Everybody's got a theory to explain national Democrats' inexplicable and infuriating insistence on caving to republicans and abandoning Democratic values to campaign as "centrists": they've got battered-dem syndrome, they're just republicans at heart, they've been bought off or blackmailed, they're spineless cowards, they've got a Secret Plan to Win the Election, they're just pussies.
None of those theories explain why Democrats indulge in the most self-destructive tactic of all: losing elections by running away from their base.
And that raises an important question: if these rich, pampered celebrities are spokesmen for the Everyman, then who are the elites? Well, they're us, the liberal base of the Democratic party. And that's what this "run to the center" is really all about --- putting as much distance between the politicians and us as they can. It's not about being "serious" on national security or crime or family values. It's not even about appealing to swing voters. It's about repudiating liberalism. You can have a right wing zealot on the team who is so out to lunch that he writes books recommending you beat your children like he beats his dog. But associations with anything remotely culturally liberal or politically progressive are considered poisonous if you care to be taken seriously by the likes of Target shopper Brian "Everyman"Williams or the policeman's daughter Maureen "Everywoman" Dowd.
Repudiating liberalism is a symbolic gesture required of Democrats by the political establishment to prove that they are not elitists. And it goes beyond mere posturing on gay marriage or abortion. The national security challenge is always not to appear to be "an appeaser." The way you prove that is by refusing to appease the Democratic base. The economic challenge is to walk very carefully on taxes because it "costs jobs" for the hard working man and the struggling businessman alike who are in this thing together against the liberal elites. The cultural challenge is to not appear to be too friendly to blacks or too unfriendly to socially conservative religion in order to prove that that you are not beholden to the "extremists." The entire construct is based upon Democrats distancing themselves from their most ardent supporters (which is quite convenient for Republicans.)
Glenn Greenwald explains why holding Democratic candidate's feet to the fire is the only way to reverse Democratic losses.
One of the primary reasons that blogs emerged over the last seven years was as a reaction to, an attempt to battle against, exactly this narrative which the media propagated and Democratic institutions embraced -- that it is the duty of every Democrat to repudiate and attack their own base; that the truly pernicious elements are on the "Far Left", whose values must be rejected, while the Far Right is entitled to profound respect and accommodation; that "Strength" in National Security is determined by agreement with GOP policies, which is where "the Center" is found; that Seriousness is demonstrated by contempt for the liberal masses; that every Democrat must apologize for any statement over which Republicans feign offense.
Plenty of Beltway institutions already existed for the purpose of cheering on any and all Democrats no matter what they do. If that's all that blogs are supposed to do, then there is no need for them.
From the beginning, blogs have been devoted to opposing Democratic complicity and capitulation -- to protesting the lack of Democratic responsiveness to their supporters -- every bit as much as opposing GOP corruption and media malfeasance. That role is at least as important as the others.
A presidential election is a unique time when Americans are engaged in a discussion over our collective political values (at least more engaged than any other time). Why would anyone watch the Obama campaign use this opportunity to perpetuate and reinforce this narrative, and watch Obama embrace polices that are the precise antithesis of the values he espoused in the past, and not criticize or object to that? Criticisms of that sort aren't unhealthy or counter-productive. They're the opposite. Of course one ought to object if a political candidate -- even Barack Obama -- is advocating policies that trample on one's core political values or promulgating toxic narratives. That's particularly true since his doing so isn't necessary to win; it's actually more likely to have the opposite effect.
A piece in the nation offers insight into one of the fundamental philosophical/political questions of the century:
Are Blue Dog Democrats evil or just stupid?
Te-Ping Chen and Christopher Hayes propose that Blue Dogs (aka DINOs) may just be unable to tell the difference between an opinion poll and election results.
Grover Norquist hit upon one of my abiding obsessions in politics, the difference between what issues people respond to in polls and what they actually vote on.
In describing the nature of the center-right coalition he said that all the different groups that make it up have their own "vote-moving issue," the thing that gets them to the polls, motivates them to make phone calls and give money. It's important, Norquist said, to understand "the difference between intensity and preference." That is, between issues that move people's actual votes, and what preferences they might express in polls. He noted that 70% Republicans are skeptical of free trade but, "they don't vote on that issue, so at one level I don't care."
Same with the growth of government under Bush. Since each constituency in the Republican coalition has gotten what it wants on its "vote-moving issues" (judges, assault weapons, tax cuts), they tolerate increased spending even if they don't like it. "Thank you very much for my vote-moving issue and grumble, grumble, you spend too much," they say according to Norquist. But "'spend too much' doesn't make people walk out of the room, it doesn't make people throw heavy objects."
Democrats have a tendency to look at polls and see vast majorities that support all kinds of things from higher minimum wages, to universal healthcare to campaign finance reform, but fail to recognize that very few of these issues are vote-movers. That doesn't mean they can't be turned into vote-movers through organizing and movement building, but on a lot of the most important issues we're not quite there yet.
The worst example of mistaking preference for intensity is on the issue of "fiscal responsibility." Tune into CSPAN at random and you're likely to hear a Democrat railing against fiscal irresponsibility and the budget deficit. The worst offenders are the Blue Dog caucus of Democrats from conservative districts who are positively obsessed, with a kind of monomaniacal zeal, on balancing the budget and matching revenue to expenditures. So much so, in fact, that they're now threatening to block Jim Webb's excellent G.I. Bill because its expenses aren't adequately off-set.
This is asinine. The notion that it will somehow be politically beneficial to go back to a conservative district and crow about killing a bill to give educational benefits to veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan is loony. And the notion that voters will base their vote on fiscal rectitude is ungrounded both empirically and experientially. Can someone name the last time a member of congress was voted out of office because the deficit was too large?
Blue Dog/DINOs misunderstand the vote-mover concept on more issues than just "fiscal responsibility." And I suspect that some of them really do grasp the concept and just delight in driving the congressional leadership crazy.
But when lobbying your local Blue Dog on an issue, distinguishing voter preference from voter intensity might just tip the decision your way.
(Short refresher: "telecom amnesty" means that companies that illegally spied on innocent Americans' phone calls, emails and text messages will be immune from liability in civil lawsuits. That, in turn, means that we spied-on citizens have no way to find out exactly what the companies did and who in the White House unConstitutionally ordered them to break the law, starting in February 2001 - seven months BEFORE 9-11.)
