Congress is dominated by the GOP, BIG PROBLEM...

[Hippo_Tron]

Let's face it we did miserably in the last election, 4-5 dem senators in key southern states will be retiring, and to top it all off Tom DeLay is gerrymandering every seat he can get out of Texas. It will take a miracle to win the house and 2004 and a serious comeback to win the senate. If a democrat beats Bush for the white house, this obviously isn't as much of a problem. But if Bush wins re-election with a Republican congress, the divided government seriously threatened if not dead already. The last president I can recall having control of congress for all of his term was FDR. Ronald Reagan, whose approval ratings were quite higher than Bush's, had a dem House for both of his terms. With the exception of our control of the senate for about 1 and 1/2 years Bush will basically have control control of congress for both of his terms (should he be re-elected). What has happened to the system? His approval ratings are in the low 50's, both houses of congress should be leaning heavilly towards the democrats yet they are not. Is anybody else seriously concerned about this?

[ThorsteinVeblen]

1. We are now the underdog

Americans love the underdog.

[La_Serpiente]

2. You are right

we are in deep kaka if we lose this election.

I see gains in Illinois, possibly Florida, and even possibly Pennsylvania (that is if Arlen Specter loses in the primary). However, I do not know if we can take back the Senate. The House? I am not sure about that.

I am not sure about anything anymore.

[Hippo_Tron]

3. As of now we have a better shot at the Senate than the House...

This could change if there's some major Bush policy fuck-up in the next year. If given a choice between the two we're definately better off with the senate so we can block judicial nominees and control the executive oversight committees.

[atldem]

4. I am concerned too

but I know that I am in the minority. I talk to people all the time about these things. I tell that I write to my Senators and Reps. and they look at me and laugh. These are people who consider themselves Democrats!!!
The right wing has a strangle hold on the media now. Look at what happened to CBS. They caved on the Reagan movie! Why? Because they spent wads of money on lobbists to pressure the FCC about ownership rules and almost got what they wanted. But they were shocked by the grassroots movement to stop the consolidations. Now Republicans are getting pressure to stop the FCC and the major Networks are seeing all of that money they spent going for nothing. They can't afford to piss off any Republicans right now so they will do their bidding. This is only going to get worse.
So if your only political activity is to type in this message board you should get used to this happening.
Call, write and get active and organized. The Republicans are better at doing those things because they like to be told what to do and how to think. We have a more difficult time because we tend to be free thinkers and want everyone to have a voice. But this is serious now. We need to stick together and put an end to this mess!

[Name removed]

9. Deleted message

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

[The Backlash Cometh]

12. Maybe you should read the salon .com article on the Reagan miniseries

before making a decision on what is really at play here. That show was necessary in order to see another side of Ronnie because Ronald Reagan is the Republican's God. He is their deity. And all the Republicans in Congress are like deacons in the field trying to capitalize on that worship. Once people realize just how flawed a man Ronald Reagan was, they might actually realize that they were duped about other things too.

[SemperEadem]

36. I think that whichever Dem candidate or "mouthpiece" can step forward

and put him/herself through the insidious scrutiny the 21st century political process seen through the prism of the right wing media's skreen masters, they will be the one who will capture the nation on the level that Clinton did back in 1992. They have to be so secure in themselves and in their lives that they can stand up to scrutiny while standing in their truth and it will make them a stronger person for doing so... because the right wing is going to invent molehills from which their mountains will spring. They haven't even geared up their Death Star 2004 yet--Dems still have to get through the primaries.

Nowdays, you can't just put yourself out in the present media cesspool and think you're going to find clean exchange or a fair chance at getting your message across. They use tactics like tripping you up by dropping an outrageous, twisted opinion 'trying to pass as fact' into the set-up of a question; or yelling over you, in your earpiece so that the distortion alone stops you dead in your tracks (like all loud, sudden noises to the ear does to humans). It's really easy to corral someone on television and make them pipe down because no one wants to end up looking like a fool on national televion, unless you've got a good personal performance contract working for you.

