Moderate Republicans are now running the Democratic Party

[Stoic]

The ghost of Ronald Reagan haunts their very dreams. I want my Party back. I'm a New Deal Democrat.

[babylonsister]

1. Baloney. Got a link to even come close to proving that? nt

[Political Heretic]

35. You show us your link first.

:shrug:

[nightrain]

2. ain't that the truth!!!

[Sherman A1]

3. They have been for a very long time

We have the Democratic Party (which is what the GOP once was) and the GOP (which is now the insane party).

[Echo In Light]

12. +1 "America has one political party w/two right wings" Gore Vidal

[QC]

26. Yes, that's pretty much the shape of things. n/t

[MrScorpio]

4. That's not right

The problem is that American society has shifted too far to the right for its own good.

The Democratic Party, as a whole, has been affected similarly.

In order to operate in today's current political environment Democrats, even the way left leaning ones, are making accommodations to the center in order to stay relevant.

Sure, a lot of people try to place the blame at the Democratic leadership's feet for the problems that we're dealing with today.

That blame is misplaced.

The real culprits are the VOTERS who elect Democrats that tend to lean rightwards and the other voters who vote overwhelmingly, against their own best interests, for Republicans.

You're not going to get your party back, because the country has gone to hell.

[hobbit709]

5. Harry Truman said it best

If you run a fake Republican against a real Republican, the real Republican wins every time.

If the Democratic party would stand up for its principles instead of catering to the right.

[MrScorpio]

8. Exactly

Democrats have been trying to compensate for the right-ward shift by promoting their own version of flag waving jingo artists... and have paid the price for their folly.

In a way, the fear and intimidation campaign that the GOP has waged since I was a small child has worked marvelously.

Now the Republicans are playing a new game... "No one is righter than thou".

No matter what reasonable position that the GOP has offered in the past, which is now acceptable to the Democrats in the present... It JUST AIN'T GOOD ENOUGH.

It's a game that we'll never win.


It's time to go back to good, old liberal basics and the Republicans be damned.

[PinkFloyd]

11. That's exactly what messed up their agenda...

On HCR, now financial reform they try to work with the GOP only to never learn their lesson. One, you can't negotiate with the GOP because they don't negotiate...you either pass whatever version they have of it or they start their noise machine on how your socialist, communist, fascist, marxist plan is going to destroy America. Two, YOUR base is more important than trying to win over fuckers that will NEVER EVER EVER EVER vote for you.

Bill Mayher was right...The Dems, especially Obama, could learn a thing or two from Bush/Cheney on tactics. They might have been the some of the biggest assholes in American history but they got exactly what they wanted, no matter how terrible it was and they didn't give a fuck. They even got away with fucking war crimes and illegally spying on ALL Americans (worse than watergate), and here the Dems might be getting their asses handed to them just over this health care fuck-up. Sorry for the rant, btw.

[KharmaTrain]

10. Did We Have A Party To Start With?

I'm a proud lifelong Democrat but there are times I read stuff on here about the past and it doesn't jive with my own experiences. This party has never been "Progressive" in my lifetime...more a moderating force against the on-going right wing tilt of the rushpublicans. The political pendulum moved to the right for the past 30 years...peaking in 2004 and its slowly starting to move the other way...obviously not fast enough for some.

You are right, its the voters who let this change happen. Many bought the lies of the Raygun/Gingrich/boooosh cabals competing against a Democratic party that has always been on the defensive and always having to play catch-up or clean-up in the wake of another GOOP disaster. It's a fetid culture in the beltway of "professionals" of all stripes...politicians, lobbyists, pundits and the like whose main objective is enriching their careers while make it seem they are neutral or honest...most times they are neither.

The work of changing the political culture of this country has just begun. The 2008 elections were a starting point not a destination. To use the sports analogy, it's one thing to rise up in the standings, its another to stay atop. The Democrats came from a big hole but now with many good goals in sight there are those who put expectations over realities.

Cheers...

[MrScorpio]

16. The Party has never been progressive during our lifetimes

Yes, there has always been liberal elements.

But the party, as a whole, has not been liberal.

Now what the party does so wholeheartedly, is try to clean up Republican crap.

We never seem to have big enough brooms

[Stoic]

24. It was in mine. I'm 53

It was a much different world in 60's (aside from the war) and "privatizing" Social Security or removing banking regulations were considered insane. Even Nixon and Ford continued many of Johnson's policies.

In 1974, when I was 18 I started working in home construction and was making about $60 a day. Today that's worth about $260 a day. The Democrats were the party of the working class. Now they are the party of "get along with our corporate masters".

[Lydia Leftcoast]

27. I'm even older than Stoic, and while Dem foreign policy was always

too interventionist for my tastes, their domestic policies in the 1950s and 1960s (outside the South) were aimed at smoothing out class distinctions. They were pro-union, pro-public services, pro-education, pro-all sorts of things.

