Here's the Crux of the Problem in my opinion. We are The Party of Nothing.

[Armstead]

Right now the GOP may be the "Party of No." But at least that is a position. Democrats have allowed themselves to become the Party of Nothing.

For eight years, Democrats and pro-Democratic liberals and progressives were told that we are impotent because we were in the minority. There was nothing we can do to slow the GOP/Right Wing/Corporate/War Mongering Juggernaut because Democrats were out of power, and the GOP was popular.

But then there was a shift. Bush and the GOP were tossed out on their ears, after screwing up the economy and enmeshing us in a needless useless war. Public attitudes were for fresh air, Populist Reform and positive change. Democrats won the power. The GOP seemed politically impotent, and the right-wing were seen as scowling mongrels off in the corner.

But now we are told Democratic Majority is impotent because the GOP minority is too powerful. Nothing can change because the Corporate Juggernaut still holds all the cards and pulls the strings. Hope and Change turned out to be just a slogan. Liberals and progressives still feel marginalized and ignored. And non-ideological moderate independents see the Democrats as the Keystone Cops, rather than effective problem solvers.

And after a temporary setback, the GOP/Right Wing is vital and confident.

We lose when we lose. And we lose when we win.

Face it. The GOP has a clear agenda as the Party of Conservatism. The Democrats SHOULD be the Party of Liberalism. But we aren't -- and so, the Corporate Conservative Agenda moves forward whether Democrats have a majority or not.

This will never change until the Democratic Party actually starts to emulate the other side and gets a clear set of principles that it will fight for.

[polichick]

1. The only way Dems have a chance is to kick the status quo corporate whores out...

Otherwise, it'll take a new progressive party.

[olegramps]

41. The Democratic Party is NOT the party of the Working Class.

The Democrats in congress are Corporate whores. They sold the working class out during the Reagan beat down. The only way Working Class folks will get a fair break is to form a Party based around unionism that demands their representatives to stop selling out to the corporations. If the Democrats threw the bums out that are failing to represent them their would be zero Democrats being reelected. Sounds like a plan I could believe in.

[Laf.La.Dem.]

2. "We lose when we lose. And we lose when we win"

Very sad but true:banghead:

[msongs]

bipartisan = dems hand over power to repubs. some dems cannot see that tho nt

[amborin]

20. Obama said, "I love the market," and "Republicans have a lot to offer"

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/15/us/politics/15caucus.html

[Blaukraut]

3. Dems prefer to be in the minority, it seems

They're certainly working (or NOT working) towards that goal. Being in the minority allows them to talk a good game and stand on their 'principles' without having to actually deliver on anything. Low risk, high reward, and we've seen how risk averse the congressional Dems and even President Obama actually are.

[harun]

4. Brutally and depressingly TRUE.

[Armstead]

5. We don;t even "talk a good game." We bumble as the opposition too.

Compare our years in the wilderness compared to the GOP.

We were "keeping pour powder dry" and supporting Bush and the GOP, and grumbling and disagreeing over whether we should openly fight back or not.

They are kicking our asses with threats and a unified message of opposition.

[corkhead]

6. 'Pukes are protecting the status quo which defines conservatism

Their political philosophy is for government to not work. It is always going to be a lot easier for them to be successful as the majority or minority with that stand.

[Armstead]

8. Their success is not assured when the population is angry at the status quo

It all depends on how the problems and the status quo are presented.

The primary failure of government for 20 years has been a failure to ACT and deal with problems. The problem has been caused by government allowing Crony Capitalism to take charge, and allowing the powerful to abuse the general population.

But the GOP and Corporate Powers have presented it as the government scvrewing up by doing "too much."

They win power by hammering that home.

Democrats, unfortunately, now echo the GOP message too often instead of offering the counter-argument as effectively and consistently. Thus our side gets to be blamed as gthe party of the status quo, while the GOP (the real status qup party) gets a free pass.

Instead we should be as strident and relentless with the counter-message that government is part of the SOLUTION, not the problem.

