John,

I do not know the answer to your first question about why the Whatcom liberals lost.

I will add to the speculation here, since that’s all it is without backup facts, that it likely had little to do with lack of inclusion more or less in one county or another. How exactly are Skagit Dems more open-minded than Whatcom Dems?

On your other topic of personal inclusion, I do observe, though, that you will likely not be very welcomed by the supporters of Vincent Buys and Tony Larson in the future, since, while speaking your mind, went out on that limb of calling them a derogatory name. What are you trying to accomplish with that?

You know, if the Dems had wealthy sponsors, they could have spent a bundle on a catered party with all the trimmings. I think we were at the sports bar for the TV’s.

Vince

Thanks for your opinion, Vince.  Actually, my “speculation” has evidence from over 30 years of active participation in the local political scene, including several campaigns - some of them very successful.  Not exactly speculation, but you can characterize it any way you wish as you obviously disagree.  Re the request to explain “open minded”, either you understand the term or you do not.  I think your response and and rejection of my post is pretty close to what I noted would happen and how I am speculating most Ds will respond.  And the beat will go on.  Thanks for giving some evidence - a singular fact - in support of my speculation.

Here’s the failing as I see it.

Many times, working on community issues, it has been effective to develop a two pronged approach.  Whatever the objective, form one moderate, reasonable group and another more extreme approach.  This establishes a basis for comparison and helps control the agenda.  It’s what Republicans did by supporting an extreme splinter group in the Tea Party.  The Teabaggers succeeded in dragging the agenda far to the right, successfully saddling Obama with the problems Bush created.

Democrats, on the other hand, give their progressive wing short shrift.  When progressives took control of the Central Committee, labor Ds pulled out completely, hoarding their cash and crippling the party.

If the Rs can serially swing things right and labor Ds refuse progressives any traction, nothing but a slow deterioration of liberal policies can occur.

It has nothing to do, as Melious proved, with the facts.  Whatever portion of the electorate bothers to become informed can never outvote those animated by emotion.

John Servais asks, “What caused the local Democrats to take such a beating?”

In 2 words: Fear & Loathing

The same emotions that caused Republicans to take a beating when they were last in power and so on, and so on…

When was the last time the party in power really did an outstanding job?

Tip,

Both sides claim that the other side is uninformed, so I am not sure that is a legitimate argument.  I am not sure anyone understands the rationale behind some voters.  I am also not sure it is really that scientific.  I suspect that one of the drivers is motivation.  The right has been highly motivated over the last two elections (2009 and 2010).  Based on my work in community organizing there is a big difference in getting something done if people are passionate about it versus they support it.  I know a lot of people that support causes, but do not really do that much about it.  I know other people that support causes and they give a tremendous amount of time, energy and money to the cause.  For 2006-2008 I think the passion lied with the left and over 2009 and 2010 the passion has been more evident on the right.  It is not that the right did not care in 2006 and 2008, but it was harder to get people to really engage and help.  Because of the wars and Bush, the left was highly motivated and the thought of Obama as president was a passionate draw.  The tide has reversed over the last two years for a variety of reasons.  Right now the political right wanted it more than the political left and that translated into votes, all the way down to the county council races.  I suspect that the tide will change back in the very near future.

I am also not sure about your tea party analysis.  I do believe that the establishment republicans in Olympia and Washington DC hate the tea party (and Sarah Palin) and as soon as they have their power back they will jettison them in a heart beat.  I personally do not believe the tears in Boehner?s eyes last night and think he should be up for an academy award for that performance, but we will see (but keep in mind I think both parties are incompetent and leaderless so certainly that taints my analysis).

This comment really has nothing to do with why liberals lost yesterday.The enviros and progressive types claim that they want to keep the rural parts of the county rural and rural and not encourage sprawl etc.Well,why not try to come up with some money to buy land and preserve it?Here’s another thought,why not try to reach out to people such as the Amish and see if they would be interested in perhaps moving here and farming.From what little I know of the Amish and or Mennonites they prefer to farm and don’t generally have very large herds of dairy cattle and don’t farm industrially.
They wouldn’t be interested in gay rights or recycling,or whatever the cause de jour is among the left,but I think that trying to get some people like them to buy land and farms in the county might not be a bad idea.
At the very least,I’m positive it’s not the worst idea I’ve ever had.

John,
Sometimes—perhaps often—two people can go through the same experience and have two entirely different interpretations.  Apparently this was the case with us last night.  Your experience was that I was ignoring you, passing you repeatedly, and then ultimately ‘weakly extended his hand and said hi.’

My experience was that I saw you in passing two or three times.  On the first occasion that I recall, you were talking to Vince Biciunas, and I said i to both of you.  You kept your hands in your pockets; Vince was warm and engaging.  I shook her hand, but you did not even acknowledge me, and so I just moved on.  Later I saw you again up close, and I forced the issue, offering a hand and saying hello.  As you were the only one directly in front of me, you acknowledged me and offered a weak handshake that seemed forced.

