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Edited on Mon Oct-01-07 10:59 PM by arendt
The Myth of a "Liberal" Democratic Leadership
by arendt
How many DUers believe there is, in the U.S. today, a "liberal media"?
Now, how many DUers believe there is, in the Democratic Party today, a "liberal leadership"? A leadership that is actively working to restore the Constitution and the Separation of Powers, end the Occupation of Iraq and the sabre-rattling around the world, stop the privatization of the military, take some steps towards balancing budgets and trade gaps, address the exponentially growing wealth gap, or institute a single-payer national health scheme. Any hands? I don't think so.
Given the last four years, its hardly debatable that the official leaders, and the unofficial "movers and shakers", of the Democratic Party are neither liberal nor progressive. How did the Democratic Party leadership get to this point? As with the "liberal media", the frog was boiled slowly. The corporatists didn't come into the Democratic Party and pull the support from every office-holding liberal in one big putsch. Just as, in 1980, the corporatists didn't come in and fire every TV news anchor and instantly replace them with the likes of John Stoessel.
In TV, the concept of "infotainment" was floated. That is, news was changed from something that the networks subsidized as a public service from their revenue to just another "profit center" that had to pull its own weight. Journalists who couldn't adapt got fired and replaced by lightweight hacks who did personality pieces. Of course, "radicals" like NYT reporter Sydney Schaumberg were instantly shown the door. Slowly, we got wall-to-wall conservative pundits, tabloid journalism, and reality TV.
Our corporate masters "turned" the Democratic Party the same way they turned TV - slowly. They let old war horses like Tip O'Neil get old and retire. Over the long run, well-funded, pro-business, pro-Wall Street Democrats pushed out pro-labor Democrats. And, it was a positive feedback loop. The more pro-business Dems, the more anti-union legislation got passed - thereby decreasing the number of union voters for pro-union candidates. Like the media purge, it was all done slowly, with a lot of phony narrative about what was really going on. You never heard stories about "conservative Democrats". You only heard about "out of touch liberals, who were living in the past". The result was that many people who got their news only from the already-corrupted corporate media outlets floated entirely through Bill Clinton's presidency, and his four year soap opera of GOP-manufactured scandals, without ever realizing how many anti-labor and anti-government actions were taken on his watch.
It finally became clear to many Democrats that something was rotten in Denmark when the corporate Dems and the corporate media jointly put out a contract on Howard Dean - a fairly conservative progressive and the pioneer in internet fundraising. The media carpet bombed us with the lie of "The Scream", and we wound up with DLC member Kerry as candidate. I think we all remember his inept response to Swiftboating, his rapid cave-in despite obvious fraud in Ohio, and a generally uninspiring campaign that stupidly believed beating Bush in a debate would change anyone's mind.
After that debacle, progressives invented the "netroots" and managed to exceed the victory margin that could be flipped without undeniable vote fraud, resulting in the victory of 2006. The corporate media immediately tried to regain control by starting up "the permanent campaign" (TPC) - the corporate media buyout of the primary system. A buyout in which the media and corporate front groups like the AARP get to pick what candidates are "worthy", what questions will get asked, and how much airtime each candidate will get. The only alternative to submitting to TPC control was to raise as much as the "name" candidates two years before the election. But this time, the progressives didn't put up with eight years of soap opera. Rather, in eight months, they have a serious case of buyer's remorse about the "conservative Dems" that they elected and the phony candidates they are being offered. This is reflected in the abysmal poll numbers for Congress. And after the "no withdrawl/corporate healthcare forever" debate, hopefully by falling poll numbers for the "leading" candidates.
With a public that is onto the bunkum, even TPC isn't enough security for the corporations. So, we have the move by reactionary Florida and conservative Michigan to usurp New Hampshire's traditional primary role. This further assault on the primary system reflects the fact that NH has become "unreliable" to corporations. NH actually has a meaningful primary process - old-fashioned, retail politics; and that politics reflects a state that has switched from the Red column to the Blue column over the last ten years. Hence the drive to compress the primary schedule and pre-empt retail states like NH in favor of wholesale states like Florida. Florida is a huge state with an untypical demographic (huge number of retirees) and an infamously crooked history of voter suppression and ballot tampering. So, of course, the Florida Dems are "outraged" that Howard Dean at the DNC refuses to give them an exception to rules they agreed to long ago. Its the DLC equivalent to the GOP attempt to break the unit rule in California - I don't like the rules, so I will change them.
And, that is the real story behind the myth of a Democratic leadership defending our Constitutional rights, our institutions, and our economy from George Bush. One last thought. But, first my hat: :tinfoilhat:
Just like "Only Nixon could go to China.", only a nominally "liberal" Democratic president could turn on the police state that Bush+Dick have set up without putting mobs in the street. B+D can't do that because they have blown all their credibility. Everyone sees their every move as nothing but self-serving lies.
But, a newly elected "liberal" Democrat, who did nothing to take all the police state laws off the books, could contrive a confrontation and start turning the screws on genuinely liberal/progressive leaders and organizations with the powers W usurped and no one successfully took back. How convenient. But, naah. They would never do that. Just ask MoveOn.
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