The voice of reason

"Many liberal commentators have asked why so many workers voted against their interests on economic issues to back Bush. But the question really should be turned around: Why do the Democrats, the supposed party of the people, give working people so little to vote for?

No wonder that people who might have been convinced otherwise embraced religion or “moral values” to guide their vote--while others sank into cynicism.

If conservative ideas made inroads in the electorate, it’s because the Kerry Democrats echoed and legitimized those ideas at every turn--from support for the occupation of Iraq and the “war on terror,” to the homophobic attacks on gay marriage. If these assumptions form the unquestioned basis of acceptable mainstream politics, it shouldn’t be surprising that many people accept them--and stick with the conservative original, Bush, instead of the copy, Kerry."

-- From one of the most sober, poignant, incisive critiques of the election and Kerry's defeat, pinning blame squarely on the shoulders of the Democrats who pushed the party as far right as they could without offering anything to their purported "base." Naturally, it's in the Socialist Worker.