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Yeah it sucks, and I’m in no mood to write one of those “we fought the good fight” pieces any more than you’re in the mood to read one. So a few quick points:
1) There is absolutely no doubt in anyone’s mind that Blanche Lincoln’s derivatives amendment would never be in the financial regulation bill unless Halter was in the race. None. It’s not a guess. Many people who have been working on the legislation have said so, repeatedly. She only became interested in it to show she was doing something with the banks besides soaking up their PAC money. If she had lost today, it would’ve been out of the bill tomorrow. Tonight somewhere Goldman Sachs is weeping, because if they take it out now, she’ll look like a corporate lackey who was only doing it for the optics and Boozman will have a field day.
2. It’s no small thing that Blanche’s $2.9 million in PAC donations from Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, AIG and Exxon Mobil were offset by $3.6 million in small donor donations for Halter. That could not have happened 10 years ago, because we would have been at the mercy of the media to get the message out to tens of thousands of people. When we started trying to calculate how much the online organizations could raise together, we really didn’t know (I guessed $3 million). Now we do. $3.6 million for the not-extraordinarily-progressive Bill Halter means it can be done again, which will will be a strong incentive for quality challengers to take on incumbents who might not otherwise want to risk it.
3. We should’ve pushed back earlier on the “labor is running the campaign” narrative. Most of the money for Halter’s campaign came from small dollar donors — the labor money was outside expenditure, over which Halter himself had no control. Over the past two days I literally winced as I heard one liberal pundit after another internalize that right wing message. It had to be toxic in Arkansas.
4. That said: suck on it, “anonymous Senior White House officials” and other assorted DC Democrats (extra hard for you, Bill Clinton). Labor is not your bitch, and their money isn’t yours to direct. They’re supposed to take what, another six years of black eyes from Blanche Lincoln just because you say so? If their $8 million buys derivatives legislation and limits the damage that the Masters of the Universe can do to the world economy in the future, it’s not only a bargain, it also means that a bunch of nurses and janitors have done more to rein in the banks than you and your entire pack of servile, visionless Wall Street lackeys has done since you took office.
Update: Greg Sargent says much the same thing only better, without all the Blogging 2004 language.
208 Comments
*sigh*
lessons learned — thanks for the post mortem jane
The White House’s message seemed like gloating.
All thanks to you Jane, we actually had something to be excited about, even if Halter was not the dream candidate.
I love your bullet #2. Yes, we will do it, and I think this is a great shot fired over the bow.
That is one thing I can hold on to. Thank you, Jane.
Kudos to Halter for a race well run, and many thanks to you, Jane, for getting the ball rolling. You made a difference! We made a difference, esp in terms of the derivitives. We have to keep doing what we can. I agree with Greg sargent’s article; progressives did make a difference. Tweety ca suck on it; he already trotted out his Corp masters’ party line about how this was a “crushing” defeat for us DFHs. Bull hockey! Halter gave Lincoln a real run for her money, and she only squeaked by bc of voter dirty tricks in Garland Co. Keep it up!
What’s poor Blanche to do? Piss off the banks or piss off the people?
Jane,
People will think long and hard when you say that they will get primaried. Not many would want to go through what Blanche just went through.
We were already crushingly defeated. We couldn’t go any lower.
There were also a lot of people making phone calls, besides the contributions, to reach out to the AR voters. Nice work, even though the outcome was not what we hoped it would be.
But how many votes would have Halter gotten if the polls were actually opened?
excellent question mary — one that is on the minds of many i’m sure….
Who is next?
Blanche, grats on your quarter-final victory. Best of luck rallying your people for the finals.
I am sure they have all their dollars…I mean ducks in a row.
Probably not enough to make up 4 percentage points for a win.
I was SO looking forward to calling her office tomorrow and singing a verse of Woody Guthrie’s “So Long, Been Good To Know Ya” to the office munchkin who answered the phone…
Right on the money, no pun intended.
Jane November is a long ways away I bet the bill gets killed quietly in 2 or three weeks
Has Halter’s campaign considered a Voting Rights Act lawsuit based on the outrageous actions in Garland County?
And, now what? Are we gonna support Blanche in the general or let her spin in the wind?
May I also say that this was no kabuki on our part. So kabuki on, Garth. We are fed up with that show.
Ah if only we’d used those efforts for good instead of evil. We could’ve elected more Blue Dogs who would destroy labor, turn the country into the Republic of Gilead and write a big check directly to Goldman Sachs for the value of the Social Security Trust Fund.
What were we thinking.
Thanks for fighting for us Jane. But we don’t have time for our sorrows. The saps that run the Democratic Party really think that their opponents should give them their due and not attack them for some indefinite period of time. Kind of like “good sportsmanship.” It is one of the weaknesses of Democrats in general, but the party leadership specifically. It is one thing the Repugs figured out a long time ago. It’s why the Tea Party and the Repugs are even in any kind of contention to win the Congress. They just keep attacking. They don’t believe in giving your opponent time to regroup and neither should we. One thing that should be fought immediately is the craven voter suppression that went on in Garland County. As far as I’m concerned Blanche Lincoln won a pyrrhic victory. She’s just lost half of the Democratic Party of Arkansas with this stunt (probably more than half). Polling as bad as she does against the Repug opponent, reminding the Democrats she just screwed that she in fact screwed them is one way to make her pay repeatedly until her failure in November. Secondly, we have to really get under the skin of the Democrats in Congress and I mean BAD. We have to really turn up the fact that they are shilling for bankers and hedge funders while screwing working people.
And in my opinion, we need to really scare the hell out of the establishment. We need to start talking about a New Bonus Army. Just like the Bonus Army that camped out on the Mall in the ’30′s for what they were owed, we need to get millions of unemployed to do the same. March right down to that Mall and pitch their tents to make a statement. There are 15 million unemployed and millions more underemployed. If the fat cat, no good, bastard Banksters can get a bonus after they nearly destroyed civilization (I still think we are on a slow slide to Depression)then we need to ask, “where the hell is our bonus for putting up with it?”
Markos is essetially saying the same:
There’s no “quietly” about it. If that happens, I want the job writing John Boozman’s ads, because “vultures” is going to be the SECOND best ad of the political season:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW-ZwttqxJQ
Good points all, Jane, thanks for your hard work. Another point: the realization that Dem and Repub incumbents alike are just corporate whores is taking hold with the electorate. 49% of the Arkansas voters saw through Blanche’s BS; this message surely is sinking in elsewhere.
Jane, the deck is stacked against us, as you know better than most. Just a little of this hat trick gives them something to worry about. I am sure they won’t be getting all grey over it, but I still think we have to fight back. Or we really have had it.
Oh, Barack is going to kick ass. Also.
Jane, I can now put my head down with a smile on my face as you do what you do best: tell the goddamn truth without apology. Another dawn, another Blue Dog to mess with, we keep fighting to recover the Democratic values the WH & the congressional Dems would rather we ignore.
lol. Go for it, Jane!
Cool! Any chance the voter lawsuit in Arkansas might effect things?
The derivatives amendment was such a blatant and effective political ploy. It partially neutralized the message that she is a corporate shill. I wish I could be optimistic that the derivatives meausure will survive. Can’t wait to see who will be the chosen villain for stripping it from the conference report.
Of course having Obama cutting ads and Bill Clinton on the ground also helped Lincoln but there’s not much we can do about that it. Doesn’t exactly energize the base for 2012 though.
Seconded!
Gibbons is out of the Nevada governor’s race. Sandoval, the wnnner, would enforce Jews wearing the Star of David if his state passed a law requiring that. Interesting bunch they got there.
Boozman doesn’t need ads. Nate has him at 92% chance of winning.
I think the NV Senate race is going to be one of the most amusing races of the fall.
I mean, really — who could have made up a Prohibition Party member running for US Senator from Nevada on the ReThug ticket? Talk about things that make you go, “huh?”
Jeebers. We don’t need elections anymore. Nate can tell us who would have won./s
If their $8 million buys derivatives legislation and limits the damage that the Masters of the Universe can do to the world economy in the future, it’s not only a bargain, it also means that a bunch of nurses and janitors have done more to rein in the banks than you and your entire pack of servile, visionless Wall Street lackeys has done since you took office.
Jane, this is why I love you.
Agreed.
Damian Paletta at the Wall Street Journal has a similarly-perceptive assessment:
The spotlight now needs to be on the financial reform bill conferees, whose staffers and Party-empowered leaders have already had more than a week to quietly work on deals with the White House and Wall Street Lobbyists in the back rooms. Time for Blanche Lincoln to truly own her important derivatives piece of the legislation, and for all of us to publicly make her own it, before she can start to evince a sudden change of mind…
#1, agreed. Worth it.
