Ever get the feeling

[Mythsaje]

that when the Republicans bash Democrats and liberals for being "weak" and "appeasers" they just might have the history to back it up? I mean, it's not as though we oppose THEM with anything approaching full force. All too often our leadership appears timid and unable to take necessary risks to see things to their conclusion. When attacked, they defend half-heartedly, and never effectively riposte.

The Republicans point at the Dems and say "They're weak on defense!" because, well, they sure as hell don't bother to defend themselves worth a damn. And when one does get a solid blow in, half of the appeasers on the hill are crying "apologize" before the echo has faded.

I think we'd do well to abandon the notion that the fight has rules. THEY certainly don't act as though it does, and as was pointed out to me growing up--there is only one rule to a real fight. Win. If its not worth going to the mat for, it's not worth bothering with in the first place.

Dems are almost completely defensive, and that's often perceived as a weakness. There's nowhere near as much tactical thinking involved in our operations as there are with the Repugs, and I think that's a mistake. Especially as near the edge as they are right now. Anyone with a little foresight could tempt one of them into an unforgivable outburst just by being slightly more clever than a hunk of rock.

THEY frame the issues, then challenge us to deal with their frames. Why don't WE have people working on doing the same? If we did, it would certainly knock them off balance for a time.

"They've got the media sewn up," we might hear, and, to some extent, this is the case. But if done correctly, the gaffes we could instigate would be covered by all the networks anyway. These people are on the verge of implosion. You think maybe we could do something to help them along?

I do.

Public perception is a lot of it. And because of our lack of engagement, public perception is that they might be right--we may be weak appeasers after all. Hell, WE'RE asking the same question half the time.

What the hell is wrong with Congress? Seriously.

Obama is a different story. Unless it becomes apparent that the system as it is has failed, and in a big way, he has to play moderate to keep the lid on the explosion. People aren't looking to Congress to see the way the wind is blowing, they're looking to Obama. And Obama has to play it that everything is okay. For now, anyway. The wrong word from the White House could precipitate a panic.

But Congress... Congress can fight dirty. If they've got the guts. If they're not precisely what they're accused of being.

[Curtland1015]

1. Certainly we play weak. We have gotten better then we were, though.

This past election cycle, the Dems have showed more backbone than I've seen in a LOOOOOOOOOONG time, and I was very proud to see it. There are signs we're creeping back to our old spineless ways, but I hope we don't.

The real problem is, we try to be fair. It's just the way we are. They don't try. They go out of their WAY not to be fair, and cheaters most certainly prosper.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

2. I am hoping that,

with Rahm Emanuel in the White House, things will change and Democrats will start behaving as if they know what a spine really does.

Rahm is old school Chicago politics - just what we need. I think having Reyes begin this investigation is a great start, and I see Rahm's fingerprints all over it........................

[inna]

6. "Rahm is old school Chicago politics - just what we need."

wow, i don't think you were being sarcastic there.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

8. Sarcastic?

Do you know anything about old school Chicago politics?

[inna]

10. i know a little bit, and as far as i know it's anything but progressive.

do you disagree?

[Tangerine LaBamba]

11. It's not liberal, conservative, or progressive,

because it is the process, not the substance.

You need to learn about it. Knowing "a little bit" means you don't know anything. If you did, you'd never have asked such a question.

[truedelphi]

22. I learned a whole lot about Chicago politics while growing up there.

Every three or four years, someone at the City of Chicago would call my dad and ask him to come work with them. He always had an excuse not to.

Eventually, like fifteen years after all the job refusals, the person who took the job my dad had been offered was arrested for all the illegal things he had done at request, I imagine, of the Mayor. (Honorable Richard Daley, Sr) He ended up doing hard time.

Age eighteen: I am driving on the South Side of Chicago, it is eleven o'clock at night. And this huge fat cop is beating the crap out of a nine year old kid. I try to report him to a different cop - but that one says, "If you wanna get out of this neighborhood without ending up in jail, you better forget about what you saw tonight."

Living in Chicago was in some ways like living in an Eastern bloc country. Where else would you know exactly who would win each position on the ballot two weeks before the election!!

