Surrogates are the heart and soul of a political operation.  They help you build crowds, raise money, get media attention, craft message, shore up weaknesses (have a moderate act as a surrogate for a candidate who is perceived as too extreme, or vice versa), and attract voters.  They also, and this is important, get their hands dirty where the candidate cannot.  Republicans systematically attack our surrogates, like Cindy Sheehan, since they know that allowing us to have personalities that are also symbols allows us to frame message more efficiently and more effectively.  This is, incidentally, why people like Michael Schiavo are quite important.

John McCain is an excellent surrogate for the Republicans.  Democrats like the guy.  Even hard-core partisans.  For instance, take this diary on Kos called 'Support Sen. John McCain & his bill to ban torture'.  To paraphrase Atrios, my standards for a politician are slightly higher than 'not willing to explicitly legalize torture'.

John McCain fronts for people like Rick Santorum, and George Bush.  He fought for the Bush Iraq adventure in 2002, a Bush reelection in 2004, he fights effectively for a Republican majority in the House and Senate in 2006, and a Republican White House in 2008.  He knew torture was going on in 2004, but he still chose to support those who perpetuated it.  Our base needs to learn that if you support McCain, you support torture, intelligent design in schools, and all bad things Republican.  Period.

And this leads me to the second paragraph that I quoted.  One of the lessons that we should take from 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2005, is that having principles is seen as a sign of strength.  Tim Kaine used his stance against the death penalty to show that he is honest and independent.  Rather than punishing Kaine for believing something that wasn't popular, voters respected his honesty in confronting it directly.  He made it clear that capital punishment is a religious issue for him, that he is principled, and that he operates in good faith.  Standing up for unpopular principles is tricky, and Kaine did say he'd enforce the law even if he didn't agree with it.  Contrast this against Gore's muddled campaign in 2000, or the Democratic stance on the Iraq War, or the non-nationalized 2002 elections, or Kerry's similarly muddled campaign in 2004.  

What troubles me about the Zogby study is that a substantial part of the Democratic base seems to have gone beyond a willingness to compromise on policy and wants to compromise on principles.  All of the front-pagers on MyDD are consistently shocked at the pushback we receive when we advocate for progressive principles and advocate taking Democrats to task for acting against the most basic norms of human decency.  For instance, take this comment defending Lieberman by anonymous commenter bluenc:

I resent Lieberman's weaselly politics as much as the next Dem, but we have limited resources for 2006, and we need to focus on the real important battles. We can pick up seats in places like PA, OH, MT, RI, even AZ. We shouldn't be using our money and time to pick off a fellow Democrat. This will split up the party, and that's the last thing we need. True, the party leadership has been moving away from Lieberman lately, but there are still plenty of well-connected and well-funded Democrats who would be willing to go a few rounds for Lieberman. We don't need infighting right now, so let's nip it in the bud. Please.

This is shocking.  Lieberman is a liar and an apologist for war criminals who accuse all of us of treason.  He consistently provides cover for Republicans, and injures the Democratic brand.  It is not a waste of resources to replace a reactionary like him with a progressive Democrat.  Political capital doesn't work that way.  Yes, it will take financial resources to replace him, the political rewards in governing the country better will be more than worth it.  Let's take that one step further - what is the electoral damage of having Lieberman out there bashing Democrats and causing a consistent 'Democrats Divided' media narrative?  Pretty high.

And then there's the dishonesty in the comment. "I resent Lieberman's weaselly politics as much as the next Dem.."  No, you don't.  If you genuinely resented his politics, you would try to force change.  That you not only advocate against change but advocate against one guy on a blog putting his thoughts out on Lieberman means that in point of fact you are on his side.  Politics is about choices and trade-offs.  It is simply bad faith to whine about a politician and then when the opportunity arises to beat him argue strenuously against that.  That is the same thing as saying that 'I voted for the war before I voted against it.'  It is soulless, gutless, unprincipled politics, and it is also losing politics.  This is not to pick on bluenc specifically.  Bluenc in his/her profiles claim to be a college student, so it's fairly likely that their comment is an echo of conventional wisdom learned from elders in the political system.  It's not a unique opinion, just the last instance of something I've noticed that is fairly common.

