Are Democrats really a party of cowards?

[Cyrano]

When Republicans are in control, they govern like Attila the Hun.

When Democrats are in control, they barely govern at all. And they don’t seem to have a problem betraying their principles.

I’m not talking about the blue dog conservative Democrats we’re stuck with. I’m talking about the mainstream, majority of the Democratic Party. WTF is wrong with them?

There’s an old saying about power: “Use it or lose it.” And I fear that the Dems are on the verge of losing it this year. If this happens, they will have no one to blame but themselves.

There must be a reason as to why the Democratic Party, after having won control of the congress and the White House, seems to be spending their days living in constant fear of Republicans, cockroaches, and other vermin.

There must be a reason for their failure to govern with dignity, honesty and force. And if so, I’d like to hear what you think that reason is.

[villager]

1. The evidence would seem to speak for itself, yes?

n/t

[liberaltrucker]

2. In a word: Yes.

You summed it up pretty well.

:)

[Kitsune]

3. No, we just have a fifth column in our party.

Unfortunately the fifth column is running the party, and collaborating with the Republicans to actually try to make Democrats seem worse than Republicans.

[Cyrano]

6. It strikes me as insane that a handful of

blue dog Dems and corporate owned Dem whores can actually screw us all this much.

Why is the majority of the party not fighting back? Why are they letting themselves be bullied into going along? Then again, perhaps that's the definition of cowardice.

[Kitsune]

8. It's how the nature of the electoral system affects power structures.

Because any vote for a third party is 'wasted' there's too much incentive to stick with a corrupt organization. Otherwise I'd happily desert the Dems for the Greens or another party that I felt actually stood a chance of cutting through the blatant corruption in the federal government. But any attempt to break with the party superstructure is essentially foredoomed to failure unless a massive crisis takes place, and this may be what we're seeing on the GOP end of things, as the truly rabid loonbars begin to escape their handlers' control and try to primary the official party nominee out or run against them in the general election.

This is why rank-and-file Dems keep voting for a party that doesn't have their interests at heart. It's either them, or the Republicans, who are marginally worse. The Democratic party will have to get worse before we see a tea-party-esque break with the Democratic party superstructure and the potential rise of a party that actually has the interests of non-corporate entities in the front of their minds. How much worse, I don't know.

[samrock]

4. In a word .. yes..

Well at least those that manage to get themselves elected to congress...

[notadmblnd]

5. I think thereare a lot of cowards that work very had to squelch any

sort of gutsy moves by saying we have to be better than them, we have to take the high road because we're more righteous. I think we need to get down in the mud like they do and kick repuke ass.

[NRaleighLiberal]

7. not cowards. overly triangulating and beholden to $$$ as well. and not as nasty

and cutthroat. In other words, a paralyzing combination that ensures little gets done beyond the platitudes and ideas.

I am fed up and disgusted at it.

[ljm2002]

9. They are not cowards!

They are quite brave when it comes to defending the rights of their corporate benefactors over those of the rabble.

[piratefish08]

10. 98% of them, yes. Their level of cowardice is directly related to their corporate funding.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

11. Cowards? No. Just professional party hacks defending their place at the trough.

[tom_paine]

12. Cowardice? Complicity? Corporatization? Some combination? Something else?

Does it even matter any more?

All that matters is the result, as we phase through the different realities the Bushies and their RW Lie Machine/Corporate M$M Fusion creates, ever more right-tilting and disconnected from reality.

[hfojvt]

13. It may depend on your point of view

Did Republicans govern like Attila the Hun? What were the major policy achievements of Bush?
Tax cuts of 2001.
War in Iraq
Tax cuts of 2003

The first and 3rd are sorta easy to sell and hard to fight. To sell it, you goto the public and offer "Free money". To fight it, you have to step up and say "I am against free money."

