![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no, no, over HERE, your OTHER left
Nov. 4th, 2009 08:58 amGreat. The Republicans won a couple of races and now we get to watch the Democratic Party lurching to the right. This has become a familiar nauseating pattern since 1994. They will claim they need to move to the "center" (by which at this point they mean the actual right) to win over independents.
No, the reason people have lost enthusiasm for voting Democratic all of a sudden is disappointment and discouragement on the left. When the party base decides there's no point turning out to vote, they don't, and the other party wins. The reason Democrats won in 2006? Annoyance with the Republicans finally won out. 2008? Obama generated so much excitement because he sounded like a real progressive. Also? It turns out the Republican base was disappointed with their party for a couple of election cycles, and so they didn't turn out to vote.
Look at the polls. The nation is in a very progressive mood right now. Health care reform? Wildly popular. Ending the wars overseas? Wildly popular. Green initiatives, a second stimulus, another unemployment extension, immigration reform, net neutrality, banking reform, drug decriminalization, breaking up the banks which are "too big to fail"? All wildly popular. All progressive ideas.
What will the Democrats now do? Move to the right on every single one of these issues.
Memo to Rahm Emanuel and the DNC: the base is over here. Not over there, over here.
No, the reason people have lost enthusiasm for voting Democratic all of a sudden is disappointment and discouragement on the left. When the party base decides there's no point turning out to vote, they don't, and the other party wins. The reason Democrats won in 2006? Annoyance with the Republicans finally won out. 2008? Obama generated so much excitement because he sounded like a real progressive. Also? It turns out the Republican base was disappointed with their party for a couple of election cycles, and so they didn't turn out to vote.
Look at the polls. The nation is in a very progressive mood right now. Health care reform? Wildly popular. Ending the wars overseas? Wildly popular. Green initiatives, a second stimulus, another unemployment extension, immigration reform, net neutrality, banking reform, drug decriminalization, breaking up the banks which are "too big to fail"? All wildly popular. All progressive ideas.
What will the Democrats now do? Move to the right on every single one of these issues.
Memo to Rahm Emanuel and the DNC: the base is over here. Not over there, over here.