Well, now we know why DINO Ben Chandler chose this week to announce that he is endorsing and giving his super delegate vote to Barack Obama: to distract us from his Blue Dog buddies in the House of Representatives working behind the scenes to give Smirky/Darth the telecom amnesty real Democrats denied them in February.
Yes, Ben voted to reject amnesty in the re-authorization of the patriot act, and I was one of the many who wrote to thank him. But remember how surprised we all were that House dems suddenly discovered the "testicular fortitude" required to defy Smirky/Darth, after more than a year of fellating the White House on command?
As Glenn Greenwald reports, it appears we horrible cynics were correct - it was a trick.
Are House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and a small handful of "Blue Dog" Democrats working in secret to reverse one of the only worthwhile acts of Congressional Democrats since they were given control of Congress in 2006: namely, the refusal to vest the President with vast new warrantless eavesdropping powers and bequeath lawbreaking telecoms with amnesty? It certainly appears that way.
Numerous reports -- both public and otherwise -- suggest that Hoyer is negotiating with Jay Rockefeller to write a new FISA bill that would be agreeable to the White House and the Senate. Their strategy is to craft a bill that they can pretend is something short of amnesty for telecoms but which, in every meaningful respect, ensures an end to the telecom lawsuits. It goes without saying that no "compromise" will be acceptable to Rockefeller or the White House unless there is a guaranteed end to those lawsuits, i.e., unless the bill grants amnesty to lawbreaking telecoms.
Did you really think that Smirky-Darth were just going to loll around the White House for the next 8 months waiting for the Democrats to finally gather the courage to impeach them? They're going to be working non-stop, every day, now right through January 20, deleting emails, shredding documents, disappearing witnesses, muzzling the press, and throwing up legal roadblocks to the Righteous Justice rolling toward them.
No, I don't know that Ben Chandler is among the Blue Dogs plotting to hand amnesty to Bush, Cheney and all their sub-demons, but his record hardly gives reassurance.
Thank and congratulate him for endorsing Obama, but add a plea for his continued courage in resisted telecom amnesty in any FISA reauthorization.
As What Constitution? writes in Greenwald's comments:
Blanket and retroactive immunity for felonious and unconstitutional invasions of privacy is an affront to the Constitution of the United States, an attack upon the Rule of Law (without which this country cannot function as a democracy), and really really stupid.
This story of Patrick Murphy, the first Iraq War vet to get elected to Congress is informative and sobering. It’s also a pretty good read. But, it’s not a great read.
The book is more informative when Murphy discusses his run for Congress than in his analysis of how and where Bush went wrong in launching the Iraq War in the first place, or how Bush, Cheney, Bremer, Rumfeld et al screwed up after the invasion.
Throw in the fact that Murphy felt compelled to join the Blue Dog Coalition and renew funding for the School of the Americas, with the larger position that, as a freshman in Congress who got elected on one issue, and this is not a five-star book.
I wound up giving it three stars on Amazon. If I were the first rater, I might give it four stars. But, in light of the five-star fluff of several earlier raters, it had to get knocked down to three stars as a counterweight.
Since there’s nothing new on Iraq here, I focus my critique on the Congressman Murphy latter part of the book.
First, the amount of work involved with getting elected is huge. Especially for a first-time office-seeker with not a lot of name recognition, it can be grueling. Murphy spells that out in detail, both for the Democratic primary and the general election. He then details attack-dog Republican tactics against him in the general election, including a possible Hatch Act violation by the chief of staff of his opponent, incumbent Republican Mike Fitzpatrick.
Next, he discusses the hypocrisy of some endorsements, though he’s either too kind or too soft to use the word “hypocrisy.”
That includes the Veterans of Foreign Wars endorsing Fitzpatrick, a non-veteran. That includes unions endorsing Fitzpatrick because “he returns our phone calls.” (It’s all about access, isn’t it?)
Murphy then explains his decision to join the Blue Dogs because they stand for “balanced budgets and fiscal responsibility.”
But, uhh, Pat … “paygo” on budget issues is an official position of your party as a whole in both houses of Congress. No need to join the Blue Dogs for that, unless you think Pelosi and Reid are giving lip service.
As for SOAR, especially in light of Abu Ghraib and Gitmo, you’re naïve at best if you really think that under this administration, all its days of training human rights thugs are in the past. You should have voted to kill it.
In short, a good book but not a great one. While it is interesting to read about the shoe leather of a Congressional campaign, one doesn’t have to be an Iraq vet to do that, either.
The issues surrounding the FISA legislation are still roiling in Congress, thanks to the sudden appearance of a spine and principle by the Democrats in the House of Representatives (and correspondingly, with no thanks to the spineless and craven counterparts in the Senate, especially Jello Jay Rockefeller, the SSCI, and Harry Reid for bringing the horrid Intel committee bill to the floor instead of the far superior Judiciary bill). The most contentious issue has been, and continues to be, the proposed retroactive immunity for telco companies. Since the ugly head of the issue was first raised last summer with the railroaded passage of the Protect America Act, I have been arguing vehemently that the telcos are not in any grave danger financially from the civil suits currently pending. If their conduct is as has been described to date, they are already protected from liability for the actions that have been described, both by existing statutory immunity and by a right to indemnification from the government. The full court press for immunity by the Administration is entirely about cover for the lawless Bush Administration, and not about the impending financial demise of the telcos.
This post will go back over some of the basis for my argument that has been laid out previously, both here at Emptywheel and, earlier, at The Next Hurrah. I will also try to relate a few basics on what the general concept of indemnification is, and how it relates to contracts, in this case the agreements between the telcos and the Bush Administration. I have been making this argument for quite some time now, since last August, and have yet to have anybody put a significant dent in it; but it is no good if it cannot hold up to scrutiny. In that regard, I have posited my theory to several other lawyers expert in the field of governmental/Fourth Amendment litigation, including some extremely knowledgeable on the very civil suits at issue here, and all have agreed with the validity of my premise.
[Keep Reading...]
The Argument: The Bush Administration, with the help of telco providers (telelphone, cellphone, internet and other communication providers) engaged in massive wiretapping and datamining efforts, ostensibly to protect the United States from attack by terrorists. The legality of much of these programs has been questioned in many fora, but the germane ones for the immunity demand by the Administration are the civil suits that have been filed against both
House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel? Senate Democrats have “Stockholm syndrome” for caving to Senate GOP filibuster threats all the time.
Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid criticizes Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s “iron hand” style of government. (Oh, if it were only true, Harry. You must be confusing her with former GOP Speaker Dennis Hastert, or his power behind the throne, Majority Leader Tom DeLay.)
Neither side of the Capitol Dome has done itself much credit. The latest anti-results:
Democrats in each chamber are now blaming their colleagues in the other for the mess in which they find themselves. The predicament caused the majority party yesterday surrender to President Bush on domestic spending levels, drop a cherished renewable-energy mandate and move toward leaving a raft of high-profile legislation, from addressing the mortgage crisis to providing middle-class tax relief, undone or incomplete.
And, the backbiting probably isn’t dying down. Not after comments like this:
Reid has let his own frustration show. After Republican senators accused Pelosi of lying about her intentions on a comprehensive energy bill, the majority leader offered a backhanded defense.
“I can’t control Speaker Pelosi,” he said on the chamber floor. “I hope everybody understands that. She is a strong, independent woman. She runs the House with an iron hand. I support what she does, but no one needs to come and tell me I didn’t keep my word.”
There’s plenty of blame to go around here. First, on Reid’s side, besides his anti-filibuster all-nighter on Iraq spending, he still hasn’t figured out enough sneaky tactics to counter GOP filibuster threats. Surely, Robert Byrd, “Mr. Senate,” could tell him a trick or two.
If nothing else, why doesn’t Reid threaten to do what House Appropriations Chair David Obey plans? Gut any Senate spending bill of earmarks until Republicans start squeaking. It WILL work.
Look at the water bill that Congress recently re-passed to override a Bush veto for the first time. If there’s money involved, the GOP will listen.
On Pelosi’s side, part of it is that a number of freshman Democrats are fairly conservative. At the same time, she pissed off many of the definite liberals, before taking over, by how much, besides impeachment itself, she seemed ready to rule off the political table.
OK, so Proud Liberal John Yarmuth (D-KY3) isn't technically my Representative, if you're going to get picky about District borders. But I like to pretend he is, especially after reading pieces like this one from Page One Kentucky.
It’s hard not to like John Yarmuth. A year into his first-term as 3rd District Congressman, it’s obvious that he’s having a good time in Washington, but he’s also taking his job seriously. When he spoke to about 50 folks at Spalding University last night (a mix of journalists and students), he was eager and open in talking about his experiences. It almost felt like a family gathering (Yarmuth seems to get plenty of props from his colleagues for his media experience) where you catch up with the adventurous cousin who’s been away.
Yarmuth tells it like it is in a way that’s unusual in political circles. For one, he can admit mistakes, but he’s also willing to talk about the reasons behind his votes, even if those reasons are political.
And he's funny!
Colbert: “The best thing I’ve done in terms of publicity and exposure,” was his appearance on Stephen Colbert’s show on Comedy Central. Among the outtakes he shared was Colbert’s challenge to see if Yarmuth could tell the difference between Kentucky bourbon and Tennessee whiskey. In a blind taste test, Yarmuth got it right…twice. So Colbert asked him how long he’d been drinking on the job. There was also this clip I found on Comedy Central’s web site.
Read the whole thing for Yarmuth's take on Iraq, Blue Dogs, the presidential race, S-CHIP, running against Mitch and more.
The House will pretend to save face. Speaker Nancy Pelosi will have it pass a version of the bill that has no Iraq spending. Once it gets to the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid will let Republicans attach an Iraq spending amendment. When the bill goes to House-Senate conference, the House will “quietly” accept the Senate version.
Does Pelosi really think she’s fooling anybody? Is she that dumb in this day and age?
And the New Mexico governor and Democratic presidential candidate has a laundry list, items often also noted by folks like progressive bloggers and activists:
Richardson did not go easy on the party, assailing the Democratic-controlled Congress for its failure to accomplish more and calling on the party to win back people’s confidence.
“That begins with proving that we're listening to them,” he said.
“Look at the last twelve months. Not only are we still in Iraq, we still have the failure called No Child Left Behind. We still have 9 million children with no health insurance. We’re still allowing this president to thumb his nose at the Bill of Rights. We’re slipping into a recession," Richardson said. “And we can't even reject an attorney general who refuses to condemn torture.”
You know, it’s pretty hard to argue with any of that.
Richardson also chose the forum with the Democratic National Committee to attack Obama and Clinton for not committing to a full withdrawal from Iraq.
And, he said other candidates aren’t talking about jobs enough. Between that and the recession comments, you can’t argue with him for commenting on economic issues.
Obama repeated his claim to be the Democratic candidate who will rise above partisanship. He either still doesn’t have enough better policy planks, or else Republicans in Congress haven’t beat him about the head enough with 2x4 planks.
Edwards claimed Democrats in Congress have isolated themselves from the people.
That’s the word on what it’s going to involve to get a 35mpg CAFE bill past Congress. Now, the NYT story doesn’t use the word “bribe,” but here’s the details.
Such a deal would also provide incentives for the three big American manufacturers to continue building small cars in this country, preserving an estimated 17,000 jobs. The United Automobile Workers union and members of Congress from automaking states insisted on that provision as a condition of supporting the broader compromise.
The deal also appears to include mileage credits for so-called flexible-fuel vehicles that can run on a mixture of gasoline in relatively small proportions, and ethanol. It is comparatively inexpensive to convert vehicles to run on ethanol blends, but the fuel is available at a limited number of service stations, so the gasoline savings are expected to be minimal in the next few years.
And, here’s all that’s wrong with that.
First, E85 is a horrible answer to fuel economy. We don’t have nearly enough corn to make that kind of ethanol, the 51-cent a gallon payout for ethanol lines the pockets of ADM and Cargill, and we have no idea of celluolosic ethanol can in any way come close to filling the gap.
Second, the amount of incentives aren’t being spelled out, but you can bet it ain’t cheap. For two decades, the Big Three have resisted making better small cars and otherwise deal with a changing oil future and now, they’re getting rewarded for bad behavior. I was against the Chrysler bailout in 1981 and I’m against this now.
