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Forming another party won’t make much of a difference, because the sad fact is: progressives are outnumbered, outgunned, and outspent. There’s no easy or fast way to reverse this situation. Even if progressives bolted from the Democratic Party to form their own party, they would still be outnumbered, outgunned, and outspent. The Democrats and Republicans would continue to use populist arguments and would co-opt the progressives’ message. Moreover, a third party would probably split the vote on the left, allowing the Republicans to take control. Left: Obama as FDR on the cover of TIME—the Great Delusion.
Is there a meaningful difference between the two corporatist parties? Don Smith says yes, and he means it. What do YOU think?
By Don Smith | August 7, 2010
[print_link] Progressives often ask: are the Democrats as bad as the Republicans? Should progressives form their own party?
My answers are: no and probably not.
In short, the Republicans are far worse than the Democrats, because almost without exception, they want to destroy effective government and enrich the wealthy. The Democrats are mixed: many actually care about helping the public, others are corporatists. But even the corporatist Democrats generally aren’t as bad as the Republicans.
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Forming another party won’t make much of a difference, because the sad fact is: progressives are outnumbered, outgunned, and outspent. There’s no easy or fast way to reverse this situation. Even if progressives bolted from the Democratic Party to form their own party, they would still be outnumbered, outgunned, and outspent. The Democrats and Republicans would continue to use populist arguments and would co-opt the progressives’ message. Moreover, a third party would probably split the vote on the left, allowing the Republicans to take control. Left: Obama as FDR on the cover of TIME—the Great Delusion..
In the rest of this essay, I will fill in the details in my argument. Much of what I will say is common knowledge or obvious. But people don’t seem to “get it”. So I’ll try to be clear.
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The Evil Republicans
Almost without exception, Republican politicians are bad news. They want government to serve the interests of the wealthy, the military, and the corporations. They want to dismantle the social safety net, weaken regulation, destroy unions, privatize public schools, and destroy public transportation. They’re willing to lie, cheat, and steal to achieve their aims. They’re willing to exploit racism, bigotry, and fear. They’re OK with waging war for resources. They’re fine with bankrupting the US Treasury, intentionally mismanaging agencies, and corrupting government contracts. They’re brilliant at character assassination and dirty tricks. They deny basic science. The right wing Noise Machine of Fox News and talk radio perpetuate the myths of an alternate reality in which government and liberals are destroying America.
In numerous recent Senate bills, Republicans have been united in their opposition to even the most modest reforms proposed by the Democrats.
Republicans are bad, bad, bad.
We all knew this already. So nothing new here.
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The Mixed Democrats
As for the Democrats, they’re a mixed bag. (Again, we knew this already.) Many Democratic politicians want government to work for the people. But, unfortunately, these good Democrats are outnumbered and outgunned. There are quite a few corporate Democrats, including President Obama and the Blue Dogs. So the corporate Democrats and the Republicans are able to defeat most efforts at reform.
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But there really are many good and middling Democrats. On July 27, 102 out of 250 House Democrats (40% of the Democrats) voted against funding the war in Afghanistan. President Obama had to rely on Republicans to continue funding his war. More Republicans (160) voted for the funding than Democrats (148).
The recently passed bill to reform Wall Street actually had some teeth, they say. The Volker rule was weakened, but from what I’ve read, the bill was surprisingly robust, given Congress’s recent performance. As expected, Republicans were nearly united in their opposition to even these modest reforms and the Democrats had to go it alone.
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I’m active in the Democratic Party in Washington State, and I can say that the grassroot activists are generally very progressive, and many are quite upset with many of President Obama’s decisions.
Even the “centrist” corporatist Democrats aren’t generally as evil as the Republicans. They wouldn’t have gotten us involved in the war in Iraq. They wouldn’t have stacked the Supreme Court with right-wing ideologues. They wouldn’t have cut taxes as much for the rich. They wouldn’t have staffed federal agencies with industry hacks. They’re not ideologically opposed to government. They don’t deny global warming.
Many Democrats are open to a public option, or even single-payer health care. Had the Democrats gotten strong leadership from President Obama and from Congressional leaders, the health care reform bill could have been a lot better than it was.
Anyone who thinks that the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans is grossly mistaken or is a Republican mole trying to sow division on the Left.
