Is the Democratic Party about to be radicalized?

[happydreams]

Its just a feeling I get. People are showing their outrage more and more at BOTH parties at their inability/unwillingness to get tough on these blatantly corrupt bastards that have stolen the government. Many of those who are blowing the whistle on the fascists are conservatives in name. Wilkerson's interview on McNeil Lehrer snooze hour last night really hammered the "cabal". I have never seen a better Newshour than that one, a more coherent and harder hitting criticism of Bush by anybody on either side of the aisle. Many of the early whistleblowers were Repugs as well. Yet, we have the democrats wimping and waffling as the standard MO.

WTF is going on???

I think that Neo-liberalism is the fundamental problem that goes a long way to explaining this weirdness. For instance Bill Clinton and GHW Bush were, or are, both members of the Trilateral Commission which is a think tank and advocate of neo-liberalism, free trade, BS. Sometimes I think that the Repugs are the shock troops that advance a resource grab, like Iraq and then the dems come in to quell the dissent. Why for instance does Bill Clinton and other dems treat Hugo Chavez like a doormat? I get the sense that Chavez will be treated the same way should a democrat win the White House, though maybe not with threats of invasion and subterfuge. What gets me is that Kerry and others said he wants to "win" in Iraq. What does that mean?

Neo-liberalism is rooted in an expansionist mentality and it has come down to utter disaster. It doesn't work anymore, we have to start playing a different game or we will just go the way of all other empires in history. Maybe people are starting to realize this.


No doubt we have the ability. It seems reasonable that we could develop alternatives to fossil fuels, the technology is there, even the businesses are established marketing alternatives like wind, solar etc. What if we had put the 300 billion + we are spending in Iraq on oil we aren't going to get and spent it on solarizing 20 million US homes? But the problem is the fossil fuel and nuke power interests are not going to go quietly into the night and are adept at keeping alternatives from restricted.

Just some thoughts. Please comment

[benburch]

1. God I hope so.

It is time for radicalization.

And it is PAST time for some forceful political protests.

[Telly Savalas]

16. I hope not.

I want a party that fights for mainstream ideas like universal health care, proper funding of education, a progressive income tax, a thorough social safety net, and a rational foreign policy based on diplomacy, not military aggression. These are policies that elevate the disenfranchised and make life better for everybody, not radicalism.

[bbgrunt]

19. those ideas seem pretty radical to me.

Just go back to the health care reform attempt under Clinton. No one dared even mention "universal health care"

While I know that a lot of people will hatefully scream at the notion, but essentially both parties play to the same corporate masters. Until we get the $ out of politics and/or change the voting process to allow for "preference" voting, we will be enslaved to the monopoly of the two parties.

The notion that the dems come in to quell the dissent after a rep juggernaut is very aptly put.

[Telly Savalas]

20. There is absolutely nothing radical about universal health care

The United States is pretty much the only industrialized country that thinks its acceptable for some of its members to go without health care. Even conservatives in Canada and Europe, while they might disagree on how to implement it, still accept the basic premise that access to basic health care is a right, not a privilege. The only radicals on the health care issue are those who think it's not a big deal that 47 million Americans don't have health insurance.

[bbgrunt]

29. TS: I agree--just didn't insert the sarcasm sign

But, from the DLC perspective, those are radical ideas.

While the fight against the repukes has created a somewhat united front from the left, if we do gain any traction, we will have an even bigger battle to fight against Dems who want to co-opt the progressive agenda.

[Telly Savalas]

30. Oops. Sorry I didn't catch the sarcasm.

:hi:

[occuserpens]

2. Blair killed Clintonism?

It looks like this. Internationally, neo-liberalism is promoted mostly by Blair who is every bit as ugly as neocons.

[gordianot]

3. I don't think so. The center will continue to win, (barring Diebold)

Since the GOP has become radical I suspect that Democrats will become moderates and maybe real balance the budget Conservatives.

Like always I will remain more on the Progressive wing of the Democrats.

[melody]

4. already happening

Witness the number of young, active Democrats these days.

[KittyWampus]

5. "democrats wimping and waffling"? Where have you been lately?

watching fox news?

I am so sick of this blatant LIE. Just because you keep yourself uninformed about what Democrats are doing doesn't make it True.

[happydreams]

23. Hillary Clinton and Kerry calling for more troops in Iraq.

As cited in the Nation magazine this week.
You need to look at my entire piece and understand how dems have fallen victim to the Neo-liberal agenda as well as compare what the dems are doing to what the republicans I have cited above are doing.

[babylonsister]

6. I invite you to read this thread. The Dems are hardly

wimping and waffling, though that's what many pundits would like you to believe. Ya see, if they admit this admin has failed, then so have they for supporting it.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=2214013

[Douglas Carpenter]

13. they are getting better at opposing the Republicans

now if they can actually put forward a genuine agenda to move the country forward instead of only minimizing the damaging. They are showing more spine. But, they cannot just oppose. They have to advance.

[Totally Committed]

7. If now is not the time to get radical,

there will never be such a time!