You cannot walk into the present media arena with the expectation of being heard in a fair manner, unless you've got lazer-like focus and are at critical mass with facts to back up or refute anything laid at you. There are very few Dems who can verbally out-step most of these right wing media whore talking heads. You need to be able to debate these people effectively, yet not allow yourself to be tricked into falling into the little holes their line of questioning is all the while digging down the trail.

Which candidate can step up to that plate?

[Syrinx]

5. The Republicans also control the courts,

They control the White House, the Senate, the House, the Courts, the media, and the voting machines. These are some serious Fascists, and they are playing for keeps. This is not tinfoil-hat stuff any longer. This is fact.

They are not afraid to break every law and rule there is, because there is noone left to punish them for it. From Florida in 2001, to the Alabama goverorship last year, the illegal Texas redistricting, the California recall election, the head of Diebold saying that he would "do anything to ensure" that Dubya is reinstalled, what amounts to the censorship of the Reagan tv movie, the cops blazing with guns drawn in the South Carolina school, the people jailed for wearing tee shirts critical of the administration, the websites that have been infiltrated or just plain shut down by the government, the "suspects" that have disappeared without notiification or lawyers, and held indefinitely, the reports of torture by the justice department, the use of the unconstitutional "PATRIOT" Act used to go after people with absolutely no connection to terrorism... the list just goes on and on.

The 2004 election is the last chance we have left, if in fact, it is not ALREADY too late. We must stand up and fight, take our country back, while, if, we still have a chance.

Man. I'm depressed.

[salinen]

7. last stand

dear du'ers, the 2004 presidential election is the most important election in the history of the world! 4 more years of chenney,rummy,rice,powell,ashcroft,norton,chou,abrams,and that about seals the fate of the world. wars, environmental collapse, disease, you name it. they play it differently than the commies. they want their resources to build hummers, the commies wanted more commies. on the bright side, america will lose what bit of respect it ever had and other nations will assume the responsibility. i think in a perverse way g.w.inc. is doing the world a favor. no more imperialism from the jesus gang.

[CDiddy]

10. Umm...

What?

[forgethell]

16. No more imperialism from the jesus gang

Good. but who will the new imperialists be? You guys are depressing. Most important election in the history of the world? Nonsense. It is, though, a very important election. We need to do our very best to ensure that we win. But there will be another election in 2008. Maybe Hillary will win that one. Look, optimish will take you further than pessimism. Realism will take you further yet.

[1songbird]

8. You just depressed the heck out of me to

[Name removed]

11. Deleted message

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

[Hippo_Tron]

18. I've actually had faith in the courts...

Since they overturned the anti-sodomy laws. Bill Rhenquist is getting ready to retire which is another reason why the next election is so important. We might be able to fillibuster till the election but we can't do it forever.

[neuvocat]

6. Bush has never been more unpopular

now that there's a republican congress.

[ShaneGR]

13. Kentucky & Mississippi vs. Ohio & Pennsylvania

Red States went Red. Battleground states went blue. Democrats did very well in Ohio and Pennsylvania. So I take the Mississippi and Kentucky defeats with a grain of salt.

[Adjoran]

14. To be realistic

We don't have much of a chance to take back the Senate. We have 19 seats at stake to the repubs' 15, and at least four southerners are stepping down: Edwards NC, Hollings SC, Miller GA, Graham FL. Breauz LA hasn't decided yet if he will run again.

repubs are strong favorites to take the first three, and Florida will be close, as will LA if Breaux retires.

The House isn't much better. Only 30=40 seats are truly competitive, and unless the Texas redistricting is reversed in court, which seems unlikely now, the repubs will add at least six seats to their majority.

That's why the Presidential race is so important. "Advancing a progressive agenda?" Forget that (for now), we have to worry about the very balance of power in Washington first.

We need a candidate who can win. Let's try to choose him without beating him up too much first!

[Adjoran]

15. I should add

that we will probably pick up a Senate seat in Illinois, but that still leaves us at least -2.

