No More Moore: The DLC Joins the Witch-Hunt

[Ruffhowse]

We've got to repudiate, you know, the most strident and insulting anti-American voices out there sometimes on our party's left... We can't have our party identified by Michael Moore and Hollywood as our cultural values.
— Al From, CEO, Democratic Leadership Council

You know, let's let Hollywood and the Cannes Film Festival fawn all over Michael Moore. We ought to make it pretty clear that he sure doesn't speak for us when it comes to standing up for our country.
— Will Marshall, President of the Progressive Policy Institute, the think-tank of the DLC

THE FIRST THING I thought when reading these passages—both taken from a "soul-searching" roundtable held by the Democratic Leadership Council—was this: Who the hell is Will Marshall?

I couldn't remember seeing his name at the top of anybody's ballot. I didn't remember which, if any, elections he had ever won. I was a little mystified, in fact, by the nature of his popular support—who he meant, exactly, when he used the word "we" to talk about whom Michael Moore does and does not speak for.

According to the last data I could find, Moore recently made a movie that was seen by tens of millions of people around the world and has grossed nearly $120 million in the U.S. alone. Furthermore, it was, according to exit polls, a much better demographic success than the actual Democratic party. A Harris poll conducted in July found that 89 percent of Democrats agreed with Fahrenheit 9/11, along with 70 percent of independents. That means Moore outperformed John Kerry among independents by about 19 points, if we are to go just by the data presented by bum-licking power-worshipper Ron Brownstein of the Los Angeles Times at the DLC roundtable.

Moore's revenues come from millions of ordinary people paying 10 bucks a pop to see his film. In contrast, only about 200 people a year visit the DLC at the box office—only they pay thousands of dollars per ticket, and they all have names you'd recognize: Eli Lilly, Coca-Cola, Union Carbide, Occidental Petroleum, BP and so on.

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1203-15.htm
______________________________
The DLC is really starting to piss me off.

[hippiechick]

1. Well, that goll darn Michael Moore !!

He has the audacity to speak to the common man in the common man's language, and boasts utter disregard for elitist authoritarianism when he speaks to crowds of people inciting them to exercise their civic responsibilities !!!

We simply can't have that !!!

/sarcasm

:hippie:

[Smeggy]

3. It's all about image

The peeps from fox news twist the truth far more than Mr Moore. Yet they do it wearing suits. Have you ever seen Michael Moore wearing a suit apart from when he accepts some awards? Why doesnt he wear suits in his 'documentaries' like everyone at fox when they're reading the 'news'?

[hippiechick]

6. Does the average American wear a suit every day ?

The average American only wears a suit on the same occassions Mr Moore does --- for the most part, most of us are in jeans and work shirts 80% of the time. He dresses the way he does because he is a working class kind of guy ... he's not going to turn himself into some 'stuffed shirt' and pretend he's something he's not, that's what the arseholes on Fox do and we hold them in contempt for it.

It would only lessen his credibility, IMHO.


:hippie:

[The Crazy Canadian]

2. I guess these guys are taking some advice from the Natioanl Review

http://www.nationalreview.com/kerry/kerry200412030932.asp

NO MORE MOORE! <12/03 09:32 AM>


It's good to see that Michael Moore can afford a razor and a haircut, and some flattering...okay, less unflattering clothes. (Moore said he just wanted to look his best for his IRS audit. Good line.)

Despite his new look, it is time for Democrats to start the effort to bring their party back to the center, and a key element in this effort will be for some high-profile Democrat to pick a very public, very nasty fight with Michael Moore, and begin the process of expunging the Moore virus (symptom: rabid rhetoric) from the party's body politic.

[Vincardog]

4. It is time the Democratic party took a firm step to the LEFT

and left the leadership go play with themselves. We need no have to return to being the party of the people. The parasitically companies have enough politicians working for them without Democrats adding to their hordes.

[chaska]

8. EFF THAT!

Listen people, we are done with this centrist BS. We cannot win that way. I will not fall into line with pug lite again. You can lose the "undecideds", or you can lose your base. You can convert the undecideds to a liberal view if you play the issues right (Kerry certainly did not), but you cannot convert us hardcore liberals to a conservative stance. No effin' way. Move or lose (us).

[ever_green]

19. That's right. I won't go for Bush-Lite again either.

Screw that.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

10. It's time for National Review...

To STFD and STFU. Buncha goddamn PNAC'ers telling US what to do?

I think not.

[0rganism]

11. Isn't it great how the Dems are always expected to run to the "center"?

Election after election, the republicans win by being their most vicious reactionary rightwing selves, while Democrats are advised ever further to the right in the name of... of something. Keeping up their base of corporate contributions, maybe. Competing with the republicans on their home turf of tax cuts, union-crushing and civil liberties rollbacks. Cutting back on the social safety net while sending living-wage manufacturing jobs overseas. Whatever it takes to seem "mainstream."

Seems to me, we've tried this for over a decade, and it's a proven loser. All it accomplishes is legitimizing the excesses of the radical republicans. What wins elections now is the appearance of authority and the willingness to stand for something, no matter how moronic. Democrats can stop worrying about "finding the center", because we've already found it and wandered off somewhere to the right of it anyway. Time to run some candidates who exude character strength and populism from every pore, and aren't averse to publicly calling out the GOP for its multiple crimes.

Want a "moderate conservative" for a presidential contender? Fine, nominate Mark Warner. At least he's a governor with a reasonable chance of swinging his home state.

