Can one really be progressive, and remain a party loyalist?

[DerekG]

If Robert Kennedy Jr. is correct in asserting that 70 percent of Democrats are corrupt--and with the staggering numbers of corporate whores and warmongers who carry a (D) before their names, this estimate may turn out to be conservative (pun intended)--then we're faced with a task far more daunting than merely defeating this demented neocon cadre. In essence, we're faced with a political party, which most of us fancies an ally, whose majority favors America empire.

If we've reached the point of exasperation at seeing our young sent on yet another campaign of carnage; if it just isn't easy anymore to pry oneself from photos of Iraqi children who've had their torsos cut in half by the shrapnel of our cluster bombs; and if we're just bloody tired of making excuses for those cowards who voted for the IWR, and those who continue to approve the military budgets....then we just might have to scare the living hell out of the craven leaders and toadies of the Democratic Party. You know what this entails: withholding money and support from pro-war candidates; perhaps leaving the party en masse. Humiliate the neo-liberals; letting the chips fall where they may if Democrats are caught in scandals; drive fear into the hearts of several generations of politicos.

I myself long for the day when I can tell Clinton and Schumer, in no uncertain terms, that they disgust me. Perhaps one could chalk it up to my being male, but the thought of 100,000+ dead Iraqi men, women and children is a far greater incentive to leave the War Party than "Do you want them to repeal Roe v. Wade?" is an enticement for me to stay.

[Tweed]

1. Well....

Only have the Democratic Senators voted for the Iraq War resolution and even less in the House...

Plus you should know by now that promises were not kept to those who did vote for the Resoultion.

[DerekG]

3. The IWR was just another Gulf of Tonkin, and everyone knew it

Most of all John Kerry, who had plumbed the depths of Bushco corruption with Iran-Contra.

[funflower]

4. They knew it, and we knew it, but they were afraid the voters would

throw the out if they somehow came across as "soft on terrorism."

Kerry's anti-war stance from 30 years ago was used against him over and over.

It's sad but true that voting to go to war doesn't usually hurt politicians at the ballot box.

[DerekG]

5. In many instances, yes; but what of my representatives?

Clinton and Schumer betrayed a very vocal constituency. The experience was akin to a spit in the face.

[funflower]

7. Hillary has national aspirations, so (sorry) she's thinking about voters

in places other than NY. Even in NY, I'll bet there was significant support for the war statewide at that moment in history.

By handing over the power to Bush, the dems (and many R's) were washing their hands of responsibility, so they can now go home and say this mess was his decision.

[evlbstrd]

2. That's what we hoped for in the face of the Viet Nam war.

To make the Democratic Party more progressive, more pregressives need to get involved with the Democratic Party.
Now, if we had a more representative electoral system, even wtih verifiable paper ballots...

[lala_rawraw]

6. Progressives

By the very definition are not "fixed" as it were in one place, group, time. They are about ideals, not ideology. So the answer is, no Progressive has to "remain" and/or "be" anything. Loyalist is not a term I would use to describe any left group. Loyalists are what are in the White House now... the ones that put their loyalty to greed above their loyalty to honor.