Reply #111: pointing up the flaw of groups and parties...

[dusmcj]

this so clearly highlights the question at hand - is the survival of a particular group what's important, and they position themselves on issues in order to survive, or do we have a position on issues and form a group of those who think similarly ?

Let's make it clear: if the Democratic Party ceases to represent positions that are correct, then it will cease to exist in short order. The fact that its strategy for the last 4 years has been to use the word "fight" in emails (and unfortunately that Hillary has adopted that as a leitmotif of her campaign) means that the Republicans have already succeeded in making the Democrats react to them. If they were to have no tactical momentum of their own (i.e. tangible numeric success of their platform among the electorate) the only thing saving the Democratic Party would be that their positions on issues are clearly better in most cases than the Republicans'. Abandon that and I fail to see a reason why I should care about the Democratic Party. All that will happen is that a takeover of both parties by the reactionaries of the neocon/neoliberal community will finally result in the rise of a multiparty system.

I don't involve myself in politics to be part of a group and use that to make myself feel good. I involve myself in politics because The Personal Is Political and because politics affects every INDIVIDUAL, all of us, you and me. If a group of like-thinking individuals forms to participate in politics and decides to call itself a party, that's nice, but it's only worth its existence if it hews to its chosen principles and pursues them successfully. If it fails to do that, it serves no purpose.

Read and heed.