Reply #58: Another "Let's all unify to support 'my SET OF VALUES'". In 2008 the only UNITY

[pampango]

we had was to not elect McCain and the Pain. Many of us supported other Democratic primary candidates and did not agree with all of Obama's positions on issues even if we supported him. To say that we had unity over any SET OF VALUES in 2008 is laughable.

We will not have that unity in 2012 either but that is nothing new. The repubs will have the teabaggers dragging the party to the right while they call repubs they dislike RINO's or worse. We will try to move our party to the left and call Democrats we don't like DINO's or worse. (Given recent history the teabaggers are more likely to succeed than we are, though sometimes "success" wins the battle and loses the war - see Christine O'Donnell and Sharon Angle. Overall repubs won enough battles in 2010 to win the "war" - control of the House, too many governorships and state legislatures.) If we win enough "battles" to get progressive candidates nominated, we will probably win the "war" even if we lose a few of those "battles".

Bush fractured the repub party in 2006 and 2008 (and was a unifying factor for us). We won handily in those elections. Now we have to deal with the fact that opposition to Obama (and his "socialism" and "Obamacare" and the teabaggers' infamous "birtherism") is a unifying factor for the repubs while we "fracture" (though hopefully not to the extent that repubs did over Bush) over what Obama has and has not done to meet our expectations. Repubs should hope that we "fracture" to the same extent that they did in 2006 and 2008 and, even earlier, in 1992 and 1996 when Perot split the repub vote and helped Clinton get elected with 43% and 49% of the popular vote, respectively.