[Hippo_Tron]

17. Are 30-40 enough to have a shot at a majority?

What is the current balance in the house? Oh yeah, and don't we get any sympathy because Tom DeLay is such an ass-hole? Isn't the GOP seen as cruel by squeezing every seat possible out of Texas when they already have a sizeable majority?

[goobergunch]

20. 229 R - 206 D [12 seats needed for takeover] (n/t)

[Hippo_Tron]

21. Okay I have much more faith that we can take the house now...

I thought the GOP had something like 250 seats. If we are going to do it, we need to do it together though. We need to show how fucked up those Bush policies that all of those GOP representatives voted for. If this means we need our own Newt Gingrich, well let's do it.

[in_cog_ni_to]

30. 12--2--& 1

remember that. 12 for the house, 2 for the senate and 1 in the WH.
It was chimed at the DNC meeting. very easy to remember.

12--2--& 1
12--2--& 1
12--2--& 1
12--2--& 1

:bounce: It's doable! :bounce::bounce::bounce::bounce:

[Hippo_Tron]

31. Actually if we win the white house we only need one seat to win the senate

That is assuming Zell Miller isn't replaced by another DINO.

[NewJerseyDem]

33. Kind of

Still, the committees would be evenly split so nothing could really get done. It wouldn't be complete control of the senate.

[Hippo_Tron]

34. But we still get the committee chairs...

Giving us a lot more power than the GOP.

[NewJerseyDem]

35. True

However, nothing could actually pass the committee without at least one republican's support. For instance, we couldn't get the president's judicial nominees through the Judiciary Committee unless we could convince a republican, probably Arlen Specter if he is still around, to support that nomination. We would have an advantage but it isn't complete control like if we had 51 senators. The democrats could try to offer a deal to get Lincoln Chafee to switch parties like Jim Jeffords did and then we would have 51 senators.

[Catholic Sensation]

19. The Democrats survived the Whigs

and the Democrats will survive this short infatuation with Republicans :)

[knight_of_the_star]

22. One thing to try with the House

Press on ALL fronts! The GOP is used to dictating the terms of engagement to us and taking the initiative, by letting them do this we have been allowing ourselves to be defeated again and again. We have tried battling them in territory that is thiers (ie the media) and thus far have failed. We CANNOT keep going like this. I know one hting we CAN do to oust them in the HOuse though. Since every seat is fair game, let's organize grassroots efforts to take on EVERY SINGLE SEAT WE POSSIBLY CAN and fuck whatever the DNC says about that! If we press them on all fronts, attack by use of stumps speeches, rallies, choose candidates who are articulate and charismatic, then we can beat them! We have to be as aggressive as we possibly can, hold back nothing, damn the torpedoes and full steam ahead! If we organize this press on all fronts, get together an army of volunteers to beat them in the House, maybe also in the Senate where we can scramble the resources, we could make a Bush win in '04 a very Phyrric victory. It is known fact that there are more Democrats then Republicans. If we pull out all the stops this summer and fall with a massive grassroots blitz campaign on every puke congressman/woman we can, then we do stand a chance of beating them. The trick to this is to strain their resources. If we hit on all fronts with all we've got that we can throw at them, it will strain their resources. Their congressmen won't be able to send money to eachother to help eachother out because they will be dealing with strong challenges in their own home districts. With their forces divided and scattered, we will be able to pick off the weaker ones with ease and if we do this right, we could easily win the House in 2004. The trick is we have to start gathering what resources we can NOW in preparation, because this will be a VERY long slog, and we have to press everywhere we can for this to work or it will fail.

The reason the GOP has been able to make gains in the House (I think anyway) is because they are unchallenged seriously in their "safe" districts. Thus, those Congressmen are able to shunt funds and resources into contested areas and into legislature campaigns to consolidate their hold. If we challenge them in their "safe" districts as well as the contested ones, they will probably be caught off guard by such a massive and bold move. We have to start organizing NOW for this to work, but if we pull it off, then we stand to do what the pukes pulled off in 1994: Sieze the House by storm!

