Some of the commentary here about winning over "red state" (or red county or red precinct) voters is interesting and illuminating, but I think it misses some larger points. It's not about talking about Jesus, or branding, or even necessarily framing (although the way we do all three does need some consideration). And it's not about softening a stance on Roe v. Wade or about dumping gay rights over the side (and if that happens then the Democrats deserve to lose every election for a thousand years). It's about listening, and it's about trust.
This is not a "Feingold for President" shill -- it's an attempt to get people to think about the kind of politics we should be pursuing
This is not a consideration of how to win over the hardest of hard-right voters, or certain Fundamentalist or Evangelical factions, or culture warriors. Those folks are gone. Let them be gone. This is a consideration of how to think about the millions of folks who, inexplicably to most of us, voted directly against their own self-interest when they should've known better.
In many cases, they did know better. But they went ahead and did it anyway. They're subtly and subconsciously sending us a message, and they've been sending it for quite a while. They're telling us that we've forgotten them. They're telling us that we don't think they're important anymore. And, tragically, to many of us, they may not be.
But take a look at Russ Feingold (as other diarists have done - props to them, but there's hopefully a slightly different spin here):
In Wisconsin, this short, Jewish nebbish with a Harvard Law/ Rhodes Scholar education and an unabashedly progressive agenda ran for re-election to the Senate. Pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-civil liberties, anti-Bush. The lone vote against the Patriot Act. All in a state that was a purple battleground (as well as the home of the Republican party, the John Birch Society, and Joseph McCarthy). He was supposed to be vulnerable.
He won re-election by the largest margin of his career, gaining a significant Republican crossover. It wasn't solely a Madison/Milwaukee phenomenon, either. He won 60 of 72 counties, including some in fairly deep red territory (Kerry won 27 counties). In Calumet County, one of the reddest counties there is in this state, he caught holy hell at his last listening session for being pro-choice (and responded by essentially saying "I'll just have to respectfully disagree with you, and I appreciate your concerns"). But he only lost Calumet County by 1600 votes, or 6% of the total (Kerry lost by 4500 - 18%).
Pro-Life Wisconsin has been hammering him for years, and they hammered him again this year, along with Kerry. It had an effect on Kerry, but not so much on Russ. I saw a few front yards that had Bush signs right next to Feingold signs. I never once saw the reverse.
How is this possible? Because Russ listens, and when he speaks, he speaks with an ingrained respect (and also with a slight Upper Midwest twang - y'know, kind of a "Fargo" thing). His "listening sessions" (he holds open-access forums in every county every year - anyone can speak on any topic) are the real thing. He understands that, for rural voters, trade deals, CAFOs, commodities cartels, the Northeast Dairy Compact, and rural zoning power are often the most important issues, obscuring all others. And he listens to them and stands up for them on those issues.
Because he listens to and stands up for them on the bread-and-butter issues most important to them, they know that they as voters matter to him. They are, therefore, willing to follow (or at least forgive) when he takes a stand they don't like.
Once in a while you have to look up from the numbers and go and listen to what real human beings are saying. Russ does this.
What many of the "red-state" voters (and they live in every state, not just the red ones) are telling us is "We're voting Republican, because even though we're pretty sure they're lying to us, at least we can understand what the hell they're talking about, and at least they pretend to listen to us."
Many of the currently red states are the ones that saved Harry Truman in 1948. He listened to them, and delivered for them, and they trusted him. The red states also saved Bush in '00 and '04. He listened to them, and then screwed them over. They still trust him because they have no one else to trust, and no one else who is currently listening to them.
We've lost the language, not of religion, but of connection. Our party screwed these folks hard on NAFTA and GATT. We don't talk about CAFOs or parity or zoning much anymore. We also don't talk as much as we need to or in the ways that we need to about honesty and trust and dignity and community, and what it's like to know that every single thing you have is your own, you've worked for it, and all of it can be taken away in the blink of an eye.
These are our issues, folks. They always were. But we haven't talked about them - or listened to others talk about them -- for 30 years or more. We have this language on a local level in some places, but on a national level we've lost it.
Listen more; talk less. Stop telling people what should matter to them and start asking what does matter to them. Stop running away from the "hicks" and "rednecks" who remind you too much of your embarrassing relatives. Help people put food on the table and fight off the corporate hog farm next door, and when it's time, they'll tell the wingnuts to go screw themselves.
"People have to hear words that not only sound right but feel right. I think it's in part the economic message, but it's also in part a message about community, about who we are as a nation, about how to live a life in which you don't have to separate the life you live from the words you speak, be that in your relationship with your family, your community, your country or your world. I don't want to give an inch on a `family values' agenda..."
--Paul Wellstone
Read:
http://feingold.senate.gov/news/statement_date.html
http://www.wellstone.org/archive/category_page.aspx?catID=3605
http://www.fightingbob.com/aboutbob.cfm
[update] Title changed to more accurately reflect content, hopefully...