And those involved in politics who were progressive, and anti-war in Vietnam, often were forced to run as Republicans. So my very first campaigns were for Republicans. Walking around in the Rogers Park neighborhood, leaf letting the bungalows, with People telling me right and left how they would like to have me come in for coffee, but were afraid to. It was ovbvious that the huge ugly looking guy standing out on the sidewalk wasn't my boyfriend or husband but my "Tail" who kept detailed notes on those households that did let me in to talk.

Yeah that style of politics - is it something to admire?

I still remember how scary looking the guy was that the Democratic party put on my tail to follow me from house to house. About six foot six and always wearing this long black leather coat.

And I remembr how much I cried when I moved to Madison WI and got to vote for a REAL Democrat -Paul Soglin for Mayor. Friends couldn't understand why I left the voting booth in tears. But it was literally the first time in my life that I was aware of who was running for office and didn't know who would win until after the ballots were counted.

[inna]

25. fascinating and compelling post, thanks for the first-hand info! :) nt

[Tangerine LaBamba]

26. Yeah, it had its drawbacks -

politics is a dirty, dirty business, and it seems that a lot of people don't realize how dirty it is.

When I was living in Chicago, I was offered a job as a precinct captain one election day - this was during the time of Father Mayor Daley - and the money offered, I think it was $50, was tempting for a poor student. But, on election day, I woke up with a horrible cold, so I called in sick.

Later, I found out that all the precinct captains in a certain section of the city had been arrested, kept in custody just long enough to let the polls close, and then released.

Another time, driving on the south side (I loved Hyde Park and its environs, although I lived in the Near North/Old Town neighborhood), a law school buddy and I spotted what looked like a great big field of weed.

I mean WEED. As in ganja. WEED. Mary Jane. Herb. Smoke.

We got out and checked. Sonofabitch, it must have been a quarter acre, backing up to a restaurant parking lot and with an auto repair place on one side, and something innocuous on the other side.

The next day - well, the next night - we went back, armed with a LOT of Marshall Field shopping bags, laundry bags, another we could find that would serve our purpose.

We pulled up to the scene, and a large man approached our car. All he did was look at us, we saw another large man closer to the crop, and we took off.

Never went back.

The patronage part of the political process there kept the city humming. It was a beautifully-run place back then, with everyone getting a job with the city if they did the right thing.

I remember going down to City Hall to get a license for our dog.

I had to go to four different windows, where four different guys stamped the same form I'd filled out, then to another window to get the official copy of the license, and then to another window to get the tag for her collar, and to another window, where I signed a paper that said I'd gotten the dog's license and the tag.

I admired that. It was efficient, and the unemployment matter was dealt with.

I'm sorry you had such a hard time, but I'm glad you did what you did and that you are able to appreciate how things can be as opposed to how things are.

But, it's always about money and/or jobs. Always. That's the basis of the old school Chicago system of politics, and it's the basis of our entire political system. Only now, the Republicans play the Chicago game better than the Democrats do.

Our alderman was the guy who got everything taken care of, without fuss. The system worked.

Now I see that a woman who was my best friend during my days in Chicago has been named by Obama to be the next Ambassador to The Netherlands (her family was Dutch, and she's a first-generation American - incredibly wealthy, and, when I knew her, an active member of the Young Republicans).

She married an incredibly wealthy and powerful man in Chicago, a man who was one of Obama's earliest backers, discovering him when he (Obama) ran his first, losing campaign. My old friend has become a devout Democrat, and when I saw the amount of $$$ she was donating to Obama - and to Democrats all over the place, including Jan Shaowsky, her Congresswoman - I figured there'd be something for her son or daughter when Obama won.

I hadn't figured on her getting something for herself, but when I read about her appointment, I laughed a lot, because nothing ever changes. Not ever, not in American politics.

She's gonna be a great Ambassador, and I'm not going to write her a note to tell her that being a Democrat seems to fit her better.................... :evilgrin:

[Greyhound]

18. "Chicago politics" is going with the higest bidder, simple as that.

The most blatantly corrupt government, from Springfield to the fire inspectors and the beat cops.

