The DLC (0.00 / 0)

Well, at this point in the game, the recent results of our 'great' victory in 2006 would be no different if that victory were of DLC origin.  With the gutting of FISA last week, I'm having some existential moments, and one of them is that I made phone calls for Move-on and Bob Casey in that election and for it I  got my privacy in emailing friends in Canada eliminated. Tell me again what the actual results were of that victory and how those results would differ from what the DLC would produce?  Every year I send my dues into PFAW, and a bit of money for me, and what are the results of that: Roberts. Alito, and Brown versus gutted. Oh, and what happened with Mr Webb?  I think both move-on and pfaw should rethink their whole reason for being.  Here may be a better reason for their existence (and maybe for the whole progressive movement), though not as exciting as defeating the bad guys: educate the electorate in any given area so that that electorate will demand that their reps vote appropiately.  Jeez, there are pretty knowledgeable people I know in PA who don't even know what FISA is.  That's how Bob Casey got away with it.  And harping on  the DLC is just not a big item to me when I've had my privacy eliminated!!!!!!

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by: Andre @ Sat Aug 11, 2007 at 21:17:26 PM CDT

Persistence (4.00 / 1)

I speak of the DLC literally and symbolically to stand for centrist interests. Not harping, just analyzing their motivations and their goals.

Meanwhile, how could we expect to overcome an advantage on us that's been 30 years in the making? It will take time, and it will take persistence. In fact, it's incredible that so many progressive goals and values have come as far as they have in such a short amount of time.

The FISA vote angered and demoralized me, but only momentarily. Everyone gets tired of me referring to the few courageous citizens in Eastern Europe who managed to overthrow entrenched tyrannies, who hung in there through disappearances, tortures, deaths, friend turned against friend...but I'm going to keep doing so. Havel warned us that ours had begun to look like just another "post-totalitarian" regime. Havel won.

Hang in, because you want what you want more than your opponents. They want you depressed and demoralized. Don't hand them that victory.

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by: GlennWSmith @ Sat Aug 11, 2007 at 21:44:46 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Harold Ford On Meet the Press Tommorrow (0.00 / 0)

and he will be debating Markos of DailyKos fame. It should be a interesting smackdown if Markos is on the ball. Harold has tried to claim the netroots victorys as his own, and if nayone knows all the real details it is kos. For some more details see my diary here posted a couple hours ago, or the WaPo for Markos and Susans rebuttal piece to Harolds piece of crap OpEd from the other day.

Pledge To Ask "The Question"

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by: OneCrankyDem @ Sat Aug 11, 2007 at 21:30:01 PM CDT

How do we get rid of these guys? (0.00 / 0)

This is a refreshing confirmation of what people like myself have been thinking for a long time.

In particular, I found the following revealing:

"It's also why there was such a meek response on GOP voter suppression. A growing progressive base was ultimately a threat to centrists for the same reason it threatens the GOP."

Until reading the above, I never understood why Kerry and the Democratic Party in 2004, after having the 2000 presidential election stolen, turned a blind eye to Rove's machinations to suppress voter turnout and stood by silently while preparations were underway to steal the election in Ohio.

Glenn's piece makes it really clear that we need to cleanse the party of these Trojan horses from the corporatocracy.

My take is that the progressives' battle against the DLC needs to be joined on three fronts -- two at the grassroots and one in the media.

The first is through vigorous netroots support of progressive candidates that beat centrists.

The second is via Howard Dean's voter protection campaign being carried out through his 50 state strategy and the state and local Democratic party leaders and organizers that he is supporting.

The third is through picking loud public fights in the media with DLCers everytime they make outrageous anti-progressive centrist statements and engage in outrageous power plays.

In my view, progressives are engaged in two pivotal political fights right now to clear the way so that the American people can elect the progressive representatives preferred by the large majority (minus the 30+% hard core conservatives).

The first fight is to shove the Republican Party onto the dust heap of history as punishment for the damage it has inflicted on the country over the past 40 years.

The second fight is to cleanse the Democratic Party of phony corporatist Democrats, Blue Dogs and DLCers. Phony Dems and Blue Dog Dems should be primaried and replaced by progressive candidates. DLCers should be vigorously outed, publicly opposed and ultimately rendered persona non grata in every nook and cranny of the party.

