I think I figured it out!

[no limit]

When Republicans have the senate, the house, and the white house (as they did 2000-2006) the Democrats must bend to Republican will because they have no power in government, everything Republicans want they pretty much get at this point. Iraq, patriot act, 2 tax cuts for the rich and no child left behind they get because they have small majorities in both chambers of congress and they have the white house. Nothing Democrats can do about that.

When Democrats come in to power with huge wins and gain control of the senate and the house during mid-terms they still must bend to Republican will because they still don't have the white house. After the 2006 elections this included giving Bush every penny he asked for to fund his wars. This included legalizing warrentless wiretapping and giving telecoms retroactive immunity for illegally spying on us. It included failing to prosecute anyone in the Bush administration for breaking the law (which they clearly did over and over again). And it even included funding the surge which democrats swore they were against. In fact I can't think of a single significant thing during this time that decmorats truly wanted and they got. But hey, they didn't have the white house, can't blame them, right? Right.

So when Democrats finally get the white house, get the house, and get a 60 vote filibuster-proof majority in the senate they must again bend to Republican will because a tiny fraction of those 60 senators that caucus with Democrats are kind of conservative. That means a stimulus package with 300 billion in tax breaks for mostly rich people, no public option in their healthcare reform (reform modeled after Romneycare and passed using reconciliation), weak wall street reform, draconian budget cuts that hurt the poorest among us (low income heating assistance for example) and an extension of tax cuts for the richest Americans. Democrats wish it wouldn't have to be this way, but those darn conservative Democrats made them do it this way.

After all that when the republicans gain control of the house because americans think democrats did a shitty job (I wonder why) again the democrats must bend to their will since nothing can get done without Republican support. It's all in the name of compromise.

So when 2012 rolls around and Democrats ask you to vote for them just remember, the Republicans are worse. Nevermind Republicans get everything they want wether they win or they loose, the important thing we all need to worry about is that Republicans are way worse, nothing else in this upcoming elections is in any way important.

[robinlynne]

1. Yep, it is quite a conundrum this one...

[NightWatcher]

2. I liken it to the Harlem Globetrotters vs the Generals

Or like Obama himself said re: tv news "it's like watching professional wrestling"

It's a fix and we're suckers for thinking any different

[notesdev]

3. I have an even simpler explanation

The banks win. Always. And they own both teams.

[nashville_brook]

4. Obama 2012 - "It Is What It Is"

[Curmudgeoness]

5. I have no argument with your assessment, but

I cannot see myself voting any other way than Democrat, because, well, it is true, Republicans ARE worse. If all the Democrats who are disillusioned and feel that we are always kowtowing to Reps refuse to vote for the Dems, every Rep who runs will win. See what happens when the Reps have 100% of the legislature plus the White House, so there is no reason for compromise and no one is there to steer anything toward the middle.

I do not want the middle, but it is preferable to the batshit far right.

[no limit]

9. I certainly see what you are saying but I worry with that mindset nothing will ever change

if we have to support these people no matter what they do as long as they stay just slightly to the left of crazy right wing idiots then they have absolutely no reason to change. And if they have no reason to change they won't.

A republican victory in 2012 is unimaginable especially given the current republican field, but at the same time so is going down the exact same road we have been going for the last few years.

[Curmudgeoness]

17. And I thought that the Reps winning in the mid-terms was

unimaginable. Yet....there it is. It happened.

My choice is to ride the ass of any Dem representing me, and let them know that I will not support them in the future if they vote for certain things. (I also ride the as of the Reps, but you would not believe some of the response letters I get from them. I will never forget the one from Santorum when he was in office that basically told me that I didn't know what I was talking about and it really didn't matter what I thought.)

I make sure that they know where I stand, and what I expect of them. They have to know what we expect, and they do monitor contacts from constituents for where the wind is blowing. But in the end, I will vote for the Dem. One day in the future, I hope to see more options---lots more options. But that is not the case yet.

[no limit]

18. I'm not sure what you mean that it was unimaginable. It was seen from a mile away

And again, I understand what you are saying. But you didn't answer my question.