#2, I’m still concerned about this track as we get continually poorer and poorer, not to mention it’s still just corruption.
#3, meh. Something retarded was bound to stick, you can’t knock em all down.
#4, nice :-)
Blanche used Karl Rove’s playbook: Cheat to get close enough to steal the win.
I don’t think anyone is really heartbroken — nobody thought Halter was the new Paul Wellstone or anything. To his credit he stepped up at an important time, took a bunch of shit from the DC elites and gave it his best shot in a year where everyone knew it would be tough for Democrats. He gets props for that.
The financial regulatory bill is still wholly inadequate, but it might just suck less in the end because of Bill Halter. That’s more than we would’ve got if we just stayed home playing XBox for the past 2 months.
Given tonight’s early results on the west coast, Arkansas has nothing on California with Meg Whitman & Carly Fiorina winning their primary bids.
And the corporate funded & written ballot propositions? Don’t ask.
Hey, Teddy, how’s it going?
And I love you too, Teddy.
Ah, in another life…
If either of them win I am leaving the state. The only reason I stay now is due to health insurance. That will be gone soon anyway.
Real Progressives must get rid of the notion that politics has rules.
Obama ran one of the most progressives campaigns known to man in 2008, to only turn into Bush once he got to the White House.
Blanche Lincoln became more progressive when Halter chanllenged her, No Halter, No Derivative legislation. this is a positive (this should tell everyone that the Democratic party is not a center right party, like the MSM preaches daily)
Real Progressives have got to stop or chanllenge the MSM when they tell the avg American Voter in various ways that FDR, JFK, MLK, would have love the policies of Obama and Clinton.
FDR, JFK, MLK, LBJ, would never let Obama and Clinton get away with calling themselves Democrats.
The MSM that is own by the Corporate elites tells the avg american voter daily Obama is a Progressive, a Liberal, and they believe it and we let them do it.
Would Martin Luther King endorse more war?
Would FDR said no to the Public Option?
Would FDR joined forces with Wall Street to destroy Main Street?
No!
Obama, Blanche, and Clinton get away with lying daily.
The main question no one ever asked any Neo-Liberal like Obama and Clinton why don’t you all campaign on the ideas below:
We neo-liberals like war like republicans
We neo-liberals hate the idea of a public option
We neo-liberals want to privatize social security like republicans
we neo-liberals hate unions
etc.
Obama and Clinton know that as long as the MSM considers them part of the FDR, JFK, LBJ, MLK, family of democrats they will be o-kay.
Ask any intelligent progressive and they will tell you in a heart beat that Obama is more like Reagan than FDR.
Ask the avg american voter and they will tell you Obama is like JFK, MLK, etc. I don’t think MLK endorse War? and more War?
Until Progressive force Obama and politicians like Blanche to admit that they love Reagan and Bush more than they love LBJ and FDR, Democrats will have a problem dealing with these double agents.
The corporate elites have pull a super trick here, they have put their puppets in both parties.
Jane, my brother said, “A Democrat might hurt you accidentally, but a Democrat won’t hurt you accidentally as much as a Republican will on purpose.” I think you can say the same thing substituting Blue Dog for Republican.
And that sums up how I feel about Halter. He was better than Lincoln, but he isn’t Wellstone or Feingold.
From Hoover Dam to Damn Hooverism
California’s budget deficit is a killer asteroid, especially with the federal government’s austerity fetish against programs that serve people’s needs.
If, the way California goes, so goes the country, – start packing your bags, you will not like it here.
A republican will fuck you and spit on your pillow in the morning.
A democrat will fuck you and leave you a quarter on your pillow in the morning.
Are you saying the next governor of California will follow in St. Ronnie’s footsteps in 2016?
Might have held up under Clinton, today’s Democrat will take your panties as a trophy.
if only.
and wear them on his head as he leaves the room.
I guess the question you need to answer is, would you rather have a quarter on your pillow or spit on your pillow.
And I think that’s rather unfair to people like Feingold, the late Paul Wellstone, Barney Frank and others.
Hope you come on up to Oregon, could use your help with some popular initiatives. :-)
How did Barney wind up in there?
Of course it is unfair. 100% of the dems aren’t rotten to the core. More like 88.9%
11% is a start.
Where is the Pay in PayPal?
Ebay is a fitting paradigm for the post industrial, post middle class, post republic, post fourth estate — oligarchy.
Well, there’s that. I could’ve added point #5 I suppose — that the winner of the race was probably going to have the privilege of losing to John Boozman anyway, and in the end the real value of the race was the pressure it put on an incumbent . But that sounded a bit cynical, and it wasn’t how I felt getting into this. It does, however, reflect the accountability angle, which was explicitly what AN was set up to do.
I guess the best we can work toward is reordering the electoral landscape for 2012 so that Obama can’t win re-election without delivering on the original policy agenda he ran on for 2008.
The chance that he’ll abandon his idiotic post partisan selling out every issue that matters to 95% of the nation is beyond the third standard deviation.
Oligarchy wins.
The money will drown out sanity.
What now?
Great effort anyway Jane. We should be proud. May I suggest Landrieu in 2012?
xoxo
and make his rent boy wear them that night
Never happen. Louisiana is way weirder than Arkansas.
Oops Landrieu’s not up till 2014. I’m chomping at the bit.
Isn’t Vitter slouching toward a bid for re-election this November?
The answer to that question is — Depends.
Someone’s got to try to get rid of her. She annoys me more than any Dem.
LOL!
While I can understand how the tone of the White House comments are aggravating, I can’t say I completely disagree with the underlying message. For months, Arkansas has been on almost every political prognosticator’s list as one of those states that will flip to Republican in November, regardless of who won tonight. Unlike Meg Whitman, most candidates in November won’t have the luxury of just pulling out their checkbooks and saturating the media with their message. Will the organizations who poured in so much for Bill Halter still be able to help candidates around the country in much more closely contested races? I know many on this site don’t have any love for the current democratic crop except for Dennis Kucinich, but I guess I just can’t be that pure, particularly when I consider the possibility of a freshman class with the likes of Senator Angle, Senator Fiorina, Senator Paul and Senator Toomey.
jrbobdobbs, has an assessment of reasons for CA’s cognitive dissonance two posts down:
http://elections.firedoglake.com/2010/06/09/primary-night-liveblog-%E2%80%93-part-four/#comment-3688
People in LA think she is liberal.
Great job Jane, we soldier on.
She learned her lesson and will be a good, obedient progressive now! And BP will clean up all the oil and make everyone whole. And we’ll all live happily ever after.
“Austerity Anger Grows in Europe
MADRID – Tens of thousands protested against austerity cuts in Spain and Denmark Tuesday as Germany’s powerful unions warned of mass action and Hungary became the latest debt-ridden nation to slash spending….”
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/06/08-12
Austerity is coming to America big time,but will the american public react like the europeans?
No. If we had it in us, we’d already be a European-style social-democracy.
America will finally learn what the F stands for when we get IMF’ed.
I don’t know how but the conniving bastards in the senate will put up SOME kind of cover for the derivative language to vaporize and Blanchie-poodle will dish up the, “I tried my best but got fucked in the end” drivel. Mark my words.
The fortunes of Democrats in the country as a whole are not what this is about. There are far deeper pockets than ours that should be looking out for the general election. Having limited resources, all we can do is target a small number of primaries where (1) the incumbent didn’t live up to his/her promises and (2) is vulnerable to a primary challenge.
I was never a Halter fan, mostly because I’m sick of being pushed to support the next great “Progressive” when I know damn well he/she isn’t. I get the need to dress up a candidate to energize the voters, but it doesn’t energize me.
Do I think the money and energy spent challenging Lincoln was wasted? Absolutely not. I think the huffing and puffing by the DC Dems tonight is actually a sign that they do fear their “base” sitting out November. The WH and the elites will now attempt either to overpower labor and progressives, or to marginalize those who don’t blindly follow their lead. And in their efforts, they will ensure that some of us do exactly what we’ve said we will do — let them run their November strategy without us. They’ll hold onto their congressional majorities but just barely, and perhaps learn to fear an even larger sit-out in 2012.
Or at least I hope so…
Blanche Lincoln’s triangulating Clintonian whoredom is no match for ObamaRahma’s eleven dimensional hologrammaton.
Are you calculating the coming swan dive into a depression?