[mike_c]

7. I've been saying something similar for years....

The democratic party needs to present and work for unambiguous, liberal policy ALTERNATIVES to republican policies. Where the GOP is pro-business, the democrats should be unabashedly pro-labor. A real opposition party should be straightforwardly anti-imperialist, anti-war, and favor liberal alternatives to U.S. foreign policy. Instead, today's democratic party has moved to the right of Nixon on most of those issues, and embraced many of the essential underpinnings of Reaganism. It's not an opposition party at all, really-- just another-flavor-of-GOP, really.

[Armstead]

9. I agree wholeheartedly

[Celeborn Skywalker]

51. Exactly.

Democrats now are pretty much the same as Republicans except they aren't quite as prudish and fundamentalist.

[unblock]

10. the problem was that true democrats didn't win; the republican BRAND lost

shrub and the gang tarnished the republican "brand", and it was SO OBVIOUS that even diehard republican corporate types knew they had to buy themselves some democrats. so they started contributing hugely to to democrats, including obama and hillary, to the point where the democrats were viewed as the only real game in town.

everyone knew democrats were going to win in 2008, it was just that obvious. if you listen to some of his speeches, it was pretty obvious that mccain recognized this and didn't really try to hide it. presidential race aside, it was clear there were going to be solid gains in congress.


the corporations knew this and contributed heavily and extracted implicit promises. many democrats who won know the way the game is played and understand that they are beholden to the insurance companies and so on.

if democratic politicians could COUNT on a sustained, grass-roots movement that would keep them in power without corporate funds, then they would be fighting for us. but they view 2008 as a one-time set of circumstances and they think they need corporate funds in 2010 and beyond, so they're working for them, not us.

[Armstead]

12. They should have learned from Obama's success at building a base

I agree with much of your analysis. However, their interpretation was wrong (or deliberately corrupt).

Obama did at least put in a foundation for the sustained grass-roots movement you mentioned. Got a whole lot of people contributing a whole lot of money...Yes it had to compete with b igger corporate bucks, but if they had any principles they would have seen the potential to build on that -- which would also have meant serving the people.

Instead, they decided to remain accountable to their corporate backers, and listen to the same old stale voices.

[unblock]

15. unfortunately, this is far more viable for a presidential candidate than for a congresscritter

and the obama administration completely fell down on the concept of translating its own grass-roots campaign movement into a sustained movement. THAT could have been carries over into a grass-roots movement for congresscritters, but for whatever reasons, that never materialized. other than keeping up with facebook postings, there hasn't been much stroking of the grass-roots.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

11. Dems have to be bold and push legislation through

what is our manifesto?

[Armstead]

13. Manifesto? It's the "Let's Just Tread Water Theory"

[niceypoo]

14. The Democrats keep conceding ground to the right

The 'manifesto' seems to say 'give in', even when you have a huge majority. Obama himself is up to his neck in it.

[TheKentuckian]

16. That's what happens when you put polls over policy

We can be nothing but the party of nothing because our tent covers nearly the full range of the sane portion of ideological spectrum to the point of being nothing other than "not the Republicans", who have gone from conservative to radically regressive and keep surging further right which allows the "center" to be moved from moderate and to hardcore conservative/somewhat regressive.

[niceypoo]

19. Our party is definately overlapping the GOP now

Obama touts RW healthcare 'ideas' like tort reform. Obama pushes for nuclear power. Everything is a concession to the right. All for nothing in return, kissing up to people who hate him. Obama has chosen to be timid and to be all things to all people.

Centrist Democrats 2000s = GOP 1980s.

[Armstead]

36. That's the problem -- We are the majority and yet we allow the right to pull us to the right

These days, whenever you hear a politician or pundit say the Democrats have to move to the "center" what they are really saying is they have to become more conservative and corporate.

That's understandable coming from Republicans. But when you hear Democrats saying it, it is a symptom of how far off course we have gotten.

While the "middle" is not necessarily Sweden, I think on issues the majority of moderates are more open to liberal/progressive policies and values than the Democratic leadership gives them credit for.

