Jon Stewart makes a very good point about Democrats who thought it was smart to distance themselves from the president. Who in the world would ever think that was a good idea? And why did Obama play along with it? Distancing themselves from Obama seems to have made the Democratic loss far worse.
If there is one message that the Democrats should take home from this election disaster is that they have to support each other. Throwing Obama under a bus was complete chicken-shit. With the Republicans attacking Obama right and left, they should have taken a cue from Paul Krugman and pointed out Obama’s successes, along with the total lack of ideas coming from the Republicans, especially on healthcare, financial reform, immigration, education, climate change, the environment, social issues, and economic growth.
5 Comments
It’s insane watching dems do this sort of thing again. In 2010 you saw a flood of blue senators and reps turn tail and run away from the ACA and similarly distancing themselves from Obama. That didn’t go so well. Four years later and they take the same tack. I know that Americans have a short memory when it comes to politics but you’d think the folks running would reach back a few elections ago and compare their strategy then to what they were taking into this bout.
These are the people, the should-be allies of the President, who would be able to explain programs like the ACA, nuances of immigration control, and financial reform, and everything else you listed. Instead they confirm the GOP’s criticism of democratic handling of all these issues by running away from what they believe in, and if the person running doesn’t believe in the things they’re doing, why should voters?
I won’t claim that there’s nothing backing up Churchill’s assessment that “the best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter,” but Congressional Democrats have been making it really, really easy on their opponents and the voters to ensure they get the outcome we saw this election.
Ralph Nader, America’s greatest consumer advocate of all time, is still out there, fighting the good fight. He now has America’s greatest consumer advocate podcast, airing Saturdays(http://ralphnaderradiohour.com/midterm-elections-2014/; also on i-Tunes, etc.). I highly recommend it.
Last week’s guest, Bill Curry, made the point that candidates from both parties now rely almost exclusively on consultants and corporate lobbyist to set the tone and write the slogans for their candidate’s campaigns, based almost entirely on narrow polling data to appeal to this or that narrowest slice of a targeted demographic’s basest instincts. And the candidates dutifully obey, spouting mindless platitudes that have almost nothing to say about the real issues of the day or offer any plan or solutions to our real problems. Our so-called leaders are little more than a mouthpiece for big money corporate-backed special interests who do everything in their power to obfuscate, divide and conquer.
The beginning to a solution, he suggests, is to overturn the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling and remove the obscenely corrupting influence of unlimited anonymous campaign donations out of the democratic process, to be replaced with a more fair system of public financing. Money is power and, as we all know, absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Then there’s the GOP threat that, IF Obama uses executive orders to do anything about immigration, for instance, that we’ve already had almost six years of Obama and eight of Bush and eight of Clinton to do something about and have done nothing, THEN we may not cooperate with President Obama.
Talk about empty threats…
Ralph states “Money is power and, as we all know, absolute power corrupts absolutely”. What hasn’t been discussed is that with all the dark money flying around “talking”, how much of it is the yuan (official currency of the People’s Republic of China). Its common knowledge the GOP goes over to China to earn “speaking fees”? Since there is no transparency to the process, can anyone say there is no outside influence now having there say in our government. With the Asia trade agreement coming down the pipe we are about to be outspoken by “yuan” voices. This could make NAFTA look a minor hiccup.
It’s all Playground Politics. Republicans are the bullies. Democrats run away and hide. At least we know what DINOs look like. Voters needs something to vote FOR.