It will be nothing like this dive, though:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQITWbAaDx0&feature=player_embedded
It’s a shame, since she Lincoln will lose in the general. Vote for Green Party candidate John Gray!
Prop. 16 catching second wind.
ojala!
16 and 17
Tim Kaine and Bill Clinton can take their gloating and shove it up their corporate-owned backsides. Pseudo-Republican scum. Are the Obama girls being groomed for no-show, no-brain hedge fund jobs, too? I think it’s likely.
that’s LA coming late, – this would be pitching huge money against basic common sense and coming up empty, – cool.
Crap!
Establishment wins, the fucks who brought this economy to it’s knees, who fucked you for 40% of your Real Estate value, who are ripping you off financially, morally, ethically and every graceless way they can……???
Jane Harmann waaay ahead•-(
I think Prop 16 and 17 are going to pass unfortunately. Most of the non-crazy parts of the state have reported. I don’t know why republicans like paying higher electricity and auto insurance rates. Maybe there’s some ideological principle involved??
Well, I do worry about those democratic fortunes througout the country. Just because an elected official isn’t your elected official doesn’t mean that person can’t impact your life, especially if he/she is in the majority. Arkansans can obviously primary whoever they want, but I’m just suggesting that the outside groups should choose their battles carefully and be strategic. Blanche won’t win, but some decent democrats still have a fighting chance.
Jane, As always you are looking at the important big picture for all the Americans not just progressives which almost everybody is missing. Neither our country nor the whole world can afford another totally avoidable economic crisis caused by irresponsible speculation in markets. I really wish Glass-Steagall Act was re-instated by now to put time-tested realistic brakes on this but fed audit, derivatives piece & volcker rule is a start.
BTW your article on relevance of internet last week had the best synopsis of the current state of political action I have read so far. Thanks for the article and I encourage everybody who has not read it to read the piece. It shows clearly how the policies affecting our long term peace, security and prosperity are being framed for trivial political advantages pulling us into a ever growing whirlpool of decay. We can come out of this whirlpool only if we recognize the problem which is self-made by not participating in elections. Thanks for showing the issue with such real clarity in a lucid way in the article.
I’m looking forward to the next battle. That one would have given them a scare. The sooner the better with 2012.
Sorry, I don’t buy this optimism. Blanche doesn’t really want this amendment, and she’ll look for — and find, with the help of Schumer, Reid, and Rahm — any reason to ditch it. Look at the 50 cowards in the Progressive Caucus who actually wanted a public option, but ditched it when the time came. If they can do it unwillingly, it will be no sweat for Blanche to drop her amendment.
Jane. You’ve tried, but it’s hopeless. All those things will happen anyway. As I often said, ‘they are all pod people’. There aren’t enough of you. You aren’t wanted. The US and its population are a global outlier. They will see the unique and hideous social experiment through to its ultimate conclusion.
It is time to abandon ship, and help all those others who want to but can’t to do the same. Leave the US to its fate.
I do not think we should be so pessimistic.
But I do definitely agree if we had more people like Jane things will be way better much faster.
What we are seeing right now is trivial to what our founding fathers faced and achieved through tougher odds.
Our constitution with bill of rights and intent of our declaration of independence is their greatest contribution to the human civilization and this is what all the countries in the rest of the world strive to achieve right at this moment. Our country is more resilient and it weathered two world wars successfully and a great depression in the past. Issues we see now are minor compared to that. Just simply do not skip elections and do the best one can.
It sounds like DSCC might be the right match for you. What we have here is a relatively small budget effort aimed at keeping incumbents honest. You mentioned Meg Whitman. Who’s going to match the $80+ million she’s supposedly willing to spend on the general? Not FDL. It’s the big dollar donors like Democracy Alliance. And of course Jerry Brown needs to start running a campaign, or no amount of money will help him.
To be fair, so did almost all the other ones, save for some minor reconfigurations.
Thank you and Glenn so much for this, Jane. We lost this one, but I think it’s a good, strong first step.
Eddie Vale said today the “anonymous sources” will be holding their hands out to us today. I can guarantee they’ll be doing SOMETHING with their hands, but it won’t be holding them out! Let’s just hope the DNC bought themselves some new knee pads with those Goldman Sachs dollars.
.Weren’t there voting irregularities?
Like the halter districts had most of the voting places closed and the 3rd place was supposed to be open on the day AFTER the election which meant the 3rd voting place voters were turned away?
If Lincoln stole the election by keeping Halter supporters from running she should be thrown in prison…scratch that…Lincoln should be in prison anyway and this should add to her sentence
But that constitution has been savaged, stamped upon and ripped apart by successive administrations. Ordinary people are well on the way to becoming corporate serfs. Incidentally, it is informative to read how serfdom arose in the Russian Empire in the first place. It was a creeping process. The same creep visible everywhere in US public life.
There were competent, decent people in charge during the depression and WWII. Now there are only scoundrels, criminals, and oligarchs. It is a very different place.
You’re doing exactly what the corporatists want you to do: Give up.
If enough of you leave, the ‘corporatists’ will lose their victims and be forced to turn on each other. That is the only possible way of winning now.
Fuck serfdom. Get in their face. Teabaggers had the right tactic.
Blanche Lincoln wins re-election by hammering on liberals and labor…
And the Obama administration taunts us about it, shreiking that we should have given our money to “centrist” candidates…like them.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/09/blanche-lincoln-win-spark_n_605443.html
This is a great yardstick for just how far Obama has moved to the right. Don’t anyone go away; we aint seen nuthin’ yet.
“You’re doing exactly what the corporatists want you to do.”
Dear Phoenix, the Obama administration ARE the corporatists, and if you think that progressives have some moral obligation to support these assholes, while they trashtalk to us about our loss in Arkansas, and crap on the historic base of the Democratic party, or if you think that we’re going to stick with them, you are badly mistaken. I can’t wait to start sending money to Alan Grayson to primary Mr. Centrist.
Come the mid-terms, Rahm and the rest of these porkers will be squealing like stuck hogs.
To put it another way; I am sooo UP for a game of political “chicken” with these shitbirds. :o)
Right there with you on that, tanbark. Well said.
Alan ‘kabuki’ Grayson? No. You’ve misunderstood. Abandon the United States. Leave them to feed on each other.
And Obama is again heading down to the scene of the Gulf of Mexico crime to flex preznintial Kabuki-muscle, as he talks about finding out whose “ass to kick” at the same time he signs off on more offshore drilling.
It’s like OJ, looking for the murderer.
Goto, I think Grayson is our best hope to but a little self-interest fear in Obama, but if you’ve got a better choice, I’m listening.
Obama: Labor is an arm of the democratic party…and I’m amputating it.
Obama: We need the liberals to get out to vote…so we can get conservatives elected to bash the hippies!
Obama: We have to meet the republicans in the middle…since the republicans went over the cliff, hit the rocks below and are in the marianas trench, we have to jump off the cliff without looking back!
Obama: We can’t let republicans get into office so they can fatten their bank account by selling america off piecemeal to corporations! That’s a job that conservative democrats mastered with Bill!
If that is your best hope, then accept that you have none. For Alan ‘Kubukied’ his credibility into the dust over healthcare. He is a 4th dan, black belt at least in the art. Not quite a zen master like Harry, but well on the way.
Says it beautifully.
Incidentally, without anyone realizing it, no one speaks any more of CS in C appointees who people thought should be fired.
So now, Timmeh, Ben, Larry, and Bob have gone back under the radar. Who knows what they have planned for the serfs?
“Now what? Are we going to support Blanche in the general or let her spin in the win.”
And there’s the question. And let’s cut to the chase and extend it until 2012, because that’s what we’re talking about, soon to be; arguing about.
How bad will it be if the repubs get back into power?
My take: Obama had a window of opportunity when he took office. He came in with some of the biggest congressional margins since FDR. The repubs were in disarray. They were scared shitless of Obama and the CLEAR mandate for real change.
And he has almost totally squandered the opportunity. And after the mid-terms, the squandering is going to be practically complete. Does anyone here think that his willingness to risk political capital is going to increase when we get shellacked in November? I didn’t think so.
That’s why he keeps moving to the right and kissing more corporate ass; because he thinks that will save he and his adminstration. I think he’s mistaken. Totally. American voters know political hackery and the same old corporate sellout better then ever, and they recognize and despise political weakness in a president, and Obama now stands naked and revealed as a weak and unprincipled man.
The economy is still in the doldrums. Bush’s two wars, which of course, are now Obama’s two wars, are still rolling right along, with their astronomical costs. In short, practically nothing has really improved, except Obama has faithfully executed and protected the “too big to fail” ethic.
