Because we're such goddamned nice people who can't fight back?

Sorry, I don't buy this.  You can be nice and polite and still fight like hell for the things you believe.  I don't mean this as an attack but we're about to lose an election and we don't need false pride that it's because we're too noble.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was nice and he also was impassioned and willing to die for what he believed. People got it that he was authentic and that he was fighting for a noble cause greater than himself.

The labor leaders and union members who fought, were jailed and sometimes died for their cause were nice people but they were tough and willing to put themselves on the line and not back down.

Finally, Jim Webb is a very nich man.  I've met him several times and he's always polite.  But he's tough and was "born fighting" and doesn't let people forget it when it comes to the causes he believes in, whether it's veterans' and workers' rights, the war in Iraq, or economic fairness.

If we're really raising children so polite that they can't play a game of soccer, we are indeed in trouble!

We have allowed radical extremists and hateful, angry partisans to destroy the cultural fabric of America.  They've had massive amounts of money to build the code language that transforms discussions of "uppity n****ers" into discussions of "hard working Americans" and "F***ing Fa****ots" into "family values", but it's all there.

Obama is the first to stand firmly on the ground of virtue and fight back with everything inside the realm of decency against the indecent attacks of these hateful, greedy tyrants.

But is it enough?  Where's the messaging?  Where's the clear and resonant message that cuts to the heart of the McCain candidacy and overwhelms the Palin lipstick?

While I'm on the subject... What's the difference between Sarah Palin and George W. Bush???

can you guess?

In fact the right has a $300 M lipstick production network built all around DC - Heritage Foundation, Federalist Society, What do you think they produce?  

Where the hell has Jim Webb been?

I consider myself to be a nice well mannered person, but I know how to fight. The problem is that these people need to learn how to fight. You can fight well without fighting dirty. In fact I love a fight, but I don't revel in my opponents pain. If the truth about my opponent will damn them I have no problem speaking it. The basic problem for the Democrats is that they don't even want to tell the ugly truth much of the time. For instance, why haven't the Democrats brought up the Keating scandal yet? What are they afraid of? If the Republicans had something like this on Obama it would be everywhere.

wouldn't be much of a surprise... nevermind

I would be willing to bet that 75% of McCain supporters either have forgotten or never knew anything about this. I even didn't know what it was until a year ago. I would be willing to bet the majority of the thinly educated Republican mouth-breathers probably don't know a thing about this.

Just because some political commentator on TV may say "We knew about that" doesn't mean that millions of other people knew about it.

i dont no much about keating 5 and i could care less and I imagine most people will care even less than I do about that...that's so ridiculous...

i do not think in the least that obama has had any trouble fighting...it's just that some of us on this side seem  to think that just cuz the media says obama is having a hard time that we're supposed to believe it.

well i dont...obama's campaign has been brilliant and every time i think he doesn't know what he's doing, he surprises me...

do u honestly believe that the obama team didn't know that the mccain camp wouldn't go nutso over the lipstick on a pig statement...of course they knew they would and THEY DID...and they were able to illustrate once again how the mccain camp cant talk about the issues...

one of the dems (as a group) problems is we've never had someone that can chew bubble gum and kick ass at the same time and Obama can.

This is not the answer, just one point. The GOP are very effective campaigners, and part, not all, but part of their success is that their followers don't waver and a lot of times don't think. Just tell em something and that's it. They pride themselves in not hesitating, they think it makes them look STRONGER. And frankly a lot of the GOP roots are in rural America where a lot times people don't think outside the box, they just keep thinking the way their fathers did, and their fathers did, etc.

is willing to take Palin on:

Wait, wait. Where are all of the passionate people fighting during the primaries? I saw plenty of attacks going on at the time, directed to other Democrats.

Why can't we just keep that fight, but this time directed at Republicans? I have seen a lot more hesitation on attacking the Palin/McCain ticket that there was to attack Obama or Hillary.

On the other hand, maybe we are just to polite to fight with strangers :)

We've been pounding her from day #1. No hesitation at all in saying that she's an unqualified extremist "cocky wacko."  

When you have a string of Palin stories on the front page, obviously people are doing their job here :)

And especially not you Lowell.  What you have been doing is exactly what needs to be done.  I just don't want to see the "we're too nice to win against these meanies" mindset become the meme.  If it does, then we might as well just admit defeat right now.

BTW, you don't have to stoop to their level to fight tough.  If you know something is untrue, don't repeat it.  If it's a personal attack that has nothing to do with a candidate's performance in office, don't use it.  Their families should mostly be off limits (except for the "hypocrisy factor").  

But if somebody is incompetent, a liar, has poor judgment, doesn't understand the facts, has bad policies, is tied to an administration that has taken us in the wrong direction, those are fair things to attack them with.