Also, it’s conservatives and Democratic moderates who allegedly are strong capitalists chucking principles for unprincipled protectionism again. (There is principled protectionism, for unfair job competition by countries with no worker safeguards, etc., but, Congress on both sides of the aisle never talks about that seriously, let alone acts.)
Meanwhile, some good provisions are likely to be dropped:
Reaching agreement on that timetable is likely to require Congressional leaders to drop provisions like a mandate that electric utilities nationwide generate 15 percent of their power from renewable sources, including wind, solar and hydroelectric power. Utilities lobbied intensively against that requirement.
A House-passed measure to repeal $16 billion in tax breaks for the oil industry is also expected to be scrapped, aides said. President Bush threatened to veto the entire package if the oil and gas tax bill were included.
So, Congress is kowtowing to a threatened Bush veto rather than trying to shame him for blocking “energy security.” And, Congress is also kowtowing to Big Electricity (and Big Coal behind it).
And, our Senatorial Presidential candidates? Well, on the Democratic side, Obama has shown himself to be the worst anti-environmental panderer so far.
Update, Dec. 1: The House passed the revised bill, including ramping up ethanol requirements to 20 billion gals/year AND, even worse, keeping separate CAFE standards for cars and light trucks. I'm disgusted.
First, a leading Sunni political group and its parliamentary bloc head are alleged to have connections to car bombs. The government said Adnan al-Dulaimi, leader of the Accordance Front, could be stripped of the immunity from prosecution he holds as a member of parliament if he was found to have links to car bombs. He is denying the charges.
That’s your Surge™ at work. Breathing space for Sunni “concerned citizens groups” to build bombs!
However, an old friend, Iran, gets mention again here. Supposedly, many of the Kurdistan Workers Party members have slipped across the border into Iran.
And Bush keeps poking Congress to approve Iraq occupation money. Rep. John Murtha has now uttered the magic word “compromise,” which on Congressional Democrats and Iraq issues, is Beltway-speak for “roll over and play dead.”
The current occupant of the oval office will succeed in running out the clock on his failed Iraq fiasco, and dump it in the lap of the next president. That’s a given. The casualties mean nothing to him, he has no skin in the game, and neither do any of the “people” who comprise the jackasses’ base.
He wanted just under $200 billion to continue the mission of completely wrecking Iraq and ushering about a thousand Americans a year to an early grave. Heckuva job, that.
On Thursday the House Democrats said he should hold the phone.
[keep reading] Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said that the congress would give him $50 billion to continue operations for about four months, and that there would be strings attached, including a mandate that the (still undefined) mission be restricted. If the Resident vetoes it, she said she would not send him another bill this year. “This is not a blank check fir the president. This is providing funding for the troops limited to a particular purpose, for a short time frame.”
Bush’s fetid, soulless mouthpiece Tony Fratto got his knickers in quite a twist and said that any bill containing “artificial timelines” for withdrawal would be vetoed. “We should be supporting our troops as they are succeeding, not finding ways to undercut their mission,” he whined.
(Let’s put that “success” in perspective, shall we? As of the end of May, more air strikes had been used than in all of 2006. And 2007 is already the deadliest year for Americans in Iraq – with over a month and a half to go. Then there is the fact that the ethnic cleansing has been largely successful, and that has lead to a decrease in sectarian violence in that beleaguered nation.)
Congressional Democrats are in a tight spot – you might say they are between Iraq and a hard place. They were returned to the majority in the 2006 elections by a public that is sick to death of the Deserter in Chief’s vanity war. But, being Democrats, they are split on how to proceed. Some say the war must be funded while troops are in harms way, and they fear that the craven, soulless fuck “president” would simply abandon troops in the field and leave them stranded. He is just about that petty and pathetic, so those fears are not entirely unjustified.
Several of the anti-war liberals in the House said on Thursday that they were tentatively willing to get behind Pelosi this time – provided the Speaker will not cave as she has in the past, and send him the money he wants anyway if he vetoes the spending bill. “What I don’t want to do is get on this merry-go-round where we try to end this war and negotiate it down to a blank check. It’s time to play hardball,” said Democratic Representative Jim McGovern of Massachusetts.
And if they can't manage that...then We, the People need some new, authentic, fire-breathin' DEMOCRATS. They have a short period of time to show us something,then screw 'em. Primary challenges it is!
10 Reasons to Love Pete Stark by Travis Bickle Sat Oct 20, 2007 at 09:39:45 AM PDT
I first became aware of Pete Stark shortly after the invasion of Iraq. These were heady days of mainstream media manufactured euphoria in which few Americans were even thinking about the long term consequences of this incredibly stupid policy. One morning, seemingly out of nowhere, I saw Congressman Stark on CNBC, interacting with a bunch of pompous, gloating talking heads who were practically orgasmic over the "victory" in Baghdad. Stark got highly indignant and correctly predicted the disaster to come. He went as far as to call George W. Bush a "jerk". CNBC's Steve Liesman responded: "I resent that remark". Stark practically laughed at him and told him to resent it all he wanted. I practically stood up and cheered. Ten more reasons to love Pete Stark are below.
1. Stark was a successful businessman in the banking industry and a Republican who switched to the Democratic party as a result of the Vietnam War. He placed a giant peace sign on the roof of his Bay area bank and printed peace signs on the bank's checks. 2. Stark is the only declared "nontheistic" member of Congress, and has stated that he is "a unitarian who does not believe in a supreme being". He has verbally opposed the promotion of religion in the military, marriage contracts and science. 3. Stark is the longest serving member of Congress from the state of California. 4. Stark was an opponent of the Iraq war even before the invasion and called for a reinstatement of the draft, saying "If we are going to have these escapades, we shouldn't do it on the backs of poor people and minorities." 5. Until the end of the Republican Congress in 2006, Stark voted against every single bill to appropriate additional funds for the Iraq war. 6. In July of 2003, Stark got into an altercation with Republican Scott McInnis. The occasion was an attempt by Ways and Means chairman Bill Thomas to ram through a Republican written budget without allowing Democrats on the committee to even READ it beforehand. Stark called McInnis "a little wimp" and "a fruitcake" and challenged him to a fight. Stark is in his seventies, McInnis was fifty years old at the time. 7. In 2003, the ACLU rated Stark at 100% per cent in their scorecard devoted to ranking the votes of members of Congress. 8. In a similar process in 2005, James Dobson's Family Research Council rated Stark at 0% 9. Stark is a veteran having served in the Air Force 1955 to 1957 10. Stark participated in a lawsuit against George W. Bush over the federal budget. The suit brought by eleven congressman was ultimately dismissed.
