Where the bleep was the Democratic Infrastructure in 2000 and 2004?

[ray of light]

We could have used it back then.

Read this great diary at Kos.

"We didn’t put any resources in small states."

-- Clinton Finance Chair Hassan Nemazee, quoted by the New York Observer, on why Clinton might lose the Democratic nomination.

There is a reason why Taegen Goddard has this listed as the quote of the day over at Political Wire. Because this one sentence reveals both all that is wrong with the Clinton Democratic Party machine, and all that is right with the netroots, the Dean 50-state strategy and the Obama campaign.

When the Clintons rescued the Democratic Party from its electoral coma in 1992, they never sought to cure the patient by revitalizing it at the cellular level. Instead, the Clintons and the Democratic establishment at the time only sought to keep the patient barely alive and breathing, so as to suit the very narrow and vain electoral success of one man. There was never any effort to build the party. To use the capital of the Clinton's electoral success in 1992 and 1996 to reach new voters and bring them into the Democratic fold for good. There was never any effort to build the party at the local level.



It is clear now why the Clintons never did that. For if they gave voice to new Democrats, they would lose control over that voice. They would lose control over the message. Thus, the Democratic Party, and more specifically, the DNC, existed only to serve the electoral prospects of the Clintons during the 1990's, and not to serve the future of the Democratic Party. Indeed, it did not even serve the present of the Democratic Party, for the Party, through this neglect, suffered worse electoral losses nationwide than it ever suffered under the Reagan Revolution, which, ironically, was the disease the Clintons were brought in to cure.