I recalled that a similar situation occurred last year, when I saw you, Paul DeArmond and Tip Johnson outside Nona Rosa’s following the election.  I came over and offered a bit of small talk about how different candidates were doing, and we all talked about what we thought the ultimate outcome might be. 

The next morning you sent me an email exorciating me for assuming everything was okay, and simply coming up and engaging in casual conversation as if that were the case.  In fact, all I thought was that it seemed rude to ignore you, despite the fact that you were clearly unhappy with some of my actions since election. If I seemed a bit tentative in engaging you, perhaps that history and experience played a role.

I will take your word on the actual number of times I passed you last night.  Truth be told, it was a very busy place, and I was engaged with a lot of folks in conversation, including Tip J for probably 20 or 30 minutes.  I was niether willfully ignoring you, nor in reality paying much attention.  I’m sorry if you felt otherwise.

Why did they lose? 

  The middle ground of the American electorate is pretty pragmatic.  Burned by Bush, they turned to Obama with his hopeful message and perhaps overreaching expectations.  It looks as if the President and the Dem leadership picked the wrong problem to tackle first.  Heady with their win in 08, they turned to the Holy Grail of universal healthcare as their objective.  They failed to understand the true depth and complexity of the financial crisis.  And while they were shooting at the wrong target, I think the congressional leadership and many congressfolk also behaved like bullies and/or showed indifference to the public. 

So the Dems wound up in a perfect political storm….misdiagnosing the problems and priorities and failing to pay attention to the electorate.  That pragmatic middle of our political spectrum is large and once motivated said ?sorry folks, you said you were different, you promised to make changes and solve problems, and guess what, you didn’t perform.  Bye….at least for now.?

In our American culture and society many of us are loathe to give too much power for too long to any one group.  We expect and often demand compromise from those elected to govern.  We also expect results that make sense.  The electorate has spoken…what has happened over the last two years doesn’t make sense to the majority.  Those who were voted out of office need to take heed of that message.  The fault for losing does not lie with the opponent or the media or the voter.  The fault lies within.  If the Dems wish to return they need to examine where their attitude and programs need to change to match the needs and problems of our society.  It is not a marketing exercise.  They need to look at what is important to the electorate, listen and pay heed.  All other political machinations and strategies will fail to carry the day unless they do.

John, I don’t know completely why Whatcom Liberals lost, I’m still too close to it, but I can tell you right now, its not because of an insular attitude. They’ve been welcoming and energized to any fresh or not fresh faces at their events. I’ll have some answers as to what caused this bloodbath eventually, but I don’t think that this is it.

Hi John and all!

It’s easy to fill in the gaps that fall between social interactions, and try to connect the dots in some psycho-political way, but I think in this case it’s inaccurate.
You like to live on the outside and poke at things with a
stick. Bless you for it, but I doubt there were any serious slights. There are plenty of discussions between left and center Democrats.

In fact, I’m a moderate and I seem to recall you and Tip “unsupporting” me quite noticeably! I too, got a good view of the back of your jacket… (smile) but I still like you.
You aren’t the only one, but hey, forgive and forget.
      (tick tick boom)
  In fact, Democrats held their own outside of the 42nd District. I actually saw the dynamics differently at the
Dems party. I saw stallwarts looking around wondering who
all the people were. Democrats are growing and getting
younger, and the know-it-alls many not not-it-all.
Folks in the 40th don’t understand. They want Kucinich for everything. Without Linville, we have nobody in the 42nd
representing us. In my mind you support Overstreet, like
you picked Doug in the past, to appear like a crossover independent. which is fine, so far as it goes, but you know what? They don’t care. You’re not in their tribe and
you probably never will be. I mean you run fairhaven.com
for crying out loud. (big smile)

hugs and kisses,

Mark

Hello again,

Rereading earlier posts, I find have to say that this was not the disaster it could have been. Dems hold the Senate and the Republicans are going to have to participate. On Ham’ points…I don’t think Obama missed the economy as a target, he did just fine. People don’t seem to get that he believes in the private sector, in spite of the hollering. The President doesn’t create jobs in the manner of a full on jobs program because he is essentially a free market guy. Health care needed to be passed, and so did financial reform. I’d say he did just fine in two years. A certain portion of the electorate basically freaked out and there is nothing he could have done to prevent it. The swing was not as wide as they predicted, and it will swing back.

Mark

PS - I did enjoy reading the posts.

It’s hard to know how the voters responded when all you’re looking at is a room with about 150 people in it, all of whom look pretty much same and don’t look like random crowds you see anywhere else.

The Democrats underestimated the backlash, didn’t understand that they needed to hold together the coalition from 2008, and suffered from the usual division between grassroots and the labor machine.

In simple terms, the turnout shifted from the last presidential election and the Democrats, nationally and locally, had no plan and no counter the Republicans well-funded and highly organized comeback operation.

