Reply #8: If we shed the DLC, welcome to 40% of the vote for years to come [View All]

[CreekDog]

Feinstein rankles me, quite often, but fact is, she votes with the party and has almost as liberal a record as Boxer. Dumping her would not accomplish much. And Dodd is quite strong and effective.

If you want ideological purity, join the Green party. Not too many conservatives there, and certainly no DINO's --no chance of winning there either (winning Humboldt and/or Mendocino Counties is not enough for me).

In my post, I'm attempting to stir the pot, because I've seen all this bloviating about ditching the DLC, but fact is, they represent a block of thought and we need to be adding voters from groups that we can get, we mostly have consolidated our votes among those of us who already agree on basics of policy and ideology. Winning in American elections requires some real strategery.

Remember that Bush ran in 2000 as a moderate and made his signature issue education, and look at the conservative governance we got for it. There's something to that. Clinton ran in 1992 as a moderate, and look at all the liberal programs, tough defense of medicare and the working poor that we got out of it.

This is a hard truth for diehard activists, to gain power, you have to share it with people you hate. If you aren't prepared to do that, then you aren't prepared to have the power. Look at how LBJ passed the Civil Rights bills of his time, look at how he did it --it's not pretty my friends, but it was damned successful.

Fact is, Martin Luther King was the better man, but he couldn't have passed a Civil Rights Bill through our congress. LBJ was not the better man, but he was the better politician and he did what MLK could not. When you think about heroes, have ones like MLK, when you think about politicians, think abot the ones that accomplished things, and you'll find huge things in their character and decisions that give you pause. Lincoln, FDR and LBJ and yet they accomplished great changes in our society.