Pete Stark is a breath of fresh air. If we had 100 members like him, the Democratic party would take back this government in a landslide. If anyone owes anyone an apology, it's Speaker Pelosi to a courageous and outspoken American public servant, Pete Stark.
OK, maybe it's easy to defy the Forces of Evil when you're in your 70s and represent San Francisco.
But I believe there's a Pete Stark in Kentucky's Bluegrass, just waiting for the opportunity to overthrow Ben Chandler and return a Democrat to Congress for the Sixth District.
Louisville freshman John Yarmuth, KY-3 remains the lonely upholder of Kentucky's integrity in Congress.
David Herszenhorn in the NYT's blog the caucus features Yarmuth in a piece on the progressive freshmen's attempt to persuade their spineless and/or jaded colleagues that Congress, not the president, is the premier Constitutional power in this country.
The way Representative John Yarmuth of Kentucky sees it, lawmakers on Capitol Hill and Americans everywhere have forgotten who the Founding Fathers really intended to run the country –- not the President who was more of a Constitutional after-thought but the Congress, the people’s elected representatives. Mr. Yarmuth said he and many of the 41 other freshman Democrats in the House had been puzzling for some time over just how to remind voters of this, how to mold a most basic lesson of American civics so that it could be carried far and wide by the modern techniques of political messaging. And then an idea struck. Today, on the House floor, Mr. Yarmuth began distributing small buttons, seemingly made of parchment, with the words, “Article 1” – as in Article 1 of the Constitution, which states, “All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.” In other words: Mr. President, the Congress would like to remind you, that you, dear pal, are Article 2.
Read the whole thing, as it is full of tidbits like the elected yahoos who think "Article 1" refers to the First Amendment.
I seriously doubt Ben Chandler, DINO-KY 6, can claim that kind of ignorance. He just prefers fellating Smirky to representing his constituents.
Watch your back, Blue Dogs, Bush-lovers and Ben Chandler (KY-6): The Angry, UnSerious Left is taking aim at Bush Democrats. And they're not just sending out complaining emails.
They're recruiting primary candidates and raising money.
Don't suppose you noticed how it was the angry left-wing netroots who returned Congress to Democratic hands last November. We didn't do that so you could flush our support down the crapper by continuing to roll over and play dead for Smirky.
We sent you back to D.C. with clear, strict orders to stand up to Smirky and put a stop to the Iraq disaster, torture, warrantless wiretapping, politicization of the Justice Department, and all the other un-Constitutional crimes this maladministration is blithely continuing right in front of your stinky brown noses.
Well you better notice now because we - we who handed you Congress on a silver platter - are royally pissed off. You fooled us once, but we won't be fooled again. We're shopping for REAL Democrats to challenge repug-lites like you in the primary, and we've got the wealth of the Net to back us up.
As Glenn Greenwald notes, the left is already mobilizing to take out every DINO it can find. (more after the jump)
If the Democratic Congress capitulates yet again, there will be plenty of time and opportunity for all sorts of recriminations. I think it is quite encouraging that much of the "netroots" is now devoting its energies and resources not to supporting Democrats, but to opposing Congressional Democrats who merit defeat. Matt Stoller and Open Left, for instance, are devoting most of their energies to figuring out how to surmount the obstacles to waging effective primary challenges against Bush-supporting Democrats. The fund-raising entity run by FDL, C&L and others has begun targeting worthless Democrats, funding and running robocalls against Bush-enabling Democratic incumbents in their districts (those inclined can help fund those efforts here). MoveOn is actively considering spending large sums of money to support primary challenges against war-enabling Democrats. Obviously, there is no point in working to empower Democrats who enable and support virtually all of the worst aspects of the Bush agenda.
And Democracy For America has already found its first Progressive Challenger and is raising money. From the national email:
With Democrats like Congressman Dan Lipinski, the Republicans don't even need to run a candidate. There are some Democrats - Bush Democrats - who claim to represent us, but vote with Republicans on too many issues that matter. Send a message to Congress: You're on notice. Regardless of political party, when Congress won't represent the will of the American people, then DFA members will fight toreplace them with someone who will.
This is one bright blue Democratic district where we can make a change; Mark Pera is the progressive in the primary. Support Mark with a contribution of $15 right now:
I have never been one of those liberals who claim “there is no difference between Republicans and Democrats.” I think the Bush Terror Interregnum has thoroughly disproved that proposition.
However, if you suspect that Congressional Democrats are doing less than their utmost to distinguish themselves from the freakazoid nutjobs who populate this maladministration, you’ll find plenty of evidence in Gary Kamiya’s Salon piece How the Democrats Blew It.
One of many head-banging sentences:
By allowing themselves to be intimidated into supporting Bush's war of choice, and by failing to offer a clear alternative to his moralistic, ahistorical, thuggish approach to the Middle East, the Democrats have once again embraced their time-honored strategy of presenting themselves as kinder, gentler Republicans.
Warning: Do not read while in proximity to sharp objects, loaded weapons or an open flame.
Why are Congressional Democrats so worthless? I don't mean just DINOs like Joe Lieberman and Ben Chandler (D, KY-6). I mean supposed liberals like Dianne Feinstein, veterans like Jim Webb, presidential candidates like Hillary Clinton.
Why do they do it? Why do they spit in the face of the Democrats who voted for them? Why do they shit on the Constitution? Why do they turn their backs on America's Best and Bravest who are dying for no reason in the Iraqi desert?
Today Glenn Greenwald in Salon comes up with a new theory of Beltway Madness that explains votes that remain mysterious under all other theories.
Glenn's theory also emphasizes the critical importance of ensuring that the only Democrats permitted to reach Congress are true progressives who have not yet been co-opted by Beltway Madness.
