The final installment in this three part series makes the case that the presidential primaries are/should be/could be a national political discussion – happening only every four years, at best – that a permanent American electoral left should participate in eagerly. The first article in this series, “An Obama Primary Challenge?” argued the importance of challenging the President from his left. The second, “Know Thy Rules: The Effectiveness of a Third Party Challenge” addressed the ways in which the structure of the American political system hampers the “third party” route taken in numerous other nations.
Part III
"Why is so hard to understand the need for a primary challenge to Barack Obama? When Jesse Jackson ran in the 1988 presidential primaries, pretty much everybody understood the point. No, he wasn’t going to get elected president – or even win the nomination, but the reasons for a primary campaign don’t end there. What Jackson would do was say what needed to be said. He would get ideas shared by a lot of people onto the front page for the first time in a long time, maybe ever. He would point out the nation’s shortcomings on the domestic front as well as our excesses on our many foreign fronts. People would talk to each other about them; some would organize. Other candidates might even have to address some of this for once. As he used to put it, he would “keep hope alive.”
The Obama “Hope” posters notwithstanding, it seems obvious that Jackson’s “hope” is very much in need of life support these days. Even those convinced that the President has fought the good fight, that in his heart he remains a man of peace, and that our problems are all due to Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats, must certainly recognize the still growing gap between rich and poor, as well as the fact that we currently bomb more countries than in the Bush years. Whatever else may be the case, by now it seems clear that just being the change we wish to see doesn’t cut it as political strategy. We need government committed to making the change we wish to see. And for that to happen, at the least, we need someone spelling out the nature of that change – on the national level, much as Jesse Jackson once did.
The surface arguments against challenging Obama are the fears that it would somehow weaken him and might alienate Black America, the group that formed the base of Jackson’s campaign. The reluctance to promote an alternative vision seems to run even deeper, though, for the fact is that the Jackson candidacy was an anomaly. A look back at the last two presidential campaigns – when there was no Democratic incumbent – may provide a more typical example of the American Left’s unwillingness to support candidates aspiring to promote its ideas."
more at
http://demockracy.com/presidential-primaries-a-perspective-on-an-american-electoral-left/
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