If they know you will vote for them no matter what then what incentive do they have to change? If I was in office and I knew the liberals would vote for me no matter what I would piss all over the liberals in order to get support from the middle since that's the easiest way to win elections. This way you get support from liberals (while pissing all over them) and you pick up the "independent" vote. Makes sense, no?

[Curmudgeoness]

22. I see your point, and I have no real argument with it.

But what I am saying is that they do not KNOW I will vote for them. I am unknown here, I can state that I WILL vote Dem every time. But I will let them know that they may lose my vote. And some have. I have no voted for any Rep for any office since the Gingrich gloating period, but I have skipped a certain candidate in the past if they really have pissed on me.

There are no answers that will make sense. I just know that I support extremists groups, not because I completely agree with their stand or tactics, but because I know there needs to be a balance against the extremists on the other side. And without the Dems, who like it or not are the only other party with enough power to do a thing, the Reps will move even farther away from us than they are doing now. I work much harder on the primary races, where I see very liberal candidates, and those are the ones I will support every time. But if the rest of the area I live in (which is rather Red) goes with another candidate, there is nothing more I can do.

What are you thinking the answers are? Do we sacrifice a decade or more waiting for the party for change? Or for another party to gain enough clout to be viable?

[no limit]

26. That's fair, they can't be absolutely sure that you will vote for them. And don't get me wrong...

I don't claim to have any answers. I wish I did. The decision seems to be between a crap sandwich and a shit sandwich. They are both the same thing, but one sounds just slightly less offensive.

Like I said in the subject, you are right, they don't know for sure you will vote for them. But I feel like they are taking it as a high possibiliy. And looks like they are probably right. Eventhough you might do alot of hard work on your part to get them to move to the left (which I applaud) in the end you are here advocating that as long as they remain slightly to the left of republicans we should still support them over the alternative.

And again, don't get me wrong. I don't know what the alternative is. I remember the 2000 elections. The Democrats took liberals for granted and as a result they lost the election by a few hundred votes (well...and because of a supreme court that figured they had the authority to pick the president). Yet today they seemed to have forgotten that. So if they don't get elected in 2012 because of lack of liberal support (just as in 2000) there is absolutely no evidance that they will become more liberal as a result. But at the same time they will only have themselves to blame.

The whole thing sucks, it's a lose lose situation and shows just how fucked up our system is.

[Curmudgeoness]

31. Ah, so we do totally agree. Can I serve you a crap sandwich? nt

[no limit]

33. Crap sandwich? Remind me which one that is again?

I don't remember if I had the shit sandwich or the crap sandwich last time.

:toast:

[Curmudgeoness]

34. That is the less "offensive" sandwich. nt

[Donnachaidh]

6. Fore The Win!

:thumbsup:

Of course, because the Republicans are so bad we can't even ask our reps to actually represent us :puke:

[patrice]

7. "huge wins"? & you're pretending all Democrats are the same, when, in fact, those majorities

included a significant minority of Blue Dogs, so it has not been an ideological majority in my lifetime at least.

[no limit]

8. Right, and all republicans ARE the same?

Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, George Voinovich, and Lisa Murkowski. Did they all toe the republican party line?

[patrice]

13. No, but because they are Republicans, we might assume that the probability that they will tow

the party-line is higher than those Blue Dogs, making those Blue Dogs doublely effective for the Republicans. If the probability were the same, they'd cancel each other out, thus giving the advantage to the numerical majority.

The margins are not as great as you claim they are, not only in Congress, but also in the whole social context, so saying the weight of the Democratic defections = the weight of Republican defections, so ALL Democrats are traitors, seems pretty dismissive of the realities.

[no limit]

16. But you are trying to change the facts of the matter

Being from Maine democrats have a huge sway over Olympia Snowe. Maine is a very liberal state.

George Voinovich was from a district largely influanced by Cleveland, again liberal. He had such positions as being for higher taxes and he voted against John Bolton to the UN. Democrats could have influanced him greatly if they wanted to.