[Hippo_Tron]

24. WOOT! Great idea...

We need serious opposition for EVERY GOP Congressman/Woman INCLUDING Hastert and DeLay. We should start writing letters to Nancy and see if she'll listen.

[knight_of_the_star]

26. I'm not just atlking about writing letters

I mean gathering volunteers and monies and finding a charismatic and articulate candidate in EVERY REPUBLICAN DISTRICT WE POSSIBLY CAN! Hell, I'm going to try to get my comrades in the Green Party around here to try to take some shots at Cunningham and Issa, because if you look at it, if there are more Ds and Gs in the House than Rs, then we win no matter what, mostly because it seems like the Democrats around here in North County San Diego are either a.) smart yet boring or b.) not bold enough to try. That and it could add flavor to the political discourse if a third Party gets seats in the House.

[goobergunch]

28. And of course, there are two DUers running

Jeff Seemann (vs. Ralph Regula) and Vince Whitacre (vs. Jim Sensenbrenner)!

[knight_of_the_star]

29. If I wasn't 18

You could make that 3, but I'm not running for political office until I've don at least 5 years as a prosecutor in a DA's office in either SF or LA.

[BadFaith]

23. A Republican-dominated Congress is bad for some conservatives too...

The irony of the situation is that in every year that one party has had control of both the executive and legislative branches, regardless of which party it is, Federal spending has ALWAYS increased. Small government conservatives, among whom limited Federal spending is a central tenet of their politics, lose out whenever there isn't a divided government. Even Republican party flaks like Steve Moore of the Club for Growth, in their more honest moments, acknowledge this.

[Hippo_Tron]

25. Dick Armey comes to mind n/t

[Fla Dem]

27. Can only hope balance shifts in next election

The trouble started during the Clinton years. No way all those investigations would have even gotten off the ground if we had a balanced Congress. But ith the Repugs in control the administation was screwed.

Here's the latest. Dems can't get a resonable investigation into the the Plame scandal, but let the Democrats develop a stratgey for getting to the truth about Shrub's war and the Repugs shut down another critical investigation.

From today's Washington Post:

"Angry about a leaked Democratic memo, the Republican leadership of the Senate yesterday took the unusual step of canceling all business of the committee investigating prewar intelligence on Iraq.

Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) called on the author of the memo -- which laid out a possible Democratic strategy to extend the investigation to include the White House and executive branch -- to "identify himself or herself . . . disavow this partisan attack in its entirety" and deliver "a personal apology" to Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), chairman of the Select Committee on Intelligence.

Only if those steps are taken, Frist said, "will it be possible for the committee to resume its work in an effective and bipartisan manner -- a manner deserving of the confidence of other members of the Senate and the executive branch."

[BadFaith]

32. The Investigations were politically irrelevant...

...in as much as it had little effect on the Democrats. The DNC got the message out that the Lewinsky Scandal was a politically motivated witch hunt, the public at large had every reason to believe them, and the public did. Bill Clinton enjoyed the highest approval ratings of any President in history, and had an approval rating of 80% in February of 1998, in the midst of the Lewinsky scandal. The investigations, however, lowered the approval ratings of Republican luminaries such as Fmr. House Speaker Newt
Gingrich and Rep. Henry Hyde, who were seen as hypocrites for essentially attacking the President for moral lapses which they themselves committed. And let's not forget Rep. Bob Livingston, who resigned over his daliances.

The obstructive and unfair practices of Congressional Republicans now are something that, unfortunately, happens beyond the realm of party ideology and into the "cult of personality" that has surrounded President Bush since 9/11. The RNC desperately needs an administration that champions American virtues at every turn in order to cull favor with local constituencies, and the result is a Congress that is entirely beholden to the White House. Thus you'll hear about anonymous Congressional staffers accusing the administration of bullying Senators and Representatives that "coddle Democrats". This is the widely accepted reason for why Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont renounced his party affiliation, and why you have several former Congressman decrying the current state of affairs, the most notable being Fmr. House Majority Leader Dick Armey.

[SemperEadem]

37. Are you better off than you were 4 years ago?

Didn't Bill ask that question when he started running for president?