Things are not going well for the Republicans. From Newsweek:
More Americans still disapprove of the president’s handling of problems caused by Rita than approve (49 percent vs. 42 percent.) And, across the board, most of his most visible policies only pull the support of a third of the country: on the economy, 35 percent approve; on Iraq, 33 percent; on energy policy, 28 percent.
More worrisome still, the base that provides the floor to the president’s support are critical of their own party these days. For instance, a 49-percent plurality of Republicans says their party is “too close to oil companies” and a 53-percent majority says it’s “too close to big business.”
And the GOP politicos are starting to feel the heat. Here’s a selection of quotes from this morning’s New York Times.
“It’s been a difficult week, I’m not going to sugarcoat it,” said Representative David Dreier, the chairman of the Rules Committee, who has assumed new duties in the reshuffling.
Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York and chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, agreed. “You get your job done,” he said. “You can’t panic. Even though our poll numbers are going down, there’s no great love for the Democrats, no great support.”
“The Republican Party has taken some real body blows and is on the ropes right now,” said Tim Pawlenty, the Republican governor of Minnesota. Because of recent events, he added, “Democrats basically have been keeping their mouth shut and watching as the Republicans kind of implode.”
Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, argued that the Republican Party needed to acknowledge the governmental failures in responding to Hurricane Katrina and outline a broad agenda for change. As the party in charge, “We had better be the leader of changing it until it works or we will legitimately be fired as failures,” he said.
Other Republicans argued that the political times demanded a little soul-searching. Representative Chris Shays, a Republican moderate from Connecticut, said that the Republican Congress “needed to do a better job of oversight” of the executive branch. “We are not a parliament,” he said.
And John C. Danforth, a moderate and former Republican senator from Missouri, argued that the times “call for the Republican Party to recapture the middle of the political spectrum and to do a better job of emphasizing that.”
Perhaps Nancy Pelosi sums it up best:
“Republicans are blinded by their culture of cronyism and corruption,” said Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the House Democratic leader. “They’re crumbling, arrogantly protecting their power.”
And Nancy is not alone. It’s just that GOP members aren’t willing to go on the record.
Some backbenchers were gloomy and resentful, but unwilling to say so on the record, for fear that the vindictive DeLay might survive. “Leadership has become ossified and hopelessly out of touch,” lamented one such member. “They only care about one thing, hanging onto their own power. I’m not ready to take them on, at least not yet, not unless I have to!”
Is it 2006 yet?
“Being called partisan and vindictive by Tom Delay is like being called ugly by a frog.” — Ronnie Earle, Prosecutor
Present company at the BMT frog pond excluded, of course! ;-D
That’s a lot of bad news there, and yet, Obama and others are calling for a further shift to the middle (right). Fuck that. I say attack them and attack them hard.
Just now on Face the Nation, I heard it said that there is a real opening on the left for someone to step up and fill. Then they speculated on whether it would be John Kerry or Russ Feingold. Ugh.
on Russ for his Roberts vote? Or just in general?
I looked on his site last night for an explanation of his vote. Couldn’t find it. First of all I don’t understand it. I thought Feingold was a liberal. Can someone explain his vote to me.
My point above was that John Kerry is hardly representative of the REAL left and Feingolds vote calls his leanings into question. At least for me.
I’m pretty sure he voted for Ashcroft too, and explained it as his philosophy that the Prez should be deferred to in making his cabinent, expect in extreme cases.
But I’m not sure why that logic would apply to the court and a lifetime appointment.
Despite his Roberts vote, he is still the most viable progressive currently running for President.
It’s simple to me. If he is the most viable progressive and he seeks the support of progressives in that effort, then voting for Roberts was a big mistake. There’s a major disconnect between what passes for progressives in Wash. and the real progressives out here in the hinterland.
although he can still point to being the only Senator to vote against the Patriot Act (a proud and courageous vote indeed), voting against the war, and a generally good legacy of being on the correct side of the issues.
He has one obvious weakness, and it involves appointments. Not sure why he gets soft on them.
Obviously now is no time to go soft. Next to the war, which is temporary, as bad as it is, the Supreme Court is the most important issue facing us right now. Roberts will be on the court for most of the rest of our lives. If he was willing to go against the entire congress to vote against the Patriot act, then why is he willing to give cover, if that’s what he’s doing, to the pro-life democrats by voting for Roberts? That’s too much politics, and not enough integrity.
I miss Paul Wellstone.
we all do.
