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The eyes of the nation were on the special election in Georgias 6th Congressional District Tuesday. And, once the dust settled, Democratic leaders tried to spin it as a mix of good news and bad news.

The good news, according to Rep. Ben Ray Lujan, D-NM, chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, is that Jon Ossoff came so close. Despite the loss, we have a lot to be proud of, Lujan said. Which is kind of like the proverbial Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?

The fact is: Georgia 6 has been in Republican hands since 1979. In 2012, Mitt Romney won the district by more than 23 points. Tom Price, who abandoned the seat to become Donald Trumps HHS secretary, never got less than 60 percent. Even though Trump only carried the district last November by 1.5 points, its still a red district in a red state. So it is impressive that any Democrat proved so competitive, losing by only four points.

But: So what? Politics isnt beanbag. In politics, close doesnt mean anything. Theres only winning and losing. And winning is the only thing that counts. Jon Ossoff lost, even though he raised $23 million, more than any other congressional candidate in history, and outspent his Republican opponent Karen Handel. Jon Ossoff lost, even though this was billed as the race that would catapult Democrats back into control of Congress in 2018.

Yes, the bad news is that Jon Ossoff lost. And Democrats have to stop spinning about how well he did, all things considered, and start dealing with the reality of not only why he lost but why, in the four special elections held so far in 2017, Democrats have a record of 0-4.

Why did Democrats lose in Georgia 6? Two factors, above all others: Wrong candidate and wrong message. Jon Ossoff, former congressional staffer and documentary filmmaker, may be a bright young man, but he bombed as a candidate: too stiff, too cold, too reserved. Hes hardly the kind of guy youd want to go out and have a beer with. Hes more like the nerd youd do anything to avoid. He has all the charisma of a banana slug.

But Ossoff also had the wrong message. Not necessarily a bad message. He didnt say anything offensive. Just the wrong message. He didnt say anything particularly inspiring, either. He didnt focus on Donald Trump. He didnt adopt the progressive platform of Bernie Sanders. He just cast himself as the policy wonk who would do good things for his district when the public clearly wanted more.

According to leading political strategist Stanley Greenberg, Ossoff and his team made one other fatal mistake. They were so determined to keep the race based on local issues that they failed to respond when Republicans raised the stakes by painting Ossoff as an acolyte of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and her liberal San Francisco values. Its a tired, old, phony line of attack, but it still works in some parts of the country, especially if you dont respond.

Once Republicans had so nationalized the race, Greenberg told me, Ossoff had no alternative but to also talk about the national importance of Georgia 6. He could have done so by focusing on the Republican health care bill, which would take health protection away from 23 million Americans and be the first vote cast by whoever won the Georgia special. But he chose not to. He stayed local, instead, and lost.

The Democrats loss in Georgia 6 is all the more ironic when compared to what happened in South Carolina 5. In Georgia, Jon Ossoff received $6 million from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) and a ton of national publicity. In South Carolina, Democrat Archie Parnell received only $275,000 from the DCCC and zero national publicity.

Yet, when the votes were counted, Parnell scored better than Ossoff. He lost by only 2,836 votes, which says something about where the national Democratic Party is today. The more establishment party leaders love you, the worse voters like you and the less likely they are to vote for you.

It doesnt mean Democrats have less chance of taking back control of the House. According to strategist Charlie Cook, there are 71 districts now held by Republicans that are more favorable to Democrats than Georgia 6. But it does underscore where Democrats have to start in order to win back the House in 2018: find and field better candidates starting with a candidate who lives in the district, which Jon Ossoff did not.

Bill Press is host of a nationally syndicated radio show. He can be reached by email at bill@billpress.com.

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Press column: Coming close in Georgia no win for Democrats - Portage Daily Register

Photo: J. Scott Applewhite

Democrats to offer platform on economy in attempt to end losing streak

Democrats have been losing elections by not offering voters a bold economic agenda, and the party plans to change that by releasing a platform within a month that won't be "baby steps," Senate Minority Leader Leader Charles E. Schumer said Sunday.

Congressional Democrats will try to pass the plan legislatively over the next year a remote possibility given Republican control of Congress and will campaign on it during the 2018 midterm elections, Schumer, D-N.Y., said on ABC's "This Week."