The only case where you might have a point is Murkowski. But again, Democrats had 60 votes in the senate. On most of these votes they only needed to pick up a couple of republicans. And that's assuming that all other 38 republicans tow the party line all the time and there is absolutely nothing to you could do (even though you have the largest campaign budget of any party in history).

[patrice]

23. What about the context in which all of that is supposed to go down, especially within

the dimensions of communication and funding, and, also most especially, given the fact that every "Leftie", some of them single issue voters, who doesn't see ___________________, abandons whatever potential support for ___________________ there might be, WITH encouragement from those who actually oppose ___________________, thus driving the Blue Dogs, and anyone else who can be made vulnerable on an issue by issue basis, further toward the Right?

I imagine you do know what self-fulfilling prophecy is. Unconditional commitment is as stupid as unconditional opposition.

[no limit]

28. As far as funding goes the democrats have the biggest campaign war chest in history

on everything else you lost me since I'm not sure who "every lefty" is.

[patrice]

39. Sorry, my bad: not every Lefty, but, a significant minority thereof + our mortal enemies. nt

[no limit]

46. Still not getting you. The left is your mortal enemy?

[patrice]

47. The "Left" is being assisted by our mortal enemies, whether the "Left" recognizes & admits thatornot

[patrice]

48. The objective is to take down President Obama: on the "Left" to demonstrate political power; on the

Right to prevent ANY liberalization of any policies and to install, (because of this particular point in our economic history) probably more or less permanently, leadership that is anti-thetical to the authentic Left.

And if you are wondering about my use of quotation marks, it's because I think anyone who puts the demonstration of political power over doing no harm to those who have already been hurt/handicapped the most by what the U.S. is, ANYONE who puts the demonstration of political power over preservation of policies that help those who need help is "Left" in name only. If those things are to happen, let the poor decide for themselves what price they will pay for change, not a bunch of middle+ class economic justice/political hobbyists.

And I ask you: who is/can do more to facilitate the poor to that decision point? President Obama? or some buzzy contrarian internet "warrior" writing under a false name?

[patrice]

49. "... on the 'Left' to demonstrate political power ..." hence the appellation "the Professional Left"

For some of these people, just like with so-called "Pro-Life" -ers, it's ALL about CAREERS. They have a personal investment in the conflict and NOT in the outcomes.

[Pholus]

51. "Mortal" enemies? Egads!!!!

Really? Please reserve that term for somewhere where actual shooting might be involved.

Thanks in advance!

[happy feet]

10. What everybody misses when they talk about

stuff, is that under Bush, the republicans had fear, the circle the wagon, defend against attack, etc. thingy going on such that any opposition was painted as unpatriotic. Because of this, there is simply no comparison between the situations presented in the op.

Animal fear and pride trumps everything in terms of governing a population.

[no limit]

12. Thousands of people dying each year because they can't get healthcare sure sounds scary as well

but god forbit Democrats point that out.

[Curmudgeoness]

21. They had fear because they created most of that fear.

We never have been able to solidify and issue or emotion that will really inspire the people. They do it all the time. The fear was not there just because of 9-11, or terrorist. It was manufactured.

Just think about the assault on Social Security and Medicare, becoming popular because they are using a simple word: entitlement. When will we learn.

[patrice]

24. Now all opposition is patriotic, even from those who never were, never will be, with any of us on

our issues.

It's ALL divide and conquer.

[Scuba]

11. Barak Obama 2012 - He's not a Republican, sorta

[Cleita]

20. We don't want a Republican in the White House, but

we should do some house cleaning in Congress.

[Chris_Texas]

14. Both parties are owned by the same power elite

They own everything. EVERYTHING. What they want is more for themselves and less for you. They want your stuff.

If Obama is a good boy they will let him into the club. The only reason he was allowed to be preident at all was that THEY picked him. You would have never even heard his name had they not. Obama is doing exactly what he promised his employers he would do. They want more war, they get it. They want Americans forced by the government to BUY health insurance? They get it. They want tax cuts? They get them. They want us to slash social programs and funnel the money to them? No problem! They want corporate welfare and bailouts and handouts? They get them.

