WANTED: A SECOND AMERICAN POLITICAL PARTY

In Mississippi:

Former Republican National Committee chairman (Haley) Barbour handily defeated incumbent Democrat Ronnie Musgrove in another closely watched race. Barbour, who also campaigned with Bush over the weekend, told supporters in Mississippi Tuesday night, "Tomorrow is a day to move on and put this day behind us and get ready to accentuate the positive."

...state officials said they were investigating dozens of reports of irregularities Tuesday, including allegations that observers followed voters into ballot booths or videotaped voters and their completed ballots.

"The Republican Party has run this election with a fist full of dollars in one hand and a Confederate flag in the other," said state Democratic Party chairman Rickey L. Cole.

Earlier, Barbour had revisited another issue that divided the races -- the Confederate flag. Recent ads reminded voters that Musgrove had supported an unsuccessful 2001 referendum that sought to remove the Rebel X

Former RNC chair holds Bush's hand during the campaign? Guess the man's not political poison in Mississippi. (Didn't Clinton appear with Davis in California?) Meanwhile the best the Dems can do is make feeble claims at "voter intimidation?" My prediction: The voter intimidation ploy was planned out in advance when it looked like the election might be close. The reality was another ~55-45 win for the Reps, similar to Kentucky, even though pre election polls (just like those in California) claimed it was too close to call. The intimidation claims will fade, because 1) they are likely false and 2) it won't change the results, which is what those who make the claims really want. They could care less if every vote is counted.

Speaking of the Confederate flag issue, Howie Dean gained the respect of some folks for not backing down like a complete invertebrate when other candidates demanded he retract and apologize for his comments. (Though he should have lost much respect for appearing on the ridiculous "Rock the Vote" insult-to-Americans-under-20.) The latest developments:

Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean, under fire for saying he wanted to be a candidate for "guys with Confederate flags on their pickup trucks," issued an apology for his remark Thursday.

Dean said he used poor judgment in what was a sincere attempt to signal his effort to bring conservative but poor white voters into the Democratic Party fold.

"I think I made a mistake," Dean told CNN's Bill Hemmer on "American Morning." Dean also said he is confident his remark won't sink his campaign ship.

Meanwhile, back in Mississippi, insight and analysis from the Jackson Clarion/Ledger:

Republicans now control half the top positions in state government, and enough Republicans have been added to the Mississippi House to block any Democratic attempts at overriding vetoes.

"They can play now and play with some muscle," said Marty Wiseman, political science professor at Mississippi State University.

For the first time since Reconstruction, Republicans control the offices of governor, lieutenant governor, state treasurer and state auditor — four of the top eight positions in state government.

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Republicans went out of their way to embrace President Bush and other top national Republicans. Democrats seeking statewide office appeared to distance themselves from the national party, calling themselves "independent" and "conservative."

"When you've got to run from the national party, it puts you against your own," Wiseman said.

Recurring themes here, as Dems in the south try desperately to be Republicans and don't know it. Dean actually had a vague clue that he was out of touch, and was attempting to make contact, albeit clumsily and without a good grasp of the intricacies of southern politics. Now that his opponents for the Democratic nomination have essentially emasculated him on this one expect all their numbers to fall even further south in the south. Within a few weeks this won't be discussed in Dixie. Nor will it be forgotten.

This excerpt from commentary at CNS News provides insight into the minefield of southern politics:

...Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAuliffe had declared the Mississippi race, won by former RNC Chairman Haley Barbour, a referendum on President Bush.

And Georgia's Democrat Zell Miller, who's retiring from his Senate seat, warned that Democrats won't win the presidency if they can't carry any southern states.

"The age of the white southern Democrat has come to a close, and this is another sign of that," said Steve Moore, president of the Club for Growth, which helps fund free market candidacies.

"There's no question Bush was a big winner when it comes to these governor's races because he put his reputation on the line," Moore added. "And the Democrats tried to run against these 'Washington Republicans' that are tied to Bush, and that backfired."

In next year's presidential race, Democrats will have to win all the battleground states to offset Republican wins in the South, Moore predicts.

"If they start by losing Florida and Texas and then they're losing all the other southern states, it's just very difficult for them...to win every close state," said Moore, namely Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and West Virginia.

"Yesterday, the South's hue became more deeply 'Bush Red,'" said University of Virginia political science professor Larry Sabato. "Should Louisiana go GOP on Nov. 15, it will turn redder still.

Note the "white southern Democrat" quote. Can the Democrats reach such a voter? Note that Deans "Confederate flag" comments were also seen (rightfully) as insulting and uninformed by a lot of southern (and elsewhere) folks who are liberal-leaning Democrats by registration, but independent "swing voters in actuality. And if the Democratic candidate does reach out to such voters, at what cost? The Dems have so many conflicted special interest groups they must appease that their task may be impossible.

Signs of developing discord are showing, as knives, if not as yet being plunged into backs, are at least being sharpened:

Democrats across the country rallied to support Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairman Terry McAuliffe yesterday, a day after the party lost governorships in Kentucky and Mississippi and less than four weeks after losing the gubernatorial race in California.

But on a morning of bitter misgivings for Democrats there were also rumblings in Mississippi, California, New York, Washington, D.C., and elsewhere, with many party rank- and-file members complaining that the DNC has written off the South, taken black voters for granted and picked a poor 2004 convention site in Boston.

“Terry McAuliffe is out there on his own agenda, which does not involve the South,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the only black member of his state’s congressional delegation.

“It does not involve African Americans to the extent that they need to be. There are some real organizational problems at the Democratic National Committee that need to be corrected if in fact this party is to ever regain a majority status in Washington.”