As a Minnesotan, and someone who worked for and with both Paul and Sheila Wellstone for years, I really miss them these days too.
But I have to point out that there were times I had to wonder about his votes as well. He vote FOR both the Patriot Act and the Defense of Marriage Act. I think we have to recognize that no one is going to be with us 100%.
like I said, it bothers me.
Hazard a guess?
I don’t think he swapped his vote. Maybe some votes were swapped, but not his, IMO.
I think he is inclined to respect appointments where possible. Where some Senators vote on whether they like a candidate or agree with their positions, Feingold seems to vote ‘yes’ unless there is something criminal or unethical involved. So, he has a low bar on appointments. I can understand that, I guess, although that would not be my style.
But I think it sucks for SC nomination.
I also think a lot of Senators gave the thumbs up to Roberts to add credibility to a potential no vote on the next nominee. Since the vote changed nothing, it was an opportunity for Feingold to preposition himself on the next vote.
Only a guess.
On the last….
I will be shocked if Bush nominates anyone that resembles a moderate. I think Roberts was his moderate, which does not bode well for the next. I think the democrats have tied thier own hands on this. They won’t be able to complain about documents, at least with any precedent to stand on, and when a true modern RW conservative is nominated this time, they will be hamstrung by thier votes to seat Brown and Owen. Done deal.
to remain optimistic, but I agree with you.
The only hopeful thing I can say is that they have been expecting a battle all along, and Roberts wound up replacing Rehnquist, not O’Connor. This next seat is for the soul of the court. The Dems will fight this time, but unfortunately they have neutered themselves for the reasons you spelled out.
A lot will depend on the nominee. Gonzales opens up the possibility of a split in both parties. Both the left (because of torture) and the right (because of abortion) will find Abu completely unacceptable.
He could be defeated or confirmed with an interested cross-section of Senators.
I’m trying to remain optimistic that the Giants will step up and stop St. Louis :o)
It’s 1:00. See ya!
The other thing is that this pundit, whoever he was, acknowledged that there is a vacuum of leadership with the republicans self destructing. This is what Rena was talking about in her diary yesterday. Where are the democrats?
Last I heard, they are intentionally holding their fire because they feel that they don’t have to do anything… and in fact, to do anything is riskier than doing nothing because if they did anything that might give the repubs an opportunity to lash out at them and turn them into so much red herring.
I don’t personally agree with that attitude, myself. There’s still plenty they can do.. like vocally push for plans that they create.. that can help alleviate the nation’s problems. In fact, they could do that in such a way as to appear both above the fray and like they give a damn. Instead, they are falling back onto politically expedient tactics and aren’t doing much to dispell the idea that they aren’t too much different from there more vocally rotten colleagues.
I’m willing to bet that Reid set up some kind of vote-swapping thing so that pro-life Democrats couldn’t be “stereotyped” by the grass roots. This just further goes to show that the current crop of Senators cannot be trusted. Period. (With the possible exception of Boxer… Has she been on the wrong side of a vote recently?)
That’s the only reason I come up with too. Either way, it’s more of the same, and Obama and the establishment wonders why people feel abandoned and upset.
What I Want to Know
That dude was my first realistic choice for President last year. But it’s 2005 and it looks like he’s just about all we have left. The democrats are doing their best to keep him toned down. A big mistake in my opinion.
I have to confess, he has seemed a bit, uh, neutered, since he became DNC chair. Of course maybe that has to do with the fact that he’s attacked by the media and the DLCers every time he opens his mouth.
Susan, this is something we all need to be asking the democratic party…I WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING VOTING ALONG THE REPUBLICAN SIDE OF THINGS THAT IS DOING SO MUCH DAMAGE TO OUR COUNTRY!!!!!!!!!!!!
Wow, Susan. I watched and shed a tear or two. I remember being so hopeful when this is the kind of bandwagon we could join. I miss it so.
and that’s the biggest problem.