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Obama’s Mysterious Lack of Leadership
As we all know, President Obama has been surprisingly “centrist” (conservative) in his policies. He’s compromised early and been meek in his support for progressive causes. He’s surrounded himself with corporatist advisers and cabinet members, many held over from the Bush Administration. He’s cut shady backroom deals with Big Med and Big Insurance. He’s continued the militarism of Bush and has failed to hold Republicans accountable for their crimes. He’s fired progressive aides based on the flimsiest of charges. (See this petition for an enumeration of Obama’s failings.)
It’s rather a mystery why Obama has been so centrist. Either he’s foolishly bipartisan, or he’s fearful of losing corporate campaign money, or he mistrusts ideology, or he’s afraid of reprisal (from the CIA?). Or maybe all of the above.
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In The Warren Mystery, Paul Krugman wonders whether the Obama team are “idiots” for failing to support Elizabeth Warren. Apparently, Obama clings to his naive hopes of bipartisanship, despite the repeated eviscerating response of Republicans. Obama sure is a sucker for their rhetoric.
During his campaign, Obama said many things to attract the progressive vote. We all know that politicians tell voters what the voters want to hear. But it’s a surprise that an intelligent African American, with a history of working as a community organizer, would be so unwilling to go to bat for the middle class and the poor.
The fact is: had Obama shown guts and leadership, many more Democrats would have followed his leadership and would have voted for progressive legislation. Even if the Republicans and the corporatist Democrats had been able to squash the legislation, still Obama and the progressives could have held their head up high in defeat, knowing that they fought the good fight. And the American people would have learned a thing or two.
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The President has a pretty powerful bully pulpit, and Obama is a gifted speaker. He could explain to the American people the truth about what’s wrong with our politics, and he could shame the opposition into submission, or at least go down trying. Instead, he seems content to compromise onto unsatisfactory positions and play into Republicans’ hands.
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During his first year in office he seemed to want to erase the differences between the Dems and the Repugs, especially with regard to the bailouts and the war in Afghanistan.
Obama gives, the Republicans take, and the Republicans do all that’s in their power to make Obama fail. But again and again, Obama goes back for a beating. What a masochist!
But Obama is Obama and not FDR. It’s sad, because he is gifted, and he was given a great chance to fix things. It seems that he’s barely even trying.
What should progressives do?
Given the reality of progressive weakness, the most important thing to do, I think, is to work to strengthen the progressive news media, so that voters can learn the truth about policies and politicians. There ARE many progressive publications and commentators but their messages need to be heard by the public. Our only hope is that we can get the message out to enough people to make a difference.
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Progressives need to work to elect progressive candidates both within and outside of the Democratic Party. Progressives need to be willing to challenge and shame corporatist Democrats. Progressives within the Democratic Party need to caucus strongly, and they need to be willing to block weak bills and candidates. Had progressives in the House, including Kucinich, stood their ground with the health care reform bill, it might have ended up stronger.
Another reason that forming a third, progressive party would be very hard is that progressives tend to be independent and don’t want to follow leaders. I think this is true both locally and nationally. Getting progressives to work effectively together is a daunting task, about which I’ve written and thought. (What’s so ironic about the issue is that Republicans seem to cooperate better than progressives, even though Republicans espouse individualism and progressives espouse communalism.) If progressives would cooperate to give more support to websites and advocacy groups, both locally and nationally, their influence would be stronger and they’d be better able to coordinate.
I have several progressive political friends who refuse to join the Democratic Party. It’s a shame, because if they joined, they could help me in my efforts to push the local party to the left.
I’ll probably hold my nose and vote for centrist Democrats when the only viable opposition is Republicans. But, inevitably, I won’t volunteer my time or donate money for centrist Dems.
And inevitably, Obama’s centrism will probably harm the Democrats in November. Progressives naturally will be less willing to help the Democrats.
But when it comes to voting, I have to agree with Paul Krugman: “Just to be clear, progressives would be foolish to sit out this election: Obama may not be the politician of their dreams, but his enemies are definitely the stuff of their nightmares. But Obama has a responsibility, too…. He can’t expect strong support from people his administration keeps ignoring and insulting” This quotation is from Krugman’s Curbing Supporters’ Enthusiasm , where Krugman enumerates some of the ways in which Obama has betrayed his base.
DON SMITH is a Democratic/Progressive activist based on the Pacific Northwest.
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