I'm still recovering from my trip and Nicole is picking up the slack today so far, but I wanted to throw my two cents in if I may. There's a lot of takes going around about who is trying to take credit for our stunning defeat of the GOP on Tuesday. I want to start out by saying that Ned Lamont's campaign was one that took a shot at an entrenched Bush/War loving Democrat and said--we're not gonna take it any more. The outcome? Lamont forced Holy Joe to run as an Independent. That was truly amazing and started the anti-war drum beat going throughout the party which resulted in an incredible trouncing for Rove and Bush. Thank you Ned. The Bullshit Moose really has no clue.
I'm always labeled a Blue Dog Democrat on those funky online political tests that I take for fun. Do I remotely stand for anything like the Heath Shuler's of the wolrd? The Blue Dog Democrat meme is false as well.
We have some power now and the Democrats need to use it wisely and I think Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid understand that. Soto has some ideas. Agree or disagree.
This piece by The Nation's Ari Melber is utter nonsense. How could people say they understand the netroots and write something as patently false as this? It boggles the mind. David Sirota responds too. The bottom line is that we all played a part in it, plain and simple. We all stepped up and helped out and that is a "We" moment, not a " let's screw Howard Dean" one. Digby responds.
The strategic point that Markos and Chris Bowers and others have tried to make is that if you don't play you can't win, but every game has an entrance fee. If you don't have credible candidates in place - and, yes, even ones who are probably going to lose - you can't take advantage of a potential "wave," or a sudden scandal, or surprise retirements...read on
Markos writes a great piece.
But in the end, none of this would've happened without the effort all of us made. Those who think that the DSCC and DCCC don't deserve credit are idiots. Those who think Dean doesn't deserve credit are idiots. Those who think the netroots and grassroots don't deserve credit are idiots. We all had our roles to play, and we wouldn't be where we are today without all of us doing our part.
In some DC circles, there's a lot of chortling about Lieberman. But we did what we set out to do -- to make clear to the party leadership that the war was going to be this year's decisive issue. Until Lamont won his primary, that obvious point wouldn't pierce the DC bubble. So we had to make our point in a dramatic fashion...read on
