This is not your father's Democratic Party...

[kentuck]

In the last Republican debate, the candidates were asked about the "stimulus package" that was agreed upon by the Democratic Congress and the White House. Former Governor Mike Huckabee wondered aloud if we were not borrowing the money from the Chinese to give to American taxpayers in order to buy Chinese goods? He thought it would be a better if we expanded the Interstate 95 Highway along the East Coast? Perhaps build two extra lanes and use American workers and American concrete and American steel? I wondered, why doesn't a Democrat say something like that? Huckabee sounded like he wanted a WPA program to put Americans to work and stimulate the economy?

It is painful to even think that the Democratic Party no longer thinks in such terms. They no longer seem concerned about the least amongst us. They no longer seem concerned about the welfare of the working people of this country. Of course, they give lip service to issues like national healthcare and education for all, but lately, it has all been hot air. Their deeds do not match their words unfortunately.

Democrats in the Congress and the Senate seem more concerned about maintaining power than anything else. They want a "super" majority. Then they can keep those evil Republican Presidents from vetoing all their programs. Most of all, they want to win the next election.

Your father's Democratic Party was a Party of the People. They believed our People were deserving of the rewards of their hard work and accomplishments. If they were out of work, the old Democratic Party would make sure they had some unemployment insurance.

But, this Democratic Party is different. They make a deal with the White House to have a "stimulus program" to stimulate the economy. Of course, they were quick to throw out unnecessary items like unemployment insurance and food stamps for the poorest citizens in our country.

But, they were quick also to make sure they had $50 billion dollars in more taxcuts for the rich mother fuckers...

[Faygo Kid]

1. Sadly, much truth to this. The "stimulus package" is unacceptable.

Not much fight in the Pelosi-Reid era. I miss Paul Wellstone.

[msongs]

2. congressional democratic leadership is afraid of george w bush and always has been nt

[Vincardog]

19. Why should they be afraid of an inbred idiot son of a treasonous household?

[catmandu57]

3. I don't believe we have a Democratic party any more

Seriously. The Democrats used to stand up for the little guy, the old party would be fighting like crazy because there are people living on the street, people going hungry, people without healthcare, Under educated, Unemployed.
This bunch doesn't seem to care about anything but getting enough money to get re-elected, they don't work for us any more, they work for the corporations.
The sad thing is there's not an easy way to get back to where we were, and I don't think people have the fire in them to suffer through what it's going to take to do it.
We've got years of suffering to go through, eventually twenty, fifty, seventy five years who knows how long things will come back close to where they are now, maybe even better.

[Hangingon]

4. I agree....

The sort of thing FDR would do. Build something lasting and provide work. Look how many WPA and CCC projects are still being used.

[old guy]

5. The truth be told,

I'm afraid there are many in congress that are not Democrats at all. Landrieu(sp) the Nelsons(not Ozzie and Harriet), Pelosi, Reid to name a few. These folks and others give the Dems a majority in name only and continually give real Dems a bad name. Unfortunately they probably come from states or districts where real Democrats won't be elected. Just saying.

[MadHound]

6. The two party/same corporate master system of government is becoming ever more apparent

Hopefully enough people will wake up to this fact before it is too late.

[kelligesq]

7. Yep. The one party system-Dems have become repugs

:mad:

:puke:

[DiamondJay]

8. we can thank Speaker Pelosi

Honestly, Speaker Pelosi is the weakest speaker I have ever seen. She cannot push through a Democratic Agenda anywhere close to how good Newt Gingrich could push thru a Republican agenda, or how dennis hastert could do, or Tip O'Neill. I believe the only reason she was ever made speaker was because Dems thought Hillary was the shoo-in and they wanted more female votes. John Murtha should have been the speaker, he woulda at least stood up to the White House, like Gingrich did to Clinton. But dont' get me wrong, I don't like Gingrich, and the budget woulda been balanced quiker and the surplus woulda been higher without that piece of trash

[TahitiNut]

9. The Democrats demonstrated their "concern" for the workers of Michigan quite aptly.

With the single exception of Kucinich, they didn't spend a dime or a minute facing the unemployed workers of this state ... with the highest unemployment rate of all. Their only 'contribution' to this state's economy is to demand campaign money - based, of course, on the hackneyed threat of "You're either with us or you're with the enemy." It's like being given a menu with a choice of cat shit sandwiches or dog shit sandwiches - and then telling those who demur that they're 'disloyal.'

