Like fictional character Bruno Gianelli, I am tired of cowering in a corner. For those not familiar with this 20 year old speech here’s how it goes:
Because I’m tired of working for candidates who make me think that I should be embarrassed to believe what I believe, Sam! I’m tired of getting them elected! We all need some therapy, because somebody came along and said, “‘Liberal’ means soft on crime, soft on drugs, soft on Communism, soft on defense, and we’re gonna tax you back to the Stone Age because people shouldn’t have to go to work if they don’t want to!” And instead of saying, “Well, excuse me, you right-wing, reactionary, xenophobic, homophobic, anti-education, anti-choice, pro-gun, Leave It To Beaver trip back to the Fifties…!”, we cowered in the corner, and said, “Please. Don’t. Hurt. Me.” No more. I really don’t care who’s right, who’s wrong. We’re both right. We’re both wrong. Let’s have two parties, huh? What do you say?
The sad thing is, it’s still true. President Obama rode a landslide into office with a 60 seat Senate supermajority and talked about working with the Republicans to balance the budget and lower the deficit. He fatally kept the stimulus too low, immigration reform on the back burner, and bragged about passing Mitt Romney’s health care plan as his signature achievement. Yes, I get that there were a lot of factors standing in his way including a much more conservative Democratic Congress, but still. Whenever he could have fought, he always choose compromise. Maybe worried he’d be portrayed as an angry black man, maybe worried he’d be impeached by a rabid right wing if we he went too far. The point is, this history always repeats itself.
In my lifetime the Democrats have always rolled over and played dead. All of Clinton’s Republican Lite polices, voting for Bush’s idiotic and never ending wars and surveillance states, championing corporate interests over workers. Staying home when right wing governors passed right to work. “Getting tough on” teachers unions instead of working with them to secure better funding and training.
Too often our leaders raise up their hands before they fight. No point in impeachment, the GOP has the Senate. No point in stopping ICE, GOP has the Senate. Hoping Trump self impeaches and spending more time concern trolling their own base than attacking the base racism and hatred emanating from the other side. Waiving their hands that Charlie Baker is too popular to oppose.
Maybe we wouldn’t have a GOP Senate if we forced swing stage Senators to take tough vote after tough vote. Maybe, Trumps ratings would be going down instead of up if we had actual investigations and oversight into his crimes. Maybe even putting impeachment on the table. They impeached Bill Clinton over blow jobs but actual sex predators and their enablers roam the White House today and Democrats say nothing. They destroyed Hillary over email servers and a terrorist attack that wasn’t her fault, but Trumps crimes and those of his offspring and cronies get a free pass. We’ll wait for him to self impeach first.
I’m 30. I wasn’t around when Democrats did big things and won landslide victories. I’m beginning to wonder if the people that were who are still in office forget those days and forget the spirit that led to almost 40 years of uninterrupted liberal governance. Days when the GOP had to nominate Democrat Lite candidates instead of the other way around.
We are having a contested primary. I think it’s important we nominate a fighter who won’t yield their ground to compromise with a party that won’t recognize science, the autonomy of women, the civil rights of immigrants and racial minorities, the human rights of the LGBTQ community, or the dignity of working people. A party that openly disparages the poor and destroys the planet. A party that colludes with foreign powers and corporate interest to rig elections and gerrymander themselves into power they do not democratically earn.
These are the stakes. I want DeLeo to use his supermajority to override Baker and Spilka at every term and make him a two term Governor. I want them to stop his conservative assault on our unions, our healthcare, our transit system, and our ecosystem. If they can’t do it, step aside for someone who will.
I want the House majority I donated money to secure to hold this President accountable. Whether it’s politically popular or not it’s actually their job according to the Constitution. If Mitch McConnell can ruin President Obama’s agenda with a six year minority and four vote majority his last term, surely our 32 seat House Majority can do some damage to this lawless Presidency. Or at least stop it from killing migrant children.
Trump didn’t move to the middle. He didn’t listen to the polls. He caters to his base and he follows his gut. Our leaders should do the same, since our base is bigger than theirs and our issues actually poll better than theirs. But the candidate who relishes fights with his opponents and welcomes their hatred wins. Whether it’s FDR or Donald Trump. The candidate who cowers in the corner and plays it safe loses, and not only do they lose, but they make it harder for the next winner to govern as a progressive.
It’s time to fight. Civility is for losers.
Mostly a good rant, but I reject the implied premise of your very last line that we can’t both fight and be civil. I still think there’s a way to fight like heck for what we believe, but still not be nasty or personal.