It’s too early for the Republicans to be falling apart. The average American voter has the attention span of a poached egg, and can more easily remember who’s been voted off the island on the latest “Survivor” than they can remember who’s been elected to the House and Senate. And our alleged “Democratic leaders” seem perfectly willing to let the Repubs sweep all their crimes and incompetencies under the rug, lest they be accused of “partisanship”. If this had been a Democratic administration, or Democrats in leadership, there’d be cries of “corruption!” and “impeachment!” howling from the right-wingers. Anyone remember the name of the Democrat who was Speaker of the House and got hounded out for a fake book deal — I think it was Jim Wright? And look at what they did to Bill Clinton and all he did was lie about a blow job. Gotta admire their damn gall; they’ve got all these cries of “innocent until proven guilty” when it comes to Tom DeLay, but that didn’t stop them from attacking Clinton (Bill and Hillary)…oh, and let’s ask Jose Padilla and the other folks who have been “guests of the Bush Administration” down at Gitmo about “innocent until proven guilty”…
I’d love to celebrate their demise…but it’s still too damn early, and there’s a lot that can happen between now and 11/2006 — there’s too much work to do, my friends…
Here endeth the rant du jour…
Since they own the public square, they still own the campaign. They can fracture into a thousand points of darkness right now, and still come together and hold ground or gain unless there is some kind of opposition somewhere that actively strives to defeat them.
I said elsewhere that by now we’ve seen 6.02*10^23 Republican demises.
It’s almost enough to make me pronounce that Democrats are “turning the corner” on them.
…but the problem is what the dems are doing turning that corner! They seem to be republican lite in my opinion. This disturbes me terribly.
I think it’s great that the inevitable self-destruction of the GOP dysfunctional agenda is proceeding apace. But let’s be clear; it is self-destruction. I’m hard pressed to find any evidence that our Democrats have played any meaningful role in helping bring about this slow-motion disintegration of the extremist warmaking and looting agenda. The Repub plan is collapsing under the weight of it’s own irrationality; and the denial and cognitive dissonance of their plan’s most ardent supporters is helping to speed the disintegration. So, our problem is not the danger that the Repub agenda might succeed. It can’t, it won’t. The Repub juggernaut is going off the rails whether we help it or not.
Meanwhile, our problem, the country’s problem, indeed the world’s problem, is the absence of an effective opposition party run by leaders willing to actually stand up for what they claim to believe in. Hell, we can’t even get the party leadership to acknowledge the war in Iraq is an ongoing mistake and that our continued presence there only makes things worse, (because they’re too busy trying to explain away their political cowardice in having supported the Iraq invasion in the first place).
I appreciate the benefits of the strategy to let one’s opponent self-destruct on his own, but the Democratic failure is something different than this strategic silence. The silence on all those basic issues the Democratic party is supposed to stand for is the problem. Better education, affordable health care, reduction of poverty, environmental protections, individual rights, (including abortion rights), an equitable tax structure, etc.; we don’t hear much about these core issues from the Dem party leadership. and just because we’re the minority party and can’t get anything done in congress on our own initiative doesn’t mean we can’t talk about these things with the American Public.
I’d love to hear this from someone who voted for the war:
“Yes, I voted to grant the President war powers.
“I trusted the President to use these powers wisely, and only in a last resort.
“This vote was a mistake. And the American people have paid dearly for this mistake. We have paid in loss of respect in the international community. We have paid in money going to contractors that could be used to rebuild our own failing infrastructures. And over 2000 Americans and their families have paid the ultimate price.
“There was a reason why the Founding Fathers limited the power to declare war to Congress. They knew, from bitter experience, what can happen when a capricious individual is given ultimate power and uses it to the detriment of men and women thousands of miles away. By limiting the power to declare war, discussion may reveal alternatives to war. But in giving war powers to the President, Congress abdicated its responsibilities.
“I stand here before you and ask for your forgiveness, and your help in repairing the damage done by this misguided act and this misguided war.”
Of course, we’ll never hear that from anyone…like our President, the Democrats won’t admit they made a mistake…
Richard Clark, (anti-terrorism guy in the Bush regime), said that last part, but of course he was fired.
What I Want to Know
Big corporate money interests were afraid of Dean, so they conspired with the DLC to pull the plug on him by not showing any support for his message at all. And voters are afraid of change if they’re tricked by the media into being suspicious of someone. This is why Dean got the shaft. It was more by his own party and the moneybag bigwigs that support it than it was by the Repubs.
So where is that anvil?? Looks like a skipped stone to me.
The demise of the DeLay machine is a slow motion anvil which will pick up an enormous amount of speed if Abramoff remains alive long enough to be brought to trial.
But even without Abramoff in the dock, the era of the DeLay type assault on both democracy and the treasury is in it’s “last throes”. Like all tyrants, once it’s clear to his associates that he’s no longer capable of weilding retributive power, he’ll sudenly find himself bereft of the friendship and support he delusionally imagined he inspired in those around him.
