Ronnie Musgrave is a conservative Democrat who disassociated himself from the national party. And you're even gleeful that such a conservative Democrat lost. Your professed interest in the Democratic party strikes me as totally phony, contrived to the core.

In what way am I being "gleeful?" And what does Musgrove being conservative have to do with the price of tea in China?

I see a party in trouble. Lashing out at people who say so isn't going to help.

I'm sorry. I was sure I read your post to include a reference to "another one bites the dust." Must have seen it somewhere else, because I don't see it now.

Ah. Yes, an early draft did say "another one bites the dust." You caught me in the five minutes between edits, because I published it prematurely.

However, "another one bites the dust" is not gloating, Joel. Although I do think Democrats get exactly what they deserve, what with their deplorable behavior over the last year or so.

Now, you need to stop calling me names and making snotty remarks about my character. I've had about enough of that. I am not here to take abuse from you. You can agree with me or disagree with me, but enough of the ad hominem stuff.

Joel,

But you must admit, at the least, that these two defeats are not good news for the Democrats, right?

Dean,

Gazing into my crystal ball, I can't see any way for anyone other than Gephardt to take a Southern State next year (counting MO as a Southern State, though Gephardt might also play well in AR and TN as well as FL). Without taking at least one Southern State, the Democrats don't have a snowball's chance in hell of winning - win CA and NY with 90% of the vote and outpoll Bush by 5 million votes; it wont matter if they don't carry a Southern State.

Credit Dean with at least acknowleding this - and weep bitter tears at the way his fellow Democrats are ripping him to pieces over saying a kind word about red necks.

Dean,

You were the one that started calling me names by referring to "elitist crap." To me that was extremely offensive and attacked my character in a very personal way.

Mark,

Kentucky hurts and is a bad loss for the Democrats. Mississippi means nothing, as you could put all the white folks there who would vote for a Democratic president in a broom closet. Mississippi wouldn't vote Democratic in a presidential race unless it was a 50-state sweep.

That's not an attack on your person, it's on something you said. I stand by the characterization of what you said, too: it was, and is, elitist crap. I'm not otherwise interested in any "who started it" games, since I found several things you said ofensive. But if you keep implying that I'm a dishonest hypocrite, I'll have to ask you to leave. I'm not here to be your punching bag. Capice?

If you want to delete my comments, that is your right. But I'm not leaving, and I won't be intimidated by you, either.

"Intimidate?" When you're in my house, pal, you'll play by my rules, and if that strikes you as intimidation, you've got a lot of growing up to do.

Go off and make snotty, whiny, bitchy comments about how mean and nasty and hypocritical big bad Dean Esmay is to someone else. Come back when you've learned some manners.

Buh-bye.

By the way, the rules of engagement are right here, for anyone who hasn't seen 'em yet.

Actually, there were plenty of white folks in Mississippi who voted for a Democrat for president... in 1976. And I suspect the Al Gore who was elected as a senator from Tennessee in the 80s could have won Mississippi in 2000; that Al Gore, however, was a distant memory by the time the 2000 campaign rolled around.

And it's truly sad to see the national Democrats write off a state in which their own candidates can, and do, win races in heavily white areas. Unfortunately, Ronnie Musgrove decided to campaign on Buchananite sentiment rather than advancing a positive vision of what Mississippians--white and black--can do together to improve our state, and it probably cost him a second term.

As for 2004, Clark might be able to get some traction in the south if he got his head out of his ass and articulated a clear vision of what his foreign policy would be. And maybe Dean could delude southern voters into thinking that Vermont is really just a cold version of Georgia where people talk like Canadians. But IMHO Gephardt's a bit too "old left" for most of the south, although he might be able to play to the nativist sentiment with his "I hated NAFTA before Pat Buchanan did" schtick.

You circled around it, Chris, without saying it directly: one of the deplorable habits that loyal Democrats have gotten into is the tendency to ascribe sinister racist motives to white southerners. This is one of the things that's most alienated so many of them from the Democratic party.

Good point Dean. While there are some white racist southerners, they are not the norm. However, what has intrigued me is that the "Bubba" demographic keeps voting republican yet remains one of the least upwardly mobile groups of people. They remained mired in economic depression and have the tendency to blame others rather than themselves. In the same light, I must be honest and say that democrats play the race card too quickly and carelessly even when it is a valid point. My party has got to get some traction soon or the country's working poor will be in trouble. I think Clark or Dean would offer a great alternative to anything the GOP has been dishing out the last 25 years.

Tim the Soldier

Democrats will stay on this loosing spiral, unless they stop pandering to extreme leftists, and other kooks within their ranks. Like Tim the Soldier said in a previous post, Democrats have to do the right thing, instead o f pandering to the Jesse Jacksons and the Al Sharptons, and the extreme leftist Kucinich types. And if the Republicans had any sense, they would look into seeing how they could help out the working poor, in which case, they will have all the races locked up.

CNN's (minimal) coverage is here:

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/11/04/elec04.election.govs.wrap/index.html

One thing that confused me is the first paragraph's characterization of the Barbour/Musgrove race:

"Republican Haley Barbour...won the Mississippi governorship in a tight race with Musgrove."

Later in the same article, it says:

"With 84 percent of the precincts reporting, Barbour secured 53 percent, compared to 45 percent for Musgrove...."

It also says that in Kentucky, Fletcher beat Chandler by 10 points (55-45), and the quote from Fletcher indicates that he was surprised and pleased to win by such a margin.

Can someone explain to me how Barbour's 8-point margin of victory can accurately be described as "locked in a close race," while Fletcher's 10-point victory gets no such analysis? This just seems sloppy to me.

"one of the deplorable habits that loyal Democrats have gotten into is the tendency to ascribe sinister racist motives to white southerners. This is one of the things that's most alienated so many of them from the Democratic party."

Seems like they've always been alienated by anything having to do with the federal government (unless it's a cash payment, of course). Conservative pandering to those sentiments hasn't helped. I just figure some of 'em haven't gotten the word - the Civil War is over, let's move on.

As a perfect example of the ascribing of racist motives to white Southerners, see the recent kerfluffle among the Democratic presidential candidates over Howard Dean's saying that he wanted to reach out to people who had Confederate flags on their trucks. If Southerners had any doubts about what most of the leading Democrats think of them, they certainly don't now. Dean's statement may turn out to have been a stroke of genius on his part, because it gave his opponents the perfect amount of rope with which to hang their chances of getting the Southern vote.

I read Dean backed off on the Confederate flag comment already.

That's probably wise -- after all, he does still have to appeal to the Democrats who think Southerners are a buncha racist rednecks if he wants to get elected, so he can't come on too strong -- but it sure was fun watching his opponents twisting in the wind. And I think Southern Democrats will appreciate that he made the remark at all, even if he backed off, and they'll sure remember how the others reacted to it.