This is infuriating:
WASHINGTON (AP) — Divided by their liberal and moderate wings, congressional Democrats return from a monthlong recess without consensus on how to tackle several pressing issues, including Iraq and warrantless wiretaps.
Democrats control both chambers but lack the numbers to override President Bush’s vetoes of bids to mandate troop withdrawals from Iraq. They also have failed to significantly rewrite the administration’s electronic surveillance programs.
That leaves party leaders squeezed between two camps when the House and Senate reconvene Tuesday.
Anti-war lawmakers say any Iraq-related legislation that falls short of triggering troop withdrawals is pointless and gives voters the impression there is no sharp division between the two parties.
More moderate Democrats want to pursue proposals to require the administration to rest troops more often and draw up redeployment plans, even if such efforts strike some as more symbolic than substantive.
Democratic leaders tried to narrow the gap with conference calls during the recess, including one Aug. 23 that drew more than 100 House Democrats. Participants said no detailed plan emerged, in part because many lawmakers want to wait for September reports on Iraq from the Government Accountability Office and the Bush administration.
Harry Reid was elected as Minority (now Majority) leader because he threatened nobody and had no aspirations to higher office. He’s there because people like Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Chuck Schumer want him to be there. If he is foundering it is also a sign of their essential weakness in the face of Republicans simply outsmarting and outmaneuvering them time and time again. They’re sitting there holding a solid straight flush while their GOP opponents are drawing on a pair of fives. How much stronger do they need their hand to be until they act?
In the House Pelosi is constantly undermined by Steny Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel (one of the architects behind the removal of the Iran language from the supplemental, who is in charge of House messaging). If she tries to play tough with the Blue Dogs she risks losing her position and thus has no leverage.
Anybody who is thinking about occupying the White House ought to consider showing some leadership in the situation and demonstrate that they not only have some vision but the ability to unify the party behind them. The toxic distrust the public feels towards Democrats in the wake of the chaos they are so easily thrown into by a much weaker opponent not only damages the brand, it’s going to make it damn difficult to get anything done even in the event of an 08 victory — and that’s a best-case scenario.
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- The Guns of August: Health Care Reform Battle Heads to Recess
- Early Morning Swim: Rachel on the Public Option
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zed
Zederoonie!
numero tres?
Loo Hoo. @ 2
Boo hoo, Loo Hoo…!!! ;-)
Time sensitive OT (EPU) – OT – Cinnamon Life Greenwald is kicking arse and listing names on cspan 2.
Well I simply typed too many letters, CTuttle. Next time it’s just a Z!
So getting rid of the BushDogs is the only answer, right?
Out of Iraq, Now!!!
Hi Jane. I don’t want democrats to be moderate. That’s just another word for being a wuss. Democrats need to be patriots and do what our founding fathers told them to do and protect the constitution and the country.
How do we give harry the hook? The best thing he’s got going is his slogan – give em hell, harry. that’s it – a good slogan. A more fitting tribute would be – don’t wet your pants, harry.
Eureka Springs @ 5
That was the morning after we bought the Cinnamon Life and couldn’t find it.
If I were put in charge, my Order #1 would be to prohibit use of these labels:
conservative
liberal
moderate
and yes, progressive.
Order #2 would be that any discussion of issues not make use of these labels.
Harry Reid says: I am not a chicken
Palfrey had a hearing Tuesday:
At the hearing before Judge Kessler on Tuesday, August 28th, the scheduled suppression hearing was adjourned until September 7th at 10:00 AM in Courtroom 26A. Before that suppression hearing, Judge Kessler will conduct a closed interview of Palfrey prior to determining Palfrey’s motion to replace her present counsel, Preston Burton, with me, and allow Jeane to at times represent herself in what is known as Hybrid Representation.
I have been putting up quotations for a new feature at YouThinkLeft, and RonD just sent me this one from his blog.
john in sacramento @ 12
Love that Tom Tomorrow! He’s got his finger on the chicken’s pulse.
ccmask at 13
Are you an attorney?
And BTW, I avoid meats with nitrates.
Gotta run. Have a great weekend all ;-)
The view here is that this post is particularly good.
hackworth @ 9
Is that an appropriate topic for a blog that discusses Sen. Vitter (R-Pampers)?
There are a few in my party (Dems) I am very unfond of.
of course they have no consensus plan coming back. They were all hiding separately over the August recess.
Great pic, Jane!
(I didn’t know Teletubbies came in an albino version.
How inclusive.)
jayt @ 21
How was the party across the street?
Jonathan @ 16
No, that was a snip. I’m in Sales.
Mr. Gore. It’s your’s if you want it.
The contrast between the way Republicans meted swift justice on embarrassing asshat Craig and the way the Democrats pussyfoot around embarrassing asshat Lieberman is quite striking. Sya what you will about the GOP, they know how to police their caucus.
Gotta go. Heckava lightning storm right now.
Put it in bold, Jane.
Biden, Clinton, Dodd, Obama, and Kucinich sit inside the Senate and House Caucuses. Edwards and Richardson are on the outside, but have close ties and connections with others in the caucuses.
Time to step up, folks. Make your deals, knock heads together, softly persuade, loudly demand, . . . but get the Dems together.
The public is tired of GOP mismanangement, tired of GOP deception, tired of GOP war planning, and tired of GOP obstructionism.
We have the votes to control the agenda — DO IT!
Oklahoma kiddo @ 20
The distinguished weasel from CT?
Oklahoma kiddo @ 25
From your lips to Gore’s ears! Here’s hoping!
Ethicsectomies.
I think it applies to all elected persons.
button down and unplug, cc!