:puke:

[ThomWV]

10. When my father was alive, and even when I started voting, Democrats were the Party of segregation

It was not until Nixon that Democrats in the south, who were firm supporters of segregation, defected to the Republican Party in droves. Integration won out, if you believe it, and the south became solidly Republican under it, but when the south was still in Democrats hands it was segregated right up to the Potomac River.

[kentuck]

12. What, may I ask, brought on this defection to the Repub Party in droves??

Because the old Democratic Party was doing something for the African-Americans??

[ThomWV]

13. It was a series of speeches that began the use of their hidden language

And it persists to this day. I have actually seen credit given to a certain speech but for the life of me I can not remember who gave it, where, or when. It would be easy enough to find out though, just do a search on Nixon's Southern Strategy.

[tom_paine]

22. 1980: Reagan celebrating the murder of the civil rights workers in 1964

that cemented it.

But you are correct, they began using the NeoRebfederate Code after the KKK was no longer "in vogue", in the early 70s as part of Nixon's Southern Strategy.

[tom_paine]

20. Those were the Dixiecrats. And they were only Democrats because Lincoln and the Yankees were

Republicans.

There are some crazy, grudge-toting folks down there, and it's no secret the Old Confederacy was the backbone of the KKK.

NOTE: This is not a slur on Southerners in general, just historic reality. There are lots of very good and decent people in the South, as everywhere.

I'll give you an example. Talking to a woman-proprietress at a bed and breakfast in Virginia, who's rooms had civil war themes, North and South. She said, even today, so very often when Rebfederates came to stay they would turn Abe Lincoln's picture around, or wrap it in tissue paper so it could not be seen.

Now that these people are Bushies, we can see how they hate with unrelenting zealotry, indefatigable.

My point is that it wasn't really until Reagan went down to Philadelphia, Mississippi in 1980 to celebrate the murders of those three Liberal Civil Rights workers in 1964 (oh, he didn't do it out in the open, but with a big ol' wink wink to the NeoRebfederates), that most "Democrats" in the South felt comfrotable enough to know who the Party of Lee was...and that the Party of Lincoln was now the Party of Lee.

My conclusion from all this was that the Dixiecrats were always the same people. The day the Union Army left in 1877, they were back to being who they were, and nothing short of another army marching down there was going to stop them.

Finally, in the '60s, when the Democratic Party (minus the Dixicrats) backed Dr. King, that was when the Dixiecrats began to look for a Party of Racists.

But STILL they couldn't at the Party of Lincoln until they could be sure it was the Party of Lee, and Reagan cemented it in 1980.

So, it's quite complicated, because the Parties were in the rpocess of switching palces, and that Bush Rebfederate HATE was such that even after the 60s, many STILL could bring themselves to vote and belong to the Party of Lincoln.

Thus, you are technically correct, but I have always considered the KKK/Dixiecrat Wing as something seperate from FDR on through Truman, who desegregated the armed forces, and beyond.

[sutz12]

11. Really underlines the need for term limits and public financing of elections. nt

[CGowen]

14. The Empire and dollar hegemony was priority No. 1

....