Joe Biden was on Larry King a couple of months ago, saying that there will be 90,000 troops home from Iraq by the end of the summer, which is two months away. I’ll be looking forward to that exodus, along with a lot of other voters, but I don’t think I’ll hold my breath.
I think it’s now impossible for Obama to mount a real salvage operation from the 8 years of bushCo lunacy and greed. He had a chance, but I think the train has left the station. He’s done too good a job of rehabbing the republicans and the american right wing. I also think that we are going to have to pay a price for all of our hubris and stupidity, in the form of an economic situation that’s not going to turn around, and I don’t think our allies in Afghanistan are going to stick with us much longer, as the chickens over there start to come home.
Will it be all that bad if the repubs are back in power, to reap the political benefits of what they created, and what Obama has sustained?
I think not. Progressives believed that things were so bad under bush that anyone who came in, especially Mr. Hope-and-Change, would eagerly set about going full-tilt adversarial with the people who’ve nearly ruined the country. Instead, Obama has turned out to be a “centrist” lickspittle for them. Actions (and INactions, too) have consequences. Why shouldn’t they?
I doubt the american people are in a mood to reward Obama and the dems for their feckless shit, and I’m not either.
In fact, at this point, I’m physically incapable of hitting the touchscreen for him…not even with a barfbag in the booth. Obama’s best use for progressives is to turn him out of office so he can serve as a warning to the next successful democrat (whenever that is) for what could happen when he or she starts chasing the bi-partisan pony, instead of using the clout we gave them, to do the job we hired them to do.
Supporting him while he sells us out, is just more of the same crap that got us into this situation.
Bottom line: “Vote for us! We’re not as bad as the republicans!” Is a guaranteed loser of a campaign slogan…with me, and with, I believe, a lot of other americans.
Goto, you ignored the rest of it.
What’s YOUR option? Posting on progressive blogs?
Yes, that’s it. I’m curious if goto understands how his framing plays directly into their hands. “Give up, it’s hopeless.” Nonsense.
There are a thousand of us for every one of them, and more every day.
Bring it on.
At this point, I think Obama’s numbers are going to be so low that people will be coming out of the woodwork to run against him. For example, if I’m right, I expect that Hillary will find that irresistable, and will bail out of State to take another “principled” shot at the nomination. Or, maybe, she might stay there, to make her run. :o)
Which would be some pretty ferocious irony, given that he did rehab on her when he so foolishly picked her for SecState, as part of his larding his administration with Clinton retreads. That “plan” made me nervous, and rightly so, as it turned out. It was a clear indication of what kind of administration he would have.
BTW, Grayson’s falling into line on the HCR vote wasn’t a good thing, but given the situation, I don’t fault him that much for that. He has been, the best of a rather sorry lot. Again, if anyone can point to a better rallying point for punishing Obama, let’s hear it.
Unlikely, imo. I think the dems will come up with some random fall guy/gal who wants to make some speeches, fund them enough to put them ahead of whoever else, but not enough to beat Obama. Everybody gets on TV, it’s a drama for us lumpen. Might as well be Grayson.
The only way to fight against an army better equipped and with superior force is asymmetrical warfare . While mounting primary challenges is great and necessary we would be better served using the strategies of MLK and Mahatma Gandhi .
Boycotts and a general strike !
There is plenty of legitimate anger out there in the voting population and just as the Massachusetts election was a golden opportunity to send a wake up call to the establishment the oil spill in the gulf combined with the scotus decision in Citizens United is an opportunity to highlight the evils of corporatism , create a series of effective boycotts and a general strike and demand the end of corporate intrusion into our affairs .
The only reason the revolutionaries won their war against England is that they saw the futility of facing them in the traditional manner the British were prepared for . Face to face ,in rows , in a open field .
Instead the colonialists fired from between the trees ,guerrilla style and aimed at the commanding officers which , to the British was unimaginably ungentlemanly !
I’m just now in the process of reading Paul Halliday’s Habeas Corpus: From England to Empire. I learn in it that the British treated captured American rebels in the Revolution not as POW’s, but as presumed traitors. I guess that’s why they felt entitled to keep them in beastly, deadly conditions in prison ships in New York harbor. I wonder if the Americans’ “ungentlemanly” tactics may have had something to do with this genuinely ungentlemanly treatment of captured combatants.
On the other hand, we have been hearing for a long time now — ever since news about our current torture came out — how George Washington insisted on treating captured British and Hessian soldiers humanely as POW’s.
Well, with some luck the Republicans will finish her off this Fall. She won’t get a free pass. As much as I hate to say it, there will be a purge this fall, but it will be of Democrats. We will have 2 to 6 years to think about it before the Democrats are in any position to do anything. They really need to rethink their party. I’m so tired of these sort of 2% point races. The winning side thinks its a mandate, when they only got by with the skin of their teeth. Got the New Democrats on one side and the Republicans on the other, both corporatist whores.
It is best we abandon the Democrats all together. Nader 2012.
Barney Frank is as big a tool as Lincoln, he’s just quicker with the liberal-sounding sound bites. He could have ensured a very effective financial reform package coming out of the house but his masters in the financial sector wouldn’t have liked that.
Feingold, although he put on a relatively good show at Roberts’ nomination hearing in the SJC he voted to approve him as chief justice in the final vote. OK, to his credit he voted against Alito, but Roberts is going to do lots of damage for a long, long time.
Wellstone I agree with. He had to disappear because a voice of reason wasn’t going to be allowed to challenge the Bush agenda.
For the most part, Democrats aren’t worth spit or a quarter.
Kinda like Brad Sherman plans for the peaace activists on the flotilla to bring medical supplies to Gaza ?
Progressives are the british then.
A conservative could go on the air, drag a liberal from the crowd, shoot him in the head and say he was doing the country a favor by taking out a traitor…he’d get applause. He could accept a bribe on national tv and keep his job. Sandford hasn’t been fired. Kuchinelli hasn’t been fired. They have neo nazi’s writing laws in arizona.
But if a liberal says anything harsher than “shucks” or refuses to kiss tea party ass he’s slammed even by “liberal” networks as the lefts equivalent of the tea party.
Our people have to watch every word they say or they’re forced to resign while rethugs can commit crimes in broad daylight and go UP in the polls.
Transparait; I don’t think either Obama or the dems will have the political slack to withstand any kind of a challenge. Political charades are something that they simply won’t be able to afford. I think the voter landscape is going to be so bad for them that they’re going to need every single vote they can scrounge, just to survive politically. Which is why I say it’s important to punish them now, when there’s still a little time for them to change (as slim as that chance is…).
I think the die was probably cast for his being a one-term president, with his choices for appointments that would largely protect the status quo. The bitter irony of having the republicans screaming at him as if he were some kind of leftist radical, at the identical time that he’s been giving them ass massages with “centrist” unguents, is nauseating to watch.
That he just wasn’t intelligent enough to know that there was absolutely nothing he could do to get them on board for the slightest salvage operation, is depressing to think about. Hell, at this point, it looks like he’s not even smart enough to understand what a threat to him, is the misery in the Gulf of Mexico. That he’s signing off on more offshore drilling, is the stuff of political suicide. It’s going to get really bizarre, this summer.
Voting alone will not be enough to deal with the problems we are facing on this planet . Looked at the polar ice caps recently ?
Our representatives are bought and paid for , just look at Obama and the money he received from BP and his drill baby drill opposition or his tireless defence of the constitution .
BTW, that he’s supporting new drilling, albeit in “shallow waters”, is a piece of breathtaking arrogance from a politician who is on the verge of disappearing into history’s dustbin as THE poster-boy for a failed president.
Then Goto is right and we had best forget politics ,compassion ,this country ,and the fate of the planet altogether and spend armageddon quietly in a foreign country with our families .
What happens here decides the fate of the entire species .
You cannot beat these people from within the system, they have too much money–we have to stop working for the machine, strike, get into the streets. I’ll keep saying it and after more defeats like this, maybe some will get the message.
There were a few more of them than you in Arkansas even, and that in spite of Blanche Lincoln.
My thoughts? General Strike. Mass action. Overthrow. See if you can make that happen. If you conclude there isn’t support for it, my advice is get the hell out of the most evil social experiment in history. My own practical steps? I don’t live in the US. I wouldn’t set foot there either until I see the criminals in charge safely in jail and the key thrown away. Not in my lifetime? Hard luck then.
Don’t think for a second that obama’s stupid.
That prick knows what he’s doing.
