Text 12838, 153 rader
Skriven 2005-05-20 19:19:00 av Jeff Binkley (1:226/600)
Ärende: Dems
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What did they expect ?

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http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-05-19-parties-
outreach_x.htm


As Dems shore up base, GOP goes 'raiding'
By Jill Lawrence, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — National party chairmen Howard Dean and Ken Mehlman have 
the same job titles but different jobs. One is on a mission to rebuild, 
the other to expand.

Their itineraries tell the tale.

Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, is courting 
black and Hispanic voters on a regular basis. Beyond the usual run of 
speeches, fundraisers and meetings with donors, he has visited Latino 
neighborhoods and historically black campuses. He has attended black-
oriented receptions and ceremonies, spoken to minority chambers of 
commerce and raised money for Otto Banks of Harrisburg, Pa., a black 
city council candidate new to the GOP.

Dean, who reaches Day 100 as Democratic National Committee chairman 
Monday, is for the most part speaking to diehard Democrats who are the 
backbone of their party. He's addressed Democrats in nine states 
dominated by Republicans, such as Kansas and Mississippi, and in party 
strongholds such as California and Massachusetts. He's spoken to labor 
unions, gay-rights groups and state party chairs — all pillars of the 
party.

Some Democrats are frustrated by the contrast between the two 
approaches, even as they praise Dean's efforts to revitalize flagging 
state parties. "Democrats should be stirring things up, roiling the 
waters on (the GOP) side the way Mehlman is on ours. He's playing in our 
sandbox," says Steve Rosenthal, CEO of America Coming Together, a group 
formed to energize and turn out Democratic voters.

Will Marshall, president of the centrist Progressive Policy Institute, 
agrees that Democrats need to "go raiding behind Republican lines." He 
says his group and the affiliated Democratic Leadership Council will be 
doing "some missionary work of our own" in Republican states this year.

Rosenthal, Marshall and others say Democrats — led by Dean — should be 
reaching out to groups and areas where Republicans have done well: 
military families, Catholics, evangelical Christians, business leaders, 
people who live in the "exurbs" beyond even outer suburbs, and people 
who live in small, "micropolitan" cities. They also say Democrats should 
focus on black and Latino voters, even though majorities of both voted 
for Democrat John Kerry for president last year.

Dean declined to comment for this story. His spokeswoman, Karen Finney, 
says that "we will have an aggressive outreach," including to the faith 
community, "but we're focused on doing our strategy — not talking about 
it." She adds: "I'm glad to hear the Republican Party is finally 
reaching out" to minorities. "It's about time."

Republican gains 

Though Republicans still win only a fraction of the black vote, the 
trend is up: President Bush gained last year among blacks, rising from 
8% to 11%. More worrisome for Democrats as they look at future swing 
states, Bush went from 9% to 16% among black voters in Ohio — the state 
that gave him the presidency with a 2-percentage-point win. Among 
Hispanics, the fastest growing part of the electorate and once reliably 
Democratic, Bush went from 35% to more than 40% nationally.

The numbers behind the Republican push are stark. Given birth rates and 
other population trends, says GOP strategist Bill McInturff, "you can't 
be a majority party as a party of white America."

Simon Rosenberg, president of the centrist New Democrat Network, says 
his group spent $6 million in nine states last year to reach Hispanic 
voters, but "winning with Hispanics is a much higher priority" for 
Republicans. "They're doing the math," he says.

Dean, a former presidential candidate, won his current job by pledging 
to revive weak state operations, and that is his top priority now. In 
April he gave $500,000 in DNC money to parties in four states dominated 
by Republicans, and plans to dispense cash to several additional state 
parties this month. He has started placing organizers in all 50 states. 
A DNC team is helping state parties develop customized rebuilding plans.

More than three months into his tenure, Dean has yet to name a political 
director, typically the person who stays in contact with state parties 
and decides where money should go. However, he has won praise for making 
diverse appointments, including a communications director and lead 
pollster who are African-American. He's kept his profile relatively low 
so far but is set to break out Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press.

Mehlman, manager of the 2004 Bush campaign, played a crucial role in the 
GOP's two-year drive to build up grassroots operations and pinpoint 
potential supporters. The result: Republicans outperformed Democrats in 
turning out voters, and Bush won.

The GOP recently set new goals — register 4 million new voters, identify 
19 million new potential supporters — to make sure it keeps growing over 
the next four years. At the same time, Mehlman has turned to minority 
voters. "It certainly is a very big priority for me, this president and 
this party," he said in an interview.

In talks to minority groups, Mehlman promotes Bush's "opportunity" 
agenda: home and business ownership, education and private Social 
Security accounts. He says he and his party share his listeners' love of 
country, family and God. "Give us a chance and we'll give you a choice," 
he urges.

Republican strategist Matthew Dowd says Mehlman is building on his 
party's 2004 gains, while Dean is shoring up traditional support — not a 
strong position. "A party trying to win elections and expand the 
electorate would much prefer to be speaking to the other side's base 
than its own base," he says.

Jim Jordan, a Democratic strategist and Dean adviser, dismisses 
Mehlman's forays as window-dressing. "Mehlman has a huge luxury," he 
says. "He's running the same organization he's been running for a long 
time. It's in good shape. It's well funded. So he can do things like 
make PR points."

Plenty of red meat 

Dean is offering Democrats his trademark red-meat rhetoric along with 
guidance on outreach. In speeches covered locally, he has called 
Republicans "corrupt," "brain-dead" and "mean." "They are not nice 
people," he said last month in a radio interview on Air America 
Minnesota, according to the political newsletter Hotline. Last weekend 
he said House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, whose associates are 
under investigation but who has not been charged with anything, should 
go home to Houston to "serve his jail sentence" at Texas expense.

At the same time, Dean tells Democrats they need to "respect people in 
all 50 states" and try to win them over. "We need to talk to people from 
our hearts," he told California Democrats. He said Democrats should "say 
what our values are" and "inform Americans about what we believe instead 
of letting the other party do it."

That includes changing the way Democrats talk about abortion, he says. 
Forget "pro-choice" and "pro-life," he tells groups across the country, 
Democrats should talk about who makes the decision — the woman, a 
politician such a DeLay or, as reported by the Lawrence Journal World in 
Kansas, "some right-wing pastor."

Dean told California Democrats he is visiting conservative states 
because "how are people going to respect you if you don't show up and 
ask for their vote?" He is counting on that message getting out beyond 
his Democratic audiences. As he says, referring to the limited turf 
fought over last year, "You have seen the last 18-state presidential 
campaign in America."

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