PBS special on Rove - recruiting conservative Democrats

[TexasSissy]

I saw today part of the PBS special on Carl Rove, with commentary by the Dallas Morning News guy who co-wrote the book, "Bush's Brain."

I watched the part that discussed the rise of the Republicans in Texas. Texas was in the 1970s and before a Democratic state. The governor, the legislature, the local politicians were primarily Democratic. Rove is one of the ones primarily responsible for taking that situation and turning it into a Republican state.

One of the things I noticed in Rove's description of how he did this was that he talked of two key candidates they recruited from the Democratic side. They were conservative Democrats, popular, articulate, successful. One of the things they told the Dems was that since they were conservative Democrats, they had no future in the Democratic Party, so they might as well go over to the Republican side, and Rove would put the GOP machine behind them. They went. It happened. One of those guys is Rick Perry, current Texas governor. Reagan had been a Democrat, also, who was courted and won by the GOP.

I thought this was very interesting. I thought it would be worthwhile asking the question: How could the Democratic Party manage to keep its more conservative members, thereby preventing the Repubs from picking off the winners that appeal to middle America? And...should the Dem. Party work at keeping its more conservative members?

(edited for typo)

[two gun sid]

1. Of course we should.

We should also look at the repugs that don't follow the party line and bring them over to our side. People like Olympia Snow and C.T. Whitman have no future in the GOP as it stands today.

[clydefrand]

2. My PBS is showing a sacrilegious presentation of scantily

clad dancing/singing women with Christ pulling his cross up some steps as they sing, dance and mock him, I guess. I can't make any sense of it.

Can't believe that the fundies will like this presentation.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

6. Can I stream it?

O8)

[Crazy8s]

10. Jesus Christ Superstar

Call me crazy, I like it. I went to see the original cast way back in 1970 when I was 19.

[clydefrand]

25. I saw it a few years ago as a stage play, too, but what I was seeing on TV

was not like what I had seen on stage.

[TexasSissy]

37. Was it the movie? Or a special play-type show? Jesus Christ Super-

star is an Andrew Lloyd Weber movie. The Jesus Freaks, as they were called then, loved it. As did a lot of people, incl. myself. Great music. I mean...Andrew Lloyd Weber, for gosh sakes.

But they weren't scantily clad, as I remember it.

[clydefrand]

39. It was a stage play at an auditorium in Roanoke, VA

I loved it, too; and no, the people were not dressed as they were for the few seconds that I watched it last night on PBS. And I love Weber's musicals, too.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

3. Happens here every day.

And no Rove in sight.


Ed:sp

[RaleighNCDUer]

4. As far as I'm concerned, good riddance.

If they want to swap conservative dems for moderate repubs, that's fine with me. What we need to be doing is making the same, but opposite, pitch to them. The new republican party has only one use for moderates -- to pull votes that their platform will not get on its own. We've seen it again and again how they trot out the moderates to get the election, then once it is over they cast them aside again.

What is it about repubs that they let themselves be used in that way?

[FreedomAngel82]

7. Good point

I think there are some really good republicans out there who have a lot of issues that we have and maybe we could bring them to our side. If Rove can do it, why can't we? Maybe it's the key to taking back the country. The question is though: who would be able to leave their party and join ours and how would it happen? I think it's fine to have centrist democrats. As long as they follow the people they are representing and don't sell out (as in Liberman and Biden).

[Name removed]

24. Deleted message

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[RaleighNCDUer]

26. And how does it benefit dems to kiss up to turncoats who betray

us every time they turn around?

A dem is a dem by vote and by principle. Betray our principles and vote with the repubs, you're no dem. simple as that.

A big tent is nice, but it is beyond reason to extend it to those who would burn the tent down.

As I said, dump the conservative dems, woo the moderate (and one or two surviving liberal) republicans.

If the conservative dems don't want to be attacked, they can stop supporting the Bush cabal and the theocrats that support it. Is that a difficult concept?

[TexasSissy]

40. You can be a conservative/moderate Dem. w/o being a turncoat,

can't you?

