From: Nathan Newman
Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2003 8:13 AM
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Profiles In Spinelessness
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jon Johanning" <jjohanning at igc.org>
>I see more and more commentaries comparing the current spot the
>Democratic Party is in to the powerlessness of the Republican Party in
>'64, after the defeat of Goldwater. They were beaten down so badly that
>they either had to reorganize themselves and find a new direction or
>close up shop.
What an encouraging comparison!
what wishful thinking, nathan.
That was the period when the Republicans
did probably their greatest upsurge of organizing, building institutions
like Young Americans for Freedom and other "New Right" groups that laid the
groundwork for taking over the Republican Party completely and shifting
national politics signficantly to the Right.
See http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/95dec/conbook/conbook.htm for more on
the story of conservative success in organizing during the 1960s.
no way are the democrats going to accomplish this. the reps did it with grass roots organizing, and a lot of grass roots activism. the dems are a corporate, rightwing dominated party that's spend the last 20 years alienating the grass roots. and will continue to do so that it may please its MNC, wealthy sponsors, despite the fact they give more money to the reps.
While I think there are big differences, the main point is that the
mainstream has the tendency to completely dismiss a party that is short of a
majority, ignoring how radically things can change with a shift of votes to
kick them into the majority.
so what? the mainstream and most of the tributaries dismiss the democractic party as a poor, ineffectual appendix of the republicans.
why anyone is stupid enough to vote for a right wing, DLC, crypto republican democrat when they can have the real thing, a republican, beats the hell out of me.
the show liberals in the democratic party are never enough to offset the democratic conservatives, or the republicans. how many times do people need to be reminded of how many democrats voted for war in afghanistan and iraq? how many voted for tax cuts for the super rich? how many voted for the patriot act? how many voted to raise the US debt ceiling so the shrub group can spend all that money on war? how many democrats do nothing while the public education system falls apart, while health care falls apart, while jobs disappear, while housing becomes more and more expensive, the infrastructure fails. and so on and so forth. the leadership of the democratic party consistently plays the voters for suckers.
The whole dismissal of the Democrats right now
is equally misguided, especially given that recent elections have put them
almost neck and neck with the GOP.
-- Nathan
those necks you're referring to are right wing necks. DLC necks.
the only thing the democrats have going for them is fear. fear that shrub will get elected in 2004. and when push comes to shove, even that fear may not be enough to get people to vote for the party that's failed them for years. anyone want to bet the dems will not fail to capitalize on fear of shrub, too? just as they failed to get the winner of the 2000 presidential election into office.
R
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