What the hell happened to the idea of an opposition party?

[springhill]

Quotes

"What the hell happened to the idea of an opposition party? They should oppose Roberts
because they oppose him; that’s what they were elected to do: oppose people who believe
what people like Roberts believe...And with Patrick Leahy announcing that he is voting
for Roberts, one is tempted to conclude that the Democrats are just plain hopeless as an
opposition party and the Republicans will get yet another chance in 2008 to destroy what
remains decent and hopeful about America."
--Eric Alterman, Altercation, Link

[Frances]

1. That sounds very juvenile to me

I don't agree with Leahy's vote, but Leahy has voted "right" too many times for me to abandon him now.

[acmejack]

5. It won't be so juvenile when they start enacting their radical agenda!

I am actually trying to gain some insight into your thinking in arriving at this conclusion, no flame, rudeness, or snideness is intended!

I happen to agree with Eric, I am extremely disappointed in the 11 (thus far) D's who have caved. I am surprised that any woman thinks it is "Juvenile to oppose someone who we know is a radical rightist, who shows contempt for the Senate by refusing to answer direct Yes or No questions.

The WH has refused to surrender relevant documentation to the Congress, we know he was involved in the Florida debacle of 2000. What does he have to do to cause you to think opposition to him is "Adult"?

[OzarkDem]

8. Dem leaders need a wake-up call

Alterman is correct, absolutely.

We can't define our party and our candidates to the voters if we don't stand up for what we believe in. Dems continue to send conflicting messages and give the appearance of a rudderless, confused party that doesn't know what it stands for.

This kind of inconsistency is what voters find so confusing about democrats and if we don't fix it, we won't win in 2006 or 2008.

[tlsmith1963]

2. We Should Just Form Our Own

If the leaders of the Democrats won't stand up to Bush, then we need to leave the party & form a new one. I'm tired of this. I want a real opposition party.

Tammy

[skooooo]

3. Opposing the "majority" party can be uncomfortable...

...So until people can deal with that feeling, or until supporting the majority party becomes more uncomfortable than not, nothing will change.

[Zodiak]

4. I agree we shoudn't jettison Leahy

But I'll tell you what happened to the idea of an opposition party. It was sacrificed to the altar of the "big tent".

Personally, I'm tired of letting the habitual betrayers into the big tent. Leahy, however, is not one of them. His betrayal hurts, which is why you aren't see anti-Kohl and anti-Baucus threads. Those two are the real habitual betrayers who voted "yes".

[Frances]

12. Dennis Kucinich is as pure as they come

and yet I don't think he ever got 5% of the Democratic vote, not to mention what he would have gotten in a general election.

I voted for McGovern, who was also very pure, but unfortunately, not many other people voted for him.

In real life, you have to go with the best electable candidate in order to keep the country from becoming fascist.

And 3rd parties have not worked in my lifetime, which is a long time!

[mitchum]

6. You can thank the "Third Way" approach of the Clintons and Blairs...

of the world for weakening the concept of an opposition party.
Who in the hell would treat a venomous snakebite with a diluted antidote? It just doesn't work.

[Lexingtonian]

7. Let me get this straight

The majority party is failing at almost everything it touches, it's bleeding over a million supporters a month, it's screwing the wing of itself that we consider the least bearable or capable, and it has given up its nominal agenda. Its corruption is hamstringing its leaders but they can't help enabling it further and thereby provoking further investigation and indictment by the judicial system. It is cannibalizing all its own 'accomplishments' to save its most perishable and transient measures- tax cuts.

And now some well-intentioned idiot tells us our job is to distract them, to yell and shout and save them from themselves, to grab the knife with which they're jabbing and slicing themselves. Over some guy whose vote and views are relatively pragmatic and make no difference yet or in the immediate or middle future.

There are times when token opposition is the most effective kind. And recognizing when that is is what separates the pros from the amateurs.

[OzarkDem]

9. Can't win by default

He's saying Dems have to sieze this opportunity to show what they stand for and why its different than Bush and Republicans.

Voters aren't going to assume that, we have to give them a clear picture of our values, our policies, our plans. We can't be all over the map.

No matter how much Bush screws up, Dems won't get support unless they define themselves better and stand up for their beliefs.

[Lexingtonian]

10. That may be true

but there's an issue of timing. People who have spent a generation or so assured that the GOP is emotionally their home- and that's what the whole moderate center of the political spectrum has tacitly or overtly believed, if you're honest about it- will go through a grieving process when that Faith goes lost. It's as traumatic as a death in the family.

Psychologically, you can't show up at the funeral of their old Beliefs and, displaying all the goods all gussied up, tell them to cut the grief and that it's time to get hitched a second (or third) time next week. Even if they're near Acceptance it's wise to allow the courtship to begin slowly and certainly unwise to begin it while they're in Bitterness or Depression or Bargaining phases. And certainly utterly foolish to try anything while they're still in Denial.

The way to look at it is what happened to the Dixiecrats in 1965-68. They left the FDR Democrats over the course of a year or two, but it took a while into Nixon's first Presidential term- maybe four or five years in all- for him to bring them all over into the Republican Party. That first election or two after crackup is affected or won by defectors not showing up, by their wandering around in limbo. In 1992 and '94 and '96 Perot provided the perfect intermediate group for the last conservative Democrats leaving the Party; by '98 and '00 most of them were solidly assimilated as Republicans (though, as a very elderly demographic, a lot of them simply died away during the Nineties and most of them are gone now, I think).

[weiser]

11. It's not a question of timing......

It's something that needs to be done all the time. Dems feel they need to better define them selves, because the media has brainwashing the majority..... Our voices need to be heard more loudly and strongly to penetrate.


Reminds me of the agony: waiting for Kerry to get tough on Bush before the election.... He left it much too late and we lost. (his message never got through strongly enough)

Have our leadership moved closer to the right..?? Is that what has happened????

Makes me draw a parallel to Israel. In my opinion, both Labour and Likud (and every other party in Israel) is RIGHT WING. Neither is the opposition of the other, as they both agree on the principal policies that keeps the Nation as it is.... You have to be right wing to accept to live in a Nation that is occupying land illegally and oppressing a people daily in its laws and militarily. We've started to do the same in Iraq, and lets not forget that many Dems supported going to war illegally.

By that single move, they have shifted the US political spectrum significantly to the right. That's why the opposition lacks any luster. Think of it this way, some Dems have silently surrenders to the Right!!

The grass-root Democrats/Liberals are now fighting an uphill battle (against our own) to get our agenda back on the table.