They can fill the fucking ocean with oil and our leaders, their employees, will turn a blind eye and send the cops after any journalist who tries to take a picture.

That's the reality.

It's a circus. In the center ring the good clowns are whacking the bad clowns with giant rubber hammers, pies are flying, but dont make the mistake of believing that the two groups of clowns don't work for the same ringmaster. It's the REAL greatest show on earth baby.

[dixiegrrrrl]

15. By Jove, I think he's got it!!!

Now, repeat after me:

the rain in Spain falls mostly on the plain.

[Cleita]

19. Kind of what I've been saying all along about getting

Blue Dogs out of office because all you are going to get is Republican legislation anyway. You might as well have the real thing, a Republican, so you can vote against them in the next election and run a real progressive. It looks bad now, but you wait and see. All those Tea Party morons trying to shoot holes in Medicare and Social Security are going to find themselves so swept out of office they won't see the tsunami of angry voters before it hits them.

[patrice]

25. I agree, Cleita, except I believe there is a 50:50 probability that they will be swept into office,

if our own not-so-loyal opposition doesn't get it straight whom they are in bed with against Obama, i.e. folks who never were, never will be amenable to our issues and WILL, in fact, take great advantage of any weakness to defeat the things we care most about FOREVER.

[Pholus]

27. Ahhhhh, yes. Loyalty.

"Loyalty" can be to a person, or to an ideal. We merely disagree as to which is more important.

[no limit]

29. I wish I could rec this.

[patrice]

37. I agree. There's a dynamic relationship between ideas and persons that requires honesty

for clarity, or it dies and poisons everyone with stasis.

[Pholus]

40. Sometimes it helps to be more direct with what you're saying...

Your statement is a bit too abstract for my sleep deprived brain.

[patrice]

42. Sorry, trying to not be so wordy: Holding an ideal in high value is not a static thing.

You don't just say "___________ is important to me" and that's all there is to it.

The idea lives in your mind, in the world; the higher the value an idea has to you, the more of reality (persons, things, events, situations) that is tested for its relevance to the qualities and traits of that idea/value.

The highest values would be tested and re-tested the most, up to and including testing Everything over and over, hopefully not ad infinitum, but at least enough to provide or re-establish a sufficient/comfortable degree of certainty. This is not to say that one doesn't make mistakes in evaluating the objects and traits of existence for their authentic qualities, and their relevance to the ideal, but just that, if something is really important to you, you try not to make any mistakes about its relevance to your experience. This forces you to think in terms of probabilities, "It wasn't true, or it was less true, yesterday, but today x, y, z have changed, so there may be a chance that it is either true, or more true, today than it was yesterday." One goes through these kinds of testing processes, more or less consciously, more or less honestly/courageously, more or less completely, more or less continuously, for more or less all persons, things, events, situations, depending upon how valuable an idea/ideal is to that person.

Ergo, placing a really high value on something, such as Economic Justice, would cause one to NOT make summary judgments about it, based upon information that is too limited, and, then reduce ALL other potentialities to zero and that's the end of that, unless that ideal value is actually less important than you think/say it is; or its importance is over-ridden by some other ideal/value that is actually more important (e.g. the desire for Economic Justice is over-ridden by the desire for political power); or there's something about a given person/thing/event/situation that so essentially outweighs most of everything else about that person/thing/event/situation by so much that NOTHING else, NONE of any of the other probabilities inherent to that person/thing/event/situation, is/are significant.

Given the high emphasis that so many profess for this or that value and the severe lack of certain kinds of information that could be highly relevant to that stated value, the threshold for the last of the aforementioned possibilities seems pretty low on this board. An ideal is stated, a relationship to a given person/thing/event/situation is posited, a summary judgment is made and that's the end of that. Predictions are made as facts, not probabilities. No one factors the dynamic effect of self-fulfilling prophecy into their assessment. Few re-test. Few hypothesize the possible effect of other information. This apparent stasis causes me to conclude that either a given value is not as high as claimed, or another, unstated value exceeds the stated one.