Over the past few years, I've gone through a sort of journey.  When I started in politics, I thought that the problem was Bush, and that if we could only go back to Clinton it would be alright.  Then when Bush's actions didn't explain our predicament, since the war was prosecuted so badly and under such false premises, I considered the right-wing message machine and their fealty to power and the raw emotional narcotic of fear.  Then when that didn't explain our situation, I turned to the the media, since surely they should have punctured the lies.  Then when that didn't explain the actions of those who knew the truth but acted against it anyway, I turned to the Democratic leadership and local party machines.  Yet that doesn't make sense either as a total explanation, for there are people of tremenous integrity in and out of the party.

So I think the only answer to why we are where are as a country, and the judgment history will render, is that all of us, progressive or not, but all of us as citizens are in our own ways responsible for what has happened.  The numbers on the base being willing to compromise before negotiations even start suggest that we as Democrats seek someone who will pander to lead us.  That is wrong, and it is our failure.  Before we can govern, we must consider our own part in this tragedy, as Stirling puts it, so that we can move beyond it.  

I encourage people to take a moment and reflect on their own part in this failure. Because failure is a team effort, Bush is in the White House because of the efforts of millions of people to ignore the obvious - that the Republican Party is the party of crankhead porn monkeys, darwin denying dead enders, and sandwich sign prophets. It is not sane at a very basic level, and the necessity of the past was to gather against it. But from top to bottom of the society there was failure. Gore acted like the Presidency was his plaything, to be packed with his people. The Democratic Party swung behind him only lazily, the left spent more of its time attacking Gore than understanding Bush. The press kneepadded for the would be chimperial highness. And so it goes.

This then is National Failure Day, the moment when the failures in the old order finally dragged it down. One can "blame" the Five, one can "blame" the media, or "the corporations".

But in the end no leader ascends to power without a populace willing to take some corrupt bargain.

We failed because we didn't stand up for what we believed in.  It was easier to listen to the money  and the media exposure and the conventional wisdom, and pick a pro-war Democrat like Kerry.  It was easier to not hold him accountable after 2004 and demand an after-action review, and to not hold other Democrats accountable after 2002.  

It is easiest still to not hold ourselves accountable.  We still say 'it was their fault'.  The voting machines were corrupted.  The election was stolen.  Red states are dominated by Fox News. We have to swallow our principles and sacrifice our ideals, 'to win'.  The Democratic message is just complicated.  Bloggers know better, and want to fight, whereas the Democrats don't.

Nope.  These are all just excuses to avoid the question of 'what can I do to make change today, in my life, right now?'  

As progressives, we need to articulate a better logic than the logic of excuses.  Our philosophy is fundamentally about character, not litmus tests on issues or electability.  As progressives, we must rebuild a system where good character leads, and bad character doesn't.  This means that we do not ask reporters to be liberal or conservative, just that they be unafraid to speak truth to power.  We do not ask Democrats to say what they do not believe, but we do not allow them to subject us to fear-mongering tactics like saying that we need to appease the right-wing (or the middle of the country, which sounds suspiciously like the right-wing when that kind of advice is offered).  We do not attack those who compromise on policy in a process of negotiation where all parties give something up, but we do act when those who claim to represent us try to make selling out a principle of the American republic.

Above all we do not give in to fear.  And those numbers suggest that fear is the most comfortable companion for Democrats right now.  And just as fear is keeping Lieberman in office, fear will elect John McCain as President in 2008.  That is, unless you realize that a real dialogue is necessary.  In this country, the rawest form of dialogue happens through the ballot box, where we challenge people like Lieberman, where we say with our voices and our primary votes that real principled leaders have a place in our party, and support.  

I'll close with a snippet of RickD's comment. RickD doesn't think Lieberman is particularly vulnerable.  Yet he doesn't shrink from a real debate:

That doesn't mean it isn't worth running a challenge.  Defining the issues in a clear manner, and showing how Lieberman has been part of the problem: these are worthwhile endeavors.