With Markos Moulitsas meeting DLC Chairman Harold Ford, Jr. on this week’s Meet the Press, I thought I’d point how strong the correlation is between membership in the New Democratic Coalition (NDC) and the Blue Dog Coalition (BDC) and the people that sold out our rights on the FISA bill. Ford, as leader of the DLC, is also essentially the leader of the NDC (although that distinction technically goes to Ellen Tauscher (CA-10)). But, Ford Jr. also speaks for many Blue Dogs. These people must be brought to heel.
Representative
Jason Altmire PA-04 (NDC)
John Barrow GA-12 (NDC, BDC)
Melissa Bean IL-08 (NDC, BDC)
Dan Boren OK-02 (BDC)
Leonard Boswell IA-03 (BDC)
Allen Boyd FL-02 (BDC)
Christopher Carney PA-10 (NDC, BDC)
Ben Chandler KY-06 (NDC, BDC)
Jim Cooper TN-05 (BDC)
Jim Costa CA-20 (BDC)
Bud Cramer AL-05 (BDC)
Henry Cuellar TX-28 (NDC)
Artur Davis AL-07 (NDC-Vice-Chair)
Lincoln Davis TN-04 (BDC)
Joe Donnelly IN-02 (BDC)
Chet Edwards TX-17
Brad Ellsworth IN-08 (BDC)
Bob Etheridge NC-02 (NDC)
Bart Gordon TN-06 (BDC)
Stephanie Herseth Sandlin SD-AL (NDC, BDC)
Brian Higgins NY-27 (NDC)
Baron Hill IN-09 (NDC, BDC)
Nick Lampson TX-23 (NDC, BDC)
Daniel Lipinski IL-03
Jim Marshall GA-08 (BDC)
Jim Matheson UT-02 (BDC)
Mike McIntyre NC-07 (NDC, BDC)
Charlie Melancon LA-03 (NDC, BDC)
Harry Mitchell AZ-05 (NDC)
Colin Peterson MN-07 (BDC)
Earl Pomeroy ND-AL (BDC)
Ciro Rodriguez TX-23
Mike Ross AR-04 (BDC)
John Salazar CO-03 (BDC)
Heath Shuler NC-11 (BDC)
Vic Snyder AR-02 (NDC)
Zachary Space OH-18 (BDC)
John Tanner TN-08 (BDC)
Gene Taylor MS-04 (BDC)
Timothy Walz MN-01
Charles A. Wilson OH-06 (BDC)
ya know what bothers the most? Why the hell is Markos bothering to go on the fatmans show? Is it ego? Cause if that is the reason, he too can go screw.
Save the energy and focus on ridding the dems of the blueballs.
Or- shut down the party and start all over again. Anything is better that what the blueballers did to this country.
And finally- spending time with harold!! the same harold that sseems to be spending ,more and more time with the homey folks at faux!
I’m guessing he’s going on to respond to this gem from Ford:
A lot of people watch Russert who’d never otherwise ever hear of the liberal blogosphere. Not terrible to widen our collective reach.
(The CIA) “really does attract people who want to make a better, you know, want to make the world a better place . . . Of course, they’ve got their Dirty Ops and this and that, right but as an institution itself the CIA is really interested in stable world.”
(Per transcript at http://www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do;jsessionid=45B92A25510DD7CFBE6C394C1A4EA2E4?diaryId=17528 )
Then… man, that’s sad. Because he sounds just about verbatim like the Operative in the movie Serenity. That Operative wanted to make “better worlds” .. no cost to freedom was too high, in pursuit of that aim.
…was working for a more-stable world.
Help 41 Critters in, help 41 critters out.
The help they got in round one does not translate to auto-help in round two.
Some people are paying attention.
Gotta tell ya…I was relieved to not see Pat Murphy (PA-08) on that list.
Pat has been back and forth on a few of these votes, but this one was a biggie.
Nor is Joe Sestak (PA-07). I wonder if military service corrolates with voting patterns on this issue?
You have to understand that a lot of the people on the list sincerely hold the same type of conservative, security-oriented, positions as those in the GOP.
In addition many of them come from districts where more liberal views are not popular with the voters. So it’s not a simple matter of replacing a conservative Dem with a more liberal one.
In more normal times many of these people would be Republicans. You can even seen the trend increasing as many Republicans are switching parties. They bring their attitudes with them.
This is the same problem that the Dems faced when they allied with the Dixiecrats. They had to put up with their racism and opposition to social progress because they needed their support in other areas.
So the question really is, given that most of these conservative Dems are going to be in the next congress and given that they are not going to change their basic outlook on life what are the practical steps that can be taken to make progressive policies more likely to get enacted?
The Republicans used outright blackmail on their house members to enforce obedience. This included taking away committee positions, withholding campaign funds and even killing pork earmarks. One would hope that the Dems won’t stoop this low.
So each time there is a discussion of the problems with the conservatives in the Dem party it would be useful if there was also a simultaneous discussion of what practical steps should be undertaken to counter this difficulty.
All this makes me wonder where Evan Bayh’s daddy Birch went wrong.
I’m keeping watch on Barry Welch over in the next district from me to see if he fares better this time around. Maybe Pence will finally be outta there!
Call the DNC and let them know that this is unacceptable. I actually did a post this morning on the exact same Blue Dog situation as Booman, before seeing this post.
http://scaryshit.blogspot.com/2007/08/blue-dogs.html
Howard Dean isn’t reading the comments sections on blogs. You need to call the DNC if you want to see a change made. Their phone number is 202-863-8000.
Don’t just complain online, be an activist and make a real difference.