 

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Aug 11, 2007 at 21:48:46 PM CDT

This Is Where Matt's Analysis Could Get Refined (0.00 / 0)

This passage really struck a chord with me:

The progressive movement has not just threatened this message monopoly -- it is undoing it. Through MoveOn, the rise of popular documentaries, blogs, think tanks, etc. It's not just that we talk about real values and innovative strategies. It's because we're talking, period, that the centrists feel threatened.

Hence the DLC's vicious attempts to discredit the movement. And that's what they want. They don't seek to win an argument over policy. They seek to destroy the credibility of their opponents and restore their message monopoly.

not just because it's true, but because I think it more accurately captures what's going on than Matt's broad-brush labelling of them as "conservative" or "rightwing."

Of course, they are conservative compared to us.  But they aren't Pat Robertson/Grover Norquist/Tom DeLay conservative.

They are, however, completely uninterested in argument, and totally fixated on personal attacks, the same as conservatives are, for the same basic underlying reasons, as you say:

A growing progressive base was ultimately a threat to centrists for the same reason it threatens the GOP.

Why? Because a rise in the progressive base ultimately threatens their backers.

It's all about a very tiny slice of very special interests.  It's all about plutocracy vs. democracy.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Aug 11, 2007 at 23:15:32 PM CDT

The Establishment Conensus (0.00 / 0)

I think the establishment consensus, while clearly benefiting very few in effect and in policy, seems quite a bit more widely established in the various threads that pass for "mainstream culture" today. Now, this very great culture in my opinion, consumer stuff mostly, but it's undeniably pervasive.

Politically, some of this manifests as apathy, but also as a vague trust and allegiance with "Corporate America." Corporations specifically are generally unpopular, but the cultural space they occupy is home to many.

The good news is that this is changing: as people are exposed to different (and I would say better) cultures, of which more meaningful political messages are a part, fewer and fewer of them want to stick with the beige-flavored 30-second soundbytes.

Looking beyond a well-networked progressive base and towards a true progressive governing majority requires breaking through this culture, as well as the interests that ride on top of it.

Me | My Work | Future Majority

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by: Josh Koenig @ Sun Aug 12, 2007 at 01:53:19 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

This is really interesting... (0.00 / 0)

And it implies that the goal of the "centrists" was, at least indirectly, to undermine and weaken the Democratic party. If they cared about nothing more than promoting their financial interests, then the side effect that their strategy shrunk the base would not matter to them in the long run. It really makes the DLC out to be cannibals, when you think about it. I guess the moral is that the DLC is just another aspect of the anti-New Deal backlash that has dominated politics in the post war era.

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by: Mark Wallace @ Sat Aug 11, 2007 at 23:25:20 PM CDT

That's why... (0.00 / 0)

...such a thing as "coordinated campaigns" were invented to be outside formal party structures. This accomplished two things: it guaranteed no infrastructure would be left behind for the party; it allowed the message to be focused on "independent" voters -- and left the message, of course, in the hands of the consultants who spent the money given to campaigns by the centrists...

Many of these candidates and campaigns (post-'72) were Democrats, especially in the South where they were once the dominant party. But it was a very conservative party then. We wouldn't want to return to anything like it. LBJ had been unique in the sense that he cared about disinfranchised minorities. The business interests re-asserted themselves as Democrats because the growing Republican Party was already dominated by its chosen (and increasingly far right few. The neoliberal Ds of the WWII generation would find no home in the increasingly conservative GOP. Still, in those days it was not so much a matter ideology. They remained Ds because of social habit and personal enmity with some of the GOP leadership.

I believe they also carried with them a bit of the New Deal legacy. They were never anti-government. They just wanted to make sure it served their interests, which they honestly and forthrightly believed were the nation's interests. I disagree with that, but must admit that they organized brilliantly to protect those interests. They were shrewd. As we must be.

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by: GlennWSmith @ Sun Aug 12, 2007 at 00:51:25 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

In His Book "Democracy Heading South" (0.00 / 0)

Augustus B. Cochrane III argues that America circa 2000 had become functionally similar to the South circa 1950 as described by V.O. Key in Southern Politics.