In the meantime, speaking of anvils, the Dem party has it’s own array of anvils that need to be exposed and cut loose, and these anvils represent a far bigger problem for the party and the country than any amount of lunatic behavior on the part of the Repubs. IMHO.
The problem here is that simply negative campaigning and hammering home the failures of the GOP will not translate to votes for Democrats. In order to get votes, not only will they have to hammer on the GOP’s failures, they will have to articulate a distinct, positive plan to remedy the mistakes. Simply bashing the GOP will only further depress turnout numbers for voters from both parties.
I agree 100%
When I say attack I mean to do both. There’s plenty of voters out there who are ripe for the picking if only the democrats spell out in a cohesive way, what they are prepared to do differently.
Here’s what I don’t understand:
Exploiting this weakness — which is not a new weakness and which exists outside of their base — is so clearly the better strategy to win those votes that can be peeled off the middle. So for the love of civil rights, universal healthcare, a living wage, and cute little puppy dogs jumping next to Mom with apple pie on Independence Day, could someone please explain to me why the Democratic party machine is so damn obsessed with moving to the right on social issues? Especially on social issues where Democrats already have the majority, like abortion rights? Anyone?
I was specifically referring to Pelosi’s statement there. Great, Ms. Pelosi. You’ve managed to frame the GOP as evil. Now people are going to stay home. You’ve either got to give them a reason to vote – by advocating progressive or, hell, even moderate policies – or you’re going to lose. Again.
It’s not 2006 yet… but it’s getting awful close.
I attended a house party for Kirsten Gillibrand yesterday afternoon. Kirsten has filed her papers to challenge John “Congressman Kick-Ass” Sweeney to represent the 20th Congressisonal District (warning: pdf)of New York.
Sweeney is the sort of Republican that still claims there were/are WMD’s in Iraq and is almost singlehandedly responsible for putting the “thug” in ReTHUGlican by his role in the “Brooks Brothers Riot”. Sweeney has also been vocal in defense of Tom Delay and I noticed just the other day that Delay’s new spokesman (see bottom of page in link), one Kevin “Maddog” Madden, was Sweeney’s spokesman in his early years including during the 2000 election stealing episode… funny how these guys get around.
Kirsten is a very exciting candidate. Her presentations are getting sharper and crisper everytime I hear her speak. She is a partner at Boies, Schiller & Flexner. David Boies you may recall represented (Vice) President Al Gore in front of the Supreme Court in 2000.
During the Clinton Administration, Kirsten served as Special Counsel to the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Andrew Cuomo. She played a key role in developing and furthering HUD’s economic development and labor initiatives. While at HUD, Kirsten also advised the Secretary on a broad range of ethics and labor issues, new markets legislation, and governmental investigations.
Committed and strong on Women’s Issues, particularly women in government, a family tradition as her grandmother started the first women’s democratic club in Albany, NY, and Kirsten has served as Chair of the Women’s Leadership Forum Network, on the Board of the Eleanor Roosevelt Legacy Committee, an organization similar to Emily’s list focusing on women in New York politics.
Republicans really ought to start panicing. We are taking Governor Dean’s call to challenge them everywhere very seriously. NY-20 is a very difficult district for a Democrat to win but we are not daunted. Kirsten is a serious candidate and Sweeney is exactly the sort of person that should never be allowed in government. We will challenge them here and challenge them strongly. They really ought to start panicking and changing leadership and direction because we are going to win seats like this one in 2006 and they will no longer be in power.
Is there a campaign website yet?
In the works… I had thought it would be up by now but not yet. A google of her name will show some of her activity but getting her own site up and running has got to be a priority.
This thread of commentary is excellent. It’s significant that our putative leaders in the Democratic party seem categorically unable to speak with such courage and sincerity, and to seem virtually unwilling to explore the issues we’ve spoken of here.
This failure is central to the broader problem in the party. Whether we talk about the details of strategy and tactics, the benefits of allowing the majority party to self-destruct on its own, or the calculus of counting seats and choosing specific electoral battles in which to expend resources, in the end, if the Dem leaders refuse to address and stand up for the core issues, they will continue to lose elections. And, even more tragically, if they win by using this tactic of betrayal of principle, they will be no use to us either. For me, it’s better to lose on principle than win by betraying that principle, because winning through betrayal is a net loss.
The “go along to get along” rubric of congressional self-protection, combined with the effectiveness of the emotion based, (as opposed to fact-based), smear machine of the Repubs have emasculated the Dem party at least as far as the leadership is concerned. The prominent Dems are simply too afraid to take a stand against the regime on any major issue. Personal ambition trumps the best interests of the country for most of them, and if this is the case, what does it matter if they win or not? The results would still be betrayal of principle and capitulation to the special interests with the biggest bank accounts.