Hey, even the Republicans were for good public services and schools, although they always hated unions. During my childhood and teenage years, the governorship of Minnesota passed back and forth between the Republicans and Democrats on a regular basis, and we never noticed any wrenching changes either way. Both parties believed that their job was to maintain a good quality of life for the state's residents.

I spent my grade school years in a Midwestern factory town. All my classmates, white or black, came from families where one parent worked, but all these families had a house and a car. They lived the life that Michael Moore describes as his childhood in Capitalism: A Love Story.

What I remember most about the 1960s is REAL "hope and change." We had a lot of hope that life would get better for everyone (because we could see improvements all around us) and change was happening at a dizzying rate.

I never dreamed that I would live through a time when there was a whole TV network and genre of radio designed precisely to bash the values I grew up with. I never dreamed that a bunch of turncoat Democrats (the DLC) would help Reagan implement his warped vision in the name of "bipartisanship."

I never dreamed that I would see a day when the "mainstream" of the Democratic Party was to the right of the 1960s Republicans.

[Stoic]

29. We're seeing the culmination of Reagan push and...

Big Corporate Money pull. The leadership of the Democratic Party is solidly against the interests of working men and women. It's sad to see the desperation in the eyes of some of my older lefty friends. They wanted Obama to be the progressive champion and can't face, at least openly, how terribly we've been betrayed.

[glitch]

30. Me too. And I remember when our progressive leaders were assassinated in the 60s

And dirty tricks won out in the 70s-80s-90s-00s against those that were only politically assassinated. There is a very good reason for the alleged (and IMO a bogus corporate media construction and a captured election process) "rightward-shift".

Shock and awe without the physical destruction.

[LWolf]

17. +1

[Lerkfish]

19. um I have to disagree with you on that. Voters are not often given a choice

between a conservative dem and a liberal dem, because the local Party organization picks who they will place on the ballot.

I know because in Ohio we had an excellent candidate, war veteran, who was pressured to drop his candidacy by the party....maybe you remember that one?

[MrScorpio]

21. It's kind of like a chicken vs egg dilemma right here

But, I do think that the country went rightward first and then the Democrats followed suit

I can't see that case that you've cited contradicting my observation.

[Political Heretic]

36. That is a steaming pile of bullshit. Poll after poll shows the precise opposite.

On major issue after major issue, polls show the American public is dramatically to the LEFT of its representatives. And yet its the powers that be (and apparently, you) who keep pushing this tired old meme that the country is conservative.

I'll give you just one example:

A New York Times/CBS News poll released last week shows, yet again, that the majority of Americans support national health insurance.

The poll, which compares answers to the same questions from 30 years ago, finds that, “59% say the government should provide national health insurance, including 49% who say such insurance should cover all medical problems.”

Only 32% think that insurance should be left to private enterprise.

http://www.healthcare-now.org/another-poll-shows-majority-support-for-single-payer/

[opihimoimoi]

6. They wish they did....the GOP is TOAST....they are fucked....their Gropanator is a fail

Beck Bachman is nuts

Palin is a quiter

Jindal is Alfred e Newman

[dmallind]

7. Not even close.

Think of the worst Blue Dog conservadem DLC traitor or whatever other vitriol you prefer.

Research their voting record with the Dems.

Think of the most reasonable and moderate Republican you can.

Research theirs.

Tell me whose record is closest to that of the Progressive caucus.


Words mean things. Not being as left as you would like does not equal Republican.

[Political Heretic]

37. Answer: Neither.

Because both are economic conservatives.

[DrDan]

9. absolutely correct - the party has been headed to the right for some time

and the move to the right here has tracked with it.

the old "moderate" is the new "liberal" ----- or the old "conservative is the new "moderate"

[ShortnFiery]

13. You got that right!

[cali]

14. such a meaningless OP.

[Political Heretic]

38. not unlike this modern democratic nightmare. We need fresh blood bad.

[NuttyFluffers]

15. i'm in the GOP; moderate republicans are pretty fucking crazy. don't let them run your party! :(

i became a republican for the joy of the entertaining propaganda, but i vote my principles. being around some of these people, i can assure you that a "moderate republican" is anything but. the only "left wing" of the republican party is also known as "neurotic selfish individualist" and can be roughly classified as sane. the rest...

if you want my unwelcome advice, i think your tent got too big...

[Lydia Leftcoast]

28. The tent is too big and yet too small

It has been expanded to include yuppie Republican Lites, but the New Deal Democrats are being pushed out into the cold, or, in some cases I know of, deciding not to take any further abuse and to leave.

[mmonk]

18. Me too. Well said.

[JamesA1102]

20. New Deal Democrats supported segregation.

and the interment of Japanese-Americas without due process.

[hobbit709]

22. Not just the Democrats at the time.

[Stoic]

25. Yes, we should track them down like Nazis

and bring them to justice. Bastards.

[Hannah Bell]

34. ....