"Democrats need a strong, bold, sharp-edged and common-sense economic agenda," Schumer said. "Policy, platform, message that appeal to the middle class, that resonate with the middle class."

With Republicans controlling the White House and Congress, and Democrats unable to score a win in recent special elections for open congressional seats, the party's trying to find an effective approach beyond simply opposing President Donald Trump and Republican policies.

Some Democrats have questioned whether House Minority Leader Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., should be replaced to give the party new leadership heading into the 2018 elections.

Schumer didn't offer details about the g economic plan but said the top lesson for Democrats after losing to Trump in 2016, and more recently a hard-fought and costly special election in Georgia on June 20, is that it's not enough for the party to simply oppose Trump and that an economic message is missing.

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Democrats to offer platform on economy in attempt to end losing streak - Albany Times Union

The loss in last weeks special congressional election in Georgia produced predictable hand-wringing and finger-pointing inside the Democratic Party. It also raised anew a question that has troubled the party through a period in which it has lost political ground. Simply put: Do Democrats have a message?

Right now, the one discernible message is opposition to President Trump. That might be enough to get through next years midterm elections, though some savvy Democratic elected officials doubt it. Whats needed is a message that attracts voters beyond the blue-state base of the party.

The defeat in Georgia came in a district that was always extremely challenging. Nonetheless, the loss touched off a hunt for scapegoats. Some Democrats, predictably, blamed the candidate, Jon Ossoff, as failing to capitalize on a flood of money and energy among party activists motivated to send a message of opposition to the president. He may have had flaws, but he and the Democrats turned out lots of voters. There just werent enough of them.

Other critics went up the chain of command and leveled their criticism at House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). She has held her party together in the House through many difficult fights ask veterans of the Obama administration but she also has become a prime target for GOP ad makers as a symbol of the Democrats liberal and bicoastal leanings. Pelosi, a fighter, has brushed aside the criticism.

Perhaps Democrats thought things would be easier because of Trumps rocky start. His presidency has produced an outpouring of anger among Democrats, but will that be enough to bring about a change in the partys fortunes?

(Amber Ferguson/The Washington Post)

History says a president with approval ratings as low as Trumps usually sustain substantial midterm losses. That could be the case in 2018, particularly if the Republicans end up passing a health-care bill that, right now, is far more unpopular than Obamacare. But Trump has beaten the odds many times in his short political career. What beyond denunciations of the Republicans as heartless will the Democrats have to say to voters?

Though united in vehement opposition to the president, Democrats do not speak with one voice. Fault lines and fissures exist between the ascendant progressive wing at the grass roots and those Democrats who remain more business-friendly. While these differences are not as deep as those seen in Trumps Republican Party, that hasnt yet generated a compelling or fresh message to take to voters who arent already sold on the party.

[Lessons from this years special congressional elections]

Hillary Clinton, whose rhetoric often sounded more poll-tested than authentic, never found that compelling message during her 2016 campaign. She preferred to run a campaign by demonizing Trump and, as a result, drowned out her economic platform. This was a strategic gamble for which she paid a high price.

The absence of a convincing economic message did not start with Clinton. Former president Barack Obama struggled with the same during his 2012 reelection. He wanted to claim credit for a steady but slow recovery while acknowledging forthrightly that many Americans were not benefitting from the growth. It was a muddle at best, but he was saved by the fact that Mitt Romney couldnt speak to those stressed voters either. In 2016, however, Trump did.

Clintons loss forced Democrats to confront their deficiencies among white working-class voters and the vast areas between the coasts that flipped in Trumps direction. Their defection from the Democratic Party began well before Trump, but until 2016, Democrats thought they could overcome that problem by tapping other voters. Trump showed the limits of that strategy.

The Georgia loss put a focus on a different type of voter, the well-educated suburbanites, particularly those who dont live in deep-blue states. While losing ground among working-class whites, Democrats have been gaining support among white voters with college degrees. In the fall, Clinton advisers believed she would do well enough with those college graduates to overcome projected erosion among those without college educations. She fell short of expectations, however, allowing Trump to prevail in the pivotal Midwest battlegrounds.