How the hell did we end up with Harry Reid? You think LBJ would put up with all this s*it? Think LBJ wouldn’t have smacked down Lieberman?
Jonathan @ 23
My Bush’s Last Day hat was much more appreciated than at the July 4 party.
Rib-Fest was pretty sweet, too.
The Democratic Party. The party of choice. The ‘choice’ is either HRC or the GOP. Gawd.
Outstanding disection Jane! Maybe it’s truly time for a third party. What we have seems to be mostly corporate backed politics with little wiggle room for real change and decision making. A year ago I was on fire rooting for a new breed of Democrats (as in Ned Lamont here in CT), but I am feeling rather hopeless these days. Lamont lost thanks to the same cast of characters you mention in your post.
We should all do ourselves a favor and read “Imperial America” by Gore Vidal. Now that’s a writer who knows what’s been wrong here for a long, long time, like back to the founding fathers (meaning rich, lawyerly WASPs who had no intention of allowing the riff-raff to have a say in government). I believe that’s where we are and probably where we will stay over the long haul. So very distressing.
cleter @ 33
LBJ, as president, gave up power over senate democrats by pushing forward the civil rights bill.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 25
Ahh, the eternal optimist… with the jockeying of the Primary calendar, it’s not feasible for him…!!! 8-(
cleter @ 29
He’s one of them. Perhaps the worst of the bunch.
Whenever I send a candidate a check during the primaries, that candidate is doomed. This fine tradition goes back as far as Gary Hart.
I’m strongly tempted to send the Twenty Dollar Check of Doom to Hillary.
The time is not ripe for a third party.
Corporate interests still have their way.
The time will come when there is a collapse.
Here’s what is going to happen:
Gen Betrayus will make his report in September. He will say there is real progress and we can’t pull out now. He will cite all these statistics to prove his case. They will be lies, mostly. The report will be bullshit. Congress, both R’s and Dem’s will buy this crock of fetid manure anyway, and Bush will get his funding. The occupation will go on. Things will stay the same or get worse. More and more people, Iraqi and American, will die. More and more money will be spent. Many people will get very rich from this money. They will be happy.
A Democrat will win in ‘08. Whoever they are they will not end the occupation. They will say they are “redeploying” but they will be lying. We will have over 100,000 troops in Iraq four years from now. Democrats in Congress will continue to be the pawns of the Emanuals and the Bairds and the Hoyers. Dems, still in fear of insurance companies, will also fail to do anything meaningful about the health care crisis. Distaste and disdain for Dems will grow. This will be perfectly understandable. This is how the Republicans, who would otherwise be drummed out of the country will be able to recover. The Republicans will become the anti-war party, and will blame Dems for Iraq. At that point, they will be right.
Prove me wrong.
I really don’t quite know what to do.. It’s seems the Dems have accomplished only one thing since we helped them in last years election.. They have now developed an organized preemptive courtesy strategy of letting
progressivesAmerican people know they will support thiswargenocide for as far into the future as they can see.My Senator Mark Lieberlovin’ Pryor has two lines he uses on when questioned about the war.. One is the ISG report and the other is, we need to keep withdrawal a secret.
Democrats act like they are a third party.
cleter @ 40
Pretty Please…?!!! ;-)
I really wanted to chat with Difi, durring the recess but was never able to locate her undisclosed location. She did come to an event in Fresno for the UFA but the public was not invited. Hopefully the dems had the opportunity to get a sense of how truly disgusted the public is with them for their continued rolling over for the republics.
Morris at 42
I’d like to see your predictions put up, boiled down, on the Yankee scoreboard.
We’ve all been saying the same thing as soon as we were told to wait til Sept.
its to laugh – the dems get outplayed only b/c they will not unify and also the major dem players are beholden to the DLC!! i hope we keep putting true progressive dems in power and break that hold… harry reid and steny hoyer are not leaders…
jayt @ 21
Doesn’t this basically mean we haven’t written enough letters? Haven’t made enough calls, or sent enough faxes? Does this mean the moderates don’t have enough progressives in their districts to matter what we say? What if we all sent a letter a week to all Democrats basically telling them when they’re doing right and when they’re doing wrong? Something has to be possible to bring them into line. This is exactly what I meant in my comment on the previous thread about not enough party loyalty, not enough party discipline or party unity of purpose. Without those elements, you’re kidding yourself if you think you actually have a political party. Then everybody runs around acting like cats trying to get away from water! Period! You’d think that the threat to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights would bring them together, but some are actually willingly complicit. How can this be?
So is there any way that the real dems, the LIBERAL ones, can get the rest of them to do what is right?
What are the numbers, exactly? Are the Blue Dogs in the House a majority of the caucus? I can’t help feeling if she’s so hamstrung, what’s the point of even being Speaker? Maybe better to be in the non-Blue Dog opposition and feel free to speak the truth as loudly and as often as possible. Infuriating is exactly the word. The Democrats have Actual Reality and Truth on their side, and they act like they got nothin’.
Eureka Springs @ 43
Pryor is actually right about the ‘public’ aspects in withdrawing, quietly and discreetly is the best methodology…!!!
I agree with Morris. Twenty minutes after
HillaryBarackGore is inaugerated, the GOP will turn on a dime and loudly denounce the failed Democrat War. The Democrats will suddenly assume sole ownership of all the Bush debacles.cleter @ 54
But who will believe them?
Morris Sheppard @ 42
Hard to…! :P
Morris Sheppard @ 42
That could be the least of the worries. I don’t know anymore how strongly to believe this argument that Bu’ush is perfectly willing to take the even more vehement vilification that would follow from his ordering an attack on Iran, because HE thinks it’s the right thing to do for the long-term and that HE is the only guy with the balls to do it. Attacking Iran would ensure that we are ensnared in the region for decades, enriching all the Bu’ush / Cheney cronies and keeping us in the perpetual Code Brown Homeland Shitstain status convenient for the ever-firmer grip of a police state here.
