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I support a vigorous Democratic primary against Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter (D), just like I support a vigorous Democratic primary against Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet (D) just like I support a vigorous primary against every sitting lawmaker in Congress. My support for as many vigorous primaries as possible may offend Establishment-minded activists, party-first sycophants, and other assorted incumbent-worshiping starfuckers, but that's fine with me because my support is based on the principle that the more democracy and elections and the less entitlement royalty, the better.
In the case of Specter and Bennet, I particularly support a primary because I think Democratic primaries create a dynamic whereby especially conservative/corporate candidates like these two are forced compete to see who is more centrist - and by "centrist" I don't mean the term as defined by Washington, D.C., I mean the term as defined by public opinion polls. Indeed, as proven over and over and over again, progressive position on most major issues happens to be right in the mainstream center of public opinion, while the D.C. "center" is far to the right of the mainstream center of public opinion.
However, while I'm really psyched that progressive groups are jumping into the effort to create the conditions for a primary aginst Specter, I'm a tad concerned by this from the Politico:
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The best-known Democratic challenger to Specter would likely be Rep. Joe Sestak, who represents a suburban Philadelphia-based district. Earlier this week, Sestak left open the possibility that he would jump into the race, citing Specter's party switch as a cause for concern. Another Democrat, Joe Torsella, the former head of the Constitution Center, entered the race in February, and said that he will stay in it.
With its announcement Friday, MoveOn added its voice to a chorus of other liberal groups that have been calling for a competitive Democratic Senate primary in Pennsylvania, including Democracy for America and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, which have teamed up for a separate, five-day online survey designed to gauge support for a "Draft Sestak" movement. .
First of all, is there any concrete proof that Sestak would be the "best known" candidate in Pennsylvania Democratic politics to run against Specter? I ask because it's hard for me to believe that Sestak is better known than, say, former Rep. Joe Hoeffel (D)*, a longtime (and current) Montgomery County Commissioner who has already run statewide against Specter. Recall that in Pennsylvania, many successful statewide candidates from Specter himself to Ed Rendell have had to run multiple times and lose to finally win office. I know the automatic brain-dead assumption in D.C. is that sitting House members are automatically very strong statewide candidates, but that's not always the case, especially in a place like Pennsylvania (think Rep. Ron Klink's recent and disastrously failed campaign to unseat Rick Santorum).
Second, and I ask this question in all sincerity and not in a leading kind of way, is Sestak a proven progressive? I just don't know, and I think it's fair to ask when considering whether progressive groups should automatically start beating the drum for him in a primary out of an Anbody But Arlen impulse.** If he's not, and that drum beat has sounded for him and not, say, for recruiting a known progressive vote-getter (could be Hoeffel, could be someone else, doesn't matter), then it means those progressive groups are simply echoing D.C. conventional wisdom that says sitting congresspeople are automatically the best likely to win - as I said, a dubious assumption. More importantly, progressive groups jumping behind a candidate who isn't progressive in a Democratic primary would seem to defeat the movement utility of a primary.
If a contested Democratic primary's value to the progressive movement is the creation of a competition between candidates to be progressive, then backing a candidate who isn't progressive probably wouldn't actually create that competition, or at least not nearly the intensity of such a competition as necessary (though I could be convinced that if it's a choice between no Democratic primary against Specter and one between a mediocre Democrat and Specter, the latter is still better for the progressive movement than the former).
Sestak has lately been making lots of progressive noises, and that's great. And as I said, it's entirely possible he's a solid progressive - and if he is, then there's a good case to be made that our fledgling movement should get behind him. I just don't know if that assumption/premise is true, though - and I'm asking folks who know if it is.
I raise all these issues because the decision about which primary candidate to back is a serious one, and if it's made only with D.C. conventional wisdom in mind, and not movement goals, then the primary becomes an exercise in D.C. conventional wisdom, not movement building.
* Full disclosure: I worked for Hoeffel briefly more than a decade ago. I'm not touting the idea of him making a run at all - hell, I don't even know if he would run, would want to run, or would even make the right candidate in this race. I'm just citing him as an example to make a bigger point.
** I know the canned response to this from progressive groups is that they are "polling their members" and thus their "members get to decide" - consequently creating the image that the leadership of these groups played an absolutely objective role and had no hand in picking and choosing the specific candidate to back. But that doesn't really fly - leadership of groups are certainly right to involve their memberships in decisions, but that leadership can't really claim to have no impact on the direction that their memberships often choose to take. When you ask about a "Draft Sestak" campaign, for instance, you aren't saying "should we draft A candidate" you are asking whether a specific candidate - and that specific candidate only - should be drafted, meaning it's a leading question. |
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