Third Way's new website, their new projects. We need to be aware.

[madfloridian]

First I will make one thing clear. I will speak up when I differ with party policy. I will vote for the best man in the primaries. In the general election I will vote Democratic. I will not do anything to hurt the party.

However, I will critique and analyze what the DLC/PPI/and Third Way are doing. The Third Way is very tied with them, in fact they are the ones who appointed Hillary Clinton to do the American Dream Initiative...the new policy for them.

I will watch to see it how it fits in with the DNC policy coming out later, and I have my say if I don't like it. I had my say on some things today, and I will continue to do so. But I will vote in the general election for a Democrat...at least this year.

Here is one facet of the Third Way's new projects...National Security.

Here is their new website.
http://www.third-way.com/

Here are their new projects:

http://www.third-way.com/projects

The National Security Project
http://www.third-way.com/projects/national_security

Summary:

The Third Way National Security Project is designed to address one of the most serious problems facing progressives today: their lack of credibility and a compelling vision for protecting this nation and its interests both at home and abroad.

Everywhere Americans turn, the media reminds them that we are confronting an increasingly dangerous world. Since 9/11, between 30 and 40% of the population consistently tell pollsters that they worry someone in their family could be a victim of terrorism. Those fears are valid. With the collapse of the Cold War stability, the world is a very dangerous place. Security experts are virtually unanimous in the conclusion that Americans will again be the victims of substantial terrorist attacks and that the struggle against Islamic extremist terror will continue indefinitely. Voters will not respond to approaches that ignore fear, mock it or try to intellectualize it away. They need to know that progressives understand the dangers we face and that they have a tough, hard-headed response and a smart, strong focus on keeping them safe.

I already see some of the message being used by a lot of our Democrats, including Howard Dean, which I suspect originates here....one of the main ones being that the country comes before party.

NOW since I happen to agree with that I won't argue.

I am going to post some more later about their other projects.

The Middle Class Project

The Culture project (which I suspect will push some of my buttons)

The New South project, which we see in the words of Landreiu and Warner and Pryor. (I have a feeling some more buttons will be pushed on this one as well)

AND The Conservative Rebranding project.

[msongs]

1. "Conservative Rebranding"? - like cows? ride em brokeback cowboy hehe nt

[madfloridian]

2. Isn't that a weird one? That floored me.

I am not too fond of the Southern one either.

[LincolnMcGrath]

3. "The National Security Project"

This explains Vilsack's statement from the DM Register. And gives a big smack upside the head to the .o25 percent of DUers who claimed Vilsack was "taken out of context".

On a brighter note; The GOP has, as of yet, declared that all Democrats are made from a mix of silly string and bong water, So at least these policy crafters won't have to waste their time defending our physical makeup,........yet. :eyes:

Save me from these idiots.

[mrgorth]

4. Doesn't 3rd way imply

that there's something wrong with OUR way?

[madfloridian]

5. Oh, yes, it most certainly does.

:hi:

[madfloridian]

6. More on the National Security....general points.

"The Third Way National Security Project aims to modernize how progressives handle national security affairs, from their substantive policy positions to their messaging and political outreach. We are undertaking a variety of ventures aimed at producing more compelling policy and messaging, along with the practical tools necessary to help progressives win on national security issues. These include:

Legislation: Third Way is helping to design and produce legislation intended to shore-up areas of weakness in our national defense and to underscore the progressive commitment to strength and security.

Resources for Leadership: Third Way develops useful, real world tools, expressly designed to strengthen the progressive approach to national security. Issue briefs, talking points, and policy/debate notebooks are a few of the practical resources we are creating to help progressives articulate a new, more compelling, security agenda.

Research: Third Way is engaged in a detailed examination of existing public opinion data and will commission a poll of its own to help define the precise nature and scope of the credibility problem facing progressives on national security issues and to explore potential solutions.

Events: Third Way hosts a number of regular briefings and conferences designed to bring together leading experts on national security policy for substantive discussions with senior Senate staff and others in Congress."

I get the feeling they would like their policy to trump the DNC policy soon to be coming out. Interesting to compare.