When someone offers something progressive he fights for it until it’s on the floor, then he kills the left /center left provisions, puts in center right positions, pushes them to far of center right, then when it’s about to fail because dems hate it, he twists arms, lies and oooh rolls up his sleeves aaaaah. Then he sics his dog rahmbo out to twist arms/buy votes.
He’s a center right republican playing the democrats like a fiddle.
That arrogant bastard knows that we can either support him or support a true devil. He’s a calculating selfish bastard.
Jane Hamsher:
Accountabilty Now pronouncement:
Jane Hamsher on GRITtv:
Glenn Greenwald at Balloon Juice:
Let’s get this straight, Jane: You aren’t “really heartbroken” that Halter lost, even though you were “delighted” to have recruited him to run. And never mind that he wasn’t a “barn-burning leftist,” he was running “a very populist campaign.”
Let’s see… who else ran a populist campaign? Hmmmm… let me check the Oval Office. Nope, never seen that tactic employed before. New to me (and I guess you).
As for Greenwald, he clearly states a main priority of AN was to “enable progressive candidates to mount a credible challenge against incumbents.” Or am I quoting him out of context? Or did he not get the internal memo on continuity? You know, the thing that’s important to filmmakers in ensuring… ummmm… continuity.
So were you two at odds over the fact that Halter, as you admit, was not a true progressive? Or was Glenn simply using ‘Balloon Juice’ to hype AN’s supposed progressive creds? Then again, Glenn never uses hyperbole. He’s as Serious and Sober as they come. He would never descend into rhetoric defending you from the Crime of Speaking Ill of the Leader.
As for Blanche and derivatives, I was shocked, shocked to find that there was politics going on in there. What a populist campaign tactic! The nerve!
And then there’s the money, where, in the end, you basically don’t give a camel’s hump that $3.6 million went down the drain. You and Glenn made your point, and I mean, hey, Halter wasn’t Paul Wellstone anyway, so what’s the big whup?
It’s not like it’s a big deal that Halter’s campaign, driven by your and Glenn’s folly, was financially backed by actual union dues paid by actual union members. And I say folly, because even if Halter had gotten to the Senate, you admit he would have been no Paul Wellstone. So in the end, what would have been the point? More of the same? The only difference being that you and yours paid to put a non-progressive in the Senate? Boy, that would have showed those… ummm… Washington… ummm… non-progressives!
Well, you did make one point perfectly clear: you and Glenn put all your eggs in one basket. And you lost. And so did the progressive community who, despite all the hype and expectation, never really had a true progressive in the race.
Mission accomplished.
Looking forward to an R in that column in November!!!!
Sums up the utter hopelessness of it all rather well. Not sure where you stand on it though. Would be interested to know.
msnbc is reporting Palin as the big winner last night. She does look tough. Not backing down and her crowds are growing.
I’m still reasonably confident that the Corporate Stoogie one will be most remembered (actually, reviled) as the enabler of president Palin, 2012. Would his bipartisanship even extend to taking a position in her administration? Wouldn’t surprise me. But Sarah will be along to administer the coup de grace.
Get out while there’s still time. Your movements are going to be restricted in the near future. Just like the Russian empire. Oligarchy, and the creeping introduction of serfdom. Read up about how that came about. It should leave you very scared.
And she has a lot of friends on facebook!!
also
Personally, I’d rather be the one doing the fucking, for a change. Variety being the spice of life, and all.
“Corporations own and run the country” vs. “People own and run the country.”
From now on, that’s the ONLY political discussion I’m interested in participating in.
And I’m firmly convinced that one would be a winner for our side, if we stay on message.
The message that is on peoples minds are the economy and the deficit. That is reality.
I’m in, too. It’s the only stategy left that appeals to me as having a chance to change anything.
“Big Corporations vs. Regular People. Which side are you on?”
A worthy translation into realspeak. Thank you.
a good race. A tight race. but there is no stopping, the progressive movement moves on!
I couldn’t agree more with the thoughts, sentiments, and intentions you expressed here.
Just as gravy, I would note that the Supreme Court took an action yesterday that clearly indicates their intent to curtail public financing of elections even as they enable corporate spending. Which means the path we’re on will only become more so, unless we start getting very militant and “in your face” about rallying people against the corporations and their total dominance of the political landscape.
Indeed. This is MY FUCKING COUNTRY, and nobody is driving me out of it!!!!!
If I was going to put my faith in any incumbent, it would be Feingold.
That’s my preferred bandwagon.
We know he’s smart. Which is why I always worried and now firmly believe he intended to pursue a corporate agenda all along, he just didn’t bother to tell us about it.
Michelle was a corporate lawyer. I once lived with a corporate lawyer. It’s a real strain to do that if you are not in fundamental agreement about corporations, IMHO.
Just curious, where are you living, and how? Just in case I decide to take your advice. ;-)
Not the first time I’ve thought about it, I was exploring buying a home in British Columbia in 1991. But I really hate the thought of leaving with my tail between my legs. Not in my nature.
I would love to see 100 Bernie Sanders in the US Senate. And I think that gives you an idea of where I stand. What I don’t understand is how some people here tore apart Bernie because he voted for health care, but were utterly devoted to a candidate (Halter) whose progressive credentials don’t hold a candle to Bernie’s AND were clearly questioned by none other than Jane herself.
And I don’t know how it would have furthered the progressive cause to put Bill Halter in the Senate if he wasn’t truly progressive. It was a marquee race, and Glenn and Jane picked the bright lights because it mattered more that they make their point about, and be in, the big show.
That seems to have been the most important factor. Not actually getting behind progressive candidates and causes.
Fine. It should not be that hard to show them how those two concepts are connected
They’d have to be genuinely “fucking retarded” to think any corporate agenda would help deficit or the economy. Let’s concentrate on showing them the light about who got us here, and how, and why, i.e. who benefits?
it’s called ‘a shot across the bow’. What I don’t get is that Marcy Winograd did not get a fraction of the help that Halter got. Walk and chew gum? – not us.
Thanks.
My skin crawls when he talks about liberals.
He keeps saying the liberals always disagree with him but will vote for him anyway.
They make sure that it’s a corporatist against a guy who thinks that Swifts a modest proposal is a solid policy outline and would start a nuclear war because god told him to.
Didn’t Kaine support one or two conservative dem nominees that have serious ethical issues because and are closer to republicans than democrats instead of good liberal candidates?
Maybe he nominated people with ethics scandals to match the republicans who are living violations of ethics.
Was any portion of the Arkansas vote tabulated by voting machines?
progressives do not have their pulse on the American people. Unions are unpopular. Not the way to go.
I live in Germany. Actually, as US citizens, your options are limited. South American countries will take you. That’s where I’d go. They are young, dynamic and need smart people with energy. But unless you get a job first, or are fantastically wealthy, you can’t just settle in the EU. My thought was, the wealthy among you do something like that and then help the ones without the means to do so to come and join you. Your countries citizens seem to be amazing fundraisers. This is what I’d suggest IF you conclude that there is actually not the popular will to completely reform the political system in the US, form and elect a 3rd party, prosecute and jail all the crooks, political, financial, corporate (boy you’d need prison space for that) and so on. As no one has actually put it to the test yet (hence my derision at some of this blog’ posturing) there may still be hope. But as some of you know, I’m convinced they are all pod people now.
I was making GOTV calls for Halter on Monday evening and got a wave of angry responses and hangups. I think the high-profile labor and national (i.e. “outsider”) campaigning backfired. I think there is a point when you have called the voters too often.
waitomo
I got this response to a question on another thread from jackgittes.
I think what you say there and what Jack says is the answer. We are potentially dealing with proto-Arianna’s here. It’s all about that. Nothing else. In which case. How f***ing depressing. This place is HuffPo with swear words.
you wanting to throw all those people in jail? Europe has tried that before and a lot of people died.
John Boozman is classic small gov/hot button issues GOP – parental notification and intervention on abortion, screw taxes on anything including climate or deficit deduction, end deficit via cutting welfare like food stamps and – if SS gets a means test so it is now a “welfare program” – cutting SS benefits.
Blanche beat his brother in an election – so this is personal – but she has a chance to win despite being down currently.
The derivatives amendment will have something real – her winning forces that – although I expect it to be weakened.
Meanwhile centrist Bill Clinton (not left of center Hillary) did indeed campaign for Blanche and up her vote count in Little Rock – without that 60% plus in Little Rock she would not have won.
Halter was already moving right a day before the election – rejecting the union card voting idea – so while better than Blanche, he was no Saint.
