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A Message from William Galston, Stan Greenberg and Ruy Teixeira

For several months, the three of us have been working on plans for The Democratic Strategist. We believe this publication -- for which we will serve as co-editors -- can fill a critical need within the Democratic community.

We are launching this publication because we believe Democrats must begin to develop political strategies that look beyond the standard two- and four-year time horizons set by the American electoral calendar. Democrats must develop a set of concrete and coherent political strategies for regularly winning elections and over the longer term -- perhaps over a decade or more -- winning new areas of support and creating nothing less than a stable Democratic majority in the country.

This is an extremely ambitious objective, but it is one that -- as specialists in voting behavior, public attitudes, political demography, campaign strategy and organization -- we believe is indeed achievable. For the last three presidential elections Democratic presidential candidates have come within one or two percentage points of winning an outright majority. It is not unrealistic to think that, with creative and determined strategic thinking and message development, Democrats could build a stable majority.

This is where we believe The Democratic Strategist can play a critical role. Right now there is no publication that brings together the latest solid research on public attitudes and social trends with extended, ongoing discussion of long-range Democratic political strategy. Academic journals provide empirical data but avoid political strategy; weekly opinion magazines discuss political strategy but do not have space to cover serious research on social currents on a continuing basis.

We see The Democratic Strategist as the place where these two currents can meet. The Democratic Strategist will seek to publish substantial articles that draw strategic conclusions from the latest public opinion and demographic research conducted by the academic community and commercial public opinion polling firms as well as from the leading think-tanks and policy institutes across America. The Democratic Strategist will make a special effort to encourage academic researchers whose scholarly research in specific fields has clear implications for political strategy to revise and reinterpret their data for a broad audience of Democratic planners, strategists and policymakers.

We will also create a space for campaign professionals, public intellectuals, and campaign and partisan activists to reflect on current trends and discuss or write about new strategies and options. Our goal is lively publication, informed by real data and real experience, but focused on the future.

The Democratic Strategist will also seek to create a shared venue and forum for the serious, sustained and ongoing discussion of long-term political strategy. We have developed a new and innovative system for conducting online roundtable conferences -- a system that will allow groups of Democrats to make detailed responses to an initial presentation and then engage in extended back and forth discussion in much the same way that they might in a real-world conference.

In playing this role, The Democratic Strategist will actively and energetically work to include all sectors of the Democratic community. While we as individuals have strong personal views, as co-editors of The Democratic Strategist, we will maintain a firmly neutral meeting ground for both centrists and populists, readers of The Nation and The New Republic, professional political consultants, grassroots activists and supporters of every significant candidate and perspective within the Democratic Party.

We believe that The Democratic Strategist can play an important role in the coming period and we hope that you will want to be a part of it from the very beginning.

Sincerely Yours,

William Galston
Stan Greenberg
Ruy Teixeira