It may be tinfoil, but it has a disturbing plausibility to it.
Jane,
You are right on mark as usual. It is especially appalling as the Republicans are pretty much admitting they are dead in the 2008 congressional elections.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..id=topnews
Miss you.
Ann in AZ @ 50
Ann, I share your distress, but not your surprise.
The DLC Dems show great unity of purpose and loyalty – to their owners, the corporate sector.
If they weren’t pliant, the megacorps would have given their bribes to someone else.
Ann in AZ at 50
You’ve made me understand something:
In 1960, there was a Democratic party with party disicipline.
That discipline fractured in 1968.
The Repubs filled in the void.
Pryor is actually right about the ‘public’ aspects in withdrawing, quietly and discreetly is the best methodology…!!!
True. The other way kind of makes a big shlurpy sound.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 39
Don’t forget, the Distinguished Weasel from CT is no longer a Dem. He kicked himself out when he ignored the voters of the party and went to Roveland for assistance.
CTuttle @ 53
You are probably right if one is sincere about, you know, leaving.
Pryor is using this language to hide from doing anything remotely like withdrawal. There is no way we can withdraw in secret over there, imo, nor will we..
SnarKassandra @ 55
Let’s see…. The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time, Joe Klein, Chris Matthews, David Brooks, The Wall Street Journal, Fox News, ABC, CBS, NBC and your uncle.
David Olsen @ 61
Imperium interruptus?
In the meantime, at the war, right-wing propaganda is still doing right well. Dissent and unbiased information, umm, not so well.
The cancer on the Democratic Party is the DLC. There was a time when we had no DLC. And we (Democrats) did just fine without this little group.
Dear Vice President Gore; Are you listening?
BobbyG @57
Yeah. I was looking on the bright side.
Once again we see the Green dilemma. These politicians assume we on the left have no place else to go, and capitulate every time to the right. Screw them. They have no right to our votes when they do not represent our views. Why enable their cowardice? Make them pay for it or they won’t change.
Random Iran war scenarios.
Eureka Springs @ 63
I certainly agree that it is being used as a strawman, by him, and, it would be hard to leave quietly, but, it is a wise strategy! It can and should be utilized from the four primary laagers…!
Oklahoma kiddo @ 67
Lieberman was chair of the DLC from 95 to 2001. Everything they touch turns to crap.
Rudy Tahuti @ 70
That’s why I’m in favor of creating fear.
Fear that each time ActBlue marshals supporters for or against a candidate, it matters.
Who said the Rethugs have forgotten New Orleans?
(h/t Raw)
Well, Bartlett, Rove, and Gonzales are gone (but not forgotten!!). It’s a happy thing what the judiciary committees and the house oversight committee are doing. These investigations keep tightening the noose. Perhaps by election time NOBODY will want to vote for a republican.
OK, here’s the deal. If the public perceives the disarray and disunity in the Democrat party, how can they expect better from their governing? If you can’t control your own party, how can you control and command the bureaucracy that is the Federal Government, or the armed forces, for that matter.
Here’s my reply to people expressing bafflement about Democrats:
The Democrats are officially part of the plan now. The tide has turned against progressives. If you have any evidence to the contrary, please post it. Otherwise, continued expressions of bafflement in the face of all evidence provided itself is not a “reality-based” assessment. The evidence states that Democrats are basically on board with Bush. They have their spines, and use them–to beat us over the head.
Remember the AUMF? Remember the hand-wringing about the Democrats Roberts and Alito votes? The Patriot Act? The MCA? The FISA vote? Taking impeachment off the table? Rendition, torture, and CIA black sites? Blackwater in New Orleans? Remember funding the surge? Remember Webb’s resolution calling for Congressional approval for war on Iran? Expect investigations to eventually fizzle. Democrats have betrayed you every step of the way.
Arthur Silber has it about right:
And my God. Is anything more pathetic than the liberal-progressive bloggers who continue to shill for the Democrats? They still are completely without a clue. The functional stupidity which these bloggers cultivated out of their political creationism is now set in stone. Day by inexorable day, their self-willed stupidity consumes them more and more. They have made themselves entirely worthless and completely irrelevant with regard to the most crucial issue in the world today.
And the progressive bloggers, just like the Democrats they service so slavishly, primarily think about the elections of 2008. Try, please try, to get a [expletive] clue. After we attack Iran…the world will be changed in countless ways, major and minor. I think the elections will go forward, and the major functions of our now loathsome government will continue as “normal” — except that none of it will mean anything. And since we may be concluding the first six or eight months of a genuine and spreading world war, it’s more than likely that the Republicans will keep the White House, and perhaps even take back one or both houses of Congress. The Democrats try to convince us that their dicks are just as big as the Republicans’ (an especially neat trick for Hillary, but then she is so special), but given how this game is played at present, the Democrats’ problem is that they always come too late, and not enough. The Republicans will always win this game, and they may well win it again after some nukes go off around the globe and people are dying in the millions
It simply makes no sense any longer to support Democrats for their betrayals. They only care about their seats of power. The only way to get any cooperation is to damn them to minority status for their failures to cooperate with their base. That’s the only thing that will get their attention. Otherwise, they could care less. They need to be threatened by their base, earnestly and convincingly.
