There's been a lot of discussion, both in the mainstream media and in the regular set of blogs I read, about the direction of the Democratic party the next few years. I'm still deep into ennui after the election --- and will elaborate on that point shortly --- so not terribly interested. But next week I'm invited to a meeting advertised as a grass roots reorganization of the party, an attempt by concerned people to counter the idiotic policies proferred by our current "leadership." I've never been a registered democrat, and never will be, but I plan to attend and hope to offer a few words of solace to these disgruntled Ohioans. I'll start by reading the first paragraph from a recent posting by Charlie Cook
As Democrats prepare to select a new party chairman next month, they should think not only about what went wrong in 2004 but about what went right. After all, a party that carried 19 states in four consecutive elections (with a total of 248 electoral votes, just 22 short of the 270 needed to win) is not fundamentally broken, it just needs some work. But for 118,599 votes out of the 5.6 million cast in Ohio and 119 million votes cast nationwide, a different half of America would be despondent today and another group of people would be headed to Washington to celebrate the presidential inauguration.
Of course... for Democrats the lessons to be learned are usually small. Unfortunately the last 25+ years shows even small changes are almost impossible to implement.
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