Even as their fellow Dems in much of the rest of the country were still recovering from exuberant hangovers, Georgia stalwarts sat on a stage in Dad's Garage Wednesday night and tried to figure out what was left of that deflated blue eminence called the Georgia Democratic Party. They were making the best of it certainly: Rep. Tyrone Brooks, D-Atlanta; Rep. Nan Orrock, D-Atlanta; Tim Cairl of Georgians for Democracy; and Sen. Sam Zamarripa, D-Atlanta, in a Creative Loafing Political Party hosted by Senior Editor John Sugg.

Orrock said she didn't see Tuesday night as an overwhelming victory for Georgia Republicans so much as a thumbs-up for incumbents. She noted the re-election of three statewide Democratic officers: Attorney General Thurbert Baker, Labor Commissioner Michael Thurmond and Agriculture Commissioner Tommy Irvin. And, of course, she emphasized the Republican smash-up at the national level, where Democrats won control of the U.S. House and Senate, and pounded on ideologues such as Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., and Sen. George Allen, R-Va.

"There was a repudiation of that hard-line stuff last night," Orrock said. "Is that going to roll down here and permeate the consciousness down here?"

Orrock is hopeful.

So is Zamarripa, who suggested the Republicans had essentially gorged themselves into submission at the national level, and overreached on issues such as illegal immigration. The latter may have worked as a wedge issue for Georgia Republicans on Tuesday, but it will eventually undo them, he said.

"It's the most potent wedge issue they have left," Zamarripa said. "I think it's run out of steam. It's going to cost them with immigrants who are struggling to define themselves." It's also going to cost the Republican Party long-term with the sons and daughters of illegal immigrants, who won't forget the illegal-immigrant bashing, Zamarripa said. "Our opportunity is to be the party of plurality," the outgoing senator added.

Sugg tried to bait Brooks on the candidacy of Mark Taylor, who suffered a lopsided defeat at the hands of Sonny Perdue in the race for governor. The CL columnist asked Brooks if he thought Taylor was really the best person for the job.

"Yeah, I think so," Brooks said. "Mark waited in line. He was a team player. I watched him serve as floor leader for Gov. Zell Miller. What shocked me was when Cathy (Cox) got in the race."

Cox, the secretary of state, fought a bitter primary fight with Taylor before finally succumbing to the master campaigner. Following her defeat, Cox never publicly endorsed Taylor, and the party remained divided.

Like Orrock, Brooks refused to sing the blues for too long, mentioning the Democratic victories of U.S. Rep. John Barrow, D-Savannah, and U.S. Rep. Jim Marshall, D-Macon, who prevailed respectively over Max Burns and Mac Collins. Referring to President George W. Bush's repeated stumping on behalf of the two Georgia Republicans, he celebrated "the fact that Bush can come in here so many times for Burns and Collins and fail."

Zamarripa was more critical of the Taylor campaign.

"Mark Taylor ran a campaign that sounded like Sonny Perdue-lite," he said. "That formula is the wrong formula." He also said Taylor "did not run on contemporary issues" such as stem cell research.

A Howard Dean supporter and the youngest member of the panel, Cairl acknowledged that he was raised in a Michigan household where part of his church responsibilities included getting out the vote for GOP candidates. He said the Democratic Party needs more on-the-ground organizing and better recruitment of progressive candidates.

Brooks agreed with the on-the-ground organization part of that argument. But the rural Georgia native who came to Atlanta with the Civil Rights Movement said the party has to be smart in building up candidates who can lead all and not just a portion of Georgia. The old-timey Democrats who fear gays, women and African-Americans made a beeline out of the party into the arms of the GOP. In very broad terms, Georgia Republicans have set themselves up as the repository for white, heterosexual males.

"Do we want to win them back?" Brooks wondered. "Should we work to bring them back?"

Zamarripa made it clear he does not want to appease voters with old prejudices and others who won't accept the Democratic Party trying to be what he describes as the plurality party. "We've got to cut ties with the rest of those guys," he said, prompting some handclaps and an anguished cry of 'Please!" from the darkness of the theater.

On the heels of that idea, Orrock said she disagrees with Thurmond's Democratic Party strategy for victory, which he's written about in the past and speaks of often at public events. "He says you have to run to the right of center in order to win," Orrock said.

"He thinks that's the only way he can win," Brooks said.

There were some boos in the audience when Sugg spoke the name of outgoing Democratic Party of Georgia Chair Bobby Kahn.

The fact remains.

The party needs leadership.

Brooks said Democrats could bring together the broken or divergent strands of the party with the right leadership. Get Jimmy Carter and Sam Nunn in a room with Baker, Thurmond and Irvin, Brooks said. Create party co-chairs who represent the party's regional and ethnic diversity: Sam Nunn and Shirley Franklin, for example.

"Having Thurbert out there alone or Michael up there alone won't work," Brooks said. "It looks good from in here. But not out there."

Those are the symbolic moves to regenerate the Democratic Party's new public face.

Then there are those crucial moves down on the ground, in Georgia's white and black and everything-in-between neighborhoods, involving the people who don't feel anyone represents them. Difficult, yes; drudgery, maybeÉ but the only place really where the shift will occur.

"There's a huge number of unregistered voters out there," Brooks said. "If you register them, they will vote Democratic. But you have to go get them. They're not going to you."

-- Max Pizarro

For audio and photos from Wednesday night's Political Party, see the previous post on this blog.

For John Sugg's analysis of the evangelical angle to Tuesday's national Democratic resurgence, see his recent post on johnsugg.com.