As we enter the 2020 Democratic Party Primaries, this is a good time to review BooMan’s answers to Frequently Asked Questions so we may seek to participate in the sorts of discussions Martin wished to host at the dawn of this blog.
What’s This Site All About?
This site is not affiliated with the Democratic Party. However, the Democratic Party is the only institution in this country that is capable of combating the Bush administration’s agenda, or of offering a realistic alternative to the GOP’s control of both houses of Congress.
Therefore, this site is committed to building the Democratic Party, raising money for the Democratic Party and its candidates, finding and promoting promising candidates for state and local offices, helping to shape the Democratic Party’s agenda, and holding Democratic office holders to account for their votes and their ethics.
The site is also committed to doing some of the investigative work that is so desperately needed with the GOP in control of the oversight committees.
It’s extremely safe to say that BooMan’s front pages have continued to express these priorities, with “Trump” neatly replacing “Bush” in the first paragraph. (Thankfully, the House has returned to Democratic Party Caucus control.)
I am highly interested in hearing from this community during the upcoming Party primaries. The most electorally viable part of our Movement is about to make a very important decision, and good faith arguments for and against candidates will be had. Many of those arguments will be passionate.
With a ton of candidates running and preparing to run for the Party’s Presidential nomination, it’s important for all of us to concede a crucial fact. While there will be candidates who have a greater or lesser chance to win the nomination, every single candidate enters with the odds against them. That’s the math when we have more than a dozen candidates running to be the next President. To a lesser degree, this same math will also be in play in many campaigns for Congressional and other elected offices.
I dearly hope that this indelible fact allows us to avoid the damaging rhetoric that could come when the favorite candidates of many community members drop out and the candidates most disliked by many community members advance in the campaign. It is exceedingly clear that there will not be a single “favorite” candidate of Democratic Party institutions. Regardless of which candidates prominent Democrats choose to support, the candidate who persuades the most people to vote for them will be the winner. What the voters do will be the measure of the campaign. What Party leaders do will not be the measure of the campaign.
It’s also vital for all of us to concede another crucial fact. Literally every single candidate for President will be better than Trump. I don’t care for much of Tulsi Gabbard’s rhetoric, policy priorities and voting record. I also do not have confidence that she would be a strong general election candidate. However, if the Congressmember overcomes the large Democratic field and wins the Party’s nomination, that would be a strong sign of her viability. And, most importantly, she would be a