[niceypoo]

17. "The GOP has a clear agenda as the Party of Conservatism"

The GOP is in no way conservative. The GOP are radical reactionary statists. There is nothing clear about the GOP, 'agenda'. Their, 'agenda,' drifts according to whatever the Democrats are doing on any particular day. All they care about is power and money.

[FrenchieCat]

18. What we have are Democrats that do nothing but put the party down day in, day out......

what we have is a party of whiners, and it shows.

[Name removed]

23. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Fire1]

29. True that!! n/t

[Cha]

31. POW!

[Armstead]

33. Depends on how you define "whining"....I'd say the apologists are whining

"We can't do anything because those mean old Republicans won't let us."

That's whining.

"We can't get any kind of public health coverage or real regulation of insurers because those mean old frepublicans will filabuster us." or "the American people will call us Socialists" or whatever the excuse du jour is.

[depakid]

34. Wow- now that's some hard core denial

Rather cult like in nature- and reflecting statements from people like Phil Gramm on the other side of the aisle.

Here's a hint: The party is on the verge of getting a royal thumping due in no small part to what the OP describes.

It's as if some people have zero capacity to learn either from recent events- or from any of the salient, didactic moments of the past two decades.

[Ganja Ninja]

21. I blame it all on the big tent philosophy.

We've let too many of the enemy into our camp. Winning elections means nothing if once you've won you can't govern.

[ProSense]

22. "Party of Nothing." Send it to Steele. It's

the kind of drivel I'd expect from him.

Progressives (and Obama) are Doing Better Than We Think -- and We Won't Know What We've Got 'Til It's Gone

<...>

Quick Summary of 2009 Progressive Victories (more explanation below)

• Three major health bills (SCHIP, tobacco regulation, and stimulus funds for Medicaid, COBRA subsidies, health information technology and the National Institutes of Health) enacted even before comprehensive reform
  
• Stimulus contained myriad other individual policy victories, not only preventing a far worse depression but also:
  
  • Delivered key new funds for education
    
  • Expanded state energy conservation programs and new transit programs
    
  • Added new smart grid investments
    
  • Funded high-speed Internet broadband programs
    
  • Extended unemployment insurance for up to 99 weeks for the unemployed and modernizing state UI programs to cover more of the unemployed
    
  • Made large new investments in the safety net, from food stamps (SNAP) to affordable housing to child care
  
  
• Clean cars victory to take gas mileage requirements to 35mpg
  
• Protection of 2 million acres of land against oil and gas drilling and other development
  
• Executive orders protecting labor rights, from project labor agreements to protecting rights of contractor employees on federal jobs
  
• Stopping pay discrimination through Lilly Ledbetter and Equal Pay laws
  
• Making it easier for airline and railway workers to unionize, while appointing NLRB and other labor officials who will strengthen freedom to form unions
  
• Reversing Bush ban on funding overseas family planning clinics
  
• Passing hate crimes protections for gays and lesbians
  
• Protecting stem cell research research
  
• Strengthening state authority and restricting federal preemption to protect state consumer, environmental and labor laws
  
• Financial reforms to protect homeowners and credit card holders
  
• Bailing out the auto industry and protecting unionized retirees and workers

Detailed-- Let's start with health care. Even if the public option doesn't make it, we are on the verge of passing a federal reform bill that, at minimum, is projected to add health coverage for 31 million Americans in the next decade, devoting $347 billion to add 15 million people to Medicaid and CHIP programs and $447 billion to subsidize coverage for other working and middle class families.

And remember, if passed, this will be the fourth major health care bill passed in Obama's first year in office.

• The first was the passage of the Children's Health Insurance Bill, which itself will expand coverage for an additional 4 million uninsured children by 2013 on top of continuing coverage for 7 million currently enrolled in the program. And for the first time, it allowed states to cover many documented immigrant children who previously were not eligible
  
• And Congress passed its bill to give the government the power to regulate tobacco, something progressives had been seeking since the early 1990s.
  
