In recent weeks I have received quite a number
of private calls and emails from people involved
with a number of House and Senate campaigns
asking for advice based on ideas posted here
and elsewhere.
I have tried to help every one of them, pro bono I would emphasize,
because this is a moment of historic destiny for America that will leave
us with a continuation of one party goverment and all the disasters that
will follow, or a renewed American idealism and spirit with a
rejuvenated progressive movement while the Republicans snarl against
each other about how they blew it.
This note will lay out specific initiatives involving
ideas, message, taking control of the debate,
and winning. A subsequent note will propose
ways that Air America, the Party, individual
candidates and the blogosphere can fight and
win in unison on matters such as mobilizing the
vote and instant reaction to Republican vote
manipulations and their inevitable October
Surprise. Though I emphasize again we must
have OUR October surprise.
I come from the JFK school of winning. When
I was a very young Senate aide, my bosses
were JFK guys and would take me periodically
to the old Mayflower Hotel where the great
Kenny O'Donnell would hold court and talk
about JFK and Bobby. They knew how to
win, they played to win, and they won because
they always took the initiative, they always took
the offensive, they believed in striking first, and
striking hard, and taking the fight to the other
guy. Qualities modern Democrats have largely
lost and must regain.
And when I worked for the House Democratic
Leadership we won, we controlled the House,
we did battle every day with New Gingrich and
the same tactics Rove uses today, with Dick
Cheney who was then our counterpart in the
House Republican Leadership. We did not
answer them, we counter-attacked by attacking
them. I cannot tell you, how many countless
conversations I had with Democratic candidates
and Congressmen and women from tough districts about how to win.
Lets make 2006 a Tsunami. Lets make 2006
a landslide. And understand the math: we can
win seats but remain in the minority; and we can win a slight majority
of popular votes but
emerge with a landslide gain of seats. Do not
believe what the compensated consultants or
pundits say on television. They have almost
nothing to do with the real America. On the
Sunday before the 1994 Republican landslide
the Hotline and Sunday Washington Post polled
21 alleged experts. 17 of them, many of the
same people in the punditry class today, said
the Democrats would retain control of the
House. 48 hours before a Republican landslide
they had it totally backwards. When you see
them on television today, ignore them.
Here are some ways to take the right issues to the voters to win:
1. Iraq: to repeat my earlier post, candidates
can propose that if Democrats win control of
Congress our first act will be to name leaders
on national security such as Senator Sam Nunn
and General Zinni to meet with the Joint Chiefs
and Iraq commanders and develop a rational
exit strategy.
Understand the politics of Iraq. The voters
who will decide this election have lost confidence and trust in Bush,
but do not yet have strong confidence in Democrats. Every candidate now
has some position, which is fine, but understand what the voter sees
today, is
that 465 Democrats running for the House
and Senate have 465 plans, with a national
leadership without a clear plan. This is hard
to communicate, and easy to demonize.
The way to handle this, is talk sense to the
voters, state that if Democrats win Congress
the obvious truth is that we will have a
Democratic Congress and a Republican
President and obviously they will sit down.
Our simple message is this. If Democrats
win some of the most credible and respected
national security figures in the Nation will be
working with us, to get out of the mess Bush
created. Vote for us, that is what voters get.
Vote for Republicans, Bush has promised two
more years of the same and the only people
making these decisions are named Bush,
Cheney, Rumsfeld and Rove.
The American people are tired of polities
so obsessed with Iraq, that the President
cuts and runs at Tora Bora, and lets Bin
Laden escape, and runs his policies so
poorly that he ends up recruiting more
terrorists, making the world more dangerous,
and playing into the hands of Iran.
Trust me, folks, we win that debate.
2. This is the big sleeper issue: Bush is
bringing back the draft through involuntary
military service, the most recent example
being the involuntary recall of Marines. He
is doing this because he has mismanaged
the war, the reserves and our force structure.
We take this issue to the voters: listen to the
news of what Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney and
Rove want to do, if they continue having total
power. They seem to want war everywhere,
and having started one war in Iraq that we
did not have to fight, if they have total power
for two more years, and push for more unwise wars, they will have to
find more troops and
that means more involuntary service which
is in fact a draft.
Go right in the face of Republican opponents
and make them answer this: for every war
position you advocate, where do you get the
troops? Are you supporting more involuntary
service and if there is another significant war
would you support resumption of the draft?
And to voters: the best way to prevent this,
is bring back the check and balance of a
Democratic Congress that will do its job,
which the Republican Congress has not done.
3. Lets have a pro-American energy policy
made in public not anti-American energy
policy made in secret in Dick Cheney's office.
Understand the Cheney link, make this link at
every opportunity, Cheney is less favorably
viewed than the bird flu. We must be honest
about it, and if we are, media will report it.
Draw brutally hard and true comparisons: it is
wrong for executives of major oil companies
to have severance and compensation packages
where they make hundreds of millions of dollars
in personal profit while our troops risk their
lives for inadequate pay. It is wrong for major
oil companies to have the largest profits in
the history of capitalism while some Americans
have to choose between buying food or paying
gouge prices at the pump, while veterans find
military hospitals closed, and oil speculators
use our money to buy mansions in the Hamptons and weekend trips to ski
in the
Swiss Alps.