Nevertheless, DNC leaders, members of Congress and party officials from Alaska to New Mexico to North Carolina said McAuliffe could have done little to prevent Rep. Ernie Fletcher (R-Ky.) from trouncing Democratic Attorney General Ben Chandler and Haley Barbour (R) from beating Gov. Ronnie Musgrove (D) in Mississippi.

Other Democrats, including DNC officials, said that if anyone is to blame for those losses it is the Democratic Governors Association (DGA) and Democratic state and local leaders...

...Democrats also pointed out that, in Kentucky, Chandler was saddled with scandals surrounding Democratic Gov. Paul Patton. They further argued that Mississippi... was too conservative to fight for and that Musgrove had been an aberration.

...Other Democratic officials defended McAuliffe but criticized party leaders on Capitol Hill, particularly Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (S.D.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), citing division within party ranks about the Iraq war.

...Still others said state and local Democratic leaders in the South had failed to build the party machinery needed to turn back the Republican tide that has swept all levels of government in that part of the country since the civil rights movement of the mid-1960s.

In South Carolina, for example, former Gov. Jim Hodges (D) had neglected to build a party organization for statewide campaigns, said former DNC Chairman Don Fowler, now a political science professor at the University of South Carolina, in Columbia.

Fowler said Southern Democrats had failed to take their message of greater economic opportunity and racial equality to the people, calling themselves Democrats while distancing themselves from national leaders in Washington.

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DNC officials and Democratic House members, including Reps. Frost and Barney Frank (Mass.), downplayed the gubernatorial elections, arguing that the committee is right where it wants to be. DNC officials insisted that the party is looking forward to hosting its national convention in Boston.

Many Democrats have questioned the wisdom of hosting the big event in liberal Massachusetts instead of taking their case to New York, where the GOP will be, or Miami, site of the Florida post-election meltdown in 2000.

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On Wednesday, Republicans were anything but frustrated. The party’s gubernatorial wins in Kentucky — the first in more than 30 years — and Mississippi showed the president’s broad appeal, current RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie said at a press conference.

Looking forward to the Nov. 15 Louisiana gubernatorial election, in which Republican Bobby Jindal is running neck and neck with Democratic Lt. Gov. Kathleen Blanco, Gillespie said voters want a positive message.

“What we saw again here were examples of the candidates running on issues,” Gillespie said, referring to the Kentucky and Mississippi races, “talking about creating jobs, talking about improving schools, talking about making healthcare more affordable for their citizens, and Democrats running very negative campaigns.”

"Neck and neck" in Louisiana too, eh?

I don't mean to gloat here; I really want a two-party system. Like most Americans I'd prefer a loyal opposition to any administration. But the Dems are loosing (and loosing it) on a lot of issues. Where can they start to fix their problems?

First they must accept that they have a problem. Hating Bush will not keep him from being reelected.

Next they must show an ability to work with the other party; in power or out, there must be some cooperation, especially in time of war. (So acknowledging that this is time of war may be step 2, then making cooperative efforts) A two-birds-with-one-stone effort may be possible, to mend bridges in the south and show cooperation. If I Were I Terry McAulliff's replacement I would seriously consider demanding this simple first step from my cronies in the Senate (from the OpinionJournal):

Democrats may also want to reconsider the wisdom of their Senate judicial-filibuster strategy. Republicans in Mississippi made much of the Democratic filibuster of appeals-court nominee Charles Pickering Sr., a highly regarded Mississippian who has been unfairly labeled a racist. A Senate vote on ending the filibuster, conveniently timed for last Thursday, was big news in his home state.

Two other Southerners are on the filibuster list: Alabama Attorney General William Pryor and Texas Supreme Court Justice Priscilla Owen. A third, Janice Brown, an African-American now sitting on the California Supreme Court, is the daughter of a sharecropper from rural Alabama. National liberal Democrats claim these popular Southerners are too "extreme," which is another way of saying "drop dead" to the entire South. On Tuesday's evidence, the South is returning the compliment.

Really, it's a pale hope at best that the Democrats problems are confined to the south. A judicial nominee finally getting past their iron curtain would probably score them some desperately needed points nationwide.

But it's not going to be easy.

Another controversial Bush nominee passed a preliminary test Thursday, getting approval on a party-line vote from members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown now awaits her fate in the full Senate, where Democrats have already put the brakes on four of President Bush's nominees for the bench.

Brown, who has been lauded by Republicans as a great candidate for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, has been targeted by some African-American activists who say the conservative, black, female justice is not a good fit on the 12-member D.C. court because of her temperament on the bench and inadequate qualifications...

...(NAACP chairman Julian) Bond said President Bush is nominating Brown to make him look sympathetic to minorities, even though the African-American candidate is completely unacceptable.

"Judicial selection should be based on principle, not on pigment. The president cheapens the process when he substitutes race for rationality or color for capability," Bond said.

But the White House continued to back its candidate, repeating again on Wednesday that Brown is ably qualified for the federal bench, primarily because she is not a judicial activist.

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The 54-year-old Brown was born in segregated Alabama, the daughter of sharecroppers. She has served on the California Supreme Court for nearly eight years, and was re-elected in 1998 with 76 percent of the vote.

But you know why Ms Brown probably won't make it? Because when Democrats say "conservative judges", this is what they have in mind. (It's from the DNC homepage folks, and it's nothing new.)

Speaking of judges, these guys just overturned action by both the other two branches of the government, so perhaps they could just appoint and confirm more of themselves to the bench, don't you think?