DLC: a little policy advisory group or a corporate infiltration?

welshTerrier2

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Sat Aug-12-06 05:51 PM
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DLC: a little policy advisory group or a corporate infiltration?

this thread is going to quickly decline into total idiocy ... maybe there's just no way to avoid that when the DLC and its relationship to the Democratic Party is the issue ...

for some time, i have pushed for party unity ... it's almost unimagineable that we could have an internecine civil war within the Democratic Party and expect to be able to reclaim national prominence and power ...

battles back and forth have argued about just how large the progressive wing of the party actually was ... i've frequently been referred to as "Mr. One Percenter" in my "cordial discussions" with DLC proponents ... for a very long time, i saw our wing of the party as an unrepresented minority ...

well, not so fast there, bucko!! increasingly, the progressive wing has emerged as the majority voice in the party ... to take just one issue, even outside the party, a majority of American now oppose the war in Iraq ... candidates like Hillary Clinton are out of touch with the majority of Americans on this critical issue; when you extend that to just the Democratic Party, her position lies in a very tiny minority ... but this thread is NOT about any single Democrat ... the point is that the DLC is NOT the majority voice in the party and it's way past time for our elected leaders to start recognizing that ...

most of us are sick and tired of the America's pro-corporate agenda and we see our own party doing virtually nothing to address this problem ... we see a nation that has been sold to the highest bidder and we see no remedies or platform planks to fight back on behalf of the American people ...

and we see a DLC with a list of contributors from all the wrong places and an agenda the majority of us strongly oppose ...

so here's the question ... what's in the Democratic Party's best interests: peaceful coexistence or all out war for control of the party? bash away all you like from either side but please at least respond to the question being asked ... i'm hoping to get some good insights about whether to continue calling for unity with all corners of the "big tent" or whether to push to rid the party of these corporate infiltrators ...

before you respond, you might find it useful to read Sirota's latest salvo ... here are a few excerpts:

source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-sirota/temper-tantrums-at-big-mo_b_27124.html

But, of course, we're expected to forget that reality - and forget what the DLC's huge treasure trove of corporate cash has bought over the years. Kilgore wants us to believe that the DLC, for instance, had nothing to do with aggressively pushing corporate-written trade deals that deliberately undermined Americans' job security, wages and benefits - all to the benefit of the DLC's big corporate donors. He wants us to believe the DLC had nothing to do with these trade deals, despite the DLC's well-documented record pushing these trade deals even today - as trade policy's horrific consequences for ordinary Americans are intensifying.

Similarly, he wants us to believe the DLC has been a great champion of health care reform, instead of what it really has been: a force that, at every turn, has tried to make sure Democratic Party policy never challenges the profiteering of the DLC's health and pharmaceutical industry donors.

We're also not expected to remember that the DLC and cronies like Lieberman have made their name viciously attacking progressives on all sorts of issues and undermining the Democratic Party's ability to have a clear message that contrasts with Republicans. <skip>

You may recall it was DLCers like Will Marshall that helped neoconservatives push the Iraq War in the late 1990s. You may recall it was the DLC and DLCers like Joe Lieberman who helped legitimize the concept of Social Security privatization as far back as 2000 - undoubtedly making their donors in the financial services industry very happy. You may recall it was the DLC's congressional arm that authored a letter to Speaker Dennis Hastert demanding Hastert pass the credit card-industry written bankruptcy bill. <skip>