• And then there was the stimulus money for health care, which dedicated more than $145 billion to investments and reform of health care systems,including
  
  • $87 billion to states in just the next couple of years to maintain Medicaid programs
    
  • $25 billion to help laid-off workers afford their previous employer's health care via COBRA
    
  • $19 billion for Health Information Technology (HIT) deployment and
    
  • $10 billion in additional funds for the National Institute of Health.

Really, you should count the COBRA subsidies, HIT expansion and NIH funding as three additional health care bills passed, since each in a normal year would have been considered a profound and singular legislative achievements.

The Stimulus Plan as Multiple Progressive Achievements: But that's was one problem with the stimulus bill-- it was so large that it's treated as one thing, instead of a whole array of legislative achievements pulled together to also help save the economy from depression and collapse. So let's step back and pull the recovery plan apart into it's multiple progressive achievements. The list of individual programs may seem long, but when you are talking about billions of dollars for each one handed out over a relatively short period, they are worth remembering for their individual progressive achievement and for the billions committed, especially for many programs starved for funds for decades. I'll summarize some of these below, but you can see more details in Progressive States' Implementing the Recovery Plan.

• Stimulus Saving the Economy: Before going into all the individual programs, let's talk about the overall achievement of the recovery plan in stabilizing the economy. Most progressives will agree it should have been bigger, but key economists agree it was critical to staving off an economic collapse; as Paul Krugman wrote, without the stimulus plan, "we would have had a full Great Depression experience...Deficits, in other words, saved the world." Including not only direct jobs created but the ripples of jobs created through indirect stimulus, the Economic Policy Institute confirms the stimulus' was responsible for creating or saving from 1.1 to 1.5 million jobs since its passage. A large part of this effect was in preventing catastrophic layoffs of teachers, nurses and other state and local employees by offsetting revenue losses at the state and local level. While there seems to be some kind of sexist media meme that only highway jobs, presumably manned by manly men, count as "real jobs", the stimulus however has kept hundreds of thousands of teachers and nurses and child care workers on the job-- one of the most important anti-recession government employment programs of the last half-century.
  
  
• Education Funding: This emphasizes that along with being a major health care bill, the stimulus was one of the largest federal education bills in history. It devoted $139.24 billion to education funding over a couple of years, including:
  
  
  • State Fiscal Stabilization Fund of $53.6 billion to help state and local governments avert budget cuts
    
  • $39.5 billion in educational block grants allocated by student and general population measures
    
  • $5 billion for incentive grants and other purposes.
    
  • $24.8 billion for School Construction Bonds
    
  • $11.3 billion for special education
    
  • $10 billion for Local Educational Agencies
    
  • $3 billion for School Improvement Grants.
    
  • Higher education funding of approximately $30 billion was distributed directly to students and their families, but an estimated $15 billion for scientific research flowed partly to universities.
  
  
• Clean Energy and Transportation Investments: Estimates on potential green energy investments in the recovery package, including upgrading our transportation infrastructure, range from $70.6 billion to $113.5 billion depending on what is included, but the bottom-line is that this package is the largest investment in energy independence in American history. These included:
  
  
  • Over $14 billion for various State Energy Conservation Programs, including $5 billion for the chronically underfunded Weatherization Assistance Program to help low-income families reduce their energy costs by weatherizing their homes.
    
  • $11 billion for smart grid technology aimed at improving the energy efficiency of electrical grids around the country, a key to making alternative energy production and distribution viable.
    
  • The recovery plan was also a key "down payment on a new transportation vision," in the words of the coalition Transportation for America, including $27.5 billion allocated to the traditional highway program, $8.4 billion for public transportation, $9.3 billion for intercity and high-speed passenger rail, and $825 million for projects that will make our streets safer for walking and biking. Significantly, the law included unprecedented flexibility in using "highway" funds on ports, transit, passenger and freight rail, or other projects.
  
  
  
• Broadband Investments: The recovery plan allocated $7.2 billion to promote high-speed Internet programs for rural, unserved and under-served areas and for initiatives that expand public community centers' capacity and for the development of a national broadband map.
  
  
• Unemployment Insurance Extension and Reform: While the present recession is bad, one reason many unemployed workers and their families are better off than in past recessions is that help for the unemployed has been far more extensive due to the stimulus plan.
  