We need to kick all the Neo-Liberals (read: DLC) the hell out of the Party, and go back to strong, real Liberal ideals. Neo-Liberals are the new Neo-Cons, and must be resisted and voted out of office whenever they run. Or, we as a Party and as a country, will live to regret it bitterly.

TC

[Armstead]

8. Neo-liberalism is radicalism

I agree with you, but I'd put it differently.

Neo-liberalism advances a radical agenda for ursurping the values that most Americans believe in. They are colonialists and empire builders. They6 have been taking us on a radical departure from democracy-based free enterprize for at least 30 years.

What you call radicalism is actually just common sense. So it isn;t necessary to radicalize the democratic party. it's necessary to reject the radicalism of corporate elitism and phony "free trade" and get back some common sense.

[GrpCaptMandrake]

11. The dicotomy here lies in the transferrance

of sixties "radicals" to today's "neo-cons." I've almost come to the conclusion that "neo-" anything is just code for "hateful and mean-spirited."

Consider that vaunted judicial darling of the right, Janice Rodgers Brown: she was a MAOIST, for heaven's sake, in her college days.

It was Winston CHurchill who said something to the effect that "any person who, in his youth, is not liberal, has no heart, and who, in his later years is not a conservative, has no head." Is this what we are witnessing in the rise of the Neocons, who started out as something entirely different?

The radicalism we seek on our side isn't neo-anything. It is a return to the values of our fathers. The honest, genuine, but tough-minded compassion of FDR; the earnest comittment of JFK; the principled bi-partisan ability of people like George Norris, the Republican who almost single-handedly created the Tennessee Valley Authority and the Rural Electrification Act.

Our radicalism should be a radical commitment to the normal and the rational, including a non-negotiable demand that issues of faith be returned to the churches and removed from governance and science; a radicalism dedicated to a return to the values in which the Framers sought to inculcate the fledgling nation. When the national norm is corporate greed, globalized human exploitation and the insularization of our sense of community, our radicalism is the promotion of the interpersonal and the unique.

Maybe that's us: the Radical Normal.

[Armstead]

14. Radical Normal -- I like that

I think the "neo" types were basically extremists, who channeled it in one direction and then into the opposite one.

And other 60's "leftists" followed the mantra of "working within the system" for change. That's a good thing (and basically what I've tried to do in life). However, when one does that, adapting to the pragmatic side of the system can overwhelm any desire or ability to actually change ot for the better over time. So -- if one is not careful -- it becomes like the Vichy collaborators who prop up a bad system and become part of it.

We do need to get back to what you call Radical Normal, which is simply a reassertion of the idealistic values and actions that most Americans actually share down deep, despite the brainwashing of the last 30 years.

[Mme. Defarge]

17. Doesn't radical mean

root? I thought true radicalism meant getting back to fundamentals -- which, of course, can be very threatening to the status quo. Hence, radicalism has been characterized to mean something way out, outlandish, or, heaven forbid, not mainstream.

[happydreams]

22. Neo-liberalism is rooted in expansionism.

[C_U_L8R]

9. There's a big difference between...

radicalized and motivated.
And the core democratic base is VERY motivated and
energized. We're pumped up and taking no prisoners !!!
It's our enemy that wants to paint our momentum
as "radical" or loony. HA HA WHATEVER !!!
The Bush Reich can EAT OUR DUST as they
are LEFT BEHIND more and more every day.

[Burried News]

10. Maybe it's simpler to say we have two Republican Parties?

Teddy Kennedy implied as much.
Or maybe the powers behind the scene make sure they have leverage in both parties so that they always have a winning horse in every race.

[occuserpens]

12. 1.1 Republican parties, to be more exact

[leesa]

15. No. It's about to be normalized. The corporate whoredom of the past was

the radicalized era.

[cornermouse]

18. In the 70s I was pro-abortion, Women's Rights Amendment, etc.

I considered myself middle of the road. 30 years later, I still have the same beliefs, but now I'm probably considered radical? How? I didn't change.

[Douglas Carpenter]

26. well, if someone advocated the same domestic policy Nixon

advocated and Ford ran on -- they would be called a far leftest these days -- not only by the GOP but by certain prominent Democrats

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

21. The country is edging left. The Dems are following (sort of).

Politicians don't lead. They follow the voters and the money.

[Swamp Rat]

24. dupe

dupe

[Swamp Rat]

25. good point

Just follow the money. :)

[happydreams]

28. Agreed. The public is much more progressive than

what is representing us in Washington. The corruption of politics is what is disallowing the public' representation.

[happydreams]

27. Just what I was looking for. A diversity of opinion here.

Thank you all for contributing to this thread. The issue is complex and the dems are starting to do some interesting things with the closed door session etc. I'm just concerned that they won't go far enough.

By radicalized I meant it similar to what happened in the Civil War when the North (Union) became radicalized to restore the Union then realized they must end slavery. Today we have this clamor to end corruption but how are we going to do that with corporations running the show and a Neo-liberal mindset that has taken over both parties?

I don't have a computer and only a limited time at the library so if I'm late getting back to you please be patient.

Thanks.