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2010/03/duncan-ed-budget-segregation-wins-2-1.html

[Political Heretic]

39. Waaah Waaah Waaaaaaaaaaah

[Douglas Carpenter]

23. I think it has a lot to do with the increased power of capital

"When I was a boy" even most Republicans - even those who were defined as conservative -at least agreed in principle with the idea that those who genuinely cannot help themselves should be provided some assistance at public expense. It is hard to imagine now, but the actual legislation for the school lunch program and the food stamp program were largely written with the help of Bob Dole and George McGovern working together to produce the legislation. Medicare, Medicaid and the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Act passed with the backing of mainstream Republicans.

Following the removal of the dollar from the Brentwood agreement in 1971, American economy and much of the world economy shifted from being production oriented and labor intensive to speculative oriented. Enormous amounts of fast money was being made hand over fist; first on currency speculation, then land speculation and then speculating on the stock market, commodities and everything and any anything - including the whole new world of derivatives which largely changed the stock market into one huge casino. Although there were a number of vast fortunes made by many lucky individuals - the over all effect on society lead to a very raw and ruthless form of capitalism and less sense of community.

Sometime in the 1970's with this new economy taking shape, this consensus of at least some sense of community responsibility fell apart and was largely replaced with a worldview that proclaimed market capitalism alone will solve all of societies ills. Although the Republicans embraced most enthusiastically this philosophy, this new form of capitalism and the belief that the wealth created by the "free market" would correct societies ills - the Democrats went along with this worldview as well - offering only weak resistance to the power of almost unrestricted and speculative oriented capitalism. After all many, probably most Democratic politicians and professional operatives were also people who benefited in financial terms from this developing new economy in which making money was the one absolute moral principle.

To a large degree, I believe political ideology that puts complete faith in "market based solutions" and "economic initiative" are largely a cynical justification, given that the purity of the free market is quickly discarded when it conflicts with opportunities for more fast money. Still largely this sophistry followed an economic process that was already well under way. The claims of this ideology simply dominate both political parties - albeit to a more extreme level in the GOP. On domestic economic matters, Richard Nixon would be denounced as a socialist by current Republican Party standards. The so-called "moderate Democrats" are simply filling the political space once held by the Nixon/Ford Republicans - although on economic matters, the so-called "moderate Democrats" are probably slightly to the right of Nixon/Ford Republicans - while what is now considered a "moderate Republican" would have simply been beyond the pale in earlier times. Barry Goldwater was considered an extremist by most Americans in 1964 - "In your gut you know he's a nut" - yet old Sen. Goldwater by the time he left this earth, found himself completely alienated from the modern Republican party that he helped create - He was simply too liberal.

Sure there has been significant moves toward social-liberalism since then - on issues like gay rights, womens rights, pro-choice and other issues that are not directly economic or foreign policy related matters.

But when it comes to economics - any major move or campaign within the Democratic Party for major and sweeping public initiatives that would mean real change in the New Deal or Great Society sense - the Democratic Party pretty much abandoned that by the late 1970's. Even 26 years ago, by the time Walter Mondale, who had a background as a strong liberal New Dealer, became the Democratic nominee, if one actually took a look at his specific proposals and the specific proposals of the Democratic platform by that time - the Democratic Party and even most old liberals had already essentially abandoned the New Deal and Great Society tradition of public initiatives and sweeping reform in favor of highly watered down public initiative mixed with private, "market incentive" approaches.

Both parties, at least when it comes to basic economics, can pretty much now say, "we are all Reaganites now" - and have been able to say so at least since that dark, dark night in November of 1980.

By some strange "coincidence" the wealth gap and social-economic stratification of American society has also highly increased since then.

[Hannah Bell]

33. +100

[Douglas Carpenter]

41. well thanks Hannah

[Kolesar]

31. thin...eom

[Hannah Bell]

32. moderate? moderate republicans never even conceived of privatizing the entire nation's public

schools.

that particular gem was part of the bircher crowd's agenda in the 70s.

moderate republicans thought birchers were nuts.

[Political Heretic]

40. No. Corporate suck-offs interested in maintaining their own power and privilege ARE the Party

..with scant few exceptions.

Or I should say, they are our "Democratic" representatives. There are millions of registered Democrats around this country. Perhaps its time we decided enough is enough and started transforming the Democratic Party in to one that would prioritize the needs of working class families ahead of the whims of the financial elite?

Maybe its time we found the courage to challenge establishment lackeys with Democratic challengers that come from working class roots and carry a working class agenda?

[gatorboy]

42. I'm not sure if they're running it. But the blue dogs certainly are trying to hold it hostage.

n/t

[Echo In Light]

43. .

[TorchTheWitch]

44. they've had control of the party for decades

This is nothing new to anyone paying any attention. They're just more blatant and more bold.

[NorthCarolina]

45. I think that's due to what could be called the DLC "New Dem" effect. eom