Challenge Republicans to give back campaign
campaign donations from oil companies who
are more loyal to despotic Middle Eastern
business partners than Americans on Main
Street. Call for an energy policy that is truly
powerful and pro-American and creates new
energy sources and attack an oil-dominated
Republican Congress that favors an oil-
dominated energy policy, and then recycles
their bloated profits into Republican campaigns
so they can buy the next Congress, too.
Use aggressive, patriotic terms. Take the fight
to them. Ask questions they must answer. Do
the attacks the way Republicans do, except we
tell the truth. Lump the Republican President,
the Republican Congress, major oil companies
and Dick Cheney into one big bed and say its
time to throw the bed out of the house.
4. Go to the voters and say on the first day
of the Democratic Congress we will pass a
bill to help homeless veterans of America.
Understand this will win support and acclaim
from liberal groups who want to help the
homeless, military families who care about
these issues passionately, and religious groups
of every denomination. There are ways to
communicate this position that cost nothing,
that reach huge audiences of Middle America
that determine not only who wins, but create
the possibility of a giant landslide Tsunami
election. This is a compelling moral issue
and a powerful political issue.
5. And yes talk about challenging all of our
people to work against homelessness and
hunger throughout the land. Quote the Sermon
on the Mount, and Hillel, and JFK saying that
God's work must truly be our own. Do public
announcements where the candidate stands
next to a Minister, a Priest and a Rabbi in
whatever combination is appropriate for the
constituency. People care about these issues, we have a decent and
noble people in America,
and liberal politicians and their consultants
sell them short as well as Republicans.
Bill Clinton won a majority of the evangelical
Christian vote, and we should go after every
vote of every person of faith and be just as
aggressive taking our case to them, as we
are taking our case for a pro-America energy
policy and rational military policiies. Just for
emphasis I repeat: at every opportunity have
a public announcement with the candidate
standing next to leaders of different faiths,
and communicate this to the local church
or temple newsletter as well as local radio
and television.
6. Speak in terms of the American Family, to
be united, rather than rabid partisanship of the far right Republican
Congress. Use this phrase at every opportunity, use language and ideas
that average Americans relate to.
Our American Family supports wounded troops
whether or not we support the war; our family
helps the poorest among us because as JFK
said God's work must truly be our own; the
American Family wants to give our children a
better world, not a world of endless war leaving
them with shameful debt.
7. Look for opportunities to say nice things
about some Republicans when possible, such
as John McCain and Colin Powell. And yes,
yes, I will get some comments about how
evil they are, but I know how to win elections
in tough states and districts. I certainly have
my differences with McCain and Powell, but
they are better than Bush and Cheney, and
they have stratospheric favorable ratings, and
this dramatizes the kind of America we get with
a Democratic Congress of unity and respect
versus a Republican one party government
of intolerance, disunity, extremism and failure.
8. Go right in Republican face on homeland
security and level these charges directly:
Where were you, Republican Congress, for
six years doing nothing on immigration and
creates the crises we have today? Where
were you, Republican Congress, refusing to
protect our ports from the day after 9-11 until
today? With a Democratic Congress we will
have more American protection for American
security, while one party Republican Congress
has nothing better than Dubai port deals.
Every Democratic candidate and campaign
manager should get the book by Clark Kent
Ervin, former Inspector General of Homeland
Security, a Republican and a good guy I know. Page after page, issue
after issue, lets tell the country who will really make America safer.
Where were you, Republican Congress, trying
to cut money for airport screening? Where were you, Republican
Congress, shortchanging
local police and firefighters when you should
have been supporting them since 9-11? Where
were you, Republican Congress, when instead
of supporting nuclear non-proliferation you were
asleep at the switch while Russian nuclear
materials remain unsecured today, Pakistani
proliferators work secretly with terrorists, and
and the FBI still cant get a computer system
that works?
Vote for us, American people, and we will take
this fight to them every hour, every day, from
the first day of the new Democratic Congress.
I end Part I with this. The American people have rejected Bushism and
the Republican
Congress. The only tactic left for them, is to
demean us and slander us, to make us look
like we are alien, radical creatures who will
endanger America. They are so low they
cannot win by elevating themselves; all they
can do, is try to drive us down to levels below
theirs.
The American people love underdogs and
fighterss; lets take the fight to them.
The American people are tired of anger politics, fear politics,and
partisan vindictivenesss; lets stand for an American family with
pro-American policies, pro-American unity, and the American
spirit of courage and bravery. The American
people do not want to substitute our anger and
vindictiveness for theirs; they want to end this
era of Bushism and Republicanism and all it
represents, and bring back the good old USA
with a can-do spirit, a country that comes
together, and a democracy that is respected
throughout the world.
With overwhelming disapproval of the status
quo, the President, the Congress and the
media the American people are giving us their
message loud and clear. If we listen carefully
to what they are saying, we will win an epic
victory and send a message that will rocket
through America and rocket around the world.