This is a positive sign that perhaps this loss will finally mete out enough electoral punishment that they will learn:
First, we need to get real. I can’t tell you how optimistic I was going into this election, though, looking back, there doesn’t seem to have been a reason for quite such a sunny view. But I, like most of us, fell for the echo chamber. Daily Kos, MyDD, Steve Soto, Pandagon, and all the other blogs are run by good people with positive intentions, but if they’re you’re primary source for information, you’re outlook is perverted by an overwhelming amount of good news and a general disdain for the factual accuracy of bad news. It perverts your perspective and, because the sample group is so totally different than most of America, it begins to twist your political predictions and assumptions of what works (for more on this, see my article Power Trippi).
Not only were you in an echo chamber, but you flat out villified anyone who had the temerity to disagree with you (I don’t mean you specifically, Ezra, but rather, the collective) on any issue.
While Ezra seems to be getting it, Jesse is still in the fever swamps:
Incidentally, I really do believe Bush’s win is based on getting out the homophobic votes for the same-sex marriage amendments across the nation. I get the feeling he won’t get denounced for relying on homophobes to get him into the White House.
This is simply more of the childish, churlish, obnoxious bile that got you where you are. Opposition to gay marriage is not the same as homophobia or bigotry, no matter how many times you say it. Unless, of course, you think that the following percentages of the following electorates are all homophobic bigots:
Arkansas: 75%
Georgia: 77%
Kentucky: 75%
Michigan: 59%
Mississippi: 86%
Montana: 66%
North Dakota: 73%
Ohio: 62%
Oklahoma: 76%
Oregon: 57%
Utah: 66%
A sign of adulthood and maturity is an acceptance that other people’s positions on issues might differ from yours- something the Democratic party simply seems unwilling to understand. Look at recent history:
In favor of the War in Iraq- you have been fooled by the administration that Saddam was behind 9/11 or you are a bloodthirsty jingoist after oil.
In favor of tax relief- you are a greedy sob who hates the poor.
Do I need to go on?
Seriously, although I am glad my side (for the most part) won, the country is not well-served in the long run with such dominance of the electoral process. Until the Democrats come to terms with their deep problems, and manage to learn how to oppose someone on issues without villifying the populaces of entire regions of the country, they aren’t going to win a national race for years to come.
*** Update ***
Like I said, Ezra is learning, although he still seems to think that oppositin to gay marriage is a de facto position of ignorance. For some, maybe. For all, of course not.