In this regard, she (Feinstein) really symbolizes a major imbalance in the Washington political system. The right-wing Republicans in Congress have an affinity with their base and share the same basic values. One saw that quite vividly in the recent immigration debate, where most Congressional Republicans -- particularly the "conservative" ones -- embraced rather than ran away from their angry, impassioned base by blocking enactment of the immigration bill which the GOP establishment favored but which the right-wing base hated. Most conservative Senators sided with their base over the GOP establishment, as they usually do when there is a split (Harriet Miers, Dubai Port Deal, even steadfast support for the Iraq War). And they rarely repudiate the political value system of their base because they respect it and share it. By very stark contrast, most (though certainly not all) Democrats in Congress -- particularly the most influential and longest-serving ones in the Senate like Feinstein -- have contempt for their base and share virtually none of their values. In March of last year, I had an e-mail exchange with the spokesperson for a key Democratic Senator on the Intelligence Committee regarding how bloggers and their readers could work more closely with Democratic Senators to highlight the need for the NSA lawbreaking scandal to be investigated and taken more seriously. Ultimately, they made clear that they wanted nothing to do with actual citizens who were eager to bring that situation about, as I was told:
I think there is an opportunity for us to figure out a better way to work together. But, you have to understand, my ultimate goal is to help [the] Senator achieve his objective of real oversight on national security matters by the Intelligence Committee. Even with the best of intentions, I'm not convinced that bloggers can help us meet that goal. In fact, I worry about it hurting our efforts given the increasingly partisan environment.
Right now, only John Yarmuth of Louisville's Third District is genuinely representing Kentucky Democrats.
I'm telling my fellow progressives to get serious about recruiting REAL Democrats for the First, Second, Fourth, Fifth, and yes, Sixth District Congressional races next year, not to mention Mitch's Senate seat.
Let's find the Sixth's District's John Yarmuth or Andrew Horne. Let's support a REAL Democrat who will take on Ben Chandler.
As we have seen over the past 8 months, Democrats In Name Only are not enough. America is teetering on the edge of genuine disaster, and only Real, Progressive Democrats can save us.
And, in doing so, not just one or two, but Congressional Democrats en masse, he again demonstrates again why he’s probably my favorite progressive columnist. He first notes:
In June Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting's Extra! Magazine wrote: “If the Democrat-controlled Congress wanted to force the Bush administration to accept a bill with a withdrawal timeline, it didn't have to pass the bill over Bush's veto--it just had to make clear that no Iraq War spending bill without a timeline would be forthcoming.”
Democratic leaders know that. And here's how I know they know: days after taking control of Congress, on January 30, they invited five constitutional law experts to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee to ask them how they could end the war. Four out of five of the experts swore that the Democrats could stop the Iraq War just...like...that.
After accusing the mainstream media of perpetuating the myth that Democrats really do want to end the war, but can’t get a bill past Bush, Rall then observes:
You'd think the Democrats would want to end the Iraq War before their likely retaking of the White House, but that's because you're a human being, not a politician. Politicians are happy to dispatch hundreds of young American men and women to certain death (along with thousands of Iraqis), if the bloodshed squeezes out an extra half percentage point at the polls. Reid and Pelosi prefer to run against a disastrous ongoing Republican war than point to a fragile Democratic-brokered peace.
I really don’t think any more commentary is needed.
If you worry that even with the republican party imploding left, right and center, the rovians will once again use their "Family Values" bag of tricks to pull out a victory in 2008, keep an eye on the Kentucky Governor's race now in its last 60 days.
Gay marriage, the ten commandments, prayer in schools - the republicans are preparing to launch all the Golden Oldies against the Democrats in October.
But this time, finally, there are definite signs that Kentucky Democrats have learned not only how to fight back effectively, but actually attack the repugs on their own "Family values" ground.
Republican incumbent Ernie Fletcher, with a record of incompetence that rivals Smirky's - except for the dead people - has been reduced to running on the "we're christians and they're not" line.
It started in June, when Fletcher reversed his previous stand on expanding gambling on Kentucky. Through the May primary, Fletcher had said he would not oppose a referendum on expanding gambling, though he wasn't personally in favor of it.
Democratic gubernatorial nominee Steve Beshear has been running since February on a promise to bring expanded gambling to Kentucky. Some polls have shown that a majority of Kentuckians support expanded gambling, and more than 80 percent favor a referendum on the issue.
After Beshear won the May Democratic primary, the first post-primary polls showed Beshear beating Fletcher by as much as 40 points (Beshear has since dropped to an 18-point lead.)
Ernie flipped and came out four-square against expanded gambling, and against even allowing a referendum.
Let's upack that flip: First, if Ernie had a record of accomplishments to run on, he could afford to maintain his previous neutrality. But his record being one of unmitigated incompetence, illegality and immorality, he desperately needs an issue.
Second, Ernie gains precisely zero new votes with this changed position. Voters who oppose expanded gambling on moral grounds are already republicans who wouldn't vote for a Democrat under threat of waterboarding. Democratic voters, like me, who oppose expanded gambling on the reality-based grounds that casinos are a really stupid way to grow an economy, are desperate to get rid of Ernie and are prepared to hold our noses and vote for Beshear regardless.
Third, and this is the fun part, Ernie's flip may actually lose him some votes from his base. Among the republican opponents of expanded gambling are a significant number who strongly favor a referendum. Some may actually be deluded that they can defeat that measure, but others may want to get their opposition to expanded gambling on the record, or just make their voices heard.
So Ernie has really stepped in it. He claims to oppose expanded gambling on moral grounds, but also opposes giving those who agree with him to chance to vote it down.
A month of expensive TV commercials by Ernie on the horrors of expanded gambling has gotten him nowhere in the polls, and that's why Kentucky Democrats are preparing for an avalanche of "Democrats (heart) Satan" commercials, probably starting in October.
But Beshear and the other Democrats on the state ticket have already seized the high moral ground in a way that the party's 2008 candidates nationwide would do well to study and emulate. Some examples:
On Gambling: Democrats taunted Fletcher during his speech at the Fancy Farm picnic that his faith-based opposition to gambling exempts Kentucky's iconic horse racing industry and the extremely popular church- and community organization-based bingo industry. In fact, bingo took place just a few yards from where Fletcher was condemning gambling. If Ernie thinks gambling is so horrible, Democrats asked, why doesn't he propose shutting down the race tracks and the bingo halls?
On the Ten Commandments: Back in the early '80s, when Beshear was Attorney General, he issued an opinion that yes, the U.S. Supreme Count decision banning publicly-funded religious displays does, indeed, apply in Kentucky. Fletcher claims this proves Beshear, the son of a Baptist lay minister, is Satan's Agent.