No, the Clintons kept the Party alive to serve them, and in the process, the Party grew weaker. No attention was paid to the smaller states. No attention was paid to the local level. No resources were spend unless they advanced the interests of the Clintons.

~~~
IMAGINE if we had only had an infrastructure...there wouldn't have been a Bush. There wouldn't have been an Iraq occupation. There wouldn't have been Katrina's aftermath.

[Island Blue]

1. That's a fine question Ray -

where WAS the party Infrastructure? Nice post. K & R.

[ray of light]

3. I know where they WEREN'T in 2004, specifically. I had a friend in N.C. who

had NO DEMOCRATIC OFFICE to volunteer in. Oh...well. actually it was opened once per week. It had no computers. No database.

She brought the phone book home with her, invited friends over, and they created their own outreach!

North Carolina probably won in 04 too! I wonder what would have happened had they had a real campaign headquarters with more than one brassy lady and her kids and their friends making the calls!

[DiamondJay]

2. oh yea cuz dem party infrastructure was around during Dukakis and Mondale too

dem party infrastructure was DOA the second Reagan ran for reelection in 1984. Clinton did not hurt it. The fact is he DID bring new voters into the fold. Our popular vote average was about 42 percent in the 3 elections before him. Now it is 48.1 percent in the two elections after him. Our electoral vote 3 elections before him averaged 47.5. Now in the 2 elections after him it is 258. I think he helped our party. Many states like CA never voted democrat before him, as did states like PA, CT, NH, WI, amongst others but after clinton they have always voted blue.

[ProSense]

5. .

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ProSense]

8. delete n/t

[crispini]

4. We had no Howard Dean as chair.

Everyone was being too damn busy triangulating and calculating their way to "victory" :eyes:

[Catchawave]

9. Wasn't that McAwful's rein ?

Hi crispi :loveya:

[crispini]

10. Indeed.

Hi Catch! :loveya: Nice to seeya! :hi:

[blm]

12. Rendell then McAuliffe - TeamClinton's goal was to get PAST 2000, 2004 thru and keep

2008 open for Hillary.

[blm]

14. If we had a strong party infrastructure Gore and Kerry would've won in landslides.

But TeamClinton and Dem party spokespeople then convinced party faithful and media that it was all Gore's fault and then all Kerry's fault.

Both men ran winning campaigns. The Dem party had no infrastructure in place strong enough to get their votes allowed, cast and counted.

TeamClinton is set against Dean because he has spent the last 3 years knowing damn well how badly collapsed infrastructure was in so many key states.

He KNOWS how badly the DNC screwed up all these years and they need to push him out and make HIM appear to be the one in error (MI and Fla). Just as they did to Gore and Kerry as candidates.

[K Gardner]

7. We've never recovered, never regained a backbone, but we will. Yes we will. And

there will be tens of millions of voices and pairs of feet making sure we take our party and our country back. Excellent post !

[UpInArms]

11. in 2000, my hubby and I looked everywhere and couldn't find

a Democratic office - Oklahoma, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Missouri - couldn't even find a Gore bumper sticker.

2004 - I still have my Kerry/Edwards sticker on my visor in my car -

but I was told that we had to have an "electible" candidate :shrug:

[blm]

13. In 2000 SC there was NO Dem office at all. IN 2004 NC it was back of a flower shop.

.

[ray of light]

16. In 2004, it was in A_____'s home...and any one visiting got lectured and

told to make some calls!

[ray of light]

15. He was definitely electible. Afterall, he probably WON except that the

Republicans cheated, suppressed, and manipulated the vote in numerous states. (Such as Ohio, Florida, New Mexico.) In other states such as Nevada the Republicans hired firms to throw out Democratic voter registrations! In North Carolina, all the early voting showed a definitive lead for Kerry BUT after x amount of votes, the machines ERASED votes!

Even in Ohio, Carville told Mary Matlin who in turn told Dick CHeney that Kerry was protesting Ohio.

The conspiracy was so deep, even now we have no specific suspects to charge. We only have mounting evidence that things were rigged and that the nation as a whole was ripped off.

Regarding Gore...

In 2000, when the media spoke about the Republican protest of the vote counters...when did you find out that those hallway disrupters had been hired by Bush and given nice cozy appointments?

I found out in 2005--after the election!

[UpInArms]

26. I continue to say

that if I knew then what I know now - I would have been on a plane to Florida with a baseball bat in my bag to kneecap all those operatives in the Miami-Dade office

and btw - the crap-weasel washington post didn't tell you what happened until 2005

Monday, January 24, 2005; Page A13

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31074-2005Jan23.html

Miami 'Riot' Squad: Where Are They Now?



excerpt:

