Reply #8: We need to be The OPPOSITION Party!

[Totally Committed]

Repost from yesterday on another thread:

Democrats: What Does it Mean to be an OPPOSITION Party?

Earlier this week, potential 2008 presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, Evan Bayh, Mark Warner and Tom Vilsack trooped to Ohio to join in the Democratic Leadership Council’s “National Conversation.” Back in Washington, the DLC joined a shrinking group on the left side of the aisle advocating for the Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA. As the bill approached its vote in the House, even the “New Democrat Coalition” of centrist House Democrats came out against it. (My Note: Use of "Democrat", not "Democratic")

The DLC has been doctrinaire on free trade from the organization’s inception, so it would have been a shock if it didn’t support CAFTA. And the further enhancements of corporate power over nations, states and localities written into the fine print don’t seem to bother the DLC much either, though even its advocates admit it won’t have much of an effect on the U.S. economy one way or another. But in the end, only 15 House Democrats heeded the DLC’s call to hand George W. Bush the first important legislative victory of his second term. Though 27 Republicans voted against it, CAFTA passed by a vote of 217-215.

>snip<

The first step to becoming an effective opposition is comprehending the meaning of your own powerlessness. Powerlessness can be both a constraint and a liberation; as Republicans have found out over the last few years, banging on the doors of power is easy but governing is hard. Too often, the Clinton alumni who populate the DLC seem to have forgotten that they no longer control the executive branch. When you don’t have the ability to actually do anything, the only field you can play on is what you are able to say and what people come to believe about you. In that context, your goal isn’t to come up with the most effective solutions to knotty problems, it’s to make clear who you are. The question with a piece of legislation like CAFTA isn’t whether the bill is on balance better than it might have been. The question is: What does your support or opposition say about you?

If Democrats took the DLC’s advice, the message much of the public would pick up about the party is that once again they are siding weakly with the Republicans’ corporatist agenda, signing on to another trade agreement that will hasten the decline of American manufacturing. Is that an accurate portrayal of the agreement’s effects? Perhaps, perhaps not, but that doesn’t much matter.

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20050728/caving_on_cafta.php

What this article essentially says is that in this time of "powerlessness" against the Republicans, Democrats have a great opportunity to define themselves as the true party of opposition. We could be using this time, and the votes we cast during this time to illustrate to the public who we are as people and as a Party.

Instead, we are voting with the Party in power and acting like the Party in power in the hope of winning elections by being like they are, instead of being exactly who we are.

This isn't just about CAFTA, or about the DLC. It's also about why the DSM, Rove/Plame, The Iraq War, and so many other subjects keep disappearing from the national radar. It's not just a complicit media. It's too few elected Democrats with the guts to cause a real fuss about them.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1965036