2008 Woodie Awards
(Second in a series.)
Swept up in the excitement generated by Paul Hacket’s amazing campaign for the Ohio-2nd District Congressional seat, I could hardly peal my eyes away from my computer screen. I discovered that blogs were an amazing source for the latest news on strategies, fundraising, news, and results. But when it was all over, I was left with a sour taste in my mouth by many of the progressives posting comments on sites like MyDD, Swingstate Project, and Daily Kos. It quickly became apparent that many of these posters dozed off during some very important pre-school lessons.
LESSON 2: DON’T BE A SORE LOSER!
The minute the vote count started going downhill for Hacket, it seemed as though every progressive in the blogosphere began to blame the results on election fraud. While they stopped short of accusing the Republicans of fraud, many of the top progressive bloggers fanned the flames by iterating possible conspiracy theories.
THIS IS NOT THE WAY TO WIN FUTURE ELECTIONS. PERIOD. Blaming every election loss on foul play is a great way to look like whining losers to the American public. There is a good chance that you will lose credibility, in the process harming future election chances.
Now, if there is credible evidence that fraud has taken place, then by all means use every weapon in the arsenal to call the other side out. Otherwise, spend your energy figuring out how to do better next time. While history has shown that election rigging is an all too common occurrence, if little evidence is available, time would be better spent convincing people of why you’re right and the other guys are wrong. As much as you (and I) may think that progressives are on the right side of the issues, it is quite possible that the majority of Americans currently do not.
In the end, Democrats will start winning elections when they stop complaining and start challenging.
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