‘Civility’ meaning watering down our values for the sake of compromise or appearing to be bipartisan. Or not calling a spade a spade because we are worried about offending people. The President is a no good crook, predator, and racist and we should not hesitate to tell the American people what he is. It’s not worth watering down the truth just to play nice with Republicans who would never treat us as fairly in kind.
I have no problem with the above comment. I just don’t want to go tit for tat name calling on Twitter.
Great stuff.
This seems related. In a vote on an amendment that would ban the use of DOD facilities to hold children, 34 Democrats sided with the Republicans to defeat the measure.
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2019/roll466.xml
Seth Moulton was one of them. (All other MA members voted appropriately.)
I hope he stays in the Presidential race and gives up his House seat. He should go be an executive at Raytheon – it would fit him.
We need to stop blaming the working class for its demise and telling them they need education and job skills to succeed in America. Sure both are important but without political power, they are completely worthless.
We need to stop this talk about the “middle class”. To accept a middle class is to accept a lower class of hard working people in this nation.
We need to stop assuming conformity along demographic sectors. All women do not think alike and are pro-choice. It’s not men behind the reversal of Roe, it’s them, men and women.
We need to restore the dignity of work, all work, and all those who work full time no matter what job skills we deem it to require or dismiss as ordinary.. AND to those who work at home, taking care of the children and the elderly.
We need to repeat, over and over, loudly and clearly that no one built this on their own. The self made man is a myth and the entrepreneur is not a god send.
Finally, we need to stop this “centrist” fetish, believing that the majority lines in the center of the bell curve. We need to be bold, fight to inspire the left side of what is really an inverted bell curve, ignore the other side, and fight like hell for what’s in the middle, by being who we are and standing for something, not “wanting to compromise” with the hard right.
We fought with George McGovern. We fought with Adlai Stevenson. We always fight.
We also usually don’t curse the darkness and ignore polls in a remarkably unscientific way.
What is truly remarkable at this point is Joe Biden’s resilience (as well as Elizabeth Warren’s well-earned rise).
Yes. The polls matter. It matters that it has been the Democratic nominees who do not have the enthusiastic support of the African-American community that have consistently lost. That matters.
I’m not the one doing that
Here’s the actual center of the last electorate. It’s solidly left of center on economics and center right on social issues. None of our candidates has that sweet spot currently, but I think those that espouse genuine populism rather than a centrist restoration are the ones who will match up well against Trump.
Drutman makes two key points that could be cited against Biden.
The first is that he isn’t actually an ideological fit with the Obama-Trump voters
The second is that he is beholden to donors who are far more economically conservative than the median voter
Warren’s economic patriotism agenda is the kind of progressive and inclusive nationalism that could win back these actual centrist voters without having to move to the right on identity issues. Biden on the other hand is being attacked from the left on both identity and economic issues from which he is out of step with the base of the party, and out of step with independents on economic questions.
The neoliberal wing of the party both Clinton’s and Obama-Biden represented is not going to rescue us from Donald Trump. Only a renewed commitment to the kind of populist liberalism that won Democrats 7 out of 10 presidential elections in the middle of the century will.
Trump is no popular war hero like Ike or a successful foreign policy and domestically liberal president like Nixon. He pairs Reaganomics, never more unpopular than it is today, with George Wallace like appeals to racism and xenophobia. He is beatable by a variety of different strategies. Joe Biden’s is the most risk averse on paper or in the Beltway but actually rests on amnesia from the lessons of 2016.
It’s not enough to be anti-Trump, you also have to co-opt the parts of his agenda that appeal to the middle of the country. Fair trade, fighting drug companies, fighting opioid producers, fighting China, and bringing unionized jobs back to the heartland. Biden does not have a plan for any of that, only Obama nostalgia and reaching out to moderate Republicans and well heeled donors. Hillary tried that strategy and it already failed.
Um, are you suggesting bringing unionized jobs back to the heartland is part of Trump’s agenda? Hillary didn’t fail – the electoral college and James Comey just created a perfect storm. You still let Trump voters off way to easy for economic reasons IMO. Can we please come to an agreement whereby I acknowledge that Biden is not the only one who can beat Trump, but you acknowledge that he is certainly one of the ones who can?
I think that’s a fair agreement, James. I second the motion.
I’ve never argued he can’t win, I reject the argument that only he can win or we have to unite behind him because he’s the present frontrunner.