The war was sold as well by ginning up both fear and hate. The Saddamy-man was very easy to hate. Since the Gulf war of 1990 there had been a steady stream of propaganda on American news about how terrible, awful, no good very bad man that Saddam was. Even worse than Seinfeld, who is a very, very bad man.

Another part of the awfulness of the Bush administration came from DU. When we came to DU, we were barraged with complaints about Bush, and they were always hyperbolic. It was a daily attack on freedom and decency during the Bush years. Was it fascism yet? We joined a crowd here in three minutes of hate, shouting our curses at the hated letter W.

Now we seem to get the same thing, only the focus of our hate is on Obama. He makes us sick, if we are like Michael Moore, and everybody wants to be like Mike. Here we get another daily dose of outrage, with at least ten statements a day of a new outrage and betrayal from the Obama administration, even over things that he promised to do, like focus on Afghanistan or try to be bipartisan.

It was much the same way in 2006. Because the new Democratic Congress was neither impeaching Bush, nor cutting off the funding of the Iraq war, there was constant disgust, not against Republicans, who were sustaining Bush vetoes or against Bush for making the vetoes, but against Democrats. Some people will never be happy until Bush, Cheney, McConnell, Boehner, Limbaugh, Hannity, and Billo et. al. are rounded up, taken to Guantanamo and waterboarded ten times a day. Until that happens, Democrats are a bunch of "spineless, gutless, wishy-washy pansy faces".

The fair-watherness of liberal fandom is truly a sight to behold. We sit in our easy chairs, Monday-morning quarterbacking our team to the point where we hate our team for not winning. We sit in the stands with bags over our heads booing and then wonder why our team cannot even win with HOME FIELD ADVANTAGE. Except that home field advantage comes from having lots of CHEERING fans, not from fans who turn on you whenever you fail to run the plays they are calling from the stands.

Hatred of our quarterback - Obama, has carried over from the primaries when many were not just Clinton supporters, but Obama haters. Heck, why not, I was a Clinton hater, but many of them are still biding their time, looking for reasons to say "I told you so" to all the kool-aid drinking Obama-bots and cheerleaders. And other complaints started before anything was even done. People here got mad about Rahm, about Geithner, about Summers, about Daschle, about Vilsack, about Warren, etc., etc., etc. Well, once you decide you hate somebody and have other people constantly pointing out his faults and only his faults, it becomes pretty easy to find fault. A quote I like, although I cannot remember the source, or the exact quote. It says "If you like somebody, they can dump a plate of spaghetti in your lap and you will laugh, whereas if you hate somebody, then the way they hold their fork infuriates you."

Many people here, already hate the Democratic Party, for not being the Socialist Workers Party. They will go all out to defend Nader and go all out to attack Obama, Reid and Pelosi. The way those Democrats hold their forks is magnified and blown into an atrocity. They are put under a microscope and found to be covered with flaws, like Tina Fey in a high definition camera. They are not imperfect people fighting for a more progressive America against a powerful Rightwing Noise Machine, in this view, instead they are store-bought, cowardly sell outs.

Ralph Nader, otoh, takes a dump on America's plate by working so hard to make Bush President in 2000, and many here are still calling it chocolate pudding. Four legs good, two legs bad. Socialist good, Democrats bad.

[Oregone]

14. Only if you believe they actually are liberal

If their rhetoric is showboating electioneering, then its no wonder they don't follow through (then rubber stamp right-wing things when otu of power)

[Greyhound]

15. Not cowards, traitors.

Not all of them, of course, but more than enough. They pursue a hidden agenda that differs little from that of the republicants.

[TankLV]

16. Y.E.S.

that was easy...

next question...

[krabigirl]

17. yes

[branders seine]

18. No.

But the "leadership" in DC is bought and paid for and too cowardly to admit it and too cowardly to do the right thing instead of taking the loot.

[WVRICK13]

19. No, They Are Politicians

just like any politician, they care only about themselves. We give them money to get elected, the corporations give them money to hide for personal expenditures. Now, where do you think their alliances are?