On Fri, 15 Jan 2010, shag carpet bomb wrote:
> at least as articulated on this list, I always thought that's what Doug
> was saying. You already had an organized movement - 90s is a good
> example here, too. Already in place, it 'benefited' from the
> disappointment. The movement was made up of people who didn't buy into
> the Democrats' claims - its core was made up of them. People who had
> bought into dem's claims were then attracted to that movement as an
> outlet to express their disappointment and frustration with the Dems.
That seems fair enough. I guess I wondered too far from my original point, which is that comparing the disappointment of Kennedy/Johnson with Clinton and Obama misses something crucial: the Dems under Kennedy/Johnson passed major transformative progressive legislation. Clinton and so far Obama didn't. And yet the former is associated with by far the huger movement.
One could just as well say success led to disillusionment as that failure led to it.
Michael