I'm so relieved that we are having the discussion about which Democratic values we can safely shed early instead of waiting until closer to the next election like we usually do. I think we should get out ahead on these issues and put the Republicans off their game. I'm already on record as being in favor of scrapping our pesky insistence on teaching evolution. Clearly, it's disrespectful to those who believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible to insist that it is true. That elitist fealty to reason and fact is why they hate us so.

[...]

When you look at it, our whole problem can be laid at the foot of the Bill of Rights. Maybe it's time to take a good hard look at how much good defending that puppy has really done the Democratic Party, eh?

I'm on record on this topic as well:

Why don't we just poll the country about all these controversial subjects, and whatever positions are held by the most people, that's the position we adopt as a party, and as liberals? Surely that will help us get someone (anyone -- Zell Miller? Joe Lieberman?) elected in 2008, right?

My gosh, we are running scared, aren't we?

I find this exercise in jettisoning our long held core beliefs -- expressions, after all, of our liberal VALUES -- not only highly insulting but a piss-poor strategy for winning elections. What we need is not to create a party which looks like the GOP of 40 years ago by getting rid of everything we stand for, what we need is to craft a cohesive and easily understood narrative which encompasses and communicates those values and can compete with the GOP's obviously successful narrative of no taxes, "moral" values and strong defense.

Gun control may be unimportant to many of the posters here, but I'll wager that the majority of them didn't live in a major American city as adults in the 70's and 80's when gun violence was at its peak. Urban dwellers (and not just women) appreciate that guns are not nearly as rampant as they were in the recent past, and gun control laws are a significant part of the reason. Oh, they're far from perfect, there's loopholes galore, and no one thinks they're the only answer, but they are necessary, and any party which drops support for them will lose my vote and, I think, the votes of a large portion of those who live in urban areas -- and where, exactly, was Kerry's strength the most pronounced in this election? So the idea is to alienate that segment of the population that gives us the most consistent and strongest support in order to, perhaps, sway a few voters over from the right side of the middle?

Just how many NRA members do you think are going to change a lifetime's preconceptions of what being a liberal or a Democrat means and switch their vote over, just because the party abandons its support for gun control? It's ridiculous to think that it would do anything but lose us a significant amount of votes.

Not only that, but I object to throwing out principled positions, and the idea of standing for and doing the right thing, just to eke out a few measly votes. Democrats and liberals don't lack values, they have values which are different from (and, in my mind, superior to) the fundamentalist-Christian based "moral" values of the right and the GOP. Every time we shuck off more of them, in a pitiful attempt to triangulate ourselves to a few more votes, we hand a tremendous victory to the right, because not only will they have won an election, they will have caused us to put a stake through our own hearts.

I want to win elections as much as the next person, but there's really no point in winning unless there are specific things we want to accomplish, or prevent from happening (unless, of ocurse, we're just in it for the power and the loot). Once we've jettisoned our dearly held liberal values in the attempt to win, and stand for nothing in particular (except winning elections), what the hell good are we, and how, precisely, do we then differ from the right? Our heart being in the right place isn't enough.

That's why I'm more interested in alternate methods and mechanisms -- such as outlined below -- rather than shedding liberal values as a means toward winning elections. I'd rather give in to the triumph of style over substance than lose our actual substance altogether.