This is an Atriotic post, but I am watching the PBS Newshour with Jim Lehrer (usually a source of basic American sanity). And I am quickly coming to the conclusion that the Establishment in this nation is in a deep funk and badly in denial. They’re trying to discuss the significance of Donald Rumsfeld’s resignation in the context of Robert McNamera’s. They’re also trying to suss out the significance of the midterm elections. One of them is saying that the election results are a vindication for Bill Clinton and his vision for the modern Democratic Party. Another is suggesting that everything will be okay once Baker and Hamilton release their report on Iraq. Overall, they seem be saying that the only problem is that the Center has been rejected by the two major parties and that once we return to Centrism things will be rosy.
I have news for you. First, despite the centrifugal pull of Beltway Centrism, and it is substantial, we have never had a more progressive House of Representatives in the history of this country. I have explained this at length and it has nothing to do with the election of three conservative Democrats from Indiana. It has to do with people that go by the names of Nancy Pelosi, John Conyers, Henry Waxman, John Dingell, Bennie Thompson, George Miller, Charlie Rangel, Nydia Velaquez, and Louis Slaughter.
Additionally, we all know that the real tectonic shift in the midterm occurred in Connecticut in August. It doesn’t matter a whit that Lamont lost the general election. Ask Jon Tester and Jim Webb about the netroots. Ask Jerry McNerney or Patrick Murphy. The DLC has never been a more dead commodity than it is today, and our country has never been better poised to question the Establishment figures that brought us the wars in Korea, the coups in Iran and Guatemala, the Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, Angola, Nicaragua, Grenada, Panama, and Iraq.
Of all those conflicts, only Korea could be said to have accomplished something worth the sacrifice. I know that is a leftist thing to say. I also know that Americans, left and right, are starting to figure that out.
We will either embrace Bush’s platform of uniting rather than dividing and a more humble foreign policy or we will be further divided and further humbled.
British Petroleum said we had to go into Iran. United Fruit Co. said we had to go into Guatemala. The hotels and casinos (the mob) said we had to go into Cuba. ITT said we had to go into Chile. Halliburton and Bechtel said we had to go into Iraq.
We’re almost done listening to these people. We’re almost done listening to the Establishment. Give us health care. Do something about the cost of education. Clean up the environment. Take care of us for a change.
