A.B.D.

Another writer that I've come to admire and very much enjoy is Debra Saunders of the San Francisco Chronicle. She must feel very lonely over there most of the time. She has written an excellent column on what she heard at a DNC forum in Sacramento.

In that spirit (sort of), there were two words I heard a lot during the forum: The real enemy is not Iraqi insurgents. The real enemy is Karl Rove, the GOP bogeyman. Rove, damn him, sold the Bush agenda to 51 percent of the electorate.

It's funny how the Democrats denounced the GOP evil genius, all the while suggesting that they could be Rove, only better. So they treated issues as if issues were mere packaging, not ideas with consequences. Rosenberg noted the party's need to "revitalize our message" -- hence, the de-emphasis on Iraq.

Sacramento-based Democratic strategist Roger Salazar supports Fowler because he believes the party has to move to the center. "You have to have a broader appeal than just the base," he said. And: "The sooner we sober up, the sooner we'll take back control of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave."

The rub: It was that thinking that prompted Democrats to nominate John Kerry, who voted for a war most Democrats opposed, and went on to lose the general election.

Political consultant Katie Merrill warned that it is a mistake for observers to judge the race for DNC chairman based on the reaction of activists. Only 65 DNC members in that room, and some 440 nationally, will vote for the chairman on Feb. 12. The DNC members will be looking for a solid nuts-and-bolts chairman.

She added that while California might lean heavily toward Dean, Democrats in the South and Midwest want Anyone But Dean. And that A.B.D. push, I think, is about issues and message.

The two most prominent Beat-Dean Dems are Fowler and Frost.

Fowler summed up the A.B.D. argument when he told the Associated Press, "Dean had the oranges, but he couldn't make orange juice."

What does that even mean?

The real question is: Does it matter if you win, if you lose what you stand for?(emphasis mine)

The Dems problem is summed up with the bolded question. They lost what they stand for in the last election because they knew it was not a winning strategy. If you feel you have to sell-out to get elected, you must start asking yourself what that says of your policies and ideas. Which is why republicans will continue to win in the future. The Dems sold out to special interests a long time ago, and haven't had a new idea or thought except on how to steal elections. They've had their wake-up calls delivered in election after election now.....

But hey, I'm not complaining. ;)