It seems that different people have different ideas of what a conservative or moderate Dem. is.

I hear you on the turncoats. I agree that Dems should stick together AT THIS TIME especially. But there's room to vote your conscience in more normal times. I think you can be a conservative or moderate Dem. w/o being a Republican or voting for Republican bills (although the occasional exception may happen). Of course, these * times are different; an effort should be made to stick together, IMO.

[newyawker99]

28. Hi willoliver!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[ClintonTyree]

5. Dixiecrats is more like it..............

there isn't much of a difference between a Dixiecrat and your garden variety Republican. It wouldn't have been too hard for Rove to bring them totally to the dark side. He's a master at lying to people to further his and the neo-con agenda. I wouldn't give him too much credit for this move.

[TexasSissy]

8. Does that mean you don't think the Dems should work at keeping

the more conservative members? Or should?

[Name removed]

9. Deleted message

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[TexasSissy]

11. Rick Perry and Ronald Reagan are not Zel Miller types. Miller is

just plain wacko. Even the GOP wouldn't want him, I'm sure.

I think it's oversimplifying to just say the moderates are all like Zel Miller. They really are not. That's why they win elections.

I don't know the answer. I just thought it'd be interesting to see everyone's views. I was surprised to learn that my governor used to be a moderate Democrat.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted message

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[RaleighNCDUer]

17. I don't know Perry, but there is nothing moderate about Reagan.

He was just good enough an actor, with well honed charisma, to convince people he was. I think the fact that W uses Reagan as his model, his idol, rather than his father says a lot about how moderate Reagan was.

And there is a big, big difference between moderate dems and conservative dems. As another said, Dixiecrats. They got their start as oppositional dems -- meaning that they were dems because it was the republicans who led the north in the civil war. They never were inclusive or liberal, and the vast majority were racist, and in their later years were not far removed from their elitist, racist roots. Which is why they found a home with the new republicans, with Nixon's southern strategy.

And I say, good riddance.

[TexasSissy]

32. Reagan was not a Dixiecrat. He was a California Democrat.

As I say....to lump them all into the Zel Miller basket is incorrect.

You may say good riddance...but when the GOP plucked them out of the Democratic basket, they took over the state of Texas. Is that a good thing? I don't think so.

As I also say...Zel Miller is a special nutcase. Even the GOP wouldn't want him. He's atypical and NOT a conservative Democrat. He really is bizarre...and a Republican, as far as I can tell.

I tend to think that to fail to keep the conservatives in the party is to continue to give the GOP the country and most states. Maybe that's incorrect. Maybe the way to go is to get more and more liberal and kick out the conservatives (or not let them have a primary place in the party, as Clinton had). Really. Maybe that's the ticket. But I find it disturbing that any party would not find a place for all of its members, esp. the more conservative or moderate ones, since so many Americans classify themselves as moderate.

[RaleighNCDUer]

38. I never said that Reagan was a Dixiecrat.

Nor was he a California Democrat. He hearkened from Illinois, and made a lot of money in Hollywood.

What he was, was a thoroughly dishonest opportunist. He was still a dem when the HUAC was ravaging Hollywood, and he switched, even to the point of divorcing his thoroughly dem wife, to cover his ass. (OK, that is just inferred without evidence, but the timing was right.) And he married a hard-core elitist repub. He rode that opportunism into the governor's seat, and hooked his fortunes to Nixon's racist southern strategy, which carried him into the whitehouse where he presided over the most corrupt administration of the 20th century.

And the hard right nutjobs LOVE Zell -- they think that he and Joe Lieberman are the only good MODERATE democrats.

As I said before, being a dem is more than having your name on the right side of the ballot. It is something that is backed up by principles and ideology. The repubs have gotten where they are by strictly enforcing their ideology -- if one of their own doesn't vote right, he's targeted with primary opposition in his next election.

The left is not the wrong side. Those who complain that the two parties look alike don't say so because of the strength of our left, but the vacillating of our right.

We are the opposition party. We have to oppose, or we are nothing.