Don't forget that this is the government that made Alphonse Capone a pillar of society and celebrity.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

20. That's a very broad brush you use -

but you miss the nuance, the smaller strokes, how things worked on the local level. That's the stuff Rahm Emaunuel - and Barack Obama - are very good at, and it's just what we need now with this gutless Democratic Congress.

It's an art form, not nearly the crass thing you identify, although, yes, payoffs are part of it, just as they are - SURPRISE! - in every other part of American politics.

I know. It's a shock. And here everyone thought it really was a meritocracy.

Ha!

[Greyhound]

27. I lived it, and it was the worst place I've ever lived, bar none.

Your romanticisation of institutionalized corruption that has created one of the worst run cities in America is just sad.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

29. I lived it, too,

and I admired the way it worked.

I loved that city. Absolutely loved it. The city worked, ran smoothly, and was one of the places where I could walk my dog in the dead of night and not be afraid.

We've had different experiences of Chicago, so, naturally, our perspectives are different. I'm not "romanticizing" it, and it's kind of unfortunate that you need to make it personal, when I'm quite delighted that we have different views. That's democracy at its best and I'm simply describing my experience of it. It's not sad - not at all. I loved it.

When someone makes it personal, ad you tried to do, it's clear that's all they've got, so they try to deliver a low blow.

They fail, and they embarrass themselves, but still they do it.

Oh, well......................................

[Greyhound]

31. So the innocent people wrongly convicted of crimes they didn't commit,

the "wrong people" that were beaten, killed, driven out, etc., were of no consequence because you were one of the "right (white) people" and didn't have to "waste (your) beautiful mind" on it?

:puke:

[Tangerine LaBamba]

32. Now you're talking about

the judicial system.

That's a whole other topic.

Man, you're all het up, emoticons and all, and you're even channeling Barbara Bush.

All because someone has an opinion different from yours?

My goodness.................

[Greyhound]

33. Thanks, you consistently make my points and expose you nature in the process. n/t

[Tangerine LaBamba]

34. No, I made none of your points,

simply because all you did was post conclusions, the things you believe about the system, and then you went off on a tangent about arrests and sentencing, which made no sense.

You had no points to make, which is why you just folded................................

[truedelphi]

36. It is especially sad when someone condones

The racist beating of a black child because they saw beauty in the inherent efficiency of the city's patronage system when they got their dog a license!

How people can romanticize Chicago politics I don't know. Wasn't there a nation called Germany that got its trains to run on time, and so what if some people had to wear stars on their clothes and die in gas chambers. Or so such "romantics" might say when discussing the matter.

[Greyhound]

38. It is the same mindset.

And this person genuinely believes that she is a "good person" because she would never do the actual beating.

Just amazing.
:eyes:

[truedelphi]

23. See my longer response directly above yours. n/t

[Greyhound]

30. Very much like what I experienced. Just try explaining to a group of foreign

investors that we need to increase our first round financing budget by 30% to cover required bribes...

Blatant official criminality is just SOP there, and some of these morons would like to run the whole nation under that.:eyes:

[rhett o rick]

9. I consider "old school Chicago politics" very non-progressive. Maybe republican-like. No thanks. nm

[Tangerine LaBamba]

12. That's because

you don't know what they are.

When you label them "non-progressive," you tip your hand, and you show that you don't have the slightest idea of what the phrase means.

That's OK - I'm sure Rahm will somehow muddle through without your backing................................

[inna]

13. then please enlighten us.

there is no need for snarkiness.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

15. A statement of fact is not snarkiness,

and I am not responsible for your social studies education.

Go read up on the subject, and find enlightenment.

Until then, don't comment on things you don't understand.......................

[inna]

17. don't tell me what i should or should not comment on.

and i stand behind what i said. imo, more Chicago style politics is THE LAST thing we need, your opinion notwithstanding.

i'm done "conversing" with you at this point though, i don't appreciate condescension, snarkiness and bad attitude. :hi:

[Tangerine LaBamba]

19. Whatever you say,

toots - feel free to advertise your ignorance everywhere...................

