RE: Purple Mountain Strategy Media Coverage, The Big Strategy

John Yewell's piece in the Salt Lake Tribune over the weekend covers a lot of the regular ground that has been tilled since election day. Brian Schweitzer and the Salazars, etc, etc, are showing that at least statewide in the West, Democrats can beat Republicans with a new way of politics. And for everyone that hasn't noticed, the West is not the South.

Does the Democratic Party have Western mojo?

Well, maybe.

Of the eight states between the plains and the West coast - Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Colorado, Montana, Utah, Wyoming and Idaho - only Idaho seems irremediably Republican. Even Utah has a few prominent Democrats. The first five can legitimately be considered swing states, having voted for the presidential candidate of each major party in at least one of the last four elections.

Those five states, none of which went for John Kerry, total 32 electoral votes, one more than New York.

Also waiting in the wings are people like Rep. Mark Udall, D-Colo., son of former U.S. Sen. Morris Udall. Mark Udall has announced he will challenge incumbent Republican U.S. Sen. Wayne Allard in 2008.

If Western Democrats consolidate these gains in 2006, the national party should look closely in 2008 at candidates with a little dirt under their fingernails, at least for vice president. Out here, we prefer blue collars to blue bloods.

I would disagree with his assessment that Idaho is "irremediably Republican," it wasn't that long ago that Idaho was the home of original Coyote Dem Cecil Andrus.

Yewell is a little more spot on when he takes it a bit deeper over at the New West Network:

Democrats nationwide are wrapped up with figuring out what to believe in that will appeal to voters. I think that’s the wrong question. They should be asking: How do I learn to live with people I disagree with, and still reach out to them, still help them, still find ways to make this complicated country work together. What is the right way to live? Westerners can teach Democrats the answers to these questions. Those answers will help them win not just here, in the Mountain West, but across the country.

This is the exact sentiment that needs to be carried by Western Dems across the region to voters and nationwide to our party. I just finished reading Daniel Kemmis's "This Sovereign Land," which is an absolutely fricking must read for Western Democrats.

Kemmis argues effectively that the future of Western politics will go to the party that breaks out of the brittle dichotomy of the Republicans standing for resource extractors and the Democrats with national environmental groups. The winning party will be seen as the party of the serious middle, the party that actually fights for local cooperation and local control of the landscape.

For Democrats, the hardest part will be convincing national environmental groups that this is a good idea, or when the enviros don't come along, abandoning them. It’s a hard decision, because this will be a real choice between national Democrats and actually reviving the party in the interior West. I should also add that this choice has to do with Democracy in general than just resources management, but I'll get to that later.

Emmett O'Connell | March 14, 2005 | Comment on This Post (1 so far) Permalink: RE: Purple Mountain Strategy Media Coverage, The Big Strategy

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