Al From is really stepping into the fray now....telling us how it will go.

[madfloridian]

He appears to be advocating ignoring the grassroots, appears to be advocating privatization of services to keep a smaller government. Pretty strong op ed here.

He also points how Lieberman won over the screaming grassroots in spite of a high-profile effort to take him out.

He is getting pretty pushy here. I resent this on top of the Carville stuff. We won. Who would guess it from all the lectures and smackdowns.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20061119/news_mz1e19from.html

And while Democrats benefited from an energized party base, the key to the victory was in the contested center of the electorate, among moderates, independents, middle-class voters and suburbanites. These voters could represent an expanded Democratic base, and keeping them in the Democratic camp is vital to building an enduring progressive majority.

That is why what comes next is so important. Democrats should view this election as a beginning, not as an end. As the dust settles from the election, Democrats will face many choices, but none greater than the choice about what kind of party we want to be.

That's an especially important message for the large number of potential Democratic presidential candidates. There's a perception in some media and political circles that Democratic White House wannabes, like their Republican counterparts, must systematically bend the knee to ideologically inflexible and noisy party activists to have any prayer of nomination or election. They should pay attention to what happened in Connecticut on Nov. 7, where even in a strongly anti-war blue state, voters rejected a high-profile effort to exclude Joe Lieberman from the Democratic Party. The reality is that, unlike the Republicans who are a much more homogenous party, Democrats can only win with a broad coalition. An expanded party base depends on a spirit of inclusiveness; certainly the House Democratic caucus is more ideologically diverse than it was before Election Day. To remain in the majority, it will need to stay that way.

Uh, Al, Joe won because he got Republican votes, Republican money, and Republican support

And here is the part that reeks of privatizing. Usually they skirt the edges of it, but here he digs right in.

A final challenge for Democrats will be to exercise self-restraint in promoting new public-sector activism. Republican claims that Democrats would return Washington to old “tax-and-spend” habits didn't get much traction, given the fiscally ruinous record of the GOP Congress and administration. But surveys continue to show that a clear majority of Americans favor a government that is smaller and does less to one that is larger and does more. It won't be enough for Democrats to show they won't emulate Republicans by creating a government that is larger and does less.

Get that? He wants a government that is smaller and does less...the implication being taking care of its citizens who are ill, disabled, or in distress.