I’m sorry, I complete fail to see what you mean by that. Do you have a problem with the laws of the country being applied to EVERYONE? Which is clearly not the case at the moment?
Don’t get me started on the system as currently constituted lol.
WhatThe’; I understand. He seems to be able to string together three consecutive thoughts. Can entertain and weigh differing concepts. Doesn’t confuse the words “nuclear” and “nookie”… :o)
But really, the problem is, that he just doesn’t understand how close he is to having the bottom fall out of his presidency. Most tellingly he seems to believe that if he just lets BP continue with their low-balling bullshit, in which, the US Coast Guard…HIS Coast Guard, has essentially fulfilled the role of an African Gray Parrot with excellent echolalia ability, as it reads the BP press releases that are handed to it,
…that they will make it all right, and he can stay above it all, unsullied by oil and rotting turtles and pelicans.
I am certain of this: he is wrong.
As anyone knows who’s been keeping up with this misery, EVERY ESTIMATE OF THE SERIOUSNESS OF IT has had the living shit low-balled out of it, and has been revised upwards, usually due to honest estimates from un-purchased scientists and biologists, etc. Obama, at the least, is guilty by association, and I think he should be. He sat on his “centrist” ass for 16 months with never a thought to review or change in the oil regs, then, about three weeks before DeepWater Horizon exploded, he signed off on MORE offshore drilling.
You’ve probably looked at the latest videos of the “capped” wellhead. The gusher may be reduced, but that shit is still ripping out of that pipe at a hell of a clip.
The lag from what’s just on the surface to make it to shore, depends on the weather, of course, but it IS going to make it, and it will keep making it, for a long time. If Tony Hayward is still getting up in front of the media and telling everyone how well they’re doing, as the Gulf beaches are being covered in oil, Hayward is just going to lose the “votes” of the BP board; Barack Obama, OTOH is going to be a political pariah. NO one will even want to be seen campaigning with him.
Put it like this; I think he’s a lot more at risk by leaving this in the hands of the people who are directly responsible, with all of their self-serving bullshit being exposed, almost by the hour, than he would be if he:
Froze BP’s assets
With no warning, sent in armed U.S. Marshalls to take over BP’s headquarters, and their on-site vessels, impounded their computers and all their communications on this, from day one, and then moved in some NASA sharps to come up with a way to plug that pipe, and permanently.
I’m skeptical that BP is willing to do that. I think they want to keep it useable, to try to recoup some of their losses on this, and by doing that, they are into the “WFT…in for a dime; in for a dollar” mindset, and forget the impact on the environment.
The short of it is that Obama just doesn’t seem to realize how serious this is, and how it’s building on his head. He is going to get a lot of the blame for this, and I don’t care how hard he tries to keep it as BP’s monster; it’s going to crawl up in his lap as he sits in the Oval Office bubble. All things considered, I won’t mind a bit.
Actually, I have some ideas on how to cut down on the need for prison space that you refer to, but I’ll keep them to myself for now lol.
I like Feingold, too, but I think Grayson would, and will, be a bigger threat to Obama.
I think push is coming to shove, and as it does, the political climate now, isn’t going to look anything like it will, 5 months from now, nor, 2 years from now. Not even close.
If Grayson tries, he’s going to get taken on Airforce One, and ‘lost’ somewhere over open water.
Mary
Thanks for the republican and democrat definitions. It cheered me up. Thanks also to Jane for the illuminating insight. How about targeting Arizona next? The DNC doesn’t help much (if any) in AZ D-2. I’m afraid our next catastrophe will involve social security.
Wel, if I’m wrong, and I may be, for example, about his seemingly not being intelligent enough to know that the republicans were going to oppose practically every effort he made to salvage something from their and bush’s 8 years of lunacy, then he knew they would, and everything he’s done, every word he’s spoken about doing the right thing, is just cyinical bullshit.
And if that’s true, if he KNOWS that this disaster in the GOM is going to ruin part of the planet and his presidency along with it, then that means that he’s totally into the idea of not taking an inch of action to re-establish federal domain over these giant corporations.
And if this be so, then hamstringing him at the mid-terms, and running him out of office in 2012, will be God’s work, and no bullshit about it.
You may want to look up the word “populist” in the dictionary. It doesn’t mean “progressive.” There are right-wing populists, too.
And as for “delighted” to have recruited Halter, yes, we are, and we’ll keep doing it. It had an impact. I’ve said many times, the principle value of primaries is the effect they have on incumbents while they’re happening. It did have an impact on Lincoln’s actions. I wasn’t looking forward to watching Halter get his ass kicked by Boozman, though, who is running 25-30 points ahead of any Democratic challenger. That’s Blanche’s privilege now.
Accountability Now was set up to hold politicians like Blanche Lincoln accountable and make them defend their records with the electorate. We did that. I realize there are some big babies who want to win every election and cry when they don’t, and who somehow think that echoing the White House’s union-bashing talking points helps the union members they suddenly care so very much about, but you didn’t give a damn dime, so the cost isn’t any of your concern is it.
Congratulations on being a triumphalist for power, though. It has all the class of a junior high prom queen scrawling anonymous obscenities across the mirror in lipstick about the runner up in the girl’s bathroom.
There are a few subtle flaws in the talking points and links Rahm gave you, however. Here’s one you might find helpful:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/
Agree with that. The pain will increase, and with it the anger, and with that, hopefully, the awareness.
Oh my bloody God! You are indeed a pod person. Run for your lives everyone.
“Now you’re getting smart,” as the old joke about eating the sheep pellets goes. ;-)
I love you without reservation, Jane, and think you are a MAJOR hero for all you have done and tried to do, and that will never change, and I don’t subscribe to the flavor of the comment you responded to here, BUT
in all honesty, i must say Id be happy pushing an agenda that would appeal to “populists” from both, or either, left and right, and you have indicated in the past that you also appreciate the wisdom and opportunity present in such a strategic shift.
After all, “populist” means “people” in essence, and the interests of the people, as opposed to the big corporations (who are NOT fucking “persons,” no matter what those idiotic Supes think), should be what it’s all about, especially now when we are perched on the edge of a right-wing cliff. It would have to be a big improvement over present circumstances. Wouldn’t it? Anti-corporate, clean, accountable govt, limit foreign adventures, rule of law. All populist issues, and a good focus for improvement. IMHO
You think Bernie Sanders could seriously challenge Blanche Lincoln in Arkansas.
Okay. I think we understand the quality of thinking that’s going on here.
You’ve been here as a right wing fluffer for years. If you had a progressive bone in your body, you’d be looking to Obama and wondering why he came in on Lincoln’s side. But you’re trying to invoke some faux progressive standard you don’t believe in yourself to measure others by.
Enough with the people who were Republicans last week deciding what’s progressive, what progressives should do, and wearing it as a mantle they do not deserve. Your only goal is to cudgel others with it when they actually do fight for accountability. You can’t throw Bernie Sanders’ name in and think that it fools anyone, making personal attacks and arguments you don’t believe in to try and discredit efforts you oppose for reasons that have nothing to to with progressive values.
Here you were bashing Juan Cole in 2006 (though I think you called yourself Rob then):
And again, defending Christopher Hitchens AGAINST Cole.
Here you are bashing Glenn Greenwald and defending GE’s corporate suppession of the news.
Here you are defending Rahm in your faux-progressive mantle, calling criticism of him “unhinged.”
Your agenda is right-leaning corporatist. Stop pretending you’re anything else but an authoritarian hack who knows his own agenda is too loathsome and discredited to acknowledge, so you’re pretending to have another one to make your arguments.
Well, Razor, if I’m right, and he IS stupid, then we should run him out of office for that, too. :o)
At this point either reason works for me. :o)
Okay Jane. Having read the comments you picked out, you’ve caught a very evolved troll for us. Sorry.
However, my own question remains. Why does FDL engage in any way, shape or form with the ludicrous Democratic Party? What are you hoping to do? Why not devote resources to fighting Democrats and Republicans (they’re as close to identical as makes no difference) with a third party? Make a new, natural home for Bernie Sanders even? A party he could lead, nationally, charismatically etc. etc. At the same time, turning the tap of the ‘little people’s money’ off to the odious Rahm and friends?
Is is because you fear that there isn’t enough support in the US to do this? That the make up of the population of the country wouldn’t allow it? Is it that I am right, and the US is a global outlier?
Back in the 1980′s a new party was born in Britain in a hearbeat. Yes, it was the same old hacks as before, and it was called the SDP and it ended up part of the liberal party, but still, it showed that in other countries it was possible.