They say one picture is worth 10 to the 3 words. Take a gander at this pix.
http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ka.cfm?kaid=137
unless and until the dems get a stiff spine we on the left which is the”right side” will be pissing in the wind….here’s hoping ACT BLUE et al will be successful in getting more dems elected
Oklahoma kiddo @ 25
Below is from an email today from the CA Draft Gore committee. It cheered me and thought it might interest you too ok. ;~)
Just last week an unnamed Gore staffer was quoted as saying that Al Gore would run in 2008. “He would do it,” continued the anonymous Gore staffer, “but only, absolutely, if it looked like nobody else could take it.” Our efforts and contributions in the next four to six weeks can have a huge influence on his decision. Please visit our website regularly and send your friends and family as well.
http://www.california4gore.org
SnarKassandra View this users Facebook profile says:
September 1st, 2007 at 3:14 pm
So is there any way that the real dems, the LIBERAL ones, can get the rest of them to do what is right?
When the DCCC, DNC, or DSCC call your home asking for money, speak up and tell them that you’re a liberal Democrat and that you have nothing in common with the DCCC/DNC/DSCC. That assertion will stop the donation pitch in its tracks and force the caller to justify the liberalness/progressiveness of his/her organization. At this point, you have the caller in the palm of your hand.
1) mention the fact that Congressional DEMs continue to fund the Iraq war.
2) mention the fact that Congressional DEMs continue to give away our civil liberties (e.g., recent FISA bill).
3) mention that everytime Bush says, “Boo”, Congressional DEMs roll over for a tummy scratch.
Tell the caller (if s/he is still on the line) that liberals/progressives don’t behave like that.
When the caller ignores your complaints and continues to bore in for $$$$, tell them to politely “GO AWAY” and then hang up.
It’s your money.
If enough grass roots donors turn their backs on the DCCC/DNC/DSCC, DEM leadership will get the message. I’m convinced that power is all they really care about. If they can’t get $$$ from us, they can’t hold power.
Get your money’s worth.
Unfortunately, too much of this is wrapped up in the administration’s push against Iran. The Cheney/Bush monster is determined to bomb Iran, and I think most of Congress has figured that out (I make that assumption of the basis of the utterly cowardly votes in both houses on Lieberman’s resolution), and most of those in Congress know that all hell is going to break loose in Iraq when the bombing starts.
That’s probably the central reason for the waffling on troop levels and/or withdrawal.
So, instead of fixing both problems, Iran and Iraq, these assholes are going to create a new one and make the existing ones worse. Right now, the Iranians and the Taliban are enemies (regardless of the bullshit coming from DoD on that subject), but, if we bomb Iran, you can bet that Iran will be arming every enemy of ours in the region, to the fullest extent possible.
Unfortunately, in addition to the wholesale mayhem that will create, the Bushies will then be able to say, “lookie, lookie, we told you so.”
I really wonder how many Dems in Congress actually know that they’re being played for suckers, by Bush, and by their own party leadership.
juslin @ 80
I think that we have to get a spine before then. Bush can do so much damage before 2008.
decaffeinated @ 82
When I answer they say “May I please speak to your mommy?” And then I hang up.
Hate to say it:
The money interests favor Hillary on the Dem side.
Don’t know who the money interests favor on the Repub side. Suspect it’s Hollywood Fred.
Ann in AZ @ 77
Listening to the morning call in show on cspan today.. All callers were disgruntled Republicans. Most could not articulate what their problems were because they are so full of the very talking points which bind them. Many still cannot imagine voting D in the next election,imo, because there is no message, no strength, no real leader in the D party. Hillary and Bill as D party leaders right now, are failing America because they coddle Republicans and DLC ideology.
hackworth @ 15
He nails Harry and Pelosi to a “T”. And a lot of other Democrats as well.
Compound F @ 78
Don’t paint with too broad a stroke, my critter, Mazie Hirono, whom I talked to one-on-one the other day, assured me she was a ‘Progressive’ and her votes have been in accordance! She is stepping into Patsy Mink’s old seat (RIP!)!!! *g*
Oklahoma kiddo @ 79
If Harold Ford knew the magic winning formula for snatching people away from the GOP, wouldn’t he be a senator now?
And why isn’t Al From wearing a hobo outfit, sitting near a busy intersection with a Will Screw Up Elections For Food sign?
Eureka Springs @ 87
It’s why Feingold should have run. Anyone seen or heard from Al Gore lately?
They made it illegal for the press to say anything good about him so he is not in the news at all.
Al Gore aint going to run.
Jonathan @ 93
Sadly, So…!!! 8-(
cleter @ 90
I’ll say it. F-ck Al From!!! His only goal is to destroy the Democratic party. He’s just a power hungry twit.
Mr. Bush, you commuted Irve Scooter Libby’s sentence. Do you intend to pardon Larry Craig?
-GSD
Jonathan @ 93
*sigh* Hillary vs. Rudy, and it will all come down to ex-pat New Yorkers living in Miami, and we’ll all go to bed Tuesday night not knowing who won. *sigh*
But are matters quite the way they are presented by the party – or are we all being played?
From the August 10 Washington Post column of E. J. Dionne, Jr.:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..01928.html
From the August 27 Newsweek column of Jonathan Alter:
Http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36…..ek/page/0/
August 28 comments by House Judiciary Committee Chair John Conyers of Michigan, from the transcript of Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now! interview:
Http://www.democracynow.org/ar…..28/1526252
[Has Conyers asked Alter and Newsweek to issue a correction or clarification…? There was no letter from Conyers in the next issue, but there was a “clarification” in that letters section correcting an assertion Newsweek made in their August 13th issue about Congressman John Dingell.]