The handwriting was on the wall a year ago when the Tea Party, an astroturf operation that developed its own legs, thrashed the Dems in town hall meetings over health care.  The deal was sealed when the persistent refrain was heard that the Tea Party was too extreme for Americans and would fragment the Republican party.  That was nonsense then and it should be pretty obvious now.  The Tea Party demonstrations were turning out several thousand people along the Guide Meridian.  Interpreting that as a weakness was exactly the same self-delusion as underestimating the convergence of the far right after Clinton’s election.

This was mostly a rerun of the backlash we saw in the 1993 (local) and 1994 (national) elections.  The Democrats got blindsided there also, but this time history repeated itself and they don’t have the excuse they didn’t see it coming.  They saw the light of the onrushing train and declared it the end of the tunnel.

We’ve been sorting through the mass of political mailings and one fact is salient:  most of the money was spent through state or national parties or influence groups.  Not much was controlled locally.  So this was a campaign where most of the mailings came from outside the area.

I may be blowing pickle-smoke here, but the test is simple:  Once the precinct returns are complete, look carefully at the demographics of the voting.  I’ll wager drinks (in a quiet bar where you can get service and be heard without hurting your throat) that a review of the polling stats will show:

* The turnout shifted the geographic center of voting to the northeast of Bellingham.  This is typical of older turnouts and also of elections where infrequent voters get turned out.  I’ll bet the turnout in places like Kendall and Ferndale was up and places like the area around the center of Bellingham was down.

* The turnout was depressed among young voters and increased among older voters.

* The turnout among 1 of 4 voters was up or equal to 2008 and turnout among 4/4 and 3/4 voters was down.

This is information that rarely gets made public unless public interest groups report it.  The information is being avidly gathered privately, as you may have noted the very high level of “polling” calls asking a) how are you going to vote and b) how did you vote.  These private polls are expensive and not something you are going to read about in the papers.  They are going to be used in future elections to influence and manipulate the vote.

Given the deflationary nature of the current recession, the conservative prescription of cut budgets and taxes will do about as much good as reviving the Smoot-Hawley tariffs, though that probably will look attractive to Glen Beck’s fan club.  So we can count on the stalemate in Congress to get worse and federal intervention to reboot the economy is not going to happen.  So we can look forward to dysfunctional economic policy for another couple of years, with probably another backlash election in 2012.

We’ll see how it goes in next year’s local elections, but I’m predicting more of the same, not less.

I really should not have posted the item about Dan.  My apology to him for posting that.  It also distracted from the point of my article.  My intention was for the item to be illustrative but it certainly reads now like a personal jab.  I also could have left out the last sentence about pawns.  That also distracts from the article, and I apologize to Vincent and Tony.  I appreciate the comments and barbs.

However, Mark, I think you are wrong about my comments on your run for state legislature in 2008.  I know that I was backing you.  The only comment of mine that I find was supportive of you. It is the July 23, 2008 article on the Bill Mize forum.  In a comment, you took issue with my writing “Mark is young, liberal, very intelligent and a good speaker”.

Just some fine points:

Murray, Larsen, Morris, and Lytton won…

Linville may win yet.

87,000 ballots have been submitted to date, a respectable turnout considering at least half our middle and working classes are suffering from economic shock.

Whatcom and San Juan County may be responsible for saving Larsen and Murray their seats.

In California, Jerry Brown, a wonderful politician and human being, cruised to victory in the most powerful state economy against a savy, successful billionaire who outspent him oodles to noodles.

And finally, progressives apparently voted for Larsen despite the the fact that some of them went to jail for protesting the war at his office! Now if that doesn’t show character…and patience…and victory…what does?

Think about it, we are in a much better position than we think.

John,

No apology was needed, but I appreciate your willingness to offer it.  I also appreciate your hosting this blog, and your attention to civic matters, even when I disagree with your conclusions about what is going on and why.  I think the biggest challenge facing our country today is that too many citizens are willing to step back and let others make critical decisions without appropriate input or oversight. 

Thanks for being engaged.

A late postscript - my observation as an implant into local politics is this: corrupt federal politics is the cause of much of what ails us locally, governmentally speaking.

The entire apparatus of corporate control of the federal government, which uses the most sophisticated brainwashing tools ever known to humans, has infected people with false ideologies, designed to divide people from one another, destroy normal human interactions, and destroy human social fabric in order to enrich and maintain the power of corporate interests.

North Koreans are forced to listen to government propaganda - Americans VOLUNTARILY watch 37 hours of tv per week, on average. A totalitarian can only imagine a population that believes it has a free press while actually delivering its minds to a media controlled by authoritarian, undemocratic entities that have allegiance only to profit.

What do these corporate entities encourage to maintain power and increase profits at our expense? DIVISION! Conservatives v. Liberals; Left v. RIght; and other unhealthy ideological concepts that divide us from ourselves.

The two-party system feeds this and the parties have become as corrupt as the system itself.

I don’t have many solutions other than not watching tv - it’s not called programming for nothing.

I don’t care whether Mr. Pike or Mr. Kremen are dems or reps - I care that they are competent and honest and listen to what the people they represent are saying. We have big problems in this country - which require honest, smart, and creative leadership. This is not a zero-sum game.