The Minority Party. (How it got that way and stays that way.)

As I scanned through the morning papers recently, I was stuck by the similarity of the attacks on President Bush from both the terrorists and the Democrats. It is difficult to tell from whence such attacks come… because they are saying the same things… making the same claims… and as a result the Democrats are aliening themselves with the terrorists and those who would bring America down. That is… if… they mean what they are saying. I have to tell you, I tend to take them at their word.

Here’s a quote from Zawahri’s recently released videotape shown on Al-Jazeera TV:

“Butcher of Washington, you are not only defeated and a liar, but also a failure. “ He went on to say: “ You are a curse on your own nation and you have brought, and will bring, them only catastrophes and tragedies.”

Now, tell me… the remarks of the Democrats in Washington… and the remarks of the terrorists… were they penned by the same writer? Sure as heck sounds like it!

This is a period of great angst in the nation for we have a country split right down the middle. Our political philosophies are so polarized there is no hope of a compromise.

So what do we do? We proselytize. We try to create new converts to our way of thinking. We do this in hopes of keeping a majority of the American electorate, or… gaining a majority of the electorate.

One can accomplish this my yelling and screaming, and name calling, and threatening, and basically acting-up and acting-out, like children, or, one can accomplish this by presenting one’s political belief in an adult, reasoned, way while maintaining a modicum of “class” in the doing.

The Republicans have chosen the latter and, unfortunately, the Democrats have chosen the former.

If I were a Democrat today, I’d be so embarrassed I’d leave the Democrat Party. If I couldn’t sell my political philosophy to the American people, I would look, seriously, at that philosophy to see if I could detect what the American electorate has detected… and rejected. Blaming one’s defeat, and inability to sell Americans the Democrat Party Platform, is hardly a reason to blame the other party for the unpalatable menu your party offered.

The Republicans did not come to power overnight. It took a solid 50 years to get to the pinnacle of power in the US. That’s half a century! It took years, decades, of discipline laying out our platform, and refining that platform, until we began to reflect the philosophy of the Average American. Then we had to groom candidates for office that were convinced the message was correct and an accurate reflection of American’s understanding of the way government should be run in this country. We had to educate, and groom, law school students and then attorneys and judges until we had acceptable candidates for the offices of Judges and Justices.

And we did it! A half a century of work went into it. There were no “demonstrations” in the streets. We didn’t have the time for that sort of foolishness. We had work to do. All that work, and determination, paid off. And the Democrat Party was completely blindsided by the Republican Revolution when it came! They had no idea what had happened. They still don’t.

Until the mid nineties the Democrats were the party of power. They believed it was their birthright, as Democrats, to rule the US. They came to believe their own press releases. They were wrong on both counts. They still have not figured it out! They hang onto the belief that if only more people heard their message the Democrats would win! It never occurs to them that it is exactly their message of which Americans disapprove. It is, also, their way of presenting their message, which drives Americans away from them.

Listen to them. Listen to the leaders of each of the parties and listen to their tone as well as their presentation. The Democrats present a negative message of doom and gloom and tragedy and “woe is me” in sackcloth and ashes. The Republicans present a positive message, full of optimism and promise for good things in the future, as far as the eye can see. It is a message of undying hope and belief in the individual American’s ability to meet any obstacle and overcome it.

Now, you tell me… which message more accurately reflects Americans and the promise of America?

Democrats cannot continuously attack America, they cannot continuously blame America for all the world’s ills, they cannot continuously tell Americans they are not capable of seeing to the welfare of themselves and their families … and expect Americans to support them at the polls. But they do… and they are incapable of seeing the error of their ways. Until they do, they will be relegated to the minority position in America’s government.

Longstreet