From an August 30 Washington Post front page article by Jonathan Weisman:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..55_pf.html
[Except there’s nothing “conservative,” Allen Boyd and Lincoln Davis, about abandoning the Constitution so that our federal bureaucracy can turn its military spying capabilities on American citizens inside our own homes and offices. That’s actually the voting pattern of someone whose belief-system is more accurately described as “controlling,” “liberty-hostile,” and “Soviet-style authoritarian.”]
The ever-present “Blue Dogs” excuse is looking to be the best cover story the Democratic leadership of the House could have asked for to divert our attention from those in positions of immense power who are most responsible for the actions the party takes, and to hide – with the help of complicit silence from in-the-know caucus members – their true, apparently-corrupt agenda and motives.
Here’s the background and timeline – compiled by selise with help from House Rules Committee staffers – that demonstrates how empty were any “pleas” (to abide by the Fourth Amendment) from Nancy Pelosi and the House and Senate leadership by the time Friday evening, August 3rd had rolled around (no matter what the majority of the “Blue Dogs” were saying or doing):
Http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/8/9/175141/9215
The only story here that won’t square with the others is the one told on the record by John Conyers to Amy Goodman. Were all the anonymous leakers to Dionne, Alter, and Weisman lying? Or was John Conyers trying to parse around the truth so closely that he ended up lying? [Conyers was apparently hoping we wouldn’t notice that the “leadership” who were supposedly “against the bill” successfully did their procedural best to make sure that the White House FISA bill, and only that bill, passed the House (unamended) before the August recess.]
These multiple [”passionate,” “heated,” “explosive”] closed-door Democratic caucus meetings about FISA on August 3rd and August 4th need much, much more exploration and investigative reporting and exposure if we are to learn what’s actually going on inside this Democratic Congress, and who the responsible parties are. Every Democratic legislator who was present in those critical caucus meetings knows damn well who is telling the truth here and who is lying. Will any of them bear witness for the public to help us identify the liars and bad faith actors on the Democratic side (and especially in the leadership) of our Legislative Branch of government? Time to break the code of silence enforced on our public servants by their political parties. Please, someone on the inside, start telling the truth to the American people, political factions and wounded egos be damned.
P.S. For details on September events designed to apply pressure on Congress (and for more about Conyers from a meeting on August 28th):
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/26315
newspaperbrat…
Thanks for the link.
Let’s let Gore know we want him as our next president. I would love to see someone do a post here on why we need Mr. Gore.
SnarKassandra @ 92
I’m hoping he’s gone into hiding for a month or two to formulate his plans. The other thing I wish is for someone to call the traditional media out. The problem with that is that they have to be able to withstand the backlash, which would be fierce.
Speaking of all this Blue Malaise, what’s up with the ‘Big House’ being the House of Blues, Today???
Why can’t hillary and obama get mud all over each other and then edwards will win?
I am not ready to give up on Gore running. If he chooses not to come in, we have a pitcher warming up.
Please refresh your page to see pow wow’s comment at #98.
cleter @ 97
Gawd.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 99
Does anyone has the number and address for his Nashville office? We need to start making calls. How can he not see recent polls(I the one I saw was Michigan) that put him ahead if he ran? I know a number of people here and at DKos that would volunteer. I know I would.
If Reid and Pelosi can’t stand up to Bush and the Blue Dogs, they should resign. I want them to fight. If they win, great. If they lose, then they should pick themselves up and fight it all over again. If Blue Dogs want to replace them then fight that too. But I am sick of complacency. I want them to fight: win, lose, or draw. I want them to keep doing that for me, the 70% who agree with me, and
the country.
BTW I don’t completely buy the idea that they are just weak. The FISA votes didn’t just happen. They were designed with a certain end view in mind. This was to give Democrats a bill that they could vote for which would lose and a bill that they could vote against which would pass anyway. The May supplemental was similar. Pass a Democratic version that gets vetoed. Then pass the Republican version without a fight.
MOD @ 104
A must read!!! Potent piece, Pow Wow…!!! 8-)
CTuttle @ 101
Aren’t prisons an appropriate place for the blues?
SnarKassandra @ 102
I like Obama. I just can’t stand Hillary. I just wish Elizabeth Edwards had held elected office before. She’d make a great candidate herself.
kirk murphy at 59 says:
So then it seems to me the most important thing we can demand is campaign finance reform. We need to take no waivering on the subject for an answer. Somehow, all financing must come from individuals or public funds.
If…one of the best words in the English language.
Joe Klein’s conscience @ 110
yeah!
Hugh @ 107
You know what is said. Reid used to be a boxer. He oughta know how to fight. Obviously he lost his skills, or he just doesn’t care.
Newspaperbrat, loved your video from last night and shared it today.
Hugh @ 107
Two things that stick in my craw: 1) Simple majority is all that is necessary to pass House Bills, we have it already, and, 2) The House appropriates, simple majority, again! So WTF???
8~(
I still don’t understand what was being said in the video. Still laughed a lot.
It does sound like the top presidential candidates run the party, to judge from this.
Granted, I’m glad that they’re backing Dean and the DNC in reining in the rogue states, but it’s sad that they’re the kingmakers in this situation.
kirk murphy @ 109
I’m sure Marcy is not happy with big blue outta the title hunt, before Labor Day!!! Buckeyes are probably elated…!!!
again dems are spineless!! no other way to say it…
CTuttle @ 119
wish I’d seen that game!
Thanks, pow wow:
SEPTEMBER 15:
Thousands of Americans from around the country will join together in Washington, D.C., to demand the impeachment of Dick Cheney and George W. Bush and insist on the immediate end to the occupation in Iraq. Please join us: http://www.impeachbush.org
Or hold a local event:
Use the occassion of September 15 to hold an impeachment rally in your town. You’ll find big marches in Alabama, Kansas, and Florida on the calendar, and several more here. Hold your own. Visit your congress member’s offices. Hold a Honk-to-Impeach event. Hold a sit-in. Screen a video. Event resources are here: http://afterdowningstreet.org/eventresources
Anybody watching Missouri v Illinois?
