In 1964, Barry Goldwater ran for President on a platform of principled conservatism. His policies were so far-right as to include the possibility of using nuclear weapons in the Vietnam war. He went down in a landslide defeat against the popular incumbent Lyndon Johnson, but his willingness to articulate an uncompromising vision of America based on "strict father morality" (as defined by Prof. George Lakoff in "Moral Politics") laid the foundation for a generation of GOP dominance in American politics. Ronald Reagan, Goldwater's spiritual heir, further deepened this worldview during his tenure, and the rise of W in conjunction with the neoconservative/theocratic/media alliance represents the culmination of Goldwaterism in America. Goldwater himself lost the battle, but his vision won the war.
With the decline of the New Deal coalition and the rise of Goldwaterism, America has seen the center of gravity in politics shift further and further to the right. The Democratic party's response to this has been to move to the right in an attempt to capture an ephemeral "middle" or "moderate", while taking for granted an increasingly disillusioned and inactive base. This approach is most characterized by the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), the so-called "New Democrats," and Bill Clinton. The Democrats have run scared of advocating progressive policies due to losses by George McGovern in 1972, and to some extent, Mondale in 84 and Dukakis in 88 (without understanding all of the factors involved in these losses or looking at a coherent long-term view).
This attempt to move right has turned Democrats into slaves to Goldwaterism, like a hamster on a leash - Goldwaterism pulls right, and the Democrats follow. One could argue that the Democratic party is on the verge of becoming the Moderate Republican party, while the Republican party is on the verge of becoming the Neoconservative Theocratic party. Kerry's campaign rhetoric and foreign policy positions were often close to a moderate Republican such as (George Bush. Sr.).
John Kerry's entire campaign typified this rightward drift. Even though Kerry is in truth an anti-war hero, he framed himself as a war hero, and ran away from his anti-war activities. He staked out the most convoluted position on the Iraq war he possibly could in an attempt to ambiguously appeal to both side of the fence: he voted for the war, and he'd vote for it given all he knows now, but if he'd been President, he wouldn't have started the war, and now that we're there, he's going to bring the troops home, but he's still going to somehow "win" the war, a war that many experts have already declared lost and beyond repair. (What??!) He's for the Mass. state amendment banning same sex marriage, but against the federal amendment. He's for increased health coverage, but not universal health insurance. And on, and on.
This is not to say Kerry would necessarily have won with a progressive agenda - he still might have lost. He might have even lost by a larger margin. Public opinion polls show conservatives outnumber progressives in America - and that has to change. We have to be willing to shift the discourse over a generation. Our focus should not be the election in four years but the elections over the next 40 years, and whether progressives or conservatives will be in the majority when the youth of today - who overwhelmingly support same sex marriage and voted against Bush - are senior citizens.
Had John Kerry been willing to take a principled stand for progressivism, he might still have lost the battle, but started a long-term process that would have enabled us to win the war - that would have been true heroism. Instead, he lost the battle and accomplished nothing discernible.
The good news is, progressives have a better worldview than "strict father morality" - it's called "nurturant parent morality." That's what true progressivism is, and this worldview is one of principled nonviolence, sustainable economy, renewable energy, cooperation, universal health care... Let's have the courage to stand up for a politics of true progressivism and build a long-term progressive majority.