Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Spineless Dems: What can we do to change this!?

By

If the above is as depressing to you as it is to me, then here’s something, maybe, to animate your spirit…

we have to re-engage as powerfully as we did in the campaign to fight back against these now emboldened forces of reaction. I think this is true not just for the sake of the country but also for the sake of the GOP. The nihilist obstructionism and rhetoric they have embraced makes constitutional democracy close to impossible. Their total lack of any workable alternatives to dire problems is a form of degeneracy we have to avoid empowering.

So fight, Mr President. And to the House Democrats who won’t go along with the only way to salvage health reform: this is the only sure-fire way you will lose in November. If you pass this bill, you may also go down in this climate. But you will have done something you can be proud of. Politics cannot always be about narrow self-interest. If it always is, nothing important can get done.

Thoughts?  How do we CHANGE this?  How do we shove a backbone in the Dem leadership?

Please share widely!
fb-share-icon
Tweet
0

Comments

  1. convince elected Democrats to stop paying attention to the corporate chattering class – Brokaw, Broder, etc., the battle would be half won. Corporate media employees love to characterize progressive initiatives as “radical” and “left-wing” even when the majority of the citizenry favors those initiatives.

    <

    p>I propose two approaches to the problem:

    <

    p>1. Congressional Democrats and Obama should not factor pundit opinions into their decision-making. Ever. When it becomes apparent that their serious views distortions of issues are not having any effect, maybe they will find something useful to do with their time.

    <

    p>2. The White House press Secretary and the President should challenge corporate framing of issues when confronted with it. This would be a visible demonstration of spine-possession, and would be rewarded by voters. As a bonus, it would really piss the pundits off.

      • Because some surveys showed more reporters and copy editors are Democrats, and because calling the media “liberal” serves the conservative agenda. Neither of those actually mean that the media are liberal. The media are biased, but it isn’t toward the Left; it’s toward the Dollar. It’s corporate media, and it consistently favors points of view that support business. That often aligns with Republican positions. Occasionally, it aligns with a Democratic position, and the RWNM adds each and every one of those occasions to their list of “liberal bias” examples. Stuff like the NYT pimping the Iraq war and sitting on the illegal wiretapping story for a year are not, of course, evidence of any contrary bias; those things don’t support the CW, so they didn’t happen.

        <

        p>If you search, you will find accounts of reporters and editors admitting that they were successfully pressured to downplay stories that might have favored liberal positions. Most recently is the Herald columnist who said the paper was cheerleading for Brown.

      • It obviously serves the interests of the right to perpetuate this MYTH.  But it is absolutely and entirely a MYTH/fabrication.

        <

        p>Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR.org) routinely exposes how Not Left those “left: voices (NPR, NYT, MSNBC) are.  

    • Their heart of heart of hearts is in the right places, I think, much more so than the republicans (at least any republicans I know/have seen since the 80s)…

      <

      p>But just witness Obama’s Code Brown (Freeze! I’m not talking about health care anymore!).  

      <

      p>Not to mention Sumner and Geithner.

      <

      p>Garrrrrhrhr.

      <

      p>Frustrated.  

      <

      p>We need a better politics.  We need a better electorate.  

      <

      p>I’m demanding better, I want better.  When will someone listen to me, or/and what do I need to do to be louder?

      <

      p>Why are the Teabaggers and Republicans so much better at this than liberals/progs/dems?  Or rather, what can we do to FINALLY engage in the Best Practices from the Teabaggers et al and use them to the advantage of GOOD policies/arguments?  

  2. From Paul Waldman:

    <

    p>

    There are a lot of reasons to feel despondent at what’s been going on with Democrats in Congress and the White House over the last week. What’s remarkable is just how easy it was for them to get sent into this spiral of fear.

    I shouldn’t have to keep repeating this, but all of this chaos – talking about abandoning their agenda, the president seemingly reconfiguring his entire political strategy – is happening because their 20-seat advantage in the Senate was reduced to an 18-seat advantage. Can you imagine what would happen if they suffered a really big defeat?

    It reveals not just how little faith Democrats have in their beliefs, but also how little faith they have in their own political abilities.

    Considering the disillusionment with Obama now spreading in progressive circles, particularly over his proposal for a spending freeze, Greg Sargent noted that “fairly or not, liberals saw in him someone who would use his extraordinary communications skills to expand the field of what’s pragmatically possible, to move public opinion – not someone who would ever play by the other side’s rhetorical rules. Each time he falls short of this ideal, people grow less willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Hence the outcry about the freeze – even if the details of the freeze are proving less onerous than initially thought.”

Archives