[patrice]

43. Not that I really blame most people for what is relatively normal; just let's all be honest about

what is going on, otherwise the valence and purpose of the relationship implied by communication becomes doubtful.

[Pholus]

50. Let's sum up.

In post 2 you've implied that I'm disloyal as in the "not-so-loyal opposition."

In post 37 you implied I'm not being honest in my position and that this
dishonesty "poisons everyone with stasis."

In post 42, ironically your longest post after you apologize for being wordy,
you tell me that I am not thoroughly thinking through the consequences of
holding my values and that I obviously have not given my position any kind
of careful thought. I admit I got bored reading this and only skipped ahead to
the concluding paragraph, but I am sure I didn't miss anything of consequence.

In post 43 you seem to be questioning my motives in even holding a dissenting
opinion in the guise of honesty again. But I do appreciate your understanding
of the "lesser folks" who disagree with you out of ignorance because it's just
normal.

Summary:

Persuasive writing FAIL. First off, the general prose reminds me why Sokal was
able to get his gibberish past a referee in "Social Text." One gets tired
of too much overwrought and overcomplicated language whose sole goal is to get
the reader to surrender to it. Secondly, despite your professed desire for
"honesty" you have made no effort to understand the underpinning of *my*
position, despite the frequent jabs at both my motives, my actions and
the reasons I have arrived at my opinion. In the end, what is made clear is
that you are motivated by the unquestioned rightness of your own values
and beliefs. I would describe that as fanatacism myself.

This merely reminds me that I need to divorce my opinions about the President
from the opinions I have about his more zealous supporters on DU. In that
way he'll get a fairer hearing.

[Le Taz Hot]

53. Well said!

:applause: That should be your sig line. Excellent!

[sabrina 1]

35. Well, since liberals, progressives, 'lefties' of all types have been

the ones 'going along' for over ten years now, even against their own beliefs, just to win, just to keep Republicans out of office, I think it's their turn to get some support for their choice of candidates. I remember being persuaded to support Dems I did not like at all, but did so out of fear of Republicans winning. Of course those Dems, many of them Blue Dogs, were never going to do anything for the 'left'. But we joined their supporters, over and over again and got them elected.

I think now it's time for US to get some help, to elect the people WE think would do a better job, REAL progressives.

How about people get on board with US this time since we tried it their way over and over and we are still where we were at the beginning on the major issues, now looking at cuts to Medicare when we KNOW this is not necessary but because we got on board with the 'win at all costs' routine, it's going to happen.

So, I'm asking those we helped even when we did not want to, to support real progressive candidates this time, and to refrain from the usual 'warnings' that 'he's too far left to win' etc. How about we unite this time behind some real Democrats and then it won't matter much what the WH does.

We could have a Congress that actually works for us if we would just unite behind the right candidates and not allow the DLC wing of the party to choose the candidates.

[patrice]

38. 1+ a trillion! I especially like your suggestion to ask those whom you have worked for in the past

to support more Liberal candidates!

I live in Kansas. Everyone in my district LOVES Dennis Moore and his IS a very nice man, whom I have helped on numerous occasions, but that seat went to Kevin Yoder :puke: last time, whose extended family are some of the biggest agri-biz subsidy takers out there and he is controlled by the Evangelical ChurchCos of Johnson County, see what all of that support we gave to Dennis got us?

So, I agree, we shouldn't commit our efforts to the wrong Democrats. I just think, since the Derivative Crash of 2008, at least some of the curtains have dropped and we are now seeing the authentic and longstanding limitations on the Presidency, so all of this anti-Obama stuff that is being pedaled by ALL kinds of political types, including Dems, is really, given our status quo campaign finance & voting systems, just more "bright and shiny" crap to distract us from the REAL struggle at the local level.

You are right sabrina 1, we need to go to those local Democratic Party doors and pound real hard.