No. 1. Tom Pyle, who had worked for Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), went private sector a few months later, getting a job as director of federal affairs for Koch Industries.

No. 7. Roger Morse, another House aide, moved on to the law and lobbying firm Preston Gates Ellis & Rouvelas Meeds. "I was also privileged to lead a team of Republicans to Florida to help in the recount fight," he told a legal trade magazine in a 2003 interview.

No. 8. Duane Gibson, an aide on the House Resources Committee, was a solo lobbyist and formerly with the Greenberg Traurig lobby operation. He is now with the Livingston Group as a consultant.

No. 9. Chuck Royal was and still is a legislative assistant to Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), a former House member.

No. 10. Layna McConkey Peltier, who had been a Senate and House aide and was at Steelman Health Strategies during the effort, is now at Capital Health Group.

(We couldn't find No. 4, Kevin Smith, a former GOP House aide who later worked with Voter.com, or No. 5, Steven Brophy, a former GOP Senate aide and then at consulting firm KPMG. If you know what they are doing these days, please e-mail [email protected] we can update our records.)

Sources say the "rioters" proudly note their participation on résumés and in interviews. But while the original hardy band of demonstrators numbered barely a couple of dozen, the numbers apparently have grown with the legend.

...more...

[beachmom]

17. That diary really puts it together. If we let the Clintons back in,

we will lose so much of what we built. Obama is the future of the Dem Party.

[AtomicKitten]

18. I think it's more that their strategy was crap.

It was archaic, pointless, and ironically self-serving. In the end, they ended up rendering the Democratic Party impotent.

Howard Dean has is exactly right: 50 states, one at a time.
Obama's campaign strategy dovetails nicely into that.

K&R

[LittleClarkie]

32. Which is why Carville was mad as a hatter when Dean's strategy worked in 2006

How he expected to get the meme out that Dean was incompetent I'll never know.

[TexasObserver]

19. My first concern has always been the congress. It's the one we should hold.

It's the one that got destroyed as a result of Clinton's two terms in office. The Clintons survived, and Bill got good marks for his presidency, but they exhausted the party, and many good legislators bit the dust as a result of Clinton Fatigue and the blowback defending them brought.

Another Clinton at the top of the ticket will be POISON to everyone below, except the very safest of seats.

[OzarkDem]

20. Having been active then

I can speak for the state I live in. Clinton's came into the state to a grassroots structure that was already crumbling. Bill ran a masterful campaign, he brought his own campaign into the state, spent a lot of money and, once he won, his campaign workers went back to DC. Quite a few local Dems went on to jobs in DC, too.

Same thing happened again in 1996 - he brought people in, spent money, hired folks here, etc. and won. Again, some locals w/ ambitions went to DC to follow their career opportunities.

Similar things happened in 2000 and 2004, ready made campaigns rolled into the state, did their thing an left. Because of losses, there wasn't the usual exodus to DC and some folks even came back.

State and county Dem party operations didn't raise a lot of money to sustain operations between elections. It didn't seem to be a priority for them, some local Dem leaders felt if the party raised money for its own operations, it would cut into fundraising for candidates in local races. They also became lazy, relying on labor unions to do all their grassroots work for them instead of building their own party structure. IMHO they could have raised more and done more about retailing themselves at the local level, but lots of them didn't believe it or didn't want to.

Howard Dean and the 50 state strategy came along and not only brought them more money, a lot of them learned to be better fundraisers. They began to take their party organizations seriously, hiring instead of relying on volunteers. They learned to broaden their base of donors. Growing dissatisfaction with Bush helped a lot too.

Was it Clinton's fault? No way. The state and local branches of the Dem party had been decaying before Bill came along. He gave them a boost and infusion of cash, but it wasn't until Dean came along that they learned how to put in new leaders, raise money, grow their organization.

[stillcool]

21. Here they are!!

At the national level, the movement was founded by the Democratic Leadership Council (501c4 educational non-profit, founded 1984) and includes the House New Democrat Coalition (founded 1997), the Senate New Democrat Coalition (founded 2000), the New Democrat Network PAC (founded 1996), the misnamed Progressive Policy Institute (501c4 think tank, "Bill Clinton's idea mill", founded 1989), and the umbrella funding group The Third Way Foundation (501c3 non-profit, founded 1996).

Since coming to power within the Democratic Party with Bill Clinton's presidency, the New Democrats/DLC have worked towards "essentially the same purpose as the Christian Coalition... to pull a broad political party dramatically to the right" according to John Nichols of The Progressive.