No one is arguing that ONLY Joe Biden can win and no one is arguing that WE have to unite behind him because he’s the present frontrunner.
Facts still matter.
Care to explain what “diddling about policy perfection” means then? Or Terry’s now deleted thread about overcoming party infighting to save democracy? There has been a pattern of Biden supporters on this site acting like we are already in general election mode and panicking that their candidate was attacked by an opponent in a primary. I’m sorry-but the criticism from opponents and liberal commentators so far is hardly unfair.
This has been a much healthier primary than 2016 or 2008 in my view. There are five great choices at the top of the pack and twenty others to consider. I’m a present Warren donor, but I may not support her in the end and I’m still rooting for Bernie, Pete, Kamala, and Harris. I’ll root for Biden if he is the nominee, though his campaign so far has not convinced me he’s up to her task. Whining about legitimate criticisms of his record won’t do that either.
See my recent comment on ‘purists’ at my Lincoln post for your answer.
That’s YOUR interpretation which you come to by asserting facts not in evidence. If Terry’s diary is the one I think you mean he even listed his top five choices, none of whom were Biden. Neither diary suggested that we have to unite behind Biden now, and I think Fred just recently came around to preferring him (while still explicitly saying he wanted to hear from others).
He lied about it, but he ran on it. I think we should hold him accountable for that lie. I think candidates putting that issue up front will do the best job of that. Focus on the economic angst of the folks who lost hope and lost jobs because of globalization. Biden, as a cheerleader for globalization, is least equipped to do that.
I don’t recall Trump even pretending to be a friend to unions specifically.
Don’t get me wrong, It’s totally a myth, but one he carefully cultivated.
In OH, MI, WI, IN and PA he won pluralities of the trade union membership, which Obama actually carried by wide margins in those some states.
Now another thing I will say is Biden has been a consistent friend of labor and the optics of his campaign rollout were flawless. Particularly getting the firefighters on board.
Biden, Sanders, and Warren have been very effectively about highlighting unions throughout their campaigns. Where Biden will run into problems is the Obama-Biden record on fair trade. Trumps ad hoc tariff strategy won’t work either, but Warren’s economic patriotism really could cut through the cultural barriers keeping her from winning over white workers in a way Bidens consistency for free trade could hurt him.
All the candidates have also done a great job distancing themselves from the Obama administrations disastrous education policies. They are all centering their education proposals on valuing teachers and giving them the tools to succeed rather than the BS of accountability and race to the top Obama’s Ed Secretaries pushed.
Can you remind me? I seem to recall generally appreciating the Race To The Top.
It’s kind of like putting a band aid on a tumor. It inverted the NCLB funding scheme whereby schools that didn’t make their AYP were ‘punished’ with losses of funding and autonomy. Now schools that made their AYP were ‘rewarded’ with additional funds. Now in its defense this a formula that is designed to reward growth over performance so that a school going from 55% passing rate on an assessment to a 75% rate gets more funding then a school going from 90-95%, but it still doesn’t fix the main issue.
Teacher training, teacher retention, Inequitable funding, and the ratio for local property taxes to federal aid. Inverting that would make a much bigger dent in the achievement gaps within American and betweenness America and it’s industrialized peers who govern education directly through their federal governments.
I do not cower. I have never cowered. I do not cower in corners. I do not cower here, there, or anywhere. I know, exactly and precisely, what I believe. I know where I stand. While I might lament the fact that others do not stand with me, or even understand my stance, I do not blame them for their backwardness. It is what it is.
You want to win. Very well. You even want to win on your terms. Even better. That’s an understandable point of view… But you are doomed to lose if you make winning the point and not the terms and righteousness of your cause.
Stand up for what you believe, regardless of the possibility of winning or losing. Stand up for what you know to be right, whether or not it is a ‘winning’ argument. You will be in good company, if you do.
“I do not cower” got me to thinking about fighting for what you believe is right regardless of winning. Here’s my presidential scorecard starting in 1960:
Year My primary candidate Democratic nominee Republican nom Winner
1960 Kennedy Kennedy Nixon Kennedy
1964 Johnson Johnson Goldwater Johnson
1968 McCarthy Humphrey Nixon Nixon
1972 Muskie McGovern Nixon Nixon
1976 Brown Carter Ford Carter
1980 Kennedy Carter Reagan Reagan
1984 Cuomo Mondale Reagan Reagan
1988 Dukakis Dukakis Bush Bush
1992 Cuomo Clinton Bush Clinton
1996 Clinton Clinton Dole Clinton
2000 Gore Gore Bush Bush
2004 Kerry Kerry Bush Bush
2008 Clinton Obama McCain Obama
2012 Obama Obama Romney Obama
2016 Clinton Clinton Trump Trump
On picking the Democratic nominee, I’m batting 8 for 15 or 53%
On picking the general election winner, I’m 6 for 15 or 40%
That’s a pretty cool voter history. Cuomo running is one of the great what if’s of Democratic presidential politics. I think Clinton was a better fit for 92’ while anyone would’ve lost to Reagan in 84’, but 88’ would’ve been interesting. He also backed out of being a Supreme Court justice at the last minute.