The Georgia district had the highest percentage of college graduates of any in the nation. Ossoff tried to win over those suburban voters with a moderate message on economic issues, but it wasnt powerful or persuasive enough to overcome the appeal of the Republican brand in an election in which the GOP made Pelosi-style Democrats a focus. Loyalty to party was strong enough to allow Karen Handel to prevail.

[In defeat, Democrats point fingers at one another, especially Pelosi]

The long-running debate over the Democrats message probably will intensify as the party looks to 2018 and especially to 2020. It is a debate that the party needs. Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg, writing in the American Prospect, sees a problem that goes beyond white working-class voters to those within the Democratic base who also were left behind by the post-2008 economic gains. He argues that the partys problem is with working-class voters of all types, not just whites.

Greenberg has long been critical of the tepidness of the partys economic message and puts some of the blame on Obama. He believes the former presidents economic message in 2012 and 2016 focused on progress in the recovery largely to the exclusion of the widespread pain that still existed. That mix of heralding progress while bailing out those responsible for the crisis and the real crash in incomes for working Americans was a fatal brew for Democrats, he argues.

For progressives, the answer to this problem is clear: a boldly liberal message that attacks big corporations and Wall Street and calls for a significant increase in governments role in reducing income and wealth inequality. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has been aggressive in promoting exactly that, as he did during the 2016 campaign, with calls for a big investment in infrastructure and free college tuition at public colleges and universities. He has said he intends to introduce legislation he calls Medicare for All.

That kind of message probably will spark more internal debate, particularly among Democrats from swing districts or swing states. It points to one of the biggest challenges Democrats face as they move beyond being the anti-Trump party. That is the question of whether they are prepared to make a robust and appealing case on behalf of government in the face of continuing skepticism among many of the voters they are trying to win over. Trump might not succeed in draining the swamp, but he has tapped into sentiments about Washington that Democrats ignore at their peril.

Nor can Democrats ignore voters concerns about immigration. The Democrats message on immigration and immigrant rights (and some other cultural issues) plays well in many blue states, but it draws a much more mixed reception in those parts of the country where Trump turned the election in his direction.

In this divided era, its easy for either party to look at the other and conclude the opposition is in worse shape. Thats the trap for Democrats right now as they watch Trump struggle in office. But Democrats are in the minority in the House, Senate, governorships and state legislatures. Clinton may have won the popular vote, but that proved about as satisfying as coming close while losing last week in Georgia. Its no substitute for the real thing. If continued frustration with losing doesnt prompt rethinking about the message, what will?

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Beyond opposing Trump, Democrats keep searching for a message - Washington Post

Some Democrats say nyet to their party leaders Russia obsession.

I did a 22-county tour, Rep. Tim Walz of Minnesota told The Hill Saturday. Nobodys focusing on that.

We should stay away from just piling on the criticism of Trump, complained Rep. Peter Welch of Vermont.

In the wake of the partys failure to win a much-watched special election in Georgia on Tuesday, Democrats in all but deep-blue districts are voicing doubts about the relentless anti-Trump strategy that the party has followed since his inauguration.

People back in Ohio arent really talking that much about Russia, Rep. Tim Ryan told MSNBC on Thursday.

If we dont talk more about their interest than we do about how were so angry with Donald Trump and everything thats going on, then were never going to be able to win elections.

In a Harvard-Harris poll conducted for The Hill last week, 64 percent of registered voters said the investigations into President Trump and Russia are hurting the country, and 56 percent want Congress to move on to other issues.

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Democrats warn party to move on from Russia obsession - New York Post

You just knew it would happen.

After losing four straight snap congressional elections in each, attempting to harness bipartisan rage over an unpopular president anxious national Democrats instantly looked on the Virginia gubernatorial contest as their last, best chance at relevance in the first, worst months of the Donald Trump era.

The outside world ought to butt out.

National Democrats are mistaking apples for oranges in drawing a parallel between special elections in isolated patches of four reliably red states with a statewide race in a purple state thats becoming blue, the shade of which given the surprisingly robust turnout in the Democratic primary earlier this month may be somewhere between cornflower and cobalt.