I can’t think of a single prominent Democrat who’s actively engaged on the major issues I believe should be at the heart of the Democratic Party’s platform; issues like abortion rights, accessible and affordable health care for all, accessible quality education for all, environmental protections, civil protections for the public against the depradations and malfeasance of deep-pocket corporations, the separation of church and state, a living wage and the rweturn of a job friendly economic structure, and basic equal rights for all under the law. If I could find someone who unequivocally supported these basic principles, I’d vote for them. But I can’t even find prominent Dems willing to engage on these issues in a substantive way. This is the problem.
And then of course there’s the insidious DLC, but I’m cooking a big batch of soup right now and I’m afraid if I start in on the DLC somehow the psychic disturbances in my brain will have an adverse effect on the soup.
DLC Soup
4 cups of muck
2 cups of mire
1 oz of blood thinner
2 oz of snake oil
simmer at great length
add
a healthy dose of bullshit
Lose when ready.
IMHO– The dems think they have it made- I mean, where else do we have to go? Kind of a captive audience,dammit, and they know it.***kers.
Power goes to those most willing to slit their own throats for the cause.
Sound crazy?
Then why was it both Republicans and Dems were both frantically trying to placate the “religious right” after the last election results claimed (i.e. were distorted by the press) it all came down to “moral values”.
After all, the whole appeasement strategy of the Dems hinges on this — if these folks are powerful enough to swing an election, don’t alienate them.
But according to the Dems, the Repubs should have just ignored the religious right (as Dems avoid the “left”) — after all, they have no where else to go, right?
Yet the Republicans instead cowered and cringed and placated the religious right.
Why?
Because the Republicans knew the religious right wasn’t bluffing — and if they weren’t satisfied they’d take their ball and go home and leave the Republicans with nothing.
That’s the lesson we need to take home. Not “shut up and hope our side wins and maybe throws us a bone”. Instead we must declare “find a way to satisfy us while growing the base”.
We don’t have the power the religious right does, yet — to make elections for Dems. But we sure as hell have the power to break them. Its a start.
And the politicians, and the pundits, and the sycophants will scream “Don’t hurt yourselves — back the Dems”. We’ve got to remind them it does us no good to enable the Dems to back the Republicans. If that’s all they’re gonna do, we’re far better off clarifying that Repubs are wrong by clearing out all their Democratic cover. That’ll make it much easier to get true Democrats in there to fix this mess.
The fundies are, what? 20% of the Repub base? What do you think progressives represent in the Dem base? 30%? If we take our ball home, they don’t get to play. at. all.
Surviving in America is getting harder by the day and maybe the sooner we throw over the puppet show of Dems being somehow better or different from Repubs, the sooner citizens will band together in a new alliance.
To paraphase Huey Newton: I want a new party/One that won’t make me sick. I have more in common with Libertarians than I do with Lieberman. I have more in common with Greens than I do with Biden. Hell, I have more in common with Hugo Chavez than I do with Hillary Clinton. Obama showing up on dKos and telling us to stop bashing people who betray us was close to the last straw for me.
I want some of that pandering the fundies have been getting. Give it to me or lose me, that’s my message to the DNC.
This has been growing stronger in my own thinking of late as well — if the dems fail to regain either house in 2006 perhaps they will actually re-evaluate the “go along to get along” strategy — the way I see it (though I am still hopeful about a few actual candidates showing up, not that I will get to cast any votes for them, mind you), I have nothing particularly to lose by voting other than dem. It’ll be the same old same old in any case…
they’re WRONG! I don’t have to donate, canvas, put a bumper sticker on my car or go to the polls if I don’t think I’ve got a progressive choice on the ballot. The lesser of two evils is still evil and I’ve had it with that shit!
For BushCo. in 05. Like others have noted here, it is only 05 with a lot of time left until 11/06. Public opinion is fickle as hell and turns on a dime.
Much has been made lately of leading Dems staying quiet over a host of Bush blunders. Like a lot of you, that bothers me a lot.
But what really bothers me is the lack of an affirmative Democratic plan to counter Bush and his cronies. We can see what is wrong. A blind man can see that. What do we propose to do about it, if by some chance we take the congress/White House back in the next 3 years? I am afraid the Dems are keeping quiet, because they don’t have a clue either!