Who are our real ememies?

[burythehatchet]

You already know the answer, though you may not want to admit it to yourself. We have been skirting around the issue for years now. One week we take our ire out on Lieberman, the next week its Biden, the next week its Landreau, etc. Is it possible that that the real enemies of our progressive movement are the leadership in the Democratic party? I base that outrageous proposition on simple logic. When you know who your enemy is, it is much easier to plan your moves. But when the enemy is in your camp, you can never win until he is exposed and kicked out.

I do not advocate purges. What I do advocate is for us to open our eyes even wider and to recognize that every battle we wage against a bill or against a policy will ALWAYS we undermined by those who call themslves Democrats, yet find a way to thwart our efforts at every turn. We do NOT have 45 seats in the senate. We have, at most 20 seats. The rest are Republicans who play a role for us until their vote is needed by republicans, at which point they have to vote their conscience.

How many times has this been played out over and over and over again. So all you Hillary fans, and Obama fans, and Biden fans (I know there's at least one), you are slitting all our throats by supporting these people. WE ARE AT WAR TO SAVE OUR LIVES AND OUR PLANET! Supporting the center will result in your becoming roadkill.

[damntexdem]

1. Our real enemas?

Or our real anemones?

[burythehatchet]

2. an enema would be infinitely more helpful

[RedCloud]

21. How about our real Eminems?

And why isn't he gray or at least chocolate coated?

[RBHam]

22. Anemones always get a bad name......

They've got spines, though...

Not like some so called Democrats...

[davidinalameda]

3. I wholeheartedly agree

the same people who gave us Kerry in 2004, even with his vote on the Iraq war, along with the other enablers in the Democratic party, are just as guilty or guiltier than those who vote Republican

One of the good things about Howard Dean is that he makes the so-called party leadership nervous

[acmejack]

4. The only thing in the middle of the road

is squished armadillos! (with thanx to Jim Hightower). I it is impossible to be in the middle of this one, folks.

[LightningFlash]

5. DINOs need to be kicked out. They've got to go....

No matter what, having them in power simply feeds the corporate media its ability to obstruct justice. The democrats in name only deserve no place here and must join Zell Miller.

[Ron Green]

6. Of course you're right, but remember that the art of politics is full of

all kinds of messy compromises, and those DINOs really do represent SOMEONE. The trick is to rattle up enough anger on the left, but not to shake loose too much support in doing it.

[LightningFlash]

7. Who could propose such an ammendment....Howard Dean...?

[burythehatchet]

8. But that is the inherent contradiction of a two party system

there cannot logically be a middle.

[Ron Green]

11. I agree that Democrats must unite to fight against the thieving bastards

that are stealing our country. But do we have enough political power, at this point, to call out Lieberman, Biden, Pelosi, Obama, Landrieu, and all the other entrenched "middles," considering that the RW and MS media are all about beating the "balance" drum?

I hope you're right, but I fear you're wrong.

[RaleighNCDUer]

19. That's why Dean makes these people nervous.

Though he is a moderate, rather than progressive, there is no doubt that he is a Democratic moderate. And he is taking control of the purse strings.

He is the one who is promoting moderates and progressives at the grassroots. He is the one who these DINOs will have to come to for money. He is the one who can encourage a proper Democratic stance, at the threat of not funding a re-election.

[bryant69]

9. I guess that makes me your enemy as well

Since I am a moderate Democrat.

I'm pretty sure I'll be able to live with myself.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[burythehatchet]

10. I'm glad you would be able to live with yourself,

and I don't need yet another enemy. But I will ask you this question. How far right does the scale have to shift before you call yourself a liberal?

[bryant69]

23. Further right than this

If we were living in a sane society I'd be a moderate conservative.

[LightningFlash]

12. Moderates aren't the same thing as DINOs

You have outrage about the minutes as well, correct?

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org

If you have outrage over criminal acts such as this, there is no reason to leave the party. It's people who do not, like the "democrats in name only" that this topic is about I think.

[burythehatchet]

14. That's right but sometimes the labels can be a disservice to

understanding

[Deja Q]

13. While Clinton did some good,

he was an enabler for too many things.

And despite this incident:



He has been seen to suck up to the * 'family' infinitely more since.

[burythehatchet]

15. I keep telling myself that he is sucking up to bush

for Hillary's sake. But NAFTA and the welfare bill do not make Bill a liberal.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

16. Vote issues. Not party.

If your Dem rep/senator keeps voting with the Republicans, vote Green, or some other party. Or, sit on your hands.

Politicians don't "lead" they follow the votes and the money.

[davidinalameda]

17. I agree to a point

I am a registered Green because the national Democratic leadership has basically said to voters like me to piss off

but I would much rather remake the Democratic Party into a liberal-left party and bring in the Green voters and others who have left

We need clear boundary lines--I'm all in favor of a three party system--left, middle and right

That way we would have clear choices as voters.

But until people stop allowing the Democratic officials to maintain a policy of Repuke light, nothing is going to change and more and more people will simply become disillusioned with the whole process

[LightningFlash]

18. DINO leadership is to blame. And they are still there. NT

[burythehatchet]

20. why not go all the way to true representative government

a parliament. If we had a parliament, you would see a liberal tsunami in this country.

on edit - which is why we don't have one and never will

[davidinalameda]

24. I'd love to have a parlimentary system here

[Jack Rabbit]

25. The Demo leadership is not helpful, but it is not the enemy

They are striving for irrelevance. They refuse to do battle against the enemy. If we cannot depend on them to do that, then they are of no use to us; it leaves us to take up the battle ourselves.

The real enemy is not Bush, but those elites who have foot the bill for his rise to power. They are his masters. Bush is their tool; we may deprive them of their tool through the electoral process or impeachment and removal, but the elites will fashion new tools out out of other willing political whores.

Much of the Democratic leadership labors under the illusion that Bush the Frat Boy is just another obnoxious conservative President like his father, Bush the Preppy, or even Reagan. We survived them, and if Bush the Frat Boy were no different than that, we'd survive him, too.

The Democrats in Congress seem to be in denial about what a threat Bush is to American democracy. He came to power through electoral fraud and seeks to destroy accountability in vote counting. He operates his government in secret. He subverts civil liberties. He deliberately lies in order to promote his programs and even to plunge the nation into war. He is owed no deference, no allegiance and should not be given the degree of impunity he has been given to this point.

Should Bush succeed in destroying any substantive democracy in America, the common people of the world will be nothing but fodder for the corporate elites. Our children will be expected to fight wars that have less to do with national security than opening business opportunities for transnational corporations and imposing by force a neoliberal economic structure on developing nations; we will be expected to stock shelves while being paid next to nothing without medical or retirement benefits. America will be little better than a banana republic.

Consequently, it is up to the people to take up the cause of removing Bush from power. We must not stop there. We must go on to demand that the private sector work for the public good rather than against the public welfare and remind the elites that what the Declaration of Independence says of political elites applies to the economic sphere as well:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.