But surely, you have to try? You have to experiment and see if it can work? And if it can’t, you tried and perhaps then you abandon the country to its fate. Because if there isn’t the support for an sensible, left-wing political agenda that would benefit 90% of Americans, from amongst those self-same Americans, then what else can you do? You can lead the horse to water…etc.
You have to try. If I’m right, then what you, as a leader of ‘progressives’ are doing is no different to the actions of the Senate, trying desperately to find ever more ridiculous excuses for not voting on a measure that a majority of members have at some time pledged to support. It becomes transparent and obvíous after a while.
The Democratic Party is not, was not and can never be a vehicle for anything you want to achieve. Surely that is now undeniable. You then have to see whether the American people are the bigger barrier in your way. And if so? I really don’t know, but I’d suggest getting out of there, because President Palin will not be taking prisoners. And that is where your country appears to be heading in its rolling apocalypse.
It does bear repeating and highlighting again and again! Interesting *results,* indeed.
Thanks, Jane.
And if we keep pushing, at the *very* least they will show themselves to be who they really are more and more.
How’s that 3rd party coming along? Do you find it’s an advantage to be starting a 3rd party for the US from a perch in Germany? Or is the postage budget a bit of a bitch? I will say that the distance seems to have some discombobulating effect on your comprehension of what we are saying, thinking, and doing here …
Now that I’m moderated, I don’t necessarily have the option of replying to your lame comments.
However, it mystifies what you are trying to do there for all the reasons I’ve given. I am not alone in thinking this. There are plenty of other readers of this blog who don’t understand and who do indeed find the blog’s posturing inconsistent. It makes no sense at all.
Stop throwing the snide remarks about forming a third party. I am suggesting it. To you. Because it seems perfectly logical to me. That is all. The current approach, however you phrase it, is pointless. It is getting you nowhere.
And I think my analogy that this corner of the progressive sphere wish to avoid asking the question directly, and independently of the Democratic Party, the same way Senate leaders avoid votes on issues they would appear to have majority support for, is perfectly reasonable. You daren’t, because it wouldn’t work with a population like the United States has. A weirdly indoctrinated crowd who’ve had normal sense ground out of them in favour of complying with the corporate program.
I just want you to face the truth about the place. And perhaps to be clear with everyone about your motives.
Now, when you react all snide like that, a little part of me may wish Pres. Palin on you. I also have a sneaky suspicion that her election would change little here. It may even be considered a bonus since crafted but ineffectual outrage might command a higher premium – i.e. more money.
But I don’t want an answer from you. I want one from Jane. Her silence in the face of an absolutely obvious question is deafening, and pathetic I’m afraid.
You are welcome to your opinion, of course. I’ll stick with Jane and crew, they’re tactically brilliant and you are not. It’s easy for you to sit on the sidelines and whine about not getting any attention, but I don’t see that you have much of a track record, and neither do third parties. Jane worries Emmanuel, she pisses the little prick off. That is a good sign.
President Palin has a nice ring to it.
You are certifiably insane.
As the FDL Site Admin, I’d ask that you please debate the issues without the personal insults or your comments will continue to be moderated.
“President Palin has a nice ring to it.”
I will dance naked if the republicans are brickdumb enough to nominate Sarah Palin.
On every blog I can get on, I will also run the clip of her saying, when she was running for governor of Alaska, that she would support legislation to force women who are pregnant from rape or incest to carry to term. :o)
Oh. We would see billboards of her saying “Drill, baby, drill!” :o)
And, of course, the old standby of her opposition to sex-ed in the schools, while her unmarried daughter had a bun in the oven. :o)
(Do I recall Bristol making paid speaking engagements to advise teens on proper behavior for them? I think I do. :o) )
If ONLY this politician and her ilk can even write the platform for the GOP…we might have a chance in 2012. :o)
Bring. Her. On. :o) :o) :o)
I’m not so sure I’d share your optimism there. Her star may yet be rising in their deranged little heads.
And frankly, spoken loudly enough, and often enough, the lies, inconsistencies and outright nonsense of a Palin campaign would sit well with a large proportion of Americans from the beginning. Win a few more over, against a very little loved Obama, and you may be dancing naked when the country nominates her, not just the Republicans.
I really fear this is going to happen in 2012, and I am certain that Obama is the chief enabler of this possibility.
Wow! Fu**ing Awesome!!
I spend a lot of time during the summer at the bottom of 16-24 ft. deep rivers in beautiful Northern California (with a small boulder in my lap.) Helps me keep in shape and tripping on natural Earth energy. But nothing like the cat in that video. Thanks.
I assume that’s directed to me? I am sorry if I crossed the invisible line there. I had a slightly acrimonious debate with Rayne earlier. However, Rayne was not exactly innocent there either, and was the first to begin the ‘insults’ with various comments about my thought processes etc. I actually didn’t mind too much. In the end, I made it clear I would simply ignore the person. Which seemed reasonable and will spare any further acrimony.
The comment you’ve picked up on was half in jest. After all, this is someone who appears to seriously wish for a Palin presidency which is quite a mindset for most readers of this blog. To pick up on this now seems a little tetchy. But I apologise in any case.
I must also state that I fear part of your reason for wanting to moderate my comments is the fact that I am asking a simple, direct and obvious question directly of the blog’s founder. And no answer is forthcoming. And that is a real shame.
I’m sorry if this sounds like I’m angry at you, but YOU are the one who doesn’t understand.
He’s a corporate lapdog. He doesn’t care what happens to the country or himself, hek nows that his job is to fool progressives into thinking he’s one of them or just an idiot, he knows he’s screwing people in favor of corporations and he’s happy to do it.
He only fights when a bill becomes completely corporate owned. He knows where the breads buttered.
Yeah um, no. Rayne was very patient with you, and took you out in minimal time. You implied Rayne was Rahm for some godforsaken reason, and then continued making insulting comments. You sit there pretending you’re the victim, what you are is an irrelevant troll in Germany. And that is a real shame.
So is the aim to describe me as an irrelevant little troll in Germany in order to avoid ever answering the question I keep asking here?
Again, my Senate analogy would be perfect if that is the case.
“We can’t/won’t answer because….etc. etc. ”
hmmmm. And to think, I learned what kabuki was from reading this blog. The irony hey?
Yes, evidently, he’s quaking in his boots. So much so he went to Israel for a holiday (?) at the time of the flotilla massacre. Seems pretty relaxed to me.
Look. This ‘strategy’ is not working. Yet another emperor with no clothes. You raised money. And it has in effect got you nothing. Dare I say, there is a little truth in what Rahm said there.
The way to really worry him is from outside. But you can only do that if you are willing to put your ideas to the test on a platform independent of a Democratic party which wants nothing to do with them (or you, except your votes on election days and your money in between).
“I’m not so sure I’d share your optimism here.”
You are talking to a man who is PROUD that he voted for Barack Obama. It was the thing to do. He was, easily, the best of a sorry trio, that being Hillary Clinton and John McCain. The fact that he turned out to be articulate and not much else, is no reason to beat up on ourselves. He said he would do some good things. We trusted him. What were we supposed to do after 8 years of George Bush, write in Al Gore? (If you say “yes”, then I have two words in reply: “Joe Lieberman”.)
I would remind you that Obama and the dems, that is, WE, doubled McCain and Palin in electoral votes. Part of that was the fact that McCain was little more than a bush clone, but part of was the fact that an ass of democrats, a lot of independents, and probably even a few republicans, were scared shitless of having Caribou Barbie one 71-year-old-heartbeat away from the Oval Office. The political truth is that Palin helped drag McCain into a most-excellent asswhipping. And that has not changed. (Except, of course, Barack Obama has basically squandered it…)
One more time: if you think that any politician who has stated her support for making pregnant victims of rape or incest carry to term can be elected president (just to pick one huge facial lesion for Palin…) then I don’t know what to say to you except I believe you are very wrong.
She is nothing…let her rally the 28% mouthbreathers. She can do more harm to the republican party than Obama would ever dream of. In fact, right now she’s his bestest pal. At this point, Palin is a great red herring for the people who are still trying to cover Obama’s ass, to use to drag across his “centrist” trail, as they chant “but-but-but he’s not as bad as Sarah!”
It’s getting tiresome, hearing it from supposedly progressive bloggers. Worse, it’s becoming the new democratic campaign slogan:
As is being repeated more often these days:
“Vote for us! We’re not as bad as the GOP!”
