Here’s what the Democrats have done:

Put Roberts on the SCROTUS.

Put Alito on the SCROTUS.

Voted for the Patriot Act.

RENEWED the Patriot Act.

Voted for the Iraq war.

CONTINUE to support and vote for the Iraq war.

Voted for the MCA.

Have expressly failed to rescind the MCA.

Have failed to conduct any investigations of any crimes by BushCo. Sure, they have initiated a few but they never ever take them anywhere and go out of their way to support the weak obstructionism put out by BushCo.

Have failed to conduct investigations of Sibel Edmonds’ case.

Took impeachment off the table early and remain steadfastly intent to keep it off the table, effectively and honestly neutering themselves.

Whined about “not having the votes” because their majority isn’t big enough, while, oddly, while they were in the minority, they were just as weak and ineffectual as they are in the majority. The GOP has ALL the power regardless of whether they are in the majority OR in the minority. Where was the supermagical minority power being wielded by the GOP when the Dems were the minority?

Refuse to shut down Gitmo.

Put Mukasey in as AG in spite of his refusal to say what is obvious and has ALWAYS been the case: waterboarding IS torture. Period.

Gave us the bankruptcy bill.

Have not gone back and fixed the bankruptcy bill.

Declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard as a “terrorist organization”.

Bought into the idea that US troops will, and should, remain in Iraq (in some empire-building capacity) for a looong time.

There’s more but there you have it. McAuliffe and company (Emmanuel, BOTH Clintons, Schumer, Reid, Feinstein, etc, etc, etc) are defined by this list. It IS what they are.

Fuck the party, I want to save my country.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/…..739/346052

(Ed, we should be having a meeting sometime this year)

However, I’m not naive enough to not have been aware that Rahm Emanuel went out of his way in 2006 as the head of the DCCC to destroy progressive candidacies, such as that of likely winner Cindy Cegalis in the IL-6.

I saw what the Ohio Dems did to Paul Hackett who had a wonderful stance on the Iraq War and could have prevailed but for the intervention of the good old boys on behalf of Sherrod Brown. (Who is a decent man.)

But the Establishment of the Democratic Party is corrupt at heart and I simply cannot stomach the notion of being obeisant to a regime I despise. Surely our civic classes did not teach us that we just need to bend over so that the bosses could have their way with us.

***
One final point. There is a pernicious and pervasive misconception among captured zombies in the Democratic Party that Ralph Nader was the cause of Al Gore failing to take the White House in 2000. That’s rubbish. Al Gore lost that race on his own with inept and mediocre campaigning and a terrible strategy in Florida. Nader had nothing to do with the fact that Gore was acting like a dime-store Indian for most of the campaign. Gore should have fired every damn consultant that attach his/her lamprey mouth on Gore’s wallet. He’d have won in a landslide if he’d only had the sense act like the Al Gore we know and love today.

I personally don’t think the Congress that was elected in 1976 (actually it was pretty much a carry-over Congress…the same one that supported the Vietnam War for the prior decade) was particularly “progressive”. I’m not advocating supporting the Blue Dogs or “Bush Dogs”. In fact, just the opposite. There are several races against Bush Dog incumbents and progressives in races for seats held by Republicans that are contested. Each of these victories represent a net increase of folks that can swing the Party to the left. that’s where to put your resources.

Or you can throw up your hands and immigrate, I suppose. I’ll hold out a bit longer. Maybe I’ll end up in the camps you are worrying about. But I also know that in the multi-party elections in Austria in the early 1930’s the Communists and Social Democrats split and failed to unite, despite having a 55% majority, allowing the Austrian Nazis and Christian Democrats (Right Wing) to take control. Most of the leadership of the Communists and SD ended up in Concentration camps or sent off to fight the Russians after the Anschluss.

We can’t change the country from the top down.

Huh? Rob this exactly how the elites have been running this country since colonial days with only brief interludes of progressivism. We’ve only had two relatively reformist eras in our history, the brief effort by Teddie Roosevelt to constrain “malefactors of great wealth” and the New Deal reforms designed to protect capitalists from themselves as these cruel men set out to destroy the underclass and inadvertently bring about revolution.

In this country, two parties have survived because they have shifted positions as they get pushed in one direction or another.

The ruling elites have ruled this country with a death grip favoring the elites since the 19th Century. A canddate who truly reperesents the interest of the People simply cannot run for higher office in this nation. Dennis Kucinich or Russ Feingold may represent the absolute glass ceiling for what can be achieved. Certainly no progressive has ever or will ever be allowed to run for President. And you call this democracy?

For an excellent insight into the intermeshed cooperation and corruption of the two parties, I find the writing of Walter Karp to be exceptionally informative. Try it, you might find something you’ll enjoy learning here.

I’ve told some people that it’s likely they’re all phonies

BINGO! We have a winner.