  
  • First, the stimulus plan included extended federal weeks of help for the unemployed (help which was recently further extended with a new law) to up to 99 weeks of help in the worst hit states -- compared to just 26 weeks normally available before the recession-based reforms and no more than 52 weeks in recessions over the last three decades.
    
  • While benefits are still too meager by international standards, the stimulus, over 17.9 million Americans will receive a $25/week increase in their UI benefits.
    
  • As importantly, $7 billion in incentive money was provided to states to modernize their unemployment insurance systems to including low-income workers, part-time workers and workers who had to leave jobs for compelling family reasons-- workers previously completely excluded from UI help in most states. The result has been what the National Employment Law Project calls an "unprecedented wave of state reforms" to expand access to state unemployment help.
    
  • Add in the 65% COBRA health care subsidies mentioned above and progressives have won broader and deeper relief for the unemployed than in any past recession.
  
  
  
• Supporting the Safety Net: And for those already suffering in poverty -- or plunged into it because of the recession -- the stimulus bill extended additional help as well:
  
  
  • Nutrition Programs: Over $20 billion was added to the Food Stamps program (now called SNAP), WIC and other food programs, and the law lifted restrictions on how long unemployed individuals without children can receive SNAP benefits.
    
  • Child Care: Over $4 billion was added for child care block grants, Head Start and Early Head Start programs.
    
  • TANF: $5 billion was added to basic TANF welfare programs. While not repealing the 1996 welfare law, provisions did roll back rigid rules that would have denied funds to states that couldn't find work for rapidly expanding caseloads of the poor.
    
  • Affordable Housing Aid: Added $13.5 billion in funding for a range of affordable housing and homeless prevention programs.
  
  
  
• Expansion of science investments-- Notably, between the stimulus and other budget spending, no less than the Wall Street Journal calls Obama's investments in science, especially green technology, a "once-in-a-generation shift in U.S. science," reinvigorating 17 giant U.S.-funded research facilities, from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, as well as university research facilities.

So those are many of the myriad program gains from the recovery plan (there are more whose dollar amounts were less but who mattered greatly to those effected). But there have also been additional policy gains outside the stimulus on the environment, labor rights, gay and abortion rights, and financial reforms.

Environmental Victories: Two notable victories promise to have long-lasting legacies for the nation, even before climate change legislation comes to a vote in the Senate:

• Victory on clean cars mileage rules-- For literally decades, automakers blocked higher federal gas mileage rules and the Bush administration blocked state laws seeking to establish higher standards in their states. Obama engineered a new rule that by model year 2016, the average mandated fleet fuel efficiency standard will be 35.5 miles per gallon. Add in the$2 billion in stimulus cash for advanced batteries systems and the nation should see significant fuel savings in the near future.
  
• Landmark U.S. conservation bill - Signing a package of more than 160 bills, Obama designating roughly 2 million acres -- parks, rivers, streams, desert, forest and trails -- in nine states as new wilderness and render them off limits to oil and gas drilling and other development.

Labor Rights: On labor rights, we haven't gotten the Employee Free Choice Act, but key Bush executive orders have been reversed, new personnel are being added to the National Labor Relations Board, and Congress has passed key new laws. These include

• Executive orders to allow use of project labor agreements on federal projects, requirements not to displace qualified (often unionized) workers when changing contractors, and require all federal contractors to notify their workers of their rights to form a union.
  
• Passage of the Lilly Leadbetter Law and Equal-Pay Legislation to protect workers from pay discrimination.
  
• The Federal Mediation Board has moved to make it far easier for rail and airline workers to form unions.
  
• Obama's appointees at the Labor Department and NLRB are some of the strongest labor advocates possible, most of them drawn from pro-labor organizations.

• Social Issues: Progressive mades a number of advances on hot button "culture war" issues this year:
  
  
  • Family Planning: Obama expanding hate crimes protection to gays and lesbians.[br />
  • Stem cells: Obama signed an executive order removing research barriers.