Beshear says this: My father used to say that it doesn't matter where you hang the Ten Commandments on the wall; it matters how you keep the Ten Commandments in your heart and how you follow them in your life. Ernie Fletcher has admitted to breaking the laws of the Commonwealth. My father would not consider that to be living the Ten Commandments.
On Prayer in Schools: While he was Attorney General, Beshear issued another opinion that yes, the U.S. Supreme Court decision banning spoken prayer in public schools does, indeed, apply in Kentucky. Fletcher claims this proves Beshear, the son of a Baptist lay minister, is Satan's Agent.
I have not yet heard Beshear speak directly to this issue, but it's an absolute gimme for liberals. Not that the religious wrongs give a damn about the New Testament, but just for the record, here is Jesus on public prayer (Matthew 6)
And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites [are]: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.
On General Morality: Until recently, repugs have been so effective in painting Democrats as evil, atheistic minions of Satan, that last year a substitute teacher in my home town who admitted to a fourth-grade class that she was a Democrat, was asked by one child, innocently and seriously: "Why don't you believe in God?"
Kentucky's unions aren't taking that crap lying down. They formed a 527 to stop Bruce Lunsford from winning the Democratic gubernatorial primary in May and now they're airing radio spots to attack the republicans' "Christian values." From Bluegrass Report:
The deliberately folksy spot takes aim at Governor Fletcher (R) and attorney general nominee Stan Lee (R) on "Christian values." The ad criticizes both for "implying they are God's chosen candidates" and then reminds voters that Christian values also includes things like soaring health care costs, affordable education, and good jobs -- issues that neither candidate seems much interested in talking about.
Unions being smarter than your average bear, they are running these ads not in the secular-humanist, Democratic-majority enclaves of Lexington and Louisville, but in the Fundamentalist capitals of south-central, eastern and western Kentucky.
On Gay Marriage: This one killed Dan Mongiardo's nearly successful challenge to Senator Jim Bunning in 2004, and could threaten Jack Conway's race for Attorney General. Not because either Mongiardo or Conway are in favor of gay marriage, or even civil unions, but because both men (Conway is married; Mongiardo engaged) are the subject of repug whispering campaigns that they are gay.
Nice try, but the worm appears to be turning on gay issues even in Kentucky. People are just tired of the fear- and hate-mongering, and starting to admit they just don't care whether someone is gay.
No poll numbers for you, but a pretty good anecdote: Met a 70-year-old woman this weekend who talked about her still-healthy and still-sharp 91-year-old aunt. The one issue on which the aunt really hates republicans is gay marriage. Sayeth the aunt: "I don't care who sticks what where!"
There are two keys to success in these Democratic attacks on the repugs anti-christian values:
1) Authenticity. As in NOT hypocrisy. The Kentucky Democrats making religious points are genuine Christians and have been all their lives. In their professional and personal lives, they live New Testament, Jesus-directed values. When they speak on the subject of religious values, they sound authentic because they are.
2) Democratic/Progressive/Liberal Values. Kentucky's unions are making the critical point that traditional Democratic values ARE genuine Christian values, and that republican values are not. This is critical. Democrats who apologize for traditional Democratic values as not being Christian enough lose (see Harold Ford.) Democrats who stand up proudly for their Democratic values win (see John Yarmuth.)
I have raged for three years now against Democrats attempting to win over "Family Values" voters by pandering to the religious wrongs. It never, never, EVER works. Members of the religious wrong would rather vote for Larry Craig or Mark Foley than any Democrat, no matter how "religious."
Moderate republicans and independents, however, are open to a Democratic candidate with the courage of her convictions, even if those convictions are secular humanist. Such courage might actually get all those non-voting Democrats off the sofa on Election Day.
Standing proud for Democratic values worked last November for John Yarmuth in Louisville. We'll see in 59 days if attacking repugs on their own "Family Values" ground works for Beshear-Mongiardo, Conway and the other Democrats statewide.
By Edger - Cross-posted from OOIBC ........................................................................
By it's nature the Out Of Iraq Bloggers Caucus is, as our tagline describes, a "coalition of the willing", not a top down organization speaking with one voice, but a gathering place for bloggers united in opposition to the Iraq occupation, each with their own motivations, each with their own ideas on how the occupation can be ended.
I want to talk today about my own views, and also about a short conversation I had yesterday about whether and about how the Iraq occupation could be ended - but first I want to provide some background against which to express my own thoughts. I also hope here to encourage other OOIBC members to post their thoughts. I speak only for myself here.
OOIBC is subset of a much larger "coalition of the willing", a microcosm of the tens of millions of people who, expressing, in the words of Keith Olbermann "the collective will of the nearly 70 percent of Americans who reject this War of Lies", in the 2006 midterm elections repudiated the Republican party and I think George W. Bush's foreign policies, and swept the Democratic Party into a Congressional majority on the strength of one single issue, one overwhelming mandate.
A mandate they have since, in my view, grievously insulted the people who gave them the Congressional power they now hold by ignoring.
Few men or women elected in our history-whether executive or legislative, state or national-have been sent into office with a mandate more obvious, nor instructions more clear:
Get us out of Iraq.
Yet after six months of preparation and execution-half a year gathering the strands of public support; translating into action, the collective will of the nearly 70 percent of Americans who reject this War of Lies, the Democrats have managed only this:
The Democratic leadership has surrendered to a president-if not the worst president, then easily the most selfish, in our history-who happily blackmails his own people, and uses his own military personnel as hostages to his asinine demand, that the Democrats "give the troops their money";
The Democratic leadership has agreed to finance the deaths of Americans in a war that has only reduced the security of Americans;
The Democratic leadership has given Mr. Bush all that he wanted, with the only caveat being, not merely meaningless symbolism about benchmarks for the Iraqi government, but optional meaningless symbolism about benchmarks for the Iraqi government.
The Democratic leadership has, in sum, claimed a compromise with the Administration, in which the only things truly compromised, are the trust of the voters, the ethics of the Democrats, and the lives of our brave, and doomed, friends, and family, in Iraq.
