Grassroots organization can beat Bush, no matter the nominee

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

All the talk about capturing the center and appealing to swing voters misses our main strength - grassroots organization. We can run a general election campaign based on Television commercials and talk shows, trying to carefully craft an image that will appeal to unconnected, "independent" voters who only get their political information from FOX, CBS, ABC, NBC, etc.

Or, we can have one person in every neighboorhood, signing up new voters. We can have teams of college kids with registration forms and networks of retirees calling people - on the phone, on election day - to make sure they get to the polls.

We need to have an organization in every precinct. We cannot rely on just email lists and internet forums, nor can we rely on old fashioned union GOTV drives and house parties.

Any candidate that we nominate, provided we have a strong network on election day, is electable. We cannot compete with Bush on money, we can only defeat him with feet on the ground.

That's what the Democratic party is supposed to be about anyway.

[brainshrub]

1. Amen! Amen!! Amen!!!

This is one of the many reasons I'm supporting Dean. He has the grassroots we need to take back the whitehouse.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

9. he doesn't have enough yet

If every Dean supporter could register 5 new voters, and get at least one out to the polls, we'd win in a landslide. Can he do that? Otherwise Bush will bury him in TV commercials about his skiing problem.

[pansypoo53219]

2. and therefore

we need a nominee with a strong grassroot/web operation.
and that being so, i am with Gore and others. Dean can beat the chimp.

[chimpymustgo]

3. We can do both. Grassroots and tv commercials. We gotta throw everything

at these crooks. We've got to go after every vote - the base, swing voters, disgruntled republicans. It's going to take every vote we can hunt down in every corner of the country to counteract the stuff they will have for us.

But I do agree, we've got to go door to door, hand to hand. We can win.

[Bombtrack]

4. Well, McGovern and Goldwater had grassroots organizations

There WILL be grassroots for any nominee we pick, because there is that 12 percent of the population that is angry with Bush that isn't going away. But we also can't alienate non-activist democrats and independants

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

6. I don't want to alienate non-activist Dems and independents

I want to registered new people as voters, for one, and get the non-activists to vote. We certainly can't do that by running against Bush, we have to be running for something.

[ShimokitaJer]

8. No, you are making the same mistake the DLC did in 2002

There will NOT be automatic grassroots support no matter who the nominee is. The DLC assumes that the party machinery and money is enough to win a race, but the grassroots are not inspired simply by the possibility of someone with a D in front of their name. If they feel that the nominee does not represent their goals, then that 12 percent is going to stay at home or vote third party... like they did in 2000 and 2002.

You don't tell the grassroots who to vote for. The grassroots tells you who they are voting for. That's the definition of grassroots. And right now, they are saying they're voting for Dean. Just try sticking a Gephardt or a Kerry at the head of the ticket and telling them to toe the party line.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

10. true

we have to make sure the differences between our candidates are obvious.

[quaker bill]

5. We can compete on money as well

It only takes 2 million of us willing to invest the cost of bus ticket to Crawford to match the Bush fund raising effort.

This can be done.

It is not the fine points of platform, nor negative ads, nor debates, nor Rove attacks, nor being from the north, south, east, or west, nor tax cuts, or even resume credits that will get the job done.

You are right on the grassroots bit. Retail politics is what will get it done. It is all about people working one on one organizing and getting the vote out for the nominee.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

7. good point, and we don't need billionaires like Soros either

"It only takes 2 million of us willing to invest the cost of bus ticket to Crawford to match the Bush fund raising effort."

Good point.

[John_H]

11. Grassroots can make the difference if its close.

If Howard Dean is the nominee, there won't be enough grass or roots to overcome swing voters will loose from Chimp's proven successful campaign of fear.

Dean's a great guy, but this is worst time for a governor to run against and incumbent.

[depakid]

12. You are absolutely right

We cannot beat Republicans by relying on the broadcast media or the so called mainstream press- and this holds true for many state and local races as well. The media in this country is so overwhelmingly beholden to the right wing that it's going to take a grassroots effort, just as you describe, to win the presidency and take back the House. We can do this- as the Dean & Clark campaigns are both showing, through organizing, doing voter registration and, I would add, by actively taking on the media whores.

This latter point will actually be easier than one might think- television, radio and the major print media have gone from bad to worse over the last 8 years to 10 years and most people (even people who get much of their news from those sources) have begun to question their veracity on major stories. I see this at work, in grad school and even at grocery stores and on the train. They have concealed, manipulated, distorted and lied to us so often about the economy, the war and other issues that their credibility is pretty well shot.

Moreover, people don't much like so called journalists anymore. I rarely ever heard positive comments on the news media and in the last survey I saw, journalists had even lower favorability ratings than lawyers! I suspect that many of them are coming to realize the jig is about up- witness Russert's comment on bloggers or the recent complaint that Dean doesn't ask journalists any questions about themselves.... Of course, that doesn't mean we can afford to be complacent or let them get away with defining progressive issues or our candidates- as Trippi demonstrated on Saturday. It's just that we're going win the old fashioned way with the aid of new technology- in spite of the ever present right wing propaganda.