Strengthening Authority of States to Build on Federal Reforms: For years, states have increasingly seen their hands tied by a federal government declaring that preemption voids state consumer, environmental and labor rights laws. The Bush administration in particular used its regulatory authority aggressively to block state law after state law. In May, the White House emphasized its new commitment to respecting state regulatory rules by issuing a broad Memorandum on Preemption to all heads of executive departments and agencies, ordering them to avoid the preemption language routinely included in Bush-era regulatory preamble statements or in codified regulations unless there is "full consideration of the legitimate prerogatives of the States and with a sufficient legal basis for preemption."

The administration's affirmation of state "clean car" authority, protection of higher state consumer health care protections, and ending Bush's war on medical marijuana in the states have all been part of this movement towards of collaborative federalism that will strengthen progressive power in the states for years into the future.

Financial Reforms: Even as more comprehensive financial reforms continue to move forward in the House, a couple of significant financial consumer reforms were passed earlier this year:

• Helping Families Save Their Homes Act and the Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act -these pieces of legislation make it easier for homeowners to access financial help, established protections for renters living in foreclosed homes, and established the right of a homeowner to know who owns their mortgage, while giving the Department of Justice the ability to prosecute at virtually every step of the process from predatory lending on Main Street to the manipulation on Wall Street.
  
  
• Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act (or Credit CARD Act) of 2009- limits when credit card interest rates can be increased on existing balances and allows consumers whose interest rates have been increased to reduce their annual percentage rates (APRs) to previous levels if they've been good and paid their bills on time for six months. It also limits when interest rates can be increased, bans universal default and double-cycle billing, and restricts credit cards for minors.

Auto Bailout- Saving a core industry of our economy and as many of its attendant jobs as we can should have been a no-brainer, especially as many construction and real estate jobs are inevitably disappearing forever. And the Obama rescue was done in an extremely progressive manner, liquidating the shareholders who tolerated terrible management while safeguarding retirees and preserving a strong union for workers remaining in the industry. The "cash for clunkers" plan may have been a bit of a giveaway to the industry, but then since the U.S. government owns a chunk of the industry, reviving industry profits means returning some of the money to the government itself as a shareholder..

And More to Come: Many more progressive achievements are within reach as well, moving through the meatgrinder political process too slowly for some progressives but still quite possible in the next few months. From fundamental student loan reforms to remaking banking regulations to climate change legislation to immigration reform to labor law reform, high profile progressive initiatives are still being promoted by both the administration and Congressional leaders.

Again, we should always be demanding more-- and planning electoral responses where possible against the Congressional repesentatives and Senators blocking better reforms -- but we also need to highlight what we've won, keep allies and the base of progressives excited so that they will have the energy to fight those fights.

Progressives have been winning in the last year. We just need to keep reminding ourselves and the public of how full the cup is-- and planning to fill it the rest of the way as we win more elections in the future. It's worth remembering that large parts of what we consider the New Deal were not enacted until many years into FDR's Presidency. Social Security and the National Labor Relations Act were enacted only in 1935, three years into his term, while the federal minimum wage was enacted only in 1938, in FDR's sixth year in office. But along the way, progressives won individual victories that continually fed progressive energy for the next fight. That's the challenge now for progressives, to claim existing victories and build on that energy for fights to come.

Community Health Centers

• Obama says $155m in health funding means jobs, too
  
  
• President Obama Announces Recovery Act Awards to Build, Renovate Community Health Centers in More Than 30 States

CHANGE HILDA SOLIS CAN BELIEVE IN....

Sec. Hilda Solis announces $100 million in green jobs training grants

White House Releases Name Of Every Visitor For First Time Ever

ACLU: President Obama Issues Orders To Reduce Government Secrecy

"President Obama set a new record last year for getting Congress to vote his way"

Hinchey, Sanders and other reactions to Obama's bank reform proposal

New credit card rules go into effect on 22 FEB 2010. Here is what you NEED to know.

"Party of Nothing" is utter drivel.

[FrenchieCat]

24. Very well done! Thank you!

Like I said earlier, we are fast becoming a party of whiners.
Too bad that we are so willing to snatch the positive away from ourselves,
just because we can. In fact, it is quite tragic.