I stood out all day in Manchester in the freezing cold at the ’92 New Hampshire Democratic primary passing out stickers for NY Governor Mario Cuomo (‘Hamlet on the Hudson’ couldn’t make up his mind to run) who we tried to draft. He ended up with 4% of the vote, losing to Sen. Paul Tsongas of MA. But everyone thought 2nd place finisher Bill Clinton had won because he confidently billed himself as ‘the Comeback Kid’ after bouncing back from the fallout of the Jennifer Flowers affair and the draft dodger attack.
Dad was a big Paul Tsongas fan and voted for him in 92’. That’s another interesting what if, since had he been healthy, it’s unlikely Kerry would’ve taken his senate seat and he might’ve been able to fundraise more vigorously against Clinton.
Mario Cuomo was my all-time favorite politician, especially after I had read a biography of him, the author of which escapes me at the moment.
2008: Obama Obama McCain Obama
2012: Obama Obama Romney Obama
2016: Sanders Clinton Trump Trump
2 out of 3 for nominees and 2 out of 3 for generals. I’m sure I benefit from my record being a lot shorter.
1972 McGovern McGovern Nixon Nixon
1976 Brown Carter Ford Carter
1980 Carter Carter Reagan Reagan
1984 Mondale Mondale Reagan Reagan
1988 Dukakis Dukakis Bush Bush
1992 Clinton Clinton Bush Clinton
1996 Clinton Clinton Dole Clinton
2000 Gore Gore Bush Bush
2004 Dean Kerry Bush Bush
2008 Obama Obama McCain Obama
2012 Obama Obama Romney Obama
2016 Clinton Clinton Trump Trump
My primary pick missed in 1976 and 2004 — I’m 10 for 12 there (83%)
In the general, I’m 4 for 12 (33%)
I thought Mr. Kerry would probably get the nomination in 2004, I just didn’t like him. I was not enthusiastic about Mr. Mondale, and voted for him anyway. The sour taste I was left with after that motivated my vote for Mr. Dean in the 2004 primaries.
Mr. Mondale and Mr. Gore were the only candidates I voted for in the primary without enthusiasm.
I don’t regret any vote I’ve made in any of the primaries or the generals that followed.
I’m glad this site didn’t exist in 2004, as embarrassing as it is to read some of my old posts while maturing, I really hated Kerry as a teenager and think he would’ve made a fine president today.
That’s a solid batting average for primaries Tom. Almost matches up with my Dad’s exactly. Tsongas and Bradley being the exceptions (although he wanted to vote for McCain in 2000, but didn’t want to change parties).
Mine goes back to 1996 in terms of being voting age:
1996 Clinton, Clinton+, Dole, Clinton
2000 Gore, Gore, Bush, Bush*
2004 Kerry, Kerry, Bush, Bush
2008 Clinton, Obama, McCain, Obama
2012 Obama, Obama+, Romney, Obama
2016 Clinton, Clinton, Trump, Trump*
*=lost popular vote
+=ran essentially unopposed for Dem re-nomination
I also did have preferences going back a couple of cycles prior to voting age:
1992 Tsongas, Clinton, Bush, Clinton (I love Cuomo, but he never pulled that trigger.)
1988 Dukakis, Dukakis, Bush, Bush
Correction: my primary election batting average is 8 for 15 or 53%; general election winner is 4 for 15 or 27%.
Heh. I welcome you as a fellow traveler into the ranks of American outcasts among the electorate.
It’s no wonder that the nation is in the sad condition it’s in — America has been making terrible choices in the general election since 1966. Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan twice, George H. Bush, George W. Bush (twice), and of course Donald Trump.
If America had listened to outcasts like us, we’d be in much better shape.
Oh — and for the record — if the GOP had not forced passage of the 22nd Amendment, we would not have had George W. Bush (Bill Clinton would have easily won in 2000) and would not have Donald Trump (Barack Obama would have easily won in 2016).