The fundamentals, as the political professions would say, always favored Republicans in those congressional districts in Kansas, Montana, South Carolina and Georgia, where a historic level of spending so elevated expectations for a Democratic victory that the party was helpless to explain the embarrassment of defeat.

The districts were drawn to elect Republicans. By margins vast and slender, the districts were carried by Trump over Hillary Clinton. For both reasons, the president could install the freshly re-elected incumbents in his Cabinet, confident they would be succeeded by Republicans. And they were.

The fundamentals in an election for Virginia governor continue to favor Democrats because the contest is at-large, decided by a border-to-border vote of millions, not thousands in which roughly a dozen populous cities and counties, most in the eastern half of the state and many left-leaning, will decide the outcome.

Losing for governor, then, despite those baked-in advantages, would be an abject humiliation for Democrats one not explained away as a consequence of the baked-in advantages Republicans had in the congressional elections through gerrymandering and Trumps strength within those manipulated districts.

Put another way: The Democrats strength in the Virginia campaign is macro. The Republicans strength in the U.S. House campaigns was micro.

In a suburban-dominated, increasingly diverse state such as Virginia, national Democrats donors, strategists, commentators and officeholders also may be overlooking an important distinction between the congressional races they lost and the gubernatorial election they hope to win: The former were fully federal in their focus; the latter, partially so.

Indeed, Virginia Democrats voting in record numbers that Ralph Northams advisers feared might portend his defeat for the nomination to Tom Perriello sided by a lopsided margin with the low-key Northam. They believed he more closely reflects the state as a whole and what its divided government demands in day-to-day leadership.

Northam, originally from the countryside but now ensconced in a city, emphasized his decade in state politics a sharp contrast with Perriellos years in Washington. Northam briefly belittled Trump, who lost Virginia to Clinton by 5 percentage points, as a narcissistic maniac to assure activists he has a capacity for the jugular.

However, its a putdown that could screw up Northams promised overtures to rural voters who overwhelmingly supported Trump. Democrats, dependent on metropolitan areas, talk about reaching out to rural Virginia. But so far, its just talk.

Perriello, because he declared for the nomination only five months before the primary, pinned his candidacy almost entirely to the notion that the growing Democratic vote, supplemented by a steady stream of newcomers to this Upper South state, could be mobilized by his eloquent, full-throated appeal to animus for Trump.

Many of the handicappers and a few activists mistook for momentum Perriellos constant presence on social media and his ability to stir audiences of wistful Barack Obama and Bernie Sanders voters. Both rattled Northam, demanding he sharpen his message and spend, spend, spend emptying his treasury of $8 million.

That means that more than advice, Northam needs money from those nervous national Democrats.

Northam, validated by endorsements from almost every elective Democrat in Virginia, was considered a better fit for the nomination because of his Richmond-centric rsum and the conditions under which the governorship is decided: an off-year election with a lower turnout that has a steroid-like effect on the Republican vote.

It is a narrowing bloc white, conservative, aging, heavily male, and largely rural that is, nonetheless, reliable and whose strength is enhanced by the usual, sharp drop in a Democratic vote that tends to peak in presidential years and stirs a bit in congressional years.

To win in November, Northam and his Republican opponent, Ed Gillespie assuming each secures his respective base, perhaps an uncertainty for Gillespie because of Corey Stewarts Trump-like renunciations must still secure a hefty slice of the right-leaning independent vote.

The Quinnipiac Poll this past week showed Gillespie ahead with self-identified independents, but trailing Northam head-to-head by 8 percentage points, apparently burdened by Trump-inflicted damage to the Republican brand and the accompanying erosion in grassroots morale.

No one should be surprised, then, if Gillespie and his running mates, Jill Vogel, for lieutenant governor, and John Adams, for attorney general, go their own way, scrounging for the votes of ticket-splitters.

Might that be the Republican candidates last, best chance at relevance in the first, worst months of the Donald Trump era?

Contact Jeff E. Schapiro at (804) 649-6814. His column appears Wednesday and Sunday. Watch his video column Thursday on Richmond.com. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter, @RTDSchapiro. Listen to his analysis 8:45 a.m. Friday on WCVE (88.9 FM).

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Schapiro: No matter what national Democrats say, Virginia's is a state election - Richmond.com