[BlueIdaho]

27. Thank You for the reminder...

Its all too easy to fall into the M$M echo chamber's smack-down du jour of the Democratic party. We need to be bold and demand boldness from our elected officials. The only way for us to end the gridlock in DC is by forcing our elected officials to legislate - or perish.

[Armstead]

35. Yet again you choose to use the trees to cover up the forest

I won't spend time gong into details since you are a pro-Obama robot that never actually engages in two-way dialogue.

However,I will say in general that DEMOCRATS ARE MUCH BETTER THAT REPUBLICANS ANY DAY OF THE WEK. REPUBLICANS SUCK. DEMOCRATS WILL GENERALLY PURSUE MUCH MORE ENLIGHTENED AGENDAS.

Okay now, havking said that, "much better" does not mean that we should settle for approaches that still fall far short. healthcare? This mantra that "30 million more peopel will be covered" is meaningless and counterproductive if that really means "30 million more people will be forced by law to buy insurance they cannot afford. Maybe some will be lucky enough to qualify for a nebulous subsidy to cover part of the cost, but EVERYONE will still be under the thumb of criminal health insurance corporations who will continue to jack up rates and deny coverage."

Putting lipstick on a pig, when many Democratic politicians (probably a majority) KNOW that the only real solution is to offer public coverage (public option, medicare expansion, single-payer, etc.) but they lack the will to actually push for that. So they cave because they are afraid tro be called "socialists" by the mean old GOP, and/or are afraid to go against the wishes of the Insurance Lobby who funds them.

[olegramps]

43. This reminds me of the adage: The operation was a great success too bad the patient died.

[Armstead]

44. Good (but sad) analogy

[Hansel]

25. We are the party that has a minority of dictorial Senator's standing in the way.

The issue is the filibuster in the Senate. Without it you might be surprised at what this party stands for.

Start going after the Republicans and Blue Dogs and DEMAND an "up or down" vote. When you talk to people who whine, tell them to demand an "up or down" vote. This is about NOT getting a chance to vote, it's not about standing for "nothing".

Progressives are suckers for crumbling into defeatism and eating their own, instead of going on the attack against those standing in their way. The people you need to get mad at are not the 50+ or so Senators who support what you want, it's the handful of Blue Dogs and ALL of the Republicans that deserve your scorn. Congress has proven over and over again that they are on our side. The Senate is the problem.


UP OR DOWN VOTE! UP OR DOWN VOTE! UP OR DOWN VOTE!

It's not going to happen until we start demanding it and make a VERY PUBLIC display of demanding it and shame these fools into allowing a vote. Let's try to do it without eating our own. Let's go on the offense and resist falling into the fetal position and rocking.

[Dinger]

26. K & R. Well Said

:)

[brand404]

28. Unless non-watered down CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM passes Democrats will continue to use GOP as excuse

Democrats LOVE the payday that GOP has sold out to...however although GOP can brag openly about it and still get voted abck in democrats problem is that they are the party that is for the people and its progressive ideas....so how does one party pretend to be progressive but secretly wish for more corporate paydays...easy, just use the GOP as an excuse for not being able to get things done -- hence, where we are today.

[Sheepshank]

30. I seems to have another paradigm

As a free, independent, opinionated thinker and seeing many people here that are free thinkers, going on individual tangents, I was always offended when the RW would call anyone in this party "sheeple". That mentality just doesn't seem to apply. We are more like that you tube video about herding cats. Can't be done. THAT mentality is to our detriment. We can't coalesce. If there is any group that espouses everything that is sheeple it is the RW. They make their collective borg mentality work. How do you herd cats? Well, maybe someone can try, but it's awfully difficult without the right tuna fish dinner incentive..

[Armstead]

39. Baaaaaaaah .....Meow

While we are the cat-herding side of the aisle, even cats have basic principles they can agree on. Mice taste good.

And the GOP has their own cat-herding problems at the moment. I doubt Richard Lugar and Sarah Palin would really have a lot to say to each other if stuck in a room together.