[rhett o rick]

21. Please point out your "statement of fact" as I apparently missed it.

Are you claiming that old school Chicago politics is progressive? Like when Daily had the be-Jesus beat out of the anti-war protesters? Give me some indication that old school Chicago politics isn't good-ole-boy, rich white male politics. Just give me some facts. Pleez.

Save your snarkiness for the republicans and blue dog traitors.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

28. Where did you get 'progressive' in anything

I wrote?

Your reading skills are odd, but your presumptions and misguided assumptions are leading you down a path I've never trod.

Again, understand that "old school Chicago politics" is about the process, not the content. It is procedural, not substantive.

You don't know what it is, that's obvious, so you - in the finest Sarah Palin/George W. Bush mode - dig in and lash out at the person who is speaking of something you don't understand.

Nice going. Passive-aggressive is the last bastion of ignoramuses.

The only thing you missed was "In what respect, Tangerine?"

[The Wizard]

3. And why is it

Democrats are the ones expected to reach across the aisle only to pull back a bloody stump?
With the Democrats having large majorities it's incumbent on Republicans to reach across.
But if it were up to me I'd make them grovel.

[Spazito]

4. I have to admit, as a 'sideline spectator' (being a Canadian)...

the behavior of the Dems in Congress given the Dems hold the White House, the Senate and the House. I don't even see it as them having to fight dirty but more fight harder including taking on their own 'blue-dogs' if needs be.

[Hydra]

5. Oh, look! Less that 0 recs here too!

You must have fans.

Frankly, the Dems don't believe we deserve what we're asking for, otherwise they'd fight for us to have it. As you say, you don't fight unless it's worth winning...so they pretend to fight and fold at the first good opportunity...if they bother to do that.

[lunatica]

7. The only rule to fighting is not to win

The rule is to fight for something and to take your defeats and to keep fighting not because you want to win, but because it's the right thing to do.

Republicans fight purely for power and don't care who gets run over or how they do it. They fight to win and only to win.

Thanks but no thanks. I'd rather win because it's right and it benefits people I don't even know and never will know. I don't need to get something at the expense of others just because I want it to make me feel superior.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

14. I believe some of

that is due to the fact any GOP adminstration leaves the country in such a shambles that the Dems have to do damamge control for a good part of their turn at the helm.
Witness the 'stimulus' program as an attempt to rescue the ecomony which was driven into the ditch by the tax cutting, war starting GOP.
The time to stand fast would have been starting 9/12/01, which would be political suicide due to the control of the national dialogue by conservatives, therefore the Dems had to go along.
The Democratic Party since Jimmy Carter is like a boxer who is always back on his heels, never able to move forward and take the fight to the opponent.
Let's hope our current President knows how to change momentum.......
My 2 cents.

[Mythsaje]

16. That's a reasonable position. Makes sense. n/t

[The Stranger]

24. I'm being left with the only possible conclusion being that the Demorcatic "leadership" are shills,

accomplices, collaborators, confederates, bought-off and paid-for toadies, sycophants, plants who really truly only answer to those in power above the GOP.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

35. That's about it -

American politics, plain and simple.........................

[Echo In Light]

37. It's much like how 'pro' wrestling is scripted w/predetermined outcomes

Phony 'oppositional' party, which is why 3rd party/indie candidates are disavowed and marginalized to the extent they are, because they often represent a genuine Left - - which the Dem party doesn't embody aside from the rhetoric of corporate/right-wing propaganda, and it's simple to understand WHY those sources strategically paint what's basically the moderate republican (Dems) position as "liberal;" it establishes an acceptable framework of this far, but no further (to the Left).

[scheming daemons]

39. See Mythsaje? You *CAN* get back on the "Greatest Page"

...when you write something thought-provoking, well-researched, interesting, and not vanity about yourself.


Good post.

Rec'd.

[Puzzler]

40. Dems, in general, tend to debate more...

... and I think incorporate a wider swathe of people and political beliefs than the GOP. Dems, to their credit, have much less (or no) "lock-step", on message, talking points attitude than the GOP. Many on the right perceive this as weakness. I guess, Hitler and Stalin are their role models for strong political parties and leadership.