[sabrina 1]

41. Thank you Patrice. I remember some very good candidates

real progressives, who with just a little more help could have won, but we were encouraged not 'throw away votes' on them and 'support the ones who had the best chance'. We did that, often reluctantly.

I think things are a bit different now though. At that time, Bush was president and we were totally motivated to beat Republicans at all costs.

Also, many of the Blue Dogs are gone, so there is nothing to lose by running a good progressive candidate in some of those districts. We lost with the Blue Dogs anyhow, so why not try now for the best we can get?

I agree about the limitations of the presidency. I think the real power is in Congress. If Obama wins in 2012 and we could get a strong, progressive Congress, even those influences that might be pushing him towards more conservative policies, could not overcome a Congress that was motivated to work for the people and he would be able to tell them honestly 'Congress is not going to go for this'.

It would be a lot of hard work and would require a lot of organization all over the country, but it's worth a try imo :-)

[patrice]

44. I sure hope more people get over their dislike for canvassing for whomever in 2012. The Reps have us

beat on that score around here by their church fellowships and also our local Chamber of Commerce. Dems don't seem to be thinking of ways to parallel those environments or at least put the pressure on party members to do more than write checks. I keep saying we need yearly canvassing goals and not just in election years.

[ProSense]

30. "because a tiny fraction of those 60 senators that caucus with Democrats are kind of conservative"

Brilliant!

You mean the Senate Democratic caucus isn't straight progressive?

That they all don't support a public option or single payer?

What number is a tiny fraction?

[Pholus]

32. It does underscore the fact that the opposition seems to get a lot more done with a lot less power.

I don't remember them having a supermajority but the atrocities seemed to roll on during the Bush years. The counter-punch? Well, Mr. Lieberman seemed to be able to stop that dead in its tracks. It's almost too convenient.

[no limit]

36. Can you please tell me who mentioned single payer anywhere in this thread?

Also, in the case of the public option as I mentioned in my OP Obama passed healthcare reform using reconciliation. Reconciliation was the same way SCHIP was created. And there is no way you can argue with a straight face that they didn't have 50 votes for the weak public option they had proposed. They had the votes, they simply didn't want it because they had already made a deal with insurance companies that they wouldn't include the public option in any reform.

[Kablooie]

45. Hell. I'm voting for Pat Paulson in the next election.

The world will end about a month after the elections anyway so it doesn't really matter.

[Le Taz Hot]

52. There are many of us who see the

dog-and-pony show as what it truly is. The fact that legislative decisions, regardless of party, ALWAYS benefit the predator class is no accident.

[hfojvt]

54. I figured out that you only look at the dark side

We got nothing we wanted in 2007? I guess a minimum wage increase and expanded SCHIP do not count.

Oh yeah, SCHIP was passed twice and vetoed twice. We also got this - over Bush's veto http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:H.R.6331: (Although I am not sure what the heck that does, but we did get it against Bush's wishes.)

Most of the $300 billion in stimulus tax breaks went to the wealthy? Excuse me, I have to sneeze (bullsh*t) (bullsh*t) (bullsh*t)

Darn allergies. Apparently I am allergic to bullsh*t.

Here's details on the tax cuts in the stimulus

http://projects.nytimes.com/44th_president/stimulus/tax-cuts-for-individuals

Note $116 billion going to the making work pay credit, which phases out for higher incomes. Only $70 billion going to the AMT patch. Even with the AMT patch, which I personally hate, very little of the benefits goto the top 1%, almost 50% of the benefits goto families with incomes between $84,000 and $169,000 http://www.ctj.org/pdf/amtpatchisnotstimulus.pdf

And as for Republicans getting everything they want, what they wanted in the stimulus was this http://www.ctj.org/pdf/housestimulusupdate.pdf

And yes, that was worse, and Republicans did not get it because they lost. They got the Bush tax cuts and, to a lesser extent, the Bush tax cut extensions because they won in 2000, 2002, and 2010. Without a Bush Presidency and a Republican Congress there is no Bush tax cuts and no Iraq war.

So, yeah, it does matter if Republicans get defeated even if progressives don't get everything they want when Democrats win.