We need to have a core set of principles. The cats who may tend to be conservative have someplace else to go.

[Go2Peace]

32. We have them, trouble is we seem to be ignoring many of them (principles)

[Phx_Dem]

37. How "nothing" of you to ignore all the accomplishments of the past year.

Which have been quite numerous.

[Armstead]

38. Forest and trees -- Democrats are always better then Republicans. But...

we should be better than just "better than shit."

[niceypoo]

45. The accomplishments have been overshadowed by the cowardice

...of Democrats in congress.

Obama seems more interested in pursuing a fantasy of bipartisanship, which is ruining his presidency, rather than use his bully pulpit to push for things like healthcare.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

40. Another day, another negative post.

Seriously, do you ever say anything else? Or do just come here to bash Democrats for kicks?

[Armstead]

42. Democrats are always better than Republicans. The sun rises in the east.

Democrats are almost always better than republicans. That's a given. But I believe we should do more than just "better than shit."

Blind partisan allegiance is dangerous, if it means that democrats should never be criticized or pushed to do better when they fall short.

Such blind allegiance in the 1990's helped to create the conditions that Bush and the GOP exploited in the 00's, an d which ultimately brought us to this sorry state.

Unless you want to see a continuation of the shameful concentration of wealth and power and the massive social and economic inequities that have been allowed to wreck this country over the last 30 years, you ought to be critical of Democrats when they go along with the CONservative agenda.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

46. Unless you want to see a continuation of the shameful concentration of wealth and power etc...

perhaps you shouldn't try to tear down the only thing standing in its way. Unless you expect Republicans to do it.

Further, you say this: "Blind partisan allegiance is dangerous, if it means that democrats should never be criticized or pushed to do better when they fall short.:

But you've yet to demonstrate that there's anything in between what you describe above and, I don't know, not being every bit as vitriolic against Democrats as Republicans are. You've long, long passed the point of constructive criticism.

[Armstead]

47. Okay how's this?

I'll shut up -- or at least tone it down -- when the main message and policies of the Democratic Party more reflects the message and policies of people like Tom Harkin, Sherrod Brown, Jan Schiakovsky, Henry Waxman, Bernie Sanders (not a formal Democrat, I realize but...), Peter DeFazio, and Dennis Kucinich (yes, he may be a flake but his policies are sound) and many other clearly liberal and progressive Democrats.

But not as long as those kind of Democrats have to fight uphill against the centrist/conservative/corporate/Wall St. power structure as reflected by the Clintons and, yes, President Obama, and the weasely "pragmatism" of non-backbone, slaves-to-the wind DINOs....That brand of "democrat" has had much to do with driving the nation into a ditch over the years -- agreeing with and reinforcing the GOP CONservative mantras, ignoring core issues and forcing destructive policies onto us.

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

48. How is pragmatism "weasley", exactly?

You honestly believe that we should just tout Kucinich's philosophy, reality be damned, and hope that someday the people will coalesce around it? Really? How is that not the definition of insanity?

[Armstead]

49. Kucinich said we should not go into Iraq -- What a nut.

If you bother to look at many of his ideas, you might find that he's not really that far from what most rational (non GOP wing nut) Americans believe and want.

Sure he's kind of weird, and he sometimes is off base. But overall he is basically a liberal Democrat in the FDR tradition.

But maybe for you, being liberal is not being "reality based."

[and-justice-for-all]

50. I do not completely agree with that.....

There have been accomplishments and a nice list of them since Obama took office. They have been conveniently overlooked of course and the focus is as always narrow i.e. Healtcare and the middle east occupations.

If I had my way, I would have steamrolled those fucking pukes and did everything that needed to be done without compromise or even negotiation with them at all to get a National Health Care system. Pukes did nothing but what ever the hell they wanted for 8 long and miserable years, so fuck them!! They got their war mongering on and their national debt, so why even ask them to come to the conversation on anything?!

[pecwae]

52. "Hope and Change turned out to be just a slogan. "

Indeed so.

Unfortunately, I was too late to rec.