The Carter dollar confidence crisis

This second phase, the post-gold era, fuelled by the manipulated 1973 oil shock and US pressure on Saudi Arabia and OPEC to price oil exclusively in dollars, Kissinger's “petro-dollar recycling,” rolled along without major trouble until early 1979 when the dollar faced a major foreign sell-off during the end of the Jimmy Carter Presidency. The American Century faced one of its greatest challenges at that juncture. German, Japanese even Saudi Arabian central banks began dumping US Treasury holdings in what was called a loss of “confidence” in Carter's world leadership role.

In August 1979, to restore world “confidence” in the dollar, President Jimmy Carter, himself a hand-picked protégé of David Rockefeller's Trilateral Commission, was forced by the big New York banks, led by David Rockefeller's Chase Manhattan, to accept Paul Volcker, a protégé of Rockefeller's from Chase Manhattan Bank, as new Chairman of the Federal Reserve with an open mandate to do what was necessary to save the dollar as reserve currency.

On taking office, Volcker bluntly announced, "the standard of living for the average American has to decline." He was Rockefeller's hand-picked choice to save the New York financial markets and the dollar at the expense of the nation's welfare.

The Volcker ‘shock therapy'

....

http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3391

[Greyhound]

15. The illusion of choice is enough for most. n/t

[ileus]

16. Any construction jobs would be filled by illegals.

[tom_paine]

17. This is the sad truth that so few want to hear. I wonder how long it will be, kentuck

before the Party Over Country crowd comes over to slam you for your impure thoughts.

[goodgd_yall]

18. You don't want division do you?

Isn't the Democratic Party of the future supposed to be all about unity?

[Jed Dilligan]

21. What we need in America is not more freeways. nt

[kentuck]

25. Forest....meet the trees.

It's not about "freeways". It's about jobs and taking care of the people. Jobs so they can survive. It doesn't matter if they are building outhouses.

[Jed Dilligan]

27. Then how about something green instead?

How about something where the bulk of the spending won't go to a giant corporate contractor like Bechtel?

[kentuck]

29. Yeah. Why not?

What's stopping them?

[donkeyotay]

23. Why should we be loyal to a party that isn't loyal to us?

Why should I stand for a candidate who doesn't stand for me? The dems have truly become repo-lite. I am so discouraged. I can't believe all this country has gone through and this is it. This is what the dems offer us. Oh, I'm sorry! I'm being negative and divisive! I'm sorry! I apologize. We brought the country to these straits. We, the loony left. My bad.

[Individualist]

24. Sad but true; the party of the people has become the party of corporations.

[OzarkDem]

26. DC Dems - Clinton & Obama - don't have the willpower

there is such a huge disconnect between what they say on the campaign trail and what they do in DC. I refuse to believe there isn't a means to develop a coalition with GOP members to get a better stimulus package.

But they're so afraid of offending their corporate donors, they do nothing instead.

Ladies and Gentlemen, it will be no different if either of these two is elected to the White House. We will still sit here and wonder why they aren't considering the good ideas and they will keep making excuses for doing nothing.

Elect Edwards.

[Annces]

28. How can you vote out food stamps

There is something so wrong with this country.

[Jade Fox]

30. The Democrats have bought the myth...

that focusing on that stuff is a voter turn off. Maybe it's not a myth.

Someone said (I can't remember who or where) that most Congresspeople and Senators are millionaires, so why do we expect they will actually represent us? I don't know if that statement is true, but if it is, it's a good question.

[Jack Sprat]

31. Career politicians for sure

The people have no representation anymore. The corporations and their lobbyists are the only ones being represented nowadays. Our Dems are like the Repugs now. They just ensure the global corporates have their way, draw their fees from them at election time, and pretend their doing what's best for the country. They are destroying us.

Everyone is fed up. Things move too fast now for the horse-and-buggy government the founding fathers saw work for them 230 years ago. You cannot place any faith in a congressman or senator who has been around more than 2 years, muchless those whom have been in Washington 20 years or more. Once I was an opponent of term limits, but now, I don't think that even a senator should be allowed to stay more than 2 years. The lobbyists own most of them.