CTuttle,
Spent about 3 hours in Hawaii on September 15, 1971.
On my way to Viet Nam.
Eureka Springs @ 43
Your Senator is so dim he would make a 20 watt light bulb look like a searchlight. Does he think that if we started to leave the Iraqis wouldn’t notice.
Hey, look, Omar, no more Americans. When did that happen.
Oh, about a year ago, you must have been reading a book at the time.
As for the ISG report, it was political kabuki to allow a withdrawal and serve as CYA. In practical terms, it was a deadletter and impossible to implement.
Anyway, I sympathize with your having to suffer with a Senator that bone-achingly stupid.
CTuttle @ 101
Sports and this blog post running well together today: you can’t win if you don’t prepare. (’Course, I’m pretty sure the team thought they were preparing. I don’t know about those big folks under discussion.)
—Coming to you from Ann Arbor, where it’s just Michigan (of The) Stadium …
Phoenix Woman @ 118
That brings into question why aren’t Obama and HRC being more of a leader in the whole Iraq debate? Right now, they have a lot more power than Harry Reid does when you think about it.
Loo Hoo. @ 122
Bring your own air quality readers, the last one of these i was at in DC in 2005 they released tularemia into the areas we marched through.
Jonathan @ 124
Hickam, AFB!!! A little preview of a tropical clime, eh? ;-)
Morris Sheppard @ 42
Where will the 100,000 troops that will be kept in Iraq for 4 years come from? Do you also predict a draft? How about equipment? They say it can’t be manufactured as fast as it needs to be replaced. Maybe we can buy arms and bullets back from all those that we’ve been supplying it to all these years?
New post
pow wow @ 98 –
wow. excellent comment.
i just can’t see how the house leadership (including speaker pelosi) can be doing what a minority of the members (the bush dogs) want… how could they continue to get away with it? it seems far more likely to me that the house leadership is doing what a majority of the members want.. and the kabuki is meant to confuse us.
‘course i don’t know – i’m just trying to infer from the available evidence. but pow wow, you’re right – we need some members willing to tell us the spin-free truth about what’s going on… and so long as that doesn’t happen, i remain distrustful.
Elliott @ 123
A pretty wild affair…!!!
CTuttle @ 129
No one here wants to hear this. I think about it a lot.
Arrived at Bien Hoa Air Base 11:00 p.m. local time.
Sat on the plane next to 2 special forces officers who were the only survivors of a Viet Cong ambush.
Walked down from a Boeing 707 to the tarmac, and was drenched in sweat at the time time I reached ground.
Jonathan @ 134
I fully empathize with ya!
Jonathan @ 134
Go ahead and tell your story, Jonathan. We’d love to hear it.
Jonathan @ 117
I don’t either, but it was a solemn crowd. A girlfriend and I went to a Pentecostal church once in high school and I had the same reaction. Could not stop laughing. The fact that we weren’t supposed to laugh made it all the funnier!
Jane’s right, I think. But this dissension reminds me of Will Rogers’ quip: “I don’t belong to an organized political party. I’m a Democrat.”
Phoenix Woman @ 118
Do you understand why we can’t all just have our primaries on the same date? I understand why many years ago, with no telly, this would be the situation, but why now?
Joe Klein’s conscience @ 114
I hope Harry didn’t get take any head blows; I fear he took many.
I hope his squash is OK.
He gets falling for predictable tricks – and seems incapable of learning or generalizing specific events into a larger conceptual whole.
His apparent lack of initiative and his apparent lack of executive function (planning capacity) make me wonder about his brain function.
I wish he’d find a functional MRI scanner and get his cognitive function tested.
And – who knows? – when he’s got nothing to do but lie upon the little bed with his arms at his sides…
perhaps he’ll locate his stones.
CTuttle @ 89
I agree with Silber.
I see so many parallels to 1917 and the disagreements within the various leftish parties. In today’s world the part of the Constitutional Democrats (Kadet Party) would be played by the DLC. The Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries are the somewhat progressive Democrats.
The Bolsheviks???? The ones calling out the hypocrisy of the rest, the timidity of the collaborators, the uselessness of people like Biden, Clinton, Obama, Conyers???
Non-existent. Why? Becuase the Bolsheviks knew then and some of us know now that by trying to get this regime to follow the rule of law by hoping they can craft legislation that will embarrass them into signing it, or that the American sheep will finally see behind the curtain and realize they have been lied to is futile.
This runaway train is not going to be stopped by Pelosi-Reid and their conniving colleagues many of whom are too busy testing the winds before they act to save this country.
Even if Bushco slip quietly into the night, the internecine battles within the Democrats will be enough to turn off a good enough number of people so that a resurgent GOP will rise out of the ashes to pick up where these traitors leave off.
This pathogenetic disease that is the GOP needs to be eliminated root and branch before it can get another shot at our country.
CTuttle @ 135
Me, too Charles!! I can also empathize with those guys…I know what it’s like to be running from guys with dogs and rifles trying to kill you.
Hey, at least we’re all here, right…living in that peaceful world we fought for so no one else’s kids would have to go through it while the Bushes were vacationing in Maine.
The reality is that it takes a long time to turn this country around. Look how long it took to get out of Viet Nam. The absolutely critical task is to get a Democrat elected President next year. All that can be done before that is to try to keep this guy from making things even worse than they are.
