I love this!! It must be the Blue Dog Democrat that performs in the Democratic "Big Tent."Does he have a name?
Thanks for posting it.
Posted on 11/08/2006 3:48:50 PM PST by MadIvan
Our correspondent examines how the party masterminded its move to the centre and reined in liberals to seize hostile territories
They wear cowboy boots, chew tobacco, love hunting, hate abortion, want less government spending — and some voted for Ronald Reagan. Now they are headed to Congress as Democrats.
Although the Democrats’ victory was above all an overwhelming repudiation of the conflict in Iraq, it was also built on the back of moderate, often conservative candidates recruited to compete in traditionally Republican territory.
When Congress returns in January, both the House and Senate will see something of an ideological shift, with an influx of freshmen Democrats who, while unified in their opposition to the war, are well to the right of the party’s current caucus on cultural issues.
Their success reflects a resurgence of “Blue Dog” Democrats — socially conservative but generally economic populists — across the Midwest, and a bold new strategy to target the Republican-leaning West and South West — states such as Colorado, Wyoming and New Mexico — as a way of winning back the White House in 2008.
If Jon Tester, the Democrat’s Senate candidate in Montana, wins his race against Conrad Burns — he declared victory last night but votes were still being counted — the chamber will have a Democrat who is an anti-abortion, pro-gun, three-generation farmer with a buzz cut, three missing fingers on his left hand and no big fan of Hillary Clinton.
Jim Webb, the Democrat favoured to win a probable recount in the Virginia Senate race, was Reagan’s Navy Secretary. A social conservative, he hates liberals and likes guns so much he gave one to his son at the age of 8. He champions, as he puts it, “Southern redneck culture”. A decorated Vietnam veteran, he converted to the Democrats only over his opposition to the Iraq war.
Bob Casey, who soundly defeated the Republican Rick Santorum in Pennsylvania’s Senate race, is also anti-abortion. Like many of the new Democrats, he ran a profoundly populist protectionist economic message which attracted many blue-collar “Reagan Democrats” back to the party in the Midwest, where job losses and economic pessimism combined with Iraq to make the region one of the bleakest landscapes for Republicans yesterday.
Heath Shuler, a former quarterback for the Washington Redskins, was once courted by the Republicans as a possible congressional candidate. He is anti-abortion, pro-gun, anti-free trade — and is now the Democrat representative for the North Carolina 11th District.
In Indiana, a state overwhelmingly won by President Bush in 2004, three Republicans in the House of Representatives lost seats. All faced conservative Democrats. One, Brad Ellsworth, a county sheriff, is a social conservative who signed a no-tax-rise pledge during the campaign. Joe Donnelly was another cultural conservative winner in Indiana.
In Colorado, Democrats continued their push into the West with victory in the state’s gubernatorial contest, meaning the party now has a sweep of western governors stretching from Canada to Mexico, through Montana, Wyoming, Colorado and New Mexico.
In Kentucky, John Yarmuth, a former Republican candidate running as a Democrat, beat Anne Northup, a five-term veteran. Democrats also picked up an open seat in Republican Arizona and even unseated a Republican incumbent in Kansas — where Mr Bush won
62 per cent of the vote in 2004.
These new Democrats represent what Rahm Emanuel, the congressman who masterminded its takeover of the House, described as the future of the party, and the key to its presidential hopes. The growing belief of many Democrat strategists is that the South — the party’s base until the 1960s, but now solidly Republican — is beyond their reach, and that the future lies in targeting the Midwest and West with moderate candidates. That theory was bolstered by the defeat in Tennessee of Harold Ford. Despite running as a conservative on nearly every issue — even immigration — the black former congressman could not prevail in the one Southern senate seat in play.
The result was rich vindication for Mr Emanuel and other top Democrats who have spent two years recruiting candidates to make the party competitive in western states they had all but ceded in recent years.
Mr Emanuel and other centrists have told the incoming Democrat leadership — which is far more liberal than the new influx of moderates — that the party’s liberal wing must not dominate the agenda. The new crop of moderates will be anxious to keep the party rooted to the middle ground.
Their arrival on Capitol Hill will be one of the first early tests of the leadership skills of Nancy Pelosi who, as House Speaker, will have to forge a coalition in a party that has profound philosophical disparities.
Ironically, the greatest losses for Republicans came in the North East, the last redoubt of the party’s mainstream moderates. They were routed.
That certainly is a hue not seen in the feline world. And never as far as I have ever seen, in a mutt.
Bush is a Maineiac by birth
Doubtful, at least for most of the fish, it's just too hard for a freshman to go against the party, it's pretty much guarenteed death of getting any pork at all.
If you will it's not unlike the more fiscally conservative members of the republican party. Do you think they liked voting for some of those budgets? Nah, but at the end of the day they did.
Depends on what stage of pregnancy we are talking about.
Even Chuck Schumer knows that "pro-lifers" are a problem for the dems. That's why hypocritical Schumer, the knight in shining armor for baby killers, chose "pro-life" candidates to run in several races.
Schumer will be among those making sure that the pro-life candidates are kept off of committees that have anything to do with "life" issues.
Americans are moral people who want to vote with a clean conscience.
So the Democrats threw a few pro-lifers their way and Nancy Pelosi and the press made sure that only Republican scandals made the news.
The Democrats won by donning their "sheep costumes."
I love this!! It must be the Blue Dog Democrat that performs in the Democratic "Big Tent."Algore was pro-life too, at least until he ran for national office.
You should've heard Zell's endorsement for Sonny Perdue, our Republican governor, in this last election. It was good stuff.
Hmmm - here:
http://www.slobokan.com/archives/2006/10/30/sonny-perdue-good-for-georgia
>>One cannot be socially conservitive with the likes of Kennedy, Reid, Byrd and Pelosi running the show.
There was a really good editorial right before the election, on the theme "By electing Dem moderates, you enable extremists." I thought it was by Sowell, but I couldn't find it when I looked for it, or I'd link it.
>> Pouring crap into cowboy boots, Wranglers and a denim shirt does not make it a cowboy. Sorry. <<
Are you talking about President Clusterf*** McFumblemouth, who was almost giddy yesterday about the prospect of a Dem Congress passing his immigration "reform" bill?
They are all going to be voting the nancy pelosi line.
Lyrical.
Mark
Umm..no. He was born in New Haven, CT
You mean they don't chomp on cheddar cheese and thirst for Thunderbird?!?
I agree that Casey, Jr. got his pro-life image from his father; but what evidence does the R-t-L group have that he won't vote pro-life?
I can hardly wait for the first vote - on taxes, judges, WOT, etc. Maybe then, some conservatives will wake up and realize you don't win by losing.
Restrictions like partial birth abortions and parental notification? Yes, I agree with you.
There was another poll from 2003 from a different pollster that showed a similar result.
I believe your comments here reflect public sentiment from perhaps 15-20 years ago, but no longer. The shift has been gradual, but steady. This is good news for America, as a nation cannot survive if it cannot protect its most vulnerable (slippery slope paradigm).
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