DLC operatives actively worked to sabotage Howard Dean's candidacy for the US Presidency in 2004, claiming that the "far-left" Democrat was wrong to attack George W. Bush's tax cuts and national security policies.

Corporate contributors to the DLC and New Democratic Network include Bank One, Citigroup, Dow Chemical, DuPont, General Electric, Health Insurance Corporation of America, Merrill Lynch, Microsoft, Philip Morris, RJR Nabisco, Chevron, Prudential Foundation, Amoco Foundation, AT&T, Morgan Stanley, Occidental Petroleum, Raytheon, and many other Fortune 500 companies.

The New Democrat Movement is sometimes referred to as the Dixiecrat movement due to the DLC's origination in the southern states, their desire to get rid of affirmative action, and their membership's overwhelming whiteness.

" shift the primary focus from racism, the traditional enemy without, to self-defeating patterns of behavior " --Chuck Robb, 2nd DLC Chairman, Governor & Senator of the Great State of Virginia, White Man, 1986.

"I'm from the democratic wing of the Democrat Party" --Paul Wellstone, progressive Democrat, criticizing the New Democrat Movement.

"Democrats for the Leadership Class" --Jesse Jackson, progressive black Democrat, describing the DLC.

http://www.nndb.com/group/269/000093987/

[UpInArms]

27. wish I had more money, stillcool47

and could really say how much I love you

:hug:

(edited for drunken typo)

[stillcool]

29. Me too!

thanks:hi:

[TheDonkey]

22. Interesting

[Maribelle]

23. Stealing more pomp from the right wing hate machine - - It's all Clinton's fault!

I know many that worked very long and hard for Kerry in florida in 2004 - - he thanked us all by saying none of our votes count in 2008, as Obama nuzzled into his neck. That's all Clinton's fault right?

What Kerry and Obama have done to millions of democrats in Florida will not heal for years. Once again truly innocent and lovely democrats are made laughing stocks.

There is a truly sick an sad element wafting with all this hate clinton mime. And the irony of these widdle babies having the audacity to claim Hillary is the one polarizing.

[ProSense]

24. Bill thanked Rove:

"Hey, you did a marvelous job, it was just marvelous what you did," Clinton told Rove

[blm]

34. TERRY McAuliffe put that rule in place when HE was DNC chair and it was OK with you

then?

YOU are FEIGNING outrage at Kerry and Obama just so ytou can falsely SMEAR them and blame them for a ruling Hillary's operative put in place when HE was DNC chair.

What a nasty piece of work - smearing those adhering to a party rule while FEIGNING outrage over a rule that you didn't even KNOW came from Hillary's camp.

Nasty and absurd post all in one.

[blm]

36. hey - this widdle baby wants you to know McAuliffe put that rule up you blame on

others as you SMEAR them FALSELY.

No reply?

[DiamondJay]

25. look at the maps buddy

1980 1984 and 1988 Where was our party infrastructure then? THAT was the time period in which the Republican machine was gaining. Winning congress in 94 was only the culmination of the Reagan Revolution. in 2000, after Clinton we had which is MUUUCH closer the 270 EVs, and many more popular votes. We shoudl ask where was the Dems in 1980-1988? Now we are actually viable after Bill Clinton. The only reason we lost Congress was that with a democratic president, it was easy for Gingrich to make us "the establishment" and kick us out, not to mention Clinton's LIBERAL social positions, which he was right for. Just notice the EVs and the states before you judge "the" Clinton"s"

[ProSense]

28. Those are very large and irrelevant maps of the presidential elections! Note

the chart in the OP pertaining to nationwide losses at the Congressional and state levels.

[DiamondJay]

my point is they were in practice lost during those 3 maps

as reagan and bush sr nearly got anything they wanted with the so-called "democratic" majority. With clinton, the party power merely changed in name.

[blm]

35. We WON in 92 thanks to Dems in Congress pummeling GHWBush his ENTIRE TERM.

Thanks to Kerry, Joe Moakley, Jack Brooks and Henry Gonzalez, BushInc was becoming more exposed in IranContra and BCCI.

How did Bill repay that? By deep-sixing the investigations' outstanding matters for Poppy Bush and Jackson Stephens and THAT is what led to turnover of Congress and a Bush2 preparing to return to WH in 2000.

Don't even try to PRETEND that Dems would have lost anyway in 1994 - no way would that have happened if BushInc had been accountable for their many illegal operations.

Your argument only works if Dems FORGET exactly what was going on when Bill took office.

[madrchsod]

30. the party died 40 years ago on the streets of chicago

will the party recover under obama`s leadership?

[LittleClarkie]

31. It's how she's running her campaign too, isn't it. Skip this state or that

and go for the ones you think you can win.

The 50 state strategy is SO dead if she gets in.

I'm fighting for Gov. Dean as much as anyone else in this race.

[ProSense]

33. Hillary: some people really don't matter! n/t