Jan. 20, 2025 (Reposted Jan. 22, 2025)

Today seems like good day to float some new ideas. The Democratic Party is mired in debates about what’s gone wrong in their message to the American people. Time to turn the page. New ideas. New people. No concessions to the party veterans. This is where the future begins. Everyone must start from the same place, a Ground Zero that leads to the future.

In recent election cycles, Democrats have focused resources on winnable seats in the House and Senate, and on winnable states in presidential contests. The party needs a new approach. The party must build a super PAC with enough money so it can contest every Congressional district and the 33 states where Senate seats are on the ballot in 2026, all 468 contests. Don’t focus just on winnable seats, but on EVERY seat even if there’s no prospect of winning. Find candidates who are courageous and willing to take on the impossible fights. The strategy is simple. Be sure EVERY American hears a Democratic Party message EVERY day of the campaign cycle on their home turf.

The campaign must start now. At the outset, the task is to find candidates in every House district. In some cases, the incumbents will be the easy choice. But no one should get a free pass. The primary process is about honing the message and the public presence of each candidate. In clearly red districts, the hardest work must happen. Candidates with broad appeal need to identified, trained and prepared for a bone-bruising task that often will end in defeat at the polls. But the presence of a candidate who can articulate a consistent Democratic message will go a long way to laying the foundation for 2028 and a presidential election victory.

There also is the need for a new Democratic Manifesto. Not a Project 2025 style right-wing treatise, but a clear, concise statement of what liberal democracy in America means today. Tell the American people what has been accomplished since the economic crash of 2008. There is a great story to tell. One that will stand up to the cascade of lies and disinformation about Democrats being Marxists and Communists, or that we are un-American (as Rudy Giuliani once accused me of being) because we vote Democrat. Absurdities will eventually begin to crumble under the consistent recitation of the truths and facts about the party’s successes, like the Inflation Reduction Act and infrastructure bill or the caps on prescription medicines or the Affordable Care Act. We know, because we welcome diverse points of view, that such an undertaking won’t be easy. But in the formative debates, consensus is possible. Agreement is not only possible but essential for the future.

No reason to be shy about the bottom line either. The plan is about money. The Republicans have had nearly 40 years to build a behind-the-scenes dark money colossus through men like Leonard Leo and more recently, Elon Musk. They have spent billions of dollars since the Reagan era creating partisan state legislatures through gerrymandering, nominating judges who adhere to an ultra-conservative doctrine and finally putting forth candidates whose primary qualification is fealty to the grand scheme of turning America into a one-party state. What was once Conservatism has morphed into a MAGA-led American First movement with designs on absolute power, free of any guardrails. That’s not hyperbole: Read Project 2025 and you see in black and white what the ultimate goal is. Building a financial war chest to counter the movement is legal; it’s the law of the land. Democrats should start using it to further their messages and their goals.

What will it take? Let’s use Elon Musk as a example. He donated at least $130 million dollars to the MAGA campaign and some estimates of his spending top $200 million. But there’s also the $44 billion dollars he paid for Twitter, which he then turned into a slanted propaganda, disinformation machine. Forget the Twitter purchase. If there are 20 super wealthy Americans, each willing to put $100 million into a super PAC set up to implement the 468 strategy, that’s all that’s needed to start. Many people are not interested in donating to previous campaigns that lost but will be on board for building a new nationwide coalition of committed democrats and patriots who want to return America to its founding ideals. We should look at the project as starting from ground zero and then support candidates who can transmit the message.

I am a single voice in the political wilderness and a political neophyte. But if you agree, spread the word. Get the idea out there. Start building the foundation to restore political balance in America. We are living the results of an ultra-conservative campaign that has worked silently for 40 years to seize the reins of power. If you don’t agree with any, or even just some of their policies, now is the time to step up and begin a people’s movement to re-establish sanity in government and restore the founding principles of the Republic and our democracy.