to an end.

It will also be a signal to foreign governments, that the American values they respect, "are back in town".

Finally, we have a very practical reason to impeach/remove these bastards: so they don't pardon every last member of the current Bush regime.  

Umm...I hope you don't mean this literally, or else we'll be looking at 435 "just barely" losses...

(Yes, I know what you meant, I keed, I keed...couldn't resist :))

God willing, I'll be around for the next one as well in another 20 years.

But humor aside, I agree this is a major window of opportunity. It is the fickle middle that swings public opinion. Right now they are swinging our way. Impeaching Bush would be nice, but turning the country away from the Republicans and the Right would be more lasting.

YOU DON'T JUST WAIT FOR REALIGNMENTS, YOU WORK HARD TO GET THEM. YOU GET LONG TERM REALIGNMENTS FROM A STRONG AND CONSISTENT MESSAGE AND HEALTHY, WELL-FUNDED ORGANIZATION.

*WE HAVE NEITHER AT THIS POINT*

For the realignment the need is 62+% disapproval (everyone not partisan Republicans) and under 32% approval (i.e. moderate Republicans are split away to Undecided or disapproval).  The good news is at ~1%/month real decline of Bush support, the running rate since late 2000, that's less than a year away.

I think we're at the Nixon GOP's version of what happened to the FDR Democrats in 1965/66- exhaustion of their usefulness to The People and the start of disintegration of their coalition.  2008 should be our 1968.

There are some remains of a Republican agenda that moderate Republicans will let them finish or fail at before giving up fully on the hardliner-hijacked GOP.  The attempt to repeal the AMT.  Some last arguing and twiddling of abortion rights (I'd guess the Ayotte case will be the center).  Giving DeLay a chance to answer the charges and account for the evidence against him in open court.  The decisive failure of "freedom and democracy" with that constitution in Iraq.  The British getting out of Iraq.  One last shot at Bin Laden or Bin Laden shot at Americans.

You're right that Democrats won't need much of an agenda.  What will have to be done in 2007 and in 2009 is going to be perfectly obvious.  I still have a happy little pet slogan, though, of "Real Citizenship In A Functional America- Vote Democratic".

However, if we have someone like HRC, Kerry, or Gore, they'll change nothing. And Mark Warner will be nothing but a "care-taker" president, which is not what we need.

Money will do wonders, however.

Unfortunately, Republicans are still dominating the money game:

"The Republican National Committee raised $81.5 million, with $34 million remaining in the bank. The Democratic National Committee, by contrast, showed $42 million raised and $6.8 million in the bank."

Democrats Losing Race For Funds Under Dean

Pays to be rich I suppose.  Hopefully we can close the gap, but 2006 will likely be yet another election cycle where Democrats are playing catchup.

I think this is patently wrong.  If Dems don;t do a better job than they have in the last 10 years defining what it is they stand for, and separating themselves from the corrupt corporate control that infests both parties, then the opportunity for a realignment may end up going in a different dirrection that you think.  2006 and 2008 could be the ear of 3rd party building.  I can see 3rd party candidates at all levels on both the right and left, as well as the possibility of someone like Perot on the scene again, scooping up the disaffected independents.  

I have seen lots of evidence that these independents have fled Bush and the rethugs.  I have seen no eveidence that they are flocking to Dems in any great numbers.

The Dems' message: those guys are despicable, let us count the ways.

"America can do better. We stand with the American people." Nothing more is needed beyond generalities. Specifics are death.

The one sure way to blow this with independents is to do something like the Nancy-and-Tom fireside chats they did a couple of years ago explaining where Dems are different. Deadly. They were opening their veins right there on TV. Just hammer the hell out of them. They've earned it.

I know because I'm one of those independents the Dems need so bad.

I'm so pissed with bushco that for the first time in my life I donated money to politicians last year, and I'm so fed up with Republican BS that this year and next year I'm automatically voting against anyone with the R on the ballot.

What matters to me now is that anyone with an R will vote with the R caucus. That's the one that's ripping up the country and the constitution.

It'll take at least a decade for me to get over this and even think about voting R again. But if you blow it I'll think about staying home.

You mobilize me by hammering them.

In my opinion, there has been 2 political realignments in the last 100 years, 1932 (and immediately thereafter) and 1980 (and thereafter).  Both realignments showed that there are 3 necessary conditions for them to take place: (1) a record of policy disaster by the governing party (2) a campaign message that resonates with the public by the opposition party and (3) a program that is enacted once elected that solidifies the realignment suggested by the election.  In fact, comparing the 2 alignments really shows how important each factor is.  In the first one, a complete "paradigm shift" occurred, in the second it did not and it is instructive to see why this happened.

