by Klaus Rohrich
January 20, 2005
as President George W. Bush is preparing to take the oath of office for his second term today, I am reminded of the speech Democrat icon and Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy made to the National Press Club last week. The gist of the speech was that the Democrats have been unsuccessful in conveying their ideas to the voters, hence their continuing losses at the polls.
"There is no doubt that we must do a better job of looking within ourselves and speaking out for the principles we believe in and for the values that are the foundation of our actions. americans need to hear more, not less, about those values.
"We were remiss in not talking more directly about them, about fundamental ideals that guide our progressive principles."
at the same time Kennedy attempted to marginalize the Bush victory by stating that he categorically rejected "the deceptive and dangerous claim that the outcome of last November was somehow a sweeping or even modest or even miniature mandate for reactionary measures like privatizing Social Security…redistributing the tax burden in the wrong direction and packing the federal courts with reactionary judges."
Gee, Ted, I don't know how to tell you this, but the reason the Democrats lost was that voters are finally beginning to understand that the Democratic party is about words, while the Republicans are about actions. I'm sure the voters heard your message well enough. That's why the election resulted in the Republicans controlling all three branches of the U.S, Government, while the majority of states now have Republican governors. any claim to the contrary is indicative of a state of extreme denial.
What's at work here is probably the most significant shift in american Politics since the Civil War. Despite the Democrats' claims to the contrary, the Republican landslide was not made possible by an exceptionally large turnout of fundamental Christian voters, or gay-bashing reactionary Klan types. The result was a wholesale rejection of the ever further left-wing ideas featured by the Democratic Party. By insisting that this is not the case, Kennedy is either totally deluded or slyly disingenuous. His belief that the voters didn't get the Democrats' message is pure delusion.
How could the voters not get the message when the majority of the U.S. mainstream media played the part of the chorus to the Democrats' Greek tragedy? at every step in the campaign, the slightest rumour potentially detrimental to Bush was treated as breaking news, while anything damaging to Kerry was ignored or minimized. Bush made his entire National Guard military record available for scrutiny, while Kerry refused to release his. I don't recall The New York Times or CBS News asking Kerry why? What I do recall was a vicious assault on George Bush by Dan Rather and CBS News using forged documents as evidence. When the documents were proven false CBS continued sticking to the story, claiming it the story was plausible, despite the forged documents.
americans have figured out that for the last 40 years the Democrats have been leading them around by the nose. at every election cycle the Democrats break out their standard cards. There's the poverty card, the race card, the fear card and the abortion card, to name just a few. But with each election cycle it becomes more and more difficult for the Democrats to play these cards.
Kennedy made a noble attempt at playing some of them during his speech. When he referred to "reactionary measures" and "reactionary judges" he was comporting himself in typical old-school Democrat fashion. His claim that the Bush administration "falsely hypes almost every issue as a crisis", citing Iraq and Social Security as examples, he failed to mention that the Democrats' own William Jefferson Clinton claimed both Iraq and Social Security to be in crisis when he occupied the White House.
In attempting to set the agenda for the future, Kennedy called for a Canadian-style healthcare scheme, as well as a free college education for everyone. I believe that most americans still understand the concept that anything that's "free" has no value. If it has no value, then it is deemed "worthless". So much for free healthcare and free university degrees.
The shift that has undergone american society will continue, particularly if the leadership of the Democratic Party continues to behave in the same way as Kennedy. an analysis of November's election conducted by Pew Research Centre revealed some interesting facts: Bush's gains among non-religious voters was substantially larger than among the religious. In opting for Bush, nearly one-third cited his leadership, while over one-quarter supported his stand on the issues. as a whole, voters in 2004 were less religious that in 2000 and there was no significant increase in pro-life voters.
What Kennedy and company are missing is that the Democrats no longer control the agenda. The relevant campaign issues are no longer the ones that the Democrats are running on, nor are they likely able to resurrect them. Periodically in the history of the earth certain species that were unable to adapt to changes in their environment have become extinct. The Democratic Party's denial of the new american reality is reminiscent of the death throes of a dinosaur trapped in a tar pit.
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