[radio4progressives]

8. These people have also hijacked the term "progressive" and like Bush does

so well, stand the very meaning of it on it's head.

please tell your third way people to stop fucking with the language - they can throw money into polling, and Orwellian messaging all they want, but don't hijack the term progressives because they are antithetical to the very definition of the meaning.

[bpilgrim]

7. 1984

As liberal Democrat calls for special prosecutor on Iraq, Democrats duck
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=103&topic_id=189745&mesg_id=189745

peace

[NCarolinawoman]

9. So I wonder if this boils down to supporting wars to look tough.

I know darn well this is what happened with many Dems and the IWR.

Also the DLC's admonishment to be careful about challenging Bush's wiretapping.

And I'm also thinking of Hillary talking tougher than "W" on Iran.

It all strikes me as artificial positioning.

[Douglas Carpenter]

12. "supporting wars to look tough" I suspect that is part of what they have

in mind. My that strategy really did wonders for the Democratic Party in Viet Nam didn't it?

[Cocoa]

10. some of the stuff is very good

but it glosses over the conflicts that the centrists* in the party have with the progressives**. Doesn't even mention them.

How will the Third Way handle these conflicts? Will they show solidarity with the party, or will they sell out to the republicans, whom they appear to be very critical of in their literature?

But, like I said, some of it sounds very good, like their approach on ethics:

The legislative battle over lobbying reform has allowed conservatives to shift the blame for the mess in Washington to lobbyists, create the illusion of a bipartisan scandal, and to avoid responsibility for their own ethical lapses.

Of course lobbying reform is necessary, but let’s not kid ourselves — if you need a law to tell you that taking a first-class, lobbyist-paid luxury golf package to Scotland is morally wrong, you shouldn’t be writing laws in the first place.

We strongly believe that you cannot fix an ethical problem with only a legislative solution. And we are certain that poison pill proposals from conservatives are designed to put progressives “on the wrong side” of lobbying reform. Further, these poison pills will doom any real chance of reform altogether.

But, if this becomes a battle over legislative proposals and why reforms aren’t moving in Congress, the morally-corrupt, ethically-bankrupt conservatives will have won.

Our advice is to make the ethics issue an ethics issue.






*or, as the Third Way refer to themselves, "progressives" (sic)


**real progressives

[madfloridian]

11. Some is good. But they do NOT consider us equals I fear.

They are the "progressives", we are the "activists"...which is not a very nice word.

[Cocoa]

13. here's one I know you'll like

"Internet Deaniacs" :-)

Not in their words, but in David Broder's, whose column they feature on their site:

Because that path aims down the political center, it will not be easily accepted by many of the activists in the organizations that control the Democratic Party at the grass roots and dominate its fundraising, whether they be Hollywood millionaires or Internet Deaniacs.

[madfloridian]

14. They despise Deaniacs, consider us their worst enemy.

It is really too bad, because we are not. After seeing the Raw Story post urging bloggers and others NOT to give to rebuild the DNC...then I say to the Third Way/DLC/PPI.....hey hang around. we are so damn stupid we are giving you all the power very soon now.

[madfloridian]

15. Stuff like this from Raw Story and progressive idealists enable Third Way.

This lack of effort to work together to change things will enable this contingent of the party to keep on having the power.

I just feel after reading this that it is useless to fight. How do you fight people who don't know what the party does?

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Money_shot_0208.html

[BR_Parkway]

16. With the collapse of the Cold War stability, the world is a very dangerous

place.

My head just rings when I read that. Yes, some small amount of us might get killed in a terrorist attack, but are we less safe now because of that versus when we were worried about Russian nukes killing off millions of us in one shot?

[loveandlight]

17. "...Those fears are valid...."

That statement in the National Security Project you quote above is a false statement and puts us down the same dark road the Republican party and their neocon friends want us to go down. Because it is their turf. They have ramped up the fear and are playing that game to the hilt. As long as we don't question it at its base, then we are on their ground and will continue to lose. And will continue to spend billions for defense and nothing for the vast majority of people in this country. No more social security, no more Medicare and Medicaid, no more pensions, no health care insurance advances, no more even for education.