Nader-esque efforts to paint the Democrats as ineffectual or more or less the same simply serve the Republicans. Jane’s post doesn’t quite reach that level, but several of the comments do. We are now living with the consequences of this attitude, and if one thing is clear, it’s that anyone who thinks it won’t make a difference if the Democrats are in control — or even who thinks that it hasn’t already made a difference — is full of shit.
kirk murphy @ 140
Without Harry Reid working hand in glove with Bill Frist the MCA would never have become law. Call me suspicious but when the rubber hits the road with legislation around Reid it always seems that it is the Republican version that just happens to pass.
larry birnbaum @ 143
there is no effort to paint the democrats as anything. the effort is to try to understand what is true and to tell the truth…. as a first step to righting what is wrong.
i refuse to play the kabuki game.
James says “This pathogenetic disease that is the GOP needs to be eliminated root and branch before it can get another shot at our country.”
Imprisonment, exile, deportation and if treason be found, execution.
cleter @ 40
Does it cost $20 to assure doom? Could you get by with just $5?
If you think it has to be $20, LMK, and I’ll chip in. I’d really like to assure her doom.
Hugh @ 144
Either Harry just happens to always get conned.
Or he always cons us.
Jonathan @ 60
The other day I was listening to Thom Hartman on Air America. He was talking about “what was different” now [Iraq vs. Vietnam]. The usual suspects: there was a draft, etc.
But one he didn’t bring up was that during Vietnam we really had an active press: Dan Rather, Walter Cronkite, Peter Jennings, Daniel Schorr, I.F. Stone.
The lack of an inquiring press has really hurt this country, and has enabled the Republicans to run their scam for a full generation.
#78, & #98, you are dead right. Speak truth to power.
The Demos will get not a dime of my money. They are consistently “loyal” to BushCo & the military-industrial complex, and not an “opposition” in any way.
The war with Iran is coming. Darth Cheney’s office is rolling out the neo-con plan/ talking pts. after Labor day via the usual suspects: Fux news, AEI, etc. (Link to Digby’s latest post, and the link she gives for further details).
My own Congressional “rep” is good: Pete Stark, consistently anti-war, the only avowed rationalist (read: atheist) in the Legislative branch. But really–what difference does it make? The Demos will tolerate a dozen or so actual Progressives, Feingold, Wellstone (well, before he was “wellstoned” of course), etc. to keep some of us on board. But in reality the majority of them are of the Reid/Pelosi stripe, devoted to business as usual and creating a National Security/ fascist state.
I’m on board w/ trying to start a 3rd party– Know it will be shat upon and ridiculed by the MSM-corporate oligarchy, but I predict after the disaster brain-damaged Chimpy’s about to bring us by expanding the war to Iran, and impending economic collapse, etc., it might actually have a chance.
Well, assuming we’re not all in concentration camps or incinerated, obviously.
selise @ 145
selise, excuse me, but look at comment 150 directly above. The Republicans would be happy to pay for this kind of crap. For all we know, they are.
decaffeinated @ 82
Got just such a call night before last and gave the caller exactly this response. Even put in a few names to go with the “I don’t want my $$$ supporting. . ” line: McNerney, Rodriguez, Salazar, Pryor, Steney Hoyer, Heath Schuler, etc.
Told ‘em I was only giving directly to candidates via Blue America.
Mauimom @ 147
I’m not sure if you can buy the Doom with five dollars. I’m also not sure if you can purchase the Doom with a credit card. I think it has to be a twenty dollar check. At any rate, that was what doomed Hart, Dole*, Brown, Bradley, Edwards, and an assortment of gubernatorial chumps.
*I lost a bet.
larry birnbaum @ 151
imo, berating people to tow the party line doesn’t work. giving people a reason to support the party does.
i know too many good people who’ve given up on the dems… i’m not there (yet), but i’m not going to give good people working for a better world a hard time. we’re all working towards the same goals, we’re just pursuing different tactics.
the assumption that the (D) party really wants to do anything about restoring the Constitution and ending the war should be examined occasionally.
perhaps they are also working to consolidate a corporate authoritarian state at constant war at home and abroad?
when someone keeps folding their straight flush to a pair of fives, maybe the game is fixed?
selise @ 154
I had a lot of arguments with Nader supporters in 2000. They were absolutely blind to what they were doing. I think it’s important to make this point clearly: They were disastrously wrong. Wrong in principle, for the smug pretension that there was (and is) no difference between the two parties. And wrong in practice, in their lack of reality-based capacity to think clearly about what the effect of their narcissism and grandiosity might be. The social validation of this kind of skewed thinking has a tremendous cost.
The Democrat leadership smelling victory in 2008 is starting to get too confident,and as a result is making too many mistakes. While the children’s health insurance policy is a good thing, they should not have a Medicare cut spending bill attached to it, a clean bill would be the way to go or no bill at all.
The reality is that senior citizens vote in huge numbers, and children don’t vote and while their parents may vote, seniors will vote. The Republicans will use the Medicare spending cut bill (although this is something they want) against them in 08 the same way the Dems. used the famous “doughnut hole” against the Repbulicans in ‘06 which helped significantly to drive seniors to the poll in droves. Given the fact that were are in a time of a heightened medical care crisis, what makes the Dems. think that a cut in Medicare spending would make them popular.
If the Dems have plans for national health care and if it’s impossible for them to get a clean bill for the children’s health insurance, I would suggest scrapping the bill and just wait for 08, any cut in Medicare is a political suicide.
larry birnbaum @ 156
even if you’re right about voting for nader, my point is that you achieve NOTHING by berating people – as you yourself admit. the only thing you achieve is alienating more people. if YOU want to make progress instead of claiming moral superiority – try something else…. like giving people something worth supporting.
here’s an example – the lamont campaign. the lamont campaign succeeded by drawing people in, helping them find something productive they could feel good about contributing to…. attempting to bully people into doing something they believe is wrong does the opposite.
