Reply #163: I agree

[kenfrequed]

I don't know why the Rahmsian democrats think that ignoring their base and taking the less populist road is going to net them more workers. The issues of progressives (and their solutions) are the issues of America.

Early polls favored the public option very, very heavily. I do believe... yes, that would have to have included most independents too for it to be so popular. What did the party do? Ask Max Bacchus and ask the damnable DLC who went with the monied interests.

There are numerous progressive issues like this that would have been wildly popular and would have netted a good deal of positive inertia going into November.

To be fair, President Obama actually only deserves a small amount of blame, yeah he could have been more aggressive, yes he could have bully Pulpited the conservadems into action immediately after the election, and yes he could have chosen someone better than Rahm, but ultimately there are members of congress (particularly the senate) that deserve serious scorn for putting their pocketbooks before party and people.

Evan Bayh started screwing us before President Obama even took his oath of office by forming a Senate Blue Dog caucus. To my limited knowledge senate specific caucuses are sort of rare and this one was designed to undercut the move to the left that the overall post-bush progressive mood of the country voted for.

All that being said we just cant stay home and give up. In fact we should turn out absolutely everywhere we can.

If some people are angry at the absurdly right leaning bullshit tactics then reserve it only for the most extreme cases. Nothing would make 'republican revolution II' harder to spin than if we only lost in those few races where centrist-right leaning democrats were defeated. For this to work you absolutely still have to show up and vote for every other democrat on the ticket without fail. Make it very clear to the party that it is only these choices and policies and ideas that you argue with.

If you stay home then the repukes will spin this as an insurgency against liberal ideas and the surviving conservadems will crow about how they have to move even further to the right.