But it's time to start running real liberals at the grass-roots level. Take a hint from Goldwater's party in 1964. The republicans were out, blotto, irrelevant. They changed their agenda to reflect the racism, hypocrisy and economic ignorance of a new potential constituency, and forty years later, they call all the shots. No matter how hard we try, we will never be better than the current GOP at leveraging racism, hypocrisy, and ignorance.

So let's take it as far in the other direction as we can, and see who we find waiting for us in the greener pastures of populism and social justice.

[InvisibleBallots]

5. Al From and Will Marhsall are not normal, regular Americans

and they don't speak for me.

[Radical Activist]

7. They're still mad over Roger & Me

and the Big One. We can't have any major voices opposed to NAFTA and the WTO. That is their core agenda and they don't want too many Democrats who agree that shipping all our jobs overseas is a bad thing.

[PDittie]

9. The Dems are starting to split, right and left

DLC and DNC.

Progressives vs. GOP-Lite.

It's not a good thing, but probably for the best in the long run.

[Ima]

12. interesting

This is a snip from a very thought provoking article.


What must be broken is the Democratic Leadership Council’s corporate grip on the party. Two presidential elections in succession, DLC-led tickets have acquiesced to Republican criminality, leaving Black voting rights strewn in the gutter like plastic baubles the morning after a New Orleans Mardi Gras parade. Kerry’s near-instantaneous concession was designed to pre-empt and silence the cries of the wounded so that the DLC might make amends with the Bush Pirates and rejoin the permanent government as a compliant, junior partner. However, history may record that Kerry’s cavalier dismissal of the Democratic base’s deep pain and righteous outrage was the fatal insult. Contempt is no basis for cohabitation. If the DLC’s dead hand cannot be pried from the controls, the national Democratic Party is finished. The troops will disappear, and no amount of 527-type money will buy them back

The DLC specializes in dollar-democracy, the kind that trumps mass constituencies every time in the United States. The real field of battle for Kerry – who appears to have the rich man’s effrontery to consider running for president again in 2008 – and for Hillary and Bill Clinton and the institutional DLC, is for continued control of the Democratic National Committee (DNC). With the breathtakingly corrupt Terry McAuliffe on his way out, the Democrats must choose a new chairman by March 1 to run the party bureaucracy. So entrenched has the DLC become in the DNC, that its factions are fielding two of the major candidates for chairman. Former White House operative Harold Ickes represents the interests of DLC co-founder Bill Clinton and Senator-wife Hillary, while Simon B. Rosenberg is founder of the DLC-spawned New Democrats Network. If the 477 committeepersons want a straight-up corporate guy without the rhetorical b.s., telecom executive Leo J. Hindery Jr. is available to bring the party even closer in line with the views of his peers

http://www.blackcommentator.com/116/116_cover_black_dems.html

[Walt Starr]

23. That's why Howard Dean scared the living shit out of the DLC

Howard Dean found a "fourth way". He appealed to the common man to make small donations, handing the political power back to the people.

The DLC is fucked if they don't wield their corporate power over th heads of Democrats, thus they are fighting the fourth way movement tooth and nail!

[ExclamationPoint]

13. I JUST DON'T GET IT!

WHY do the republicans spend there time chasing down michael moore, (don't tell them this)they're only making his voice louder by trying to destroy him.

[0rganism]

21. It's all about marginalization

Michael Moore is dangerous to the rightwing insofar as his books and documentaries are presenting some very common-sense material in an understandable way. If the republicans can paint him as "fringe", people will dismiss his work without even viewing its content. So far, they've been extremely successful with this; few elected Democrats feel safe in saying that they've seen Fahrenheit 9/11, let alone that they agree with its points.

[justgamma]

14. Now I'm po'd

There was a Ltte in the local paper saying that people like MM and George Soros and Al Franken and Hollywood types just piss off the Righties. This was a Freeper letter blasting the Dems. This is just a RW talking point.
I wrote a letter, how if they would give up, Hannity, Rush, Arnold and Richard Mellon Scaife, we could do without MM et.al.
Of course mine never got published.
How come nowne of them point out just what it is that they don't like about Moore. Is it just because he told the freaking truth??? Why don't any of them address the points brought up in the movie?

[DemonFighterLives]

15. The more detractors Moore has

The more I like him. From and Marshall can kiss off.

[Q]

16. Moore's F911 is essentially ANTI-BUSH*...

...so what From is doing is calling anyone who tells the truth about him 'anti-American'. In other words...he is defending Bush*.

From is among those 'advising' the Dems not to be an opposition party.

[raysr]

17. I knew that this

would happen, keep moving right until we can win. Fuck that, start moving further left. We already have the third party we need, the Socialist Party, modified a little.

[kwolf68]

18. WTF did HE DO? ??? What did he do?

What was it so bad that he did? Tell me Al From? TELL ME???

[ever_green]

20. While I don't think Moore should be the voice of our party....the DNC

shouldn't either! They are so far out of touch with us it's not even funny. We cannot allow another Bonesman as our candidate either. Wake up everyone! Dean was sabotaged, he would've won AND YOU KNOW IT. Please stop lying to yourselves, the truth hurts. Repukes stand by Bush even though it's wrong, let's not make the same mistake.

[OneBlueSky]

22. "We can't have our party identified by Michael Moore . . .

and Hollywood as our cultural values" . . .

this should read . . .

"We can't have our party identified by the DLC and corporations as our political values"