I'd first like to say thank you Howard Dean. You helped to energize this party, find its voice again, and become a party that stands for truly progressive values. You freed us from the grasp of the DLC Republican-Lite Democrats and restored the Democratic wing of the Democratic party to its former glory. You made Democrats competitive in all 50 states, and brought hope to many Democrats living in so called "Red States".
So I think I speak for my fellow progressive Democrats when I say that you will be missed at the DNC.
However, we still have a long to go. The Republicans are undoubtedly going to spend the next 4 years regrouping and reorganizing(they may even adopt their own version of the 50-state strategy). While I believe President Obama's victory was a mandate for a new progressive politics, we cannot afford to underestimate the Republicans.
It appears that the front runner for the RNC chairmanship is Newt Gingrich. This is the same Newt Gingrich that engineered the Republican comeback of 1994. I'm sure President Obama will have a successful first-term, but never the less, we cannot let our guard down.
Besides a successful first term for Barack Obama, we're going to need a DNC chair that will preserve the 50 state strategy, that knows how to take on the Right-Wing smear machine, and that understands how to run a winning campaign.
The person who best fits this criteria would be David Plouffe. I don't need to tell everyone here how masterfully he ran the Obama campaign, you all saw it for yourselves. We need that kind of leadership at the DNC to help Democrats win in all 50 states.
In 2005, the netroots community worked to draft Howard Dean for DNC chair, and we succeeded. Now, the netroots community must work to draft David Plouffe for DNC chair.
Can we do it? Yes we can!