Although the structures were different (like lungs vs. gills), Cochrane argued, the one party South circa 1950 had been as much of an entreprenurial free-for-all as the dealigned nation circa 2000.  And the role of non-party entreprenures--be they individual poltiicians, consultants, fundraisers, whatever--was similarly inimical to creating effective political machinery that could shape an agenda for the common good.

I think you're drawing a somewhat finer distinction than he did, focusing specifically on the roles of these actors, but your account is perfectly compatible with his, and indeed your perspectives serve to reinforce one another.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sun Aug 12, 2007 at 01:45:39 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Important Point (0.00 / 0)

They just wanted to make sure it served their interests, which they honestly and forthrightly believed were the nation's interests. I disagree with that...

...and I second that disagreement. But I also feel like it's important to note that while this case wouldn't be popular if it were made explicitly, the "status quo" has a lot of cultural weight.

I was trying to make a similar point just upthread in a response to Paul, and I'm still not sure if I've quite got the right way of expressing it, but in short I think that part of our "being shrewd," is going to be looking at how to build a broad cultural base around the progressive vision.

Me | My Work | Future Majority

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by: Josh Koenig @ Sun Aug 12, 2007 at 02:02:12 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

What to call them (0.00 / 0)

I definitely understand how you would call these guys "Industrial Authoritarians" -- ever since the Clinton White House justified the Drug War on the basis that it (presumably) increased worker productivity, I've had the impression that these guys are just the overseers for our corporate masters.

However, there is something to calling their strategy "centrist", though I don't think that it precise enough. As I understand Smith's point, their strategy is to target voters who are susceptible to slick, expensive media campaigns. They are afraid of voters who decide how to vote independently of their campaign-level PR campaigns--these voters include partisans, single-issue voters, and self-educated voters.

Since the DLC avoids those first two groups of voters, they are "centrist" to the extent that we define the center according to a bipolar view based on parties or hot-button issues. But being in the center is not the point of their strategy. It seems that their point is to act "behind the scenes" -- to sidestep the issues that informed voters are focused on, and control the image of their campaign using feel-good PR tactics. This gets them into power, and gives them free reign to take control of all those "little issues" that are worth billions of dollars, but many voters tend to ignore.

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by: adam ricketson @ Mon Aug 13, 2007 at 09:14:42 AM CDT

the mythic center (4.00 / 1)

"Centrist" is a contested concept, and for some of us it carries implications of amoral, go-with-the-wind negatives. But for others it implies a kind of warm pragmatism, reasonableness.

Also, there is no "center" in politics. Rather, there are human beings whose values, depending on context -- family, work, politics -- fall all over the map, not on an easy to see left-to-middle-to-right linear scale. Use of that scale, and mention of the center, automatically marginalizes everything not in the center. In our political context, it works against progressive values.

You are not wrong about the behind-the-scenes mode of the DLC types. I just felt it better to come up with a better descriptive term, one that wasn't highly valued by the very people I believe stand in our way.

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by: GlennWSmith @ Mon Aug 13, 2007 at 14:46:59 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Lakoff and the progressive frame (0.00 / 0)

we should be thinking progressivism, protection and empowerment, the mythical center is exactly that, a myth.  A construct of conservatives to convince progressives with a conservative viewpoint on a cultural issue that that can trust the GOP.

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by: gaspare @ Wed Aug 15, 2007 at 12:06:18 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Corporations hedging their bets (0.00 / 0)

being backed by big industry, clearly if there were going to be some democrats they'd were going to side with industry, big industry.  The base was marginalized to bring over so called "moderate and liberal" republicans which may not embrace the xenophobic, racist and anti-abortion aspects of the party but would accept a "right kind" of Democrat. 

You know, I work for a big company and I do all I can to see that it makes a profit and stuff.  I like my job and my paycheck.  But crap like this is beyond the pale.  It's corportations dominating not just the business they work in but the social and cultural fabric of society itself.  and that's just wrong.  and we can see it in sky rocketing health care, where profits are maximized over the nations' health, global warming where the science is blurred while the Earth cooks and with immigration and the explotation of cheap labor, fuck is it ever cheap enough for these greedy bastards?

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by: gaspare @ Wed Aug 15, 2007 at 12:03:19 PM CDT