That is just where they want us. In fact, yes, there is a threat of terrorism that has existed for many many years. There are going to be terrorist incidents that continue, and yes, maybe someone will try something here in this country again. But building up the military and fighting wars in the Middle East and expanding areas, the so-called "Long War" described in the lastest Pentagon QDR, will not make us safe or prevent future terrorist attacks in this country. As Robert Dreyfuss lays out in an article found at TomPaine.com (http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20060208/the_neocons_long_war.php):
Of course, it ignores the fact that the blunt instrument of the U.S. military is precisely
the wrong tool to use against radical right Islamist forces. As the war in Iraq has proved
to everyone but the most hard-core neoconservative, ham-handed U.S. military attacks in Muslim
countries create more terrorists than they kill. The Times , in reporting the Pentagon’s
counterterrorism plan, quotes a Defense Department official involved in writing it who points out:

'...the American military’s effort to aid tsunami victims in southeast Asia and to
assist victims of Pakistan’s earthquake did more to counter terrorist ideology than
any attack mission.'

...So once again, President Bush is trying to scare us about the threat of terrorists with WMD,
just as he did before the war in Iraq, even though not a single terrorist in history has ever
come close to possessing WMD and even though the Bush administration has not documented a single
instance of a serious effort by terrorists to acquire weaponized chemical or biological
agents—never mind a nuclear device.

... It’s a shocking misallocation of resources, one that makes a mockery of the fact that the
Cold War is long over and that the world is mostly at peace. At peace, that is, except for wars
of America’s own making.


Where we do need to build our strengths are at home with real protection concerning our ports, our nuclear plants, our national guard reserve who who should remain at home instead of fighting in foreign wars, our fire fighting and other emergency response personnel and equipment, which have been completely neglected to fight this war in Iraq. These are all areas we can and should challenge Bush on. He has been a failure and leaves us more vulnerable to further attacks because of this neglect and his failed policies in Iraq.

We need to turn the table and get away from this fear mentality. Democratic politicians need to step up and say these things loud and clear, just as Murtha has done. We will never beat the Rebublicans at fear mongering. We seriously need to change the discourse on this subject.

[mdmc]

18. kick

for foreign policy..

[Armstead]

19. I read a couple of them so far --- interesting but bloodless

Some I agree with, some I disagree.

The military one seems to boil down to "Demand a bigger Military to defend against the charge of being weak on national Security."

Er, um, I think I'll let that one slip by.

I read the reports on the Middle Class, and two things struck me.

1)They suffer from the disease of overcomplicating things. They break things down into groups and subgrouns and analytical analysis of the preceived composition and desires of the electorate, so they can "tailor" their policies. They also can't resist tyhe opporunity to get in some "liberal bashing" in there.

2)They also buy into the Corporate CON JOB that there is nothing we can do about global competition or eonomic consolidation. As if the US is helpless to implement any policies to protect American workers and businesses from unfair competition. Therefore all we can do is react the best we can. They also seem to ignore the core of so much of it, which is the excessive concentration of wealth and power that has occurred. Everybody knows it. Most people DON'T like it. But again, their message seems to be that we have to acquiesce.

----
Unlike these think-tank folks, it does not take scientific studies or strategizing to recognize the basic facts. People are nervous, frustrated and angry because they feel that so many large forces are pressing against them. And they feel that big economic special interests have taken over and squeezed them out of the equation.

In the past, they saw Democratic Liberalism as the counterveiling force that fought that and defended the interests of the middle class and disadvantaged. But because the Democrats seemed to have stopped fighting for their interests long ago on the big issues, they no longer identify with the Democratic Party or liberalism.

The solution is not simple, but it is straightforward. Stop avoiding the issues of wealth and power, stop taking a passive stance on our ability to affect the economy and political system. Instead, start talking clearly and passionately about the real issues that most people recognize in their gutrs, and start actively pursuing policies and initiatives that really prove to people that Democrats are willing to fight to protect their jobs, living standards and businesses and economic opportunity.

I probably will sound like a Bernie Sanders groupie, but people like he and Paul Wellstone "Get it" (or "got it). They know how to push an unabashedly liberal/progressive political agenda in a way that also resonates with many in the middle and even among social conservatives.

[mitchum]

20. A pox on Third Way