Now, a little more than three months later, nothing has changed and it appears that there is no movement by the Democratic controlled Congress toward ending the financing of "the deaths of Americans in a war that has only reduced the security of Americans".
In some comments beginning here replying to a post by Big Tent Democrat at TalkLeft yesterday, Glenn Greenwald made it clear that he now feels there is no possibility of the Democratic leadership ending the occupation of Iraq in the near future, if ever.
I'm not advising Democrats to give up on Iraq. I think they ought to force the President to withdraw.
But I'm not going to lie to my readers to make them feel better. Everything I've seen from Democrats makes me conclude that nothing that anyone does will ever make them stand up to the President with sufficient unity and in sufficient numbers to force him to stop the war.
That's just reality. They can't even restore habeas corpus or defy the President's demand for vast new warrantless surveillance powers. The idea that they are going one day soon wake up and Stop the War is fanciful, no matter how much you wish it were otherwise (and, contrary to your weird praise of Atrios, he has made that point more emphatically and more continuously than anyone I know).
I'm not writing prescriptively, but descriptively. I'm not recommending that Democrats not try to stop the war. I'm not recommending that anyone stop trying. I'm just giving my honest assessment that they are not going to do it.
I earnestly hope that Glenn is wrong on this, but I believe he is not, and I agree with him.
I also have come to believe that the Democratic Leadership has no motivation to end the Iraq occupation. I think that they believe they will retain and perhaps increase their control of Congress next year, and that Democratic presidential frontrunner candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton believe that they can count on winning the presidency without ending the Iraq occupation, almost if not fully on the strength of one message - that they are not Republicans.
I think they are counting on the fear of another four if not eight years of Republican government to provide the votes for them, without having to live up to their implied promises and the expectations of them that three quarters of voters hold. I think that they are not afraid they will pay any political price whatsoever in 2008 for not living up to those implied promises and the expectations.
But I think they are not simply afraid of nothing.
I think that they, like the Republicans, are afraid of one thing.
They are afraid that the US economy cannot and will not continue to dominate the world economy, and will collapse, unless the US is able to dominate the energy resources of the world, and that cannot be done if the US withdraws from Iraq.
The invasion and the occupation of Iraq was not done to deliver 'freedom and democracy' to Iraq. It was done in the hope of ensuring US economic dominance.
Larry Everest writing at ZNet shortly before the last Emergency Supplemental funding the occupation was passed in May (the first one passed by a Democratic controlled Congress after years of supplementals passed by Republicans) described the problem much more succinctly that I am able to:
What the Bush Regime portrays as a noble effort to make the world safe from terrorism and bring democracy to the Middle East is actually a vicious war of empire to deepen the U.S. stranglehold on the Middle East and Central Asia --a war that is part of a broader effort to create an unchallenged and unchallengeable imperialist empire.
This goal is not viewed as capricious or incidental by those in charge--whether Democrats or Republicans--rather it flows from the deepest needs and drives of their system: U.S. hegemony in the Middle East and global dominance is crucial for U.S. capitalism's ongoing functioning and U.S. global power. ... So when Bush says, "Even if you thought it was a mistake to go into Iraq, it would be a far greater mistake to pull out now," he's expressing a fear -- from an imperialist viewpoint - that a U.S. pullout would leave the empire weaker. And he is saying this in opposition to other forces in the U.S. ruling class who, also coming from an imperialist viewpoint, now think it's a big mistake for the U.S. not to withdraw.
This whole dynamic of riding the anti-war vote to power, then voting to fund an ongoing war while claiming to be ending it, reflect the conflicting necessities the Democrats face. As representatives of U.S. imperialism, they are committed to maintaining U.S. global dominance. Yet they fear the U.S. is sliding toward a strategic debacle of epic proportions and may already have lost the war in Iraq.
Glenn Greenwald yesterday was expressing his belief of the reality of the situation with "Everything I've seen from Democrats makes me conclude that nothing that anyone does will ever make them stand up to the President with sufficient unity and in sufficient numbers to force him to stop the war."
I agree with Glenn. They will not end it. They have no reason or motivation to, if they can count on voter support in 2008 without ending it.
The evidence states that Democrats are basically on board with Bush.
This has been obvious for some time. Since the supplemental in the spring at least. The FISA Amendment should have been the clincher for anyone who doubted it.
They are not capitulating to Bush. They are complicit with Bush. They are confident that the electorate will capitulate to them next year out of fear of the republicans. They are playing people. This, in my view, is Democrats using the same fearmongering tactics the Republicans used so successfully for the past few years.
It's very difficult to imagine a political reality developing under which current Democrats (again I refer to leadership and presidential frontrunners) will end the occupation of Iraq.
But it is not at all difficult to imagine how it can happen.
I believe that people would feel energized if they saw and heard enough people leading us in the right direction on Iraq, and that if leading Democrats heard enough people say to them that they will not vote for ANY Democrats next year EXCEPT Democrats who have been vocally, and by their votes on supplementals, calling for total withdrawal from Iraq they would quickly notice.
They are politicians after all, and they are concerned with winning elections.
They would notice if enough people turned the tables on them and used fear to motivate them, instead of voting simply out of fear of republicans.
If Democrats were filled with fear that they would lose Congress and the presidency UNLESS the occupation was ended before the 2008 elections, they would end the occupation of Iraq.
I hope that Glenn Greenwald will use the voice and the reach and the influence he has to encourage people to threaten the Democratic Leadership and presidential hopefuls with loss of support unless they do the job the voters who gave them the Congressional majority they now hold expect of them.
As Keith Olbermann also said in May:
Those who seek the Democratic nomination need to-for their own political futures and, with a thousand times more solemnity and importance, for the individual futures of our troops-denounce this betrayal, vote against it, and, if need be, unseat Majority Leader Reid and Speaker Pelosi if they continue down this path of guilty, fatal acquiescence to the tragically misguided will of a monomaniacal president.
Accountability. We have to be accountable, and we think our politicians should be too. We do not want a replay of the craven perfidy of the last 12 years that nearly sunk the ship of state. The administrators of this blog have decided, as a group, that working to elect real Democrats to office at all levels of government is the best way to achieve the restoration of oversight and accountability.
But please! Don’t make the mistake of thinking of us as battered wives who keep coming back for more, because that would be totally wrong. Parole Officers would be much more fitting. (Full Mission Statement here.)
