Thanks, Zack
As was expected, a huge turnout for Zack Exley. Interesting, impressive guy, as was Luke Bruce. A couple of key points that I came away with in the discussion of the Kerry campaign versus the Tony Blair campaign:
- The Labour Party in the UK takes the view that you identify the core principles and policies of the party, and then fight like hell in the election process. That included dropping some issues Zach called “Trotskyist”, but overall it sounded like they were less accommodating then the Democratic Party in the US.
- It sounded like in the Blair campaign, work got done at the end of the day. Not so much in the Kerry campaign.
- The Labour Party had studied what Clinton had done in 1992 with a rapid response team. Labour used this effectively during several attempted Tory smears.
Does the DNC have a rapid response team? I’m guessing not. It’s hard to imagine anything more rapid than the criticisms of Dean by other Dems.
If anything, I’d say we’ve got a rapid circular firing squad.
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I’m still not sure I buy their assurance that Labour hasn’t moved to the right, and that we were fooled by the word “liberal” in the name of the Liberal Democrats. I remembered a chart in a Kevin Drum post that indicated that British people seemed to believe Labour had moved right and the Lib Dems were to the left of them, but I couldn’t remember the details. Now I’ve found it.
The chart is from a poll in The Economist and shows that people viewed Blair (Labour) as being slightly right of center and closest to their own position on the spectrum, while Kennedy (Lib Dem) was to the left and Howard (Tory) was far to the right. That also corresponds to what various British bloggers seemed to believe, so if we’re mixed up about where the parties stand, the confusion isn’t limited to Americans. Of course, a simple left-right spectrum is too simplistic for real discussions of political beliefs.
But aside from that, the idea of Democrats’ being better organized and more disciplined about not stabbing each other in the back (I’m looking at you, Daley) is certainly a good one. Implementing it is the problem.
—Keith • 11:27 pm
Hmm, the Oxford English Dictionary, in a volume published in 1902, defines liberal as
So the idea that liberal is the opposite of conservative doesn’t seem to be an American invention.
—Keith • 11:40 pm
Yes, Labour moved to the right from the days when the party called for the nationalization of the entire economy. Also, they’ve moved to the right in that they bring in some private contractors into their *universal health care system*. But they’ve gone to the mat on scores of issues that the MOST “left” members of our Democratic Congressional caucus won’t even dare mention.
To answer the post above…Labour had to deal with it’s “Trotskyist” wing years ago. I didn’t saying that’s what the Dems should do! If anything, we need to deal with our “Republican” wing of our party.
I had lot’s of fun - and Luke did too. Thanks again everyone!
—zack • 9:35 am, July 12