It’s a loser, I will guarantee you. The voters, left and right, I believe, are sick of hacks and sell-outs. How that will translate in the mid-terms is not precisely known, but I don’t see how democrats can take advantage of it with a preznint who regularly craps on his most loyal supporters; the progressives; the ones who were most enthusiastic about helping him to a big win.
Palin’s role is to keep the repubs on or near the far right side of the political spectrum. And with Barack Obama steadily oozing rightward himself, the farther that way she goes, the better, if you’re a democrat.
In fact, that’s one thing that really pisses me off about her; she makes him look like he IS a centrist, instead of the more-or-less moderate right-winger that he’s showing, with every passing day. I can guarantee you that every time she opens her mouth, as with the rest of the asshats, Obama grins like a possum eating shit out of a hairbrush. She and the others like her are the lynchpin of Obama and the status-quo-protectors plan of “They HAVE to support us. Where else can they go?”
Run, Sarah, run! :o)
I just don’t see him reacting like that. Rather, I see his continued refusal to engage with reality, and his absurd insistence on giving her latest droolings serious consideration. He has seriously considered Republican droolings all along his administration. Hence, you have Mitt Romney’s healthcare plan, slightly worse, nationally, for instance. He is indeed a Reagan Republican. No question about that. Only perhaps slightly to Ronald’s right.
I don’t know where that leaves you (as in the US). Except that your political system is, as I repeatedly state, hopelessly skewed rightwards, and leaves your country as a true international outlier amongst developed democracies (even Japan at this point). I find this all scary.
And that Palin has 28% as a base. That, after all their lies, lies, lies, double talk, pants down, wide stance toilet stall, Argentinian tryst hypocrisy, the Republicans retain a reflexive base never that far short of a majority of the country,and that they wish to impose ‘morality’ onthe rest of you! Well, that one will be studied for centuries to come.
WhatThe: Do you think that Obama can escape a good chunk of the responsibility for the disaster in the GOM? I don’t.
Do you think that, with the economy still in the doldrums, and with Bush’s, now HIS, two wars starting to boil all over again, that he can afford to have those spinning plates come crashing down? Again, I do not.
I think he just doesn’t believe that the voter perception of him as just another political hack, and a wimp, to boot, is being re-inforced daily. I think he doesn’t fully comprehend that his presidency is on the verge of collapse. If he did, he’d be doing more about it than just sitting in the Oval Office and making an occasional show-the-flag run down to the Gulf. His statement about going down there and talking to people “to find out which asses to kick”, was pathetic; the puerile words of someone trying to use the media, who just doesn’t have much of a clue on how to do it.
I think that any personal analysis of the man has to come up with the base that so far, he’s in over his head; that far from being the Machiavelli you’re pitching him as, he’s George Bush WITHOUT as much arrogance and cynicism, and sadly, without enough of Bush’s instinct for political self-preservation. If he had more of it; more of the cleverness that you assign to him, he wouldn’t be sitting on his ass while his presidency implodes.
You’re asking me? Certainly I can answer. I don’t see a third party that has anywhere near the tactical instincts and progressive values that FDL and Accountability Now has. None. I trust them. The last thing I want to be involved in is a bunch of ego driven theorists like yourself arguing over what to do while trying to get laid in the meantime. Irregardless, what Jane does with her time is her business. Not mine, and not yours. Who the fuck are you?
“Look. This ’strategy’ is not working. Yet another emperor with no clothes. You raised money. And it has in effect got you nothing. Dare I say, there is a little truth in what Rahm said there.”
I disagree. Do you realize that if there was no Halter, there would be no derivatives language at all? That Emmanuel wouldn’t have alienated the unions today in a fit of pique? What would have been gained by your little fantasy?
Nothing.
I’ll word it differently.
He isn’t machiavelli, he’s a corporate hitman.
He was hired to make life easier for corporations and he’s doing that.
There isn’t anything he can do about the GoM so he puts on a show of flying down to louissiana for a 10 minute photo op of him sifting through oil then jetting off.
He continually kisses wall street ass, fights against actual reform, now the climate bill will be called a communist greenpeace hippy activist bill because obama supports it…even when he gutted the part that had to do with the climate out making it an corporatist energy bill.
He was hired by corporations to keep democrats from making waves in the corporate world. He’s tried to buy off or kill the election of every liberal/progressive.
Obama is working hard to fight unemployment. He’s giving republican hack senators/congressmen their jobs back one at a time.
He doesn’t care about getting reelected. He’d like to, but if he doesn’t he’ll still get corporate cash and money from speaking tours.
He hates liberals because he isn’t one. He’s a die hard Reaganite.
The derivative language will probably be completely removed, or as good as. In any case, financial ‘reform’ has become a sick joke. Emmanuel really doesn’t care about alienating the unions. Because as he sees it, they’ve no one else to vote for. And that is my whole point.
True that about the derivatives, but they’ll have to drag it out for her now. Emmanuel can care about whatever he wants, it’s not only their votes he needs, it’s their money and their time. If he doesn’t know that, good.
Your position is eroding, you haven’t described what your plan would have accomplished.
I disagree about his not being able to do anything about the gusher. It’s a matter of sealing a 21 inch hole in a hostile environment…and a couple of smaller ones, too, as I understand it. I’ve said; I think he should shut down BP. Take over the whole shittaree, and put some smarts on it that have nothing to do with BP. NASA would be my choice. Those people have experience at problems that BP hasn’t dreamed of.
One exception; keep the guys operating the ROV’s on, but have non-BP people looking over their shoulder to make sure they’re doing just what they’re told. I think that if they can get an expandable plug down the pipe a ways, a tough, inflatable bladder of some kind, they could shut it off long enough to use a long-term substance to plug it permanently. (I have my doubts that that’s BP’s ultimately aim. I think they want to salvage the use of the well, again, and I think that’s making them attempt to gain control of it, instead of permanently sealing it.)
If I were Obama, with the way his presidency is heading, I’d welcome the chance to take this over and solve it. If he can shut that damn thing down, and do it fairly soon, he’ll look like Captain America.
The problem is, that it will entail that nasty little thing (to corporate amurka) of directly re-imposing federal control over a giant corporation, and on this, WhatThe, we are probably in agreement; I don’t think that’s in Obama’s ken. The question is, if his numbers really start tanking, as could happen if this just keeps going, of if a tropical storm kicks up in the Gulf, would he do it in self-defense?
Another consideration; if BP can’t shut it off soon, the demands for some heads to roll will become irresistable. Hayward will go first, I’d think, but that won’t be enough. I think that if they know that they can’t shut it off using the techniques and tools they have, they will inevitably move toward bankruptcy to try to cut their losses. If that happens, it’s going to become Obama’s baby, anyway. He might as well act, instead of reacting again, which seems to be his chosen policy.
Well, first of all, I must point out. I mean that FDL should define its own third party based on the values it holds, which are clearly not shared by the Democratic Party. So that would hopefully solve the problem of who to vote for instead.
Now, in Arkansas, the situation was always tricky. But if there’D been no Halter, you could still have raised money for a third party candidate in November. Split the Dem vote? Yes, probably and it puts a Rethug in, but a Rethug will win anyway, and what use is Lincoln as a Dem?
Of course, you could also save and target resources. But establishing a platform at the national level with candidates independent of the Corporate Parties, and answerable only to the values of this blog seems to me the way to go now. You could win some races. And after winning some you would be able to win more.
Pardon me, this is going to sound like real dickishness…
But this is the politics of City Council races.
I think I see our divide.
You think he’s accomodating corporations, and I think he’s actively working in their interests.
If he’s accomadating them it would be to gain funds for the dem party to win elections to vote in conservadem stuff.
If he’s working for them, he’d slash and burn anything liberal leaving corporate crap in it’s place.
He’s all show.
He does to BP what he did to wall street.
He brought them in, gave them a stern talking to, brought them into a congressional hearing with no power to prosecute, had congress bitch at them and come up with clever sound bites, and refuse giving Holder the power for a serious investigation into crime.
The congressional investigative hearings where “they get to the bottom of” torture, wall street shenannigans, war profiteering, ending this prosecuting that, bp w/e are just ways for Obama to get in front of the lights shouting “I’m holding them accountable!” and then refuse to prosecute crimes/perjury or even issue subpoenas.
He wants to look like he’s doing something. He doesn’t want to do anything, he just wants the appearance of doing something. I wonder if he’ll issue a non binding mandate or some pay the govt if you want to bs for this mess.
Heh. No question he should be run out of office. The angels would sing.
AND, how come your smiley noses are so round? :-)
I’m pretty sure you have the clearer view here.
You had me at “Labor is not your bitch”. Well said! Count me as a new fan!