At the same time, of course a candidate (read Obama for now) should also be presenting his own best credentials.  Again, don't lie, don't exaggerate.  Just tell the truth about why this candidate is better than their candidate.

That's what I mean by fighting.  We might still lose (always a possibility for either side) but it shouldn't be because we didn't put up the best fight - the best campaign - that we could.

It's not RK or the blogs that are ducking this.  But the campaign has not been as forceful as it could be and I don't want anybody using the excuse that it's because Democrats are too nice.  We are nice enough but not pushovers.

In 2006, there was an interesting article published by the Journal of Research Into Personality about a study done by professor Jack Block.  Block and his wife tracked 100 nursery school students to adulthood and found:

Children who at age 4 were described by their teachers as "self- reliant, energetic, somewhat dominating, relatively under- controlled and resilient" identified as politically liberal 20 years later.

Conversely, children described as "feeling easily victimized, easily offended, indecisive, fearful, rigid, inhibited and relatively over-controlled and vulnerable" favored conservative politics when they grew up.

Oakland Tribune, March 26, 2006.

they mock everything too, and get away with it. It doesn't matter how bad they look in the media the people that follow the GOP will vote. The GOP knows how to target the people that will help them win. Like now they're going after the rural vote, they don't care how bad they look to Americans, cause the GOP base is going to show up--they're passionate, and then they'll convince the rural vote, which won't be hard to do for them. Hopefully all these newly registered dems will show up.

By the way that video on the wolves being shot is Powerful, I hope they get that on MSM even though it may not do a lot of good, it'll dirty em a little. I still have a problem with people ENJOYING hunting defensless animals, unless they want to try killing a black bear with their bare hands--I don't have a problem with that. To me hunters without their guns are a bunch of pussies.

Max Cleland, a wheelchair bound multiple amputee Vietnam veteran, was savagely attacked in his reelection campaign as Senator from Georgia.  His Republican opponent, who won, was Saxby Chambliss.  The TV ads run by the Republicans called Cleland a friend of Osama Bin Laden, a traitor, and a coward.  Cleland, a gentleman with a gentle personality, barely fought back.

I have always wondered how this would have worked:

"Mr. Chambliss, I am outraged by your TV ads about my character.  I will meet you tomorrow at noon at the Georgia State Capital building and with the one arm I have left, I'll wipe the steps with your butt!  I'll be on time--don't be late."

No need here to revisit the abuse John Kerry took from the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" except to wonder how this would have worked:

In the first face-to-face televised debate with George W. Bush what if Kerry had skipped his opening remarks, turned to Bush and said:

"You draft-dodging Chicken Hawk creep, why don't you call me a liar and coward to my face, right here, right now instead of having your stooges do it?  I'm waiting. . . .

I believe that both men would be in office today.....

because this is America where exaggerated aggressiveness marks most of our folk heroes and frontier narratives, and bullying is an art form. Senator Obama adheres to the New England tradition of reserved conciliation as a response to finding common ground and avoiding physical fighting to settle disagreements. He is campaigning the way he intends to govern, and that is never successful in American politics. Campaigning is blood sport.

It is true that there are times both domestically and in foreign affairs, where conciliation and mediation are hopeless, and nasty frontal assault is the appropriate response (remember the American fleet attacking the Tripoli pirates and the Bey of Algiers). I think now is one of those times. Enough is enough. Publicize the hell out of Keating five and Troopergate, go for the jugular on raising taxes and leaving Palin's toonerville town with horrendous debt (and compare that to Dubya), highlight her obvious ignorance of the Bush Doctrine. Since we don't want family publicly involved (even though she parades them around at the drop of a hat), go online to dirty up that image (just as the Repubs do): On the Internet see to it that folks hear about that pregnant daughter who had actually left home and was living with her aunt because of her mother's controlling bossiness, or that the famous son bound for Iraq is in the Army because he was such a screw-up. Publish the Washington Post's comparative analysis of  Obama's tax plan vs McCain's--- it has an easily understood fabulous table that's most convincing. Demand apologies from both McCain-Palin and the jerks on television and shate radio whenever the opportunity presents itself. Sue if possible.

Palin is your typical Republican insider politician and make sure everybody learns that.

PS: one reason this time is the worst is that the traditional white male domination is on its last legs and they are mortally afraid. Fighting dirty? You betcha.

that would've been sweet if he did say that, cause Bush is a disgusting human being, and a chicken at the same time.  

Good piece, I agree with everything. I know they'll have a rebutal for everything too, but what can you do. The GOP just doesn't care--they're going after a few voters, they know their base will be there, especially now. They are the masters of distraction. But I am hoping the Americans can see through it. I can and I am not a rocket scientist.