Haha! (0.00 / 0)

The best part?
Democrats in general really don't have to do anything -- simply turn out.

Something tells me the conservative coalition is going to catch fire and crash down a lot harder than the FDR coalition did.

What happens after that?
Americans get represented?

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by: Brad O'Donnell @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 18:36:38 PM CST

Not True! (0.00 / 0)

Democrats in general really don't have to do anything -- simply turn out.

We have to buy popcorn.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 19:12:00 PM CST

[ Parent ]

And lots of Goobers for the other side (4.00 / 1)

One should always be magnanimious in triumph. It is, of course, the finest way of rubbing it in.

The liberal soul shall be made fat. He who waters shall be watered also himself. (Proverbs 11:25)

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by: kovie @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 20:03:24 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I'd rather it be Limbaugh, (4.00 / 1)

but don't count O'Reilly out of it.  He's already on record as defending the "White Male Powerstructure" in this country, plus his little Harlem restaurant loveliness.

The great thing is Fox might make the mistake of backing him to the hilt for a week or so, completely destroying the credibility of the entire network.  If Obama drives one or more elements of the right-wing noise machine to spontaneously self-combust, he could take the rest of his presidency off and still be our most effective progressive president since FDR.

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by: texas dem @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 18:38:33 PM CST

Yup (4.00 / 2)

The beauty of an Obama nomination and presidency is less about his policies, which I believe are quite progressive, even if they're not progressive enough for many progressives' taste (witness the ongoing anti-Obama meltdown over at DKos), let alone his "message of hope" style (although when was that bad IF there was something real underneath), than about what this does to the decades-long right-left conflict, and the overall center of balance of power between right and left. Because he represents nothing less than a fundamentally transformative agent in this scenario, on the order of a Lincoln or FDR.

If he can bring non-wingnut Pubs and right-leaning idies into a dominant progressive ruling coalition (the way that Reagan brought conservative Dems and centrist indies into a till-now dominant conservative ruling coalition) AND wreak havoc on the always inherently unstable conservative coalition that has held the GOP together for decades, then who cares if he's not a progressive as Edwards, Kucinich, Kennedy, or the ghost of Paul Wellstone, because the political power that he will shift towards our side will make passing a progressive agenda far easier than it would be under a more progressive president who did not have as clear and large a mandate. This doesn't mean that this WILL happen, just that it becomes that much more achievable under such circumstances. And to me, it's always been about the agenda, not the people who make it happen. But if Obama is more likely to create the political and ideological in which serious progressive advancement is most possible, I can forgive him his lamentable behavior over the past couple of months.

And in case he lets all this get to his head or otherwise fails to follow through on advancing a progressive agenda, we will be those Roman slaves of old, standing right behind him and whispering into his ears "Glory is fleeting, Barack, so get up off your ass and make universal health care happen". This goes for all other Dems, of course.

Assuming that he does win, smarter progressives will ride his wave and "use" it to advance a progressive agenda, rather than complain about its insufficient progressivism and sit it out on the sidelines, sour grapes-style. Joining doesn't mean submitting. One can be a loyal and effective member of the team without being an uncritical cultist, as opposed to the other side. Where called for, we should absolutely criticize Obama (or whoever gets elected) and come down hard on him (or them). But where we can work together to make good things happen, why the hell not? That's how things get done in politics--when they get done.

And so what if Broder & Co. approve? Having been placated into submission after years of making a living out of trashing the left, I'm quite content having them coo approvingly and being less of a nuisance than they've been. We have more important things to worry about.

Of course, all of this is quite premature. Let's see how the next month or so unfolds.

The liberal soul shall be made fat. He who waters shall be watered also himself. (Proverbs 11:25)

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by: kovie @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 20:00:49 PM CST

This Is All Highly Hypothetical (0.00 / 0)

The thing that irks me no end about Obamaphiles is the large holes in their logic.  If pigs had wings, well, then, we'd be all set.  (You have very little of that about you, but the echoes, Kovie. Still, there are echoes.)

But the reality is, there was never any clear indication that he would outperform Edwards, nor that he would actually fight for a progressive enough agenda--and by that I simply mean one that is actually scalled to the magnitude of problems we face, so that the GOP can't readily pull itself back together again and defeat him in 2012.

One of the problems with such persistently weak arguments, is that they put you to sleep.  You stop thinking about different quirky alternatives that might happen, well beyond the imaginations of the true believers.  This was something that had been gnawing at me for some time.  It's what interested me about the "Theory of Change" article by Mark Schmitt that I wrote about two weeks ago.  But now I actually think I see how something more plausible--in one sense (the "then" part of an "if/then")--could work.

But it's still hard to say how plausible the "if" part is.  I can certainly see it happening.  But, it's not really something that Democrats can control.  And in 2004 we totally blew things that we could control.  So I'm not sure where that leaves us.  But at least it leaves me in a more imaginative place.  Which is good.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 20:51:09 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I think its ploy to help Sununu... (4.00 / 1)

The NH GOP is doing whatever it can to disassociate itself from the national GOP, Bush, and from the scandals relating to the the phone-jamming electoral fraud schemes in 2002. In 2006, Voters rejected both of NH's incumbent Republican members of Congress and Democratic Governor John Lynch sailed into victory.

NH is trending very Democratic and the NH GOP knows that the only route for saving Republican Senator John Sununu in 2008 would be to embrace the grassroots appeal of Ron Paul. Attracting ideological libertarians and the many independent voters in the state is probably the only way to overcome the immensely popular Democratic candidate, Jeanne Shaheen, a former Governor well ahead in the polls over Sununu.

Rejecting Fox would be sacrilegious for Republican voters in most states, but NH has its own distinct voting habits. Just as it took crushing defeats for the Democratic Party to wake up and embrace candidates with online appeal and peer-to-peer enthusiasm, the NH GOP has defeat in recent memory and will position itself the best way possible to help Sununu.

Remember that Sununu, knowing that a well planned media spectacle could change popular opinion about his ties to the Bush administration, was the first Republican in Congress to call for the resignation of Gozales. Shrewd politicians are just as capable of orchestrating this stunt with the Fox News debate though the local party office.

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by: lhfang @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 21:47:47 PM CST

I'm Puzzled (0.00 / 0)

Either I agree with 100% (the state party's health and Sununu's reelection chances can hardly be distinguished from one another) or I'm utterly flabbergasted (you're suggesting that somehow Sununu was responsible for Fox's shutting out Ron Paul in the first place).

So, which is it?

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jan 05, 2008 at 22:51:06 PM CST

[ Parent ]