[paineinthearse]

13. What was the program's name? nt

[TexasSissy]

33. It was a special. An interview with Rove, about Rove. I don't

recall the name of it. I was doing something else when I heard it come on, so I sat down to watch it for awhile. Didn't watch the whole thing. It wasn't a Tim Russert show or anything like that.

[tijis]

14. Is this it?

http://www.klru.org/specialsession/past_shows/104.asp">Special Session: Karl Rove Speaks (It's available in Quicktime.)

[paineinthearse]

16. tijis

Thanks!

And welcome to DU! :hi:

[tijis]

19. You're welcome...

and thanks for the welcome! ;)

[newyawker99]

29. Hi tijis!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[Last Lemming]

15. Rove's power

lies in his capacity to manipulate election results--everything else is a smoke screen Don't believe the bullshit about black's being "anti-gay marriage" and therefore voting Republican or moderate Democrat's being lured away because "they have no future in their party" Rove wins elections by counting the votes. Those guys could have run as transvestites and not have a care in the world about getting elected. Don't take your eyes off this one fact: the fix is in

[RaleighNCDUer]

18. Well said. n/t

[kliljedahl]

20. How long before Lieberman goes over?

As far as I'm comcerned, he already has.


http://www.kliljedahl.net

[Name removed]

21. Deleted message

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[orpupilofnature57]

23. Sam Nunn!!

[rniel]

31. Now there's the one guy

That there is no place for in the democratic party.

[TexasSissy]

35. I agree. I used to stick up for Lieberman. Not anymore. n/t

[orpupilofnature57]

22. Stop calling themselves progressives, and by the same token Shrub..

and KKK arl should have to sign in as radicals of the most dangerous kind, in direct opposition to national security.

[applegrove]

27. Of course he wants the middle! Fiscal democrats (ones who

vote for low government debt & sound economics policies) are not a minority. Remember Kerry was one of those and Nader got 1% of the vote.

That is where everyone is. As to Liebermann... he is an Israeli hawk and until Israel no longer is a unsafe place and Palestine has no nation.. all Liebermans will be vulnerable.

Rove wants a bit out of everyone. He does not have the numbers he needs for an empire of the elites. And he will loose the southerners who finally 'wake up'. I'm sure if he could spend a few days around Lieberman he could find the right buttons to push to get Lieberman to kiss a deat arafat. That is what Rove does.

[Bridget Burke]

30. Are you one of the conservatives who've been driven away?

Your recent thread on why you were leaving the Democratic party takes on a whole new meaning.

Rick Perry is a lightweight who became a Republican because he thought it was an easier way to gain power in Texas. He only got to be Governor because Shrub got his social promotion. The Republicans don't care for him--there are at least 2 strong contenders for the Republican nomination for governor.

[TexasSissy]

36. No.

I am leaving, and have left, the Dem. Party. But as I said in my post on that subject, I am leaving because of the latest two votes by Democrats which allowed drilling in the ANWR (an issue close to my heart) and allowed Congress to intervene in the Schiavo case (a simple states' rights vs. federal govt. issue - many if not most Dems voted WITH the Repubs, thinking it would benefit them politically, I guess).

I'm just a regular Democrat. Progressives might call me moderate. Republicans call me liberal (I know this, since I post in a bipartisan forum).

I don't have a hidden agenda. What you see is what you get. This post of mine means just what it says. I saw a program...it was interesting....I wondered if Rove picking off conservative Dems had caused the shift in Texas from Dem to Republican (it was a striking and sudden shift...and massive, I might add).

Finally, this post is not about me. It is about a subject at hand.

Yes, of course Perry went to the Repub side because he thought that was the way to win an office. That's how they got him over there. They said they'd put the GOP machine behind him, for him to win office(s), which was what the Dem. Party would not do for him. They also made that deal with another conservative Dem., but I forget the name that was mentioned in the program. Didn't know him. I had not known that Perry had been a Dem., so that was a surprise to me.

[lala_rawraw]

34. He has a way

Of "recruiting" candidates. How old is he now by the way, Mr. Rove? Anyone know?