Right on, Tom. As one ‘fellow traveler’ outcast to another : ‘I’d rather be right than be president.’
The 22nd Amendment (restricting the presidency to two terms) was Ratified in 1951 as the GOP’s panicked reaction to FDR’s popular election four times.
I guess the GOP tried to remove that for Reagan in the 80’s, I do wonder if he would’ve won a third term with Iran-contra and Alzheimer’s to contend with. There’s sadly been talk of removing it for the schmuck in there now.
And Hitler’s Nazi ‘Thousand year Reich’ lasted a mere 12 years.
I think even the GOP had to admit to themselves that Mr. Reagan would not have been a viable candidate in 1988. He was barely able to get through the debates four years earlier, and was visibly faltering by the end of his second term.
I understand that his diagnosis of Alzheimer’s didn’t come until 1994, but I think his decline was visible across America even if it did not meet the clinical standards of Alzheimer’s.
I think that all bets are off with Mr. Trump. I think Ms. Pelosi is betraying America with her absolute refusal to allow an impeachment investigation to begin. I think Mr. Trump and his supporters take that as a blank checkbook to do whatever they like (as we see in this weekend’s racist Twitter outbursts).
I will be surprised if Mr. Trump voluntarily relinquishes his power.
Our prayer has been answered. Today, Rep. Al Green (D-TX) called out Caligula’s racist tweets: “I will again, this month, bring impeachment to a vote on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives for Trump’s bigotry in policy, harmful for our society. “
This is Rep. Green’s second attempt -the first was in 2017 which only got 58 votes – to open an impeachment investigation.
As I recall Rep. Green’s first attempt failed so miserably because he wanted to impeach Trump for being a horrible person. He will again if he tries to impeach over this weekend’s tweets. Racist tweets are not an impeachable offense.
I’m confident that the founders thought that being a totally despicable person was, in fact, an impeachable offense. My read of history is that this motivation was the specific reason for the phrase “high crimes and misdemeanors”.
The founders wanted to ensure that Congress had a mechanism to remove a President that did not require indictment and conviction and yet was a higher standard than “malfeasance”.
This weekend’s racist tweets themselves are perhaps not impeachable. The flagrant pandering to America’s racist and white supremacist extremists ought to be, whether or not it is.
Adolph Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Joseph Stalin had not yet happened when the Constitution was written.
Mr. Trump is doing his very best to emulate those evil tyrants.
High crimes and misdemeanors was a phrase the framers well knew and had a very specific meaning – egregious abuse of office and crimes which pretty much by definition only the President could commit. It is and was a legal term of art and not just something pulled out of thin air. Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin all committed high crimes that could get them impeached if they were President. So has Trump, but racist rants on Twitter aren’t it.
I see. So you in your view, it is necessary to wait for the secret firing squads to be discovered before taking action?
I didn’t say that racist rants on Twitter are, in themselves, grounds. The totality of his behavior — including this week’s explicit embrace of the White Supremacist agenda, directed against duly elected Representatives, is.
We don’t yet know what high crimes Mr. Trump and his Collaborators have committed, because we have even begun to investigate them.
I didn’t say that at all. In fact, did I not say in my last line “so has Trump”? I’ve wanted Trump impeached ever since he fired James Comey over the Russia investigation (and basically admitted such to Lester Holt on national TV). I am of the view that the House has a duty to impeach and agree with Elizabeth Warren that there is no political convenience exemption in the Constitution. There’s plenty of what he has done to warrant impeachment, but I do want to stick with what is actually impeachable.
It was pointed out today by Howard Fineman that Andrew Johnson was actually impeached not because specific “high crimes and misdemeanors, but rather because of bad and crude character.
He was actually impeached for several specific crimes, mostly with respect to the Tenure of Office Act (later itself ruled unconstitutional)
An impeachable offense is anything Congress says it is.
That’s not actually how it’s supposed to work.
This is what fighting back looks. Not cowering in a corner and adopting GOP talking points on the Squad but defending them as “sisters” and condemning Trump’s deplorable racism as an entire House. Props to the four Republicans who voted with us on this, and Justin Amash, now the loan independent. The rest will soon learn they cannot serve two masters-their conscience or Donald Trump.
Third ‘fake video’ of huge billboard signs under TRUMP tower goes viral :
RACIST RAPIST
(photos of Trump with Epstein)
HAS A LITTLE MUSHROOM DICK
CONCENTRATION CAMPS !
Now this is how you fight back!