DefeatBush wrote:
A lot of people simply do not understand the psychology of minority political factions.
Look at the conservative Republican Party strategists: they do everything they can to mollify and incorporate the Christian Fundamentalist faction. They do not drive them away to form a third party or run an independent candidate---they know that would be suicidal for the national Republican Party.
Instead they have built a coalition WITHIN the Republican Party.
And every element of that coalition is energized and completely committed to the cause.
The Democratic Party, in contrast, appears to be doing everything imaginable to alienate the Progressive AND the Liberal wings of the party.
Yes, the strategists are probably right: the progressives/greens/liberals have "no where else to go". But there can be a point when the alienation becomes so great that it suppresses turnout and creates an all-around de-energized party.
For the last four years I have held a bitter grudge against Nader. I still blame him for helping elect Bush. I have posted here some very long arguments AGAINST the Nader candidacy and against third party candidates in general (in Presidential elections). My anti-Bush diatribes can leave no doubt about what I think about his administration.
And yet, to my own surprise, I find myself more amenable to the Nader candidacy this time than I did in 2000. And I am not alone.
Why?
You would think it should be the opposite. Now that we know how absolutely horrendous Bush has been, how completely beyond the pale, you would think there would be much LESS allure for a Nader-type spoiler candidacy.
But there is a key psychological and political fact that must be considered:
The Democratic candidate's blatant but completely predictable "move to the center and screw the Liberals/Progressives" strategy is DOUBLY galling THIS TIME because of the absolute and complete and unprecedented vulnerability of the Right *at this moment*.
There is a window of opportunity NOW; an historic opportunity of enormous but fleeting potential.
Do you understand?
If ever there was a time for a Democratic candidate to NOT waffle and equivocate and scurry to some obsolete concept of a uncontroversial "center", in an attempt to conform to some preconceived notion of what "moderates" will consider safe and acceptable because some unimaginative and uninspired strategists cannot imagine, let alone will, the political *conquest* of the moderate swing voter---it is NOW!
If ever there was time for the Democratic candidate NOT to run a campaign based on FEAR of Republican attacks, it is NOW!! if ever there was a time for the Democratic candidate NOT to be afraid to oppose with Rooseveltian like moral clarity the neo-conservative war machine, it is NOW!!
If ever there was a time for the Democratic candidate NOT to "soften" his rhetoric, not to adopt Republican-like jingoistic "War on Terror" phraseology , not to reiterate Republican-like mantras of "free trade at all costs" , not to put oneself forward as an "invisible to the last moment then revealed as a minimally acceptable alternative to Bush candidate" -- it is NOW!!!
The time is NOW for the explosive resurgence of a proud, vital, fearless Democratic Party!
The time is NOW for bold, clear, unequivocal, un-waffling Democratic LEADERSHIP and a visionary new program for change.
The time is NOW because the Right-Wing is more vulnerable NOW than it has ever been.
The time is NOW because *right now* the disastrous results of the right-wing agenda are as clear as day; because *right now* the news is filled with death and destruction and the collapse of American values and prestige; because *right now* the Bush Administration is under investigation on a thousand fronts and is so wobbly and punch-drunk that one little push would send it to the canvass.
And yet, sadly, the Democratic Party seems to be unaware of its POWER to do just that! To knock these guys out cold.
It appears more and more likely that the Democratic Party will fail to seize this unique opportunity for a momentous national political re-alignment and will run a dull, backward-looking, fear-of-being-attacked campaign that may, if the other side insists on self-destructing, win the White House temporarily, but which has NO chance of permanently slowing down, let alone halting, the forward rushing right-wing ideological juggernaut.
It is this sense of the *lost opportunity* to take advantage of a unique moment of Republican vulnerability that is so deeply frustrating to liberals and progressives and makes their marginalization almost unbearably infuriating this time----and which is even driving some of them to reconsider the Nader candidacy.