Loo Hoo. @ 139
Because you’d have a bunch of candidates with no clear majority and a situation where there would be deals made in “smoke-filled rooms”. The primaries are supposed to “weed out” candidates with only regional or limited staying power.
But a lot of it is also advertising dollars…States want their share. And all these small states want “their say”.
But by linking together a system where there were only three or four primary dates, with a requisite number of small states from diverse regions early on…then a split between large states later (again from a variety of geographic and economic zones) you’s have enough value for all the states to have some sort of say…either in the initial weaning out (or allowing an outsider to come in)…while the big states would still count. In addition the budgets wouldn’t be so drained with vast amounts poured into just Iowa or New Hampshire.
CTuttle @ 116
Actually a TRULY SOLID Minority can bottle up things in the Senate with the filibuster rule. How many bills have been blocked by that intransigent MINORITY of Republicans who INSIST that the Democrats COMPROMISE with them.
The Democrats have to draw together and make this change…Bush should get no further Extraordinary Spending Resolutions on the war in Iraq…not the $50 billion he’s suddenly asked for ON TOP OF the $200 billion Supplemental that isn’t in the regular Pentagon Budget.
If the PUGS don’t agree to a FIXED and RAPID timeline for withdrawing from Iraq…then no Supplementals. It’s quite simple, really.
Sorry, the Lamont campaign proved that a conservative “Independent Democrat” could beat a liberal Democrat in a state as blue as there is. Lieberman has proven to be an ass, but one of the reasons he can’t be controlled even a little bit by the Democratic leadership is that he owes nothing to the Party.
So, no, I wouldn’t actually count that as a ringing success. This is exactly what I’m talking about. You’ve got to balance ends and means if you want to genuinely make a difference. You would argue, I think, that beating Lieberman in the primary sent a message to elected Democrats in other states and helped to move the country towards the realization that we’ve got to get out of Iraq sooner rather than later. I would argue that it decreased the leverage of the Party leadership and contributed to exactly the kind of weakness that Jane is complaining about. In fact I believe both are true. And so now the question is, over a several year period, which of these results predominates? The answer isn’t clear-cut, but my point is that if we’ve got to think about these reality-based implications ahead of time.
larry birnbaum @ 151
Yeah…I recall when the Federal Campaign reports came out it turned out that Conservative Neo-Cons were some of the biggest contributors to Nader’s campaigns. Wonder why?
And funny how that guy mentioned concentration camps. I recall that the schisms in the Austrian left wing parties led to a total failure to cooperate in the 1936 elections, some boycotted and others attacked the more “moderate” stances of some parties who were trying to work with some middle-parties to prevent them from sliding over to the Nazis.
Ultimately the left, which were pretty strong in the previous elections lost their influence in the Parliament, and the Nazis played king-maker. The German Nazis were marching through the streets a year later arresting all those soc*i*lists and Mar*ists. Most never had to vote again.
Phoenix Woman @ 118
Well, I think that the lower level candidates DID lead the way…and it’ll be pretty hard for Florida to not toe the line…after all, none of the major papers or TV stations will be getting any advertising $$$.
larry birnbaum @ 161 –
my comment about the lamont campaign was about how to get people involved. you don’t like the lamont campaign? then find something else for people to do! so far, all i’ve seen you advocate is towing the party line – when our party is fatally flawed.
i never voted for nader (even though i live in a “save” state)… but it is people like you who make me want to. jeesh.
Jonathan @ 117
I think there was a link to the laugh-struck Icelandic interviewer who said it was during an early ’70’s program called “Boemarang” that discussed socially awkward issues like aging, sex, family problems, relationships. That program was about medical mishaps. The woman had a botched spinal operation, while the guy with the high-pitched voice had a screwed up tonsils operation.
The announcer, even after he started cracking up kept asking risque questions…like about how these things affected their sex lives. The guy cut into the womans comments with…”and it makes it hard to do the sweet talk”. The Announcer broke up again!
And then the Announcer tried to rescue himself by asking for questions. And the guy in the back says that he had the same problem as the guy with the high voice…except that he says this in a very deep, booming voice. And the announcer starts up again! And then the Very somber crowd strts telling the announcer “What’s so funny! Don’t be so insulting!”
Yeah..he goy fired…in fact the whole staff of the program got fired! The announcer says he thinks it was some sort of “conspiracy”.
I challenge anyone, ANYONE, who can find a position Rahm takes that differs from the Hard Right Lik*d position. Rahm is representing his home country, Israel, not his district, Chicago.
The possibility is that the major Dem. candidates are pulling Reids and Pelosi’s strings. They don’t want the Congress to do something forceful because A:It could backfire on their candidacy and they would have to take a position when the vote comes up B:An issue that they can continue to beat Bush over the head with will have been resolved. What they don’t get is that the reason that Bush and Reagan won was they seemed stronger and more decided than the Dem candidates. All this policy wonkishness our candidates spew doesn’t convince one voter who isn’t a Democrat. They need to take strong unequivocal stands on the major issues and then defend those stands.
Rahm Emanuel was born in Illinois.
American Jews have a proud history of supporting progressive causes in our country. We disproportionally live in highly populated states with large numbers of Electoral votes; disproportionally vote; and are the most loyal white ethnic constituency in the Democratic Party.
Perhaps some people think it would be a good idea to alienate us from the Democratic Party through repetition the old-fashioned anti-Semitic trope of dual loyalty. I can only imagine who those people might be.