America’s Anti-Liberal Myth: Why Dems Learned The Wrong Lesson From 1984 - Salon

[RiverLover]

18. Absofreekinlutely brilliant, comprehensive, fabulous article. HUGE Thanks WillyT!

& Salon,

& Mike Conrad, beautiful writer, brilliant mind.

....Today, We Are All Walter Mondale

The hits keep coming. In more recent years New Dems have tried to apply the 1984 “lesson” to whatever political moment they’re in. Before declaring itself the New DLC (because in their mind the word “new” is some kind of magic incantation) and then ultimately folding and giving way to Third Way, the DLC tarred Democrats with the pejorative “member of the unelectable Mondale wing.” The trait that earned a Democrat this label circa 2003 was opposition to the Iraq war, a sin no Democrat with serious future national aspirations could commit lest they consign themselves to irrevocable Not President status. Anyone who would have suggested to the DLC that the next Democrat to win the White House would be a Hyde Park State Senator named Barack Obama elected in large part because of his opposition to the Iraq war would have been met with all sorts of political spectrum positioning-based derision.

In 2006 Kentucky populist John Yarmuth was written off by then-DCCC chair Rahm Emanuel as too progressive to win. Yarmuth won and has remained outspoken in the House while winning re-election ever since while, for the record, Rahm’s prized Blue Dogs have seen their ranks decimated multiple times over (and Rahm himself is now struggling to hold onto his own mayoral seat in Chicago). In 2012 Matt Cartwright ran as a proud economic progressive FDR Democrat challenging 10-term incumbent Blue Dog Rep. Tim Holden for the Democratic nomination in Pennsylvania’s newly redistricted 17th District. When Cartwright prevailed economic conservaDems in DC warned that Cartwright’s win could herald an era of unelectable Democrats ousting them in primaries. Cartwright defeated his Republican opponent in the general election by 22 points....

...What they have done is, on a number of instances, shamelessly changed their rationale for why elected Democrats need to do what Third Way’s donors wanted Democrats to do. They do this because New Dems organizations like Third Way are not on a mission to get Democrats to win elections. They’re on a mission to lock Democrats into serving high finance, even at the expense of winning elections. The New Dems are not acting out of concern that progressive populist Democrats will lose. They don’t want liberals to win.

How many times have I heard Elizabeth Warren compared to Walter Mondale here at DU?

Its like a mantra.

Please, let this article spread like WILDFIRE!!!! Truth!