In the early '30s, there was clearly a policy disaster-the great depression.  Importantly though, FDR also had a message that was believable.  He adopted the phrase "New Deal" in his convention acceptance speech and gave a clear message that he was going to change things once he got in.  It is hard to imagine him winning any realigning type victory running as a "me too" Democrat.  Of equal importance is how he governed once he was elected.  FDR and the Democratic Congress enacted a series of reforms that met the crisis and produced positive results.  Not only that, his program was consistent ideologically and vastly different from the ideology of the former governing party.  Thus, before the 1930s, people believed that there was very little the federal government could or should do about their day to day problems.  After the effects of the New Deal kicked in, people saw that government could be an agent of positive change.  Thus, a paradigm shift occurred.

In 1980, high inflation, high crime, very high interest rates, a sharp (though brief) recession and apparent ineffectiveness in foreign policy created the backlash against Democrats.  And Reagan campaigned in a very thematic way regarding how he would change things once he got in office. Once he was elected, he was able to enact his program and there seemed to be some positive effects, yet the severe recession in the early 1980s and the fact that so many workers did not really get ahead economically in the 1980s prevented there from being a complete change.

In 1994, which was a continuation of the 1980 realignment, again the Republicans ran a very thematic campaign.  Now, people here have made the point that the voters could not identify the "Contract With America" by name let alone what the "contract" contained.  Yet, regardless of the voters familiarity with the phrase, clearly the Republicans succeeded in "nationalizing" the 1994 election both in a negative way (anti-Clinton) and in a positive way (tax cuts, less government regulation).  Again, the Republicans succeeded in enacting much of their program.  Furthermore, their program in the 1980s and 1990s was ideologically consistent and different from the reigning Democratic ideology.  Thus all the conditions were there for a realignment except one.

The Republicans were never able to completely "flip" the political landscape because, as Ive wrote several times, their policies just have not been very sucessful.  They could not "close the deal" with the voters the way FDR and the Dems were able to do.  Thus, they were never really sucessful in the third condition mentioned above.

Using these lessons to our present situation shows this: (1) the first condition is met; Bush's policies have proven to be a disaster and if the economy goes south, as it may very well, they are in extremely deep trouble, as opposed the merely deep trouble they are in currently; (2) the Dems need to produce an effective, believable message that they are agents of change in order to win in 2006 and 2008; we do not have to offer a laundry list of programs, but we do have to offer enough specifics so that the public finds us believable; and (3) once in office we have to have policy choices which both change the assumptions and beliefs of the voters and are also deemed succesful.

Thus, we will not get a realignment if we elect a DLC or moderate Democrat.  Almost by definition, these individuals buy into many of the assumptions and beliefs of the Republicans and their ruling ideology.  We must have a politician that can "flip" the beliefs of Americans back to the principles that we stand for.  To truly realign the electorate, we need a complete paradigm shift and you dont get that with politicians who want to win under the old paradigm.

Now is the time for Dems to assail the Rs mercilessly. Defining and refining the stance is intra-party now; the public part comes later.

Going after the Rs now as hard as you can is vital for at least two reasons. First, Dems have been convinced for a long time about the Rs and bush, but the broader public has not. They need to hear the message, and to keep hearing it. Repetition works. Polls show that people are worried about where the country's headed, uneasy about where the system is leading their lives and what it's doing with their kids. They need to be told why that uneasiness is bush's fault. They're receptive now because they don't trust him anymore. When you hammer him and all his enablers, you hammer everything the party stands for. That has to be done.

Second, one of the ways you define what you stand for is by showing people what you're against. Isn't that what got the Rs into power? But the way you tell them also matters. It can't be done in DC-speak or bureaucratese. It has to be done in straight, short, descriptive language. This is peoples' lives we're talking about, even when we're talking policy.

It's vital to do this deconstruction now-- you should be in a deconstruction phase.

In my view, getting more specific with the public about where to take the country should come in election campaigns. For now, the thing to do is what worked for the verdammter Rs for so long: define what it is they stand for, and say the Dems don't stand for that, and the American people shouldn't stand for it anymore.

This is the softening-up artillery barrage. Dems have so much ammunition they can blast away at will. Get to it!

I've been told at work this week that a.) one man with Jesus is a majority, and b.) it doesn't matter that Bush is only 35% in the polls as long as the 35% own most of the guns.

These are the preconditions for a form of religious fascism.

I would give this country no better than 50% odds of avoiding the kind of showdown the Phillipines saw in 1986.

We are in very, very dangerous times. As dangerous as the winter of 1932-33. Maybe as dangerous as the winter of 1860-61.

The beginning of William Manchester's The Glory and the Dream gets the atmosphere right, but is less of a scholarly history.

And by the way, thats the real issue - there are apparently, 37% of America, or almost one in three that think Bush is doing a good job. Thats a huge problem, especially in light of the fact that he's turned in a record worst 4 years previous and has started off his second term dead last among all presidents. He's the modern herbert hoover of our age.

alright. You say we've broken through the 40% floor
but only 3 points, with the error bar in the 3-5 point range - with just slight movement downward, I am thinking the floor is still here.

Why people think bush is still doing a good job is because you are doing such a bad job doing yours. That any people out there at all are supporting him is, ... well lets do a list ... supporting bush is like ..

1. joining the national guard for a few extra bucks pay in your pocket..
   
2. Enrolling in that great new medicare program ...
   
3. Counting up all that money left over from your tax cuts.. !
   
4. Rallying for oil corporations, after all they deserve to price gouge us .. its libertarian
   
5. Backing his nominee, harriet miers, so you can overturn roe vs. wade

So strategically you have to start going for the only way that Bush can still be around: his propaganda Channel. Fox news.

Fox is what is keeping bush alive. That ticker crawl across the bottom of the screen is keeping one third of Americans in Terror. No big surprise that Bush likes it that way - after all - didn't he attack a secret CIA soldier fighting Al Qaeda? Ask anyone in Iraq if Bush likes to scare people.. +their+ country went from nominally operational to a complete quagmire, unemployment before American invaded was, 10 percent, its now soaring past 43%, and basic services are completely out of order. Because Americans do not know where their enemy is, and because Bush asked them to attack without ever really having an enemy - Americans are being killed in record numbers by people from the neighborhood, men women and children whose brothers, sons, daughters, fathers or mothers were killed by American forces. Over 30,000 people have died in Iraq creating the largest terrorist force in the history of the world...

I dare you to call Bush's standard tactic of Raising up the Homeland Security Alert every time the democrats do something - patriotic.

But , for 1/3 of the country - they believe that. There's only one way - to have a news channel that dedicates itself to painting the Democrats as Terrorists. A news channel that supports and feeds terrorism. That gives the real terrorists in Pakistan, North Korea, and hidden out in America - a free pass... that are actively aiding and abetting - no different than dropping a black cloth over america's eyes - the sleeper cells that even today are plotting an even worse 911 and will , thanks to Americas eyes cast overseas - likely succeed.

I for one want nothing less than a 100% disapproval rating. I want each and every American to fight against the war on terror, by Fighting against those who would twist and turn and blind us with their arrogant, purposefully deceitful practices - only for the intention of lining their own pockets. These urchins have drilled down into our churches, and infested the cable news networks.

Democrats have taken the plant out by the taproot but half of it is still there. Root it out by first taking out fox news. FCC style.

Then take out the ties that turn our churches into Karl Rove breeder reactors pumping radioactive sludge into the heads of the masses - the poor few, brave souls that are still seeking good - misled for profit and gain.

Do that. Our goal is nothing less than 100 percent. Anyone who says Bush is a good president is like saying Osama Bin Laden is a friend of the USA.

"People pretty much already know what we stand for. As long as they grow convinced that Bushism doesn't work, they will come over to our side."

If anybody reads this low into a comments section, I want to agree with others who say this ain't so. The average voter doesn't know what the Democrats stand for. Otherwise, Kerry might have won last  year because there would have been a higher turnout.

People who are turned off to Bush must be turned on the Democratic Party for the Dems to win elections. Otherwise, they may stay home.

Also, Kerry proved that "Anybody But Bush" doesn't win elections.

Now is the time for the Democratic Party -- if anybody left in its leadership has any guts or vision and personally I'm not sure they do -- to come out for what it stands for and what it will do to turn America around. Rather than pandering to "values" voters, Dems had better be creating reasons for the people who don't vote to turn out to vote Democratic.

One key area is the economy. By the time we get around to the elections next year and in 2008, we're also going to have such serious economic problems to contend with that even the brainless news media will realize it.