Dwayne Monroe wrote:
>
>
> When this happens, the ranks of true believers will
> shrink and the Repubs and the quivering Dems will find
> themselves facing some angry folks.
I believe the commonplace criticism of the Dems as "quivering" is both inaccurate and can lead to bad politics. The implication is that Democratic leaders have good intentions but are too fearful to act on their convictions. I think it makes more sense to take them at their word. They really believe in, they really stand for, their votes in Congress and their formal positions. In fact they believe in those positions so strongly that they would rather lose elections than risk having the positions threatened.
The core principle of the modern Democratic Party (implicit even in the New Deal but quite deliberate since the Truman Administration) is that "There shall be no mass movement." All other concerns (including the winning of elections) are subordinate to that central principle.
And the primary strategy for implementing that principle is to absorb the leadership of potential mass movements into the vain task of "turning the DP to the left."
Carrol
P.S. Two points:
1. By leaders I mean at every level, down to the precinct and the workplace.
2. While I myself believe that revolution is the only alternative to barbarianism in the long run (and by long run I mean about the next half century), I am invoking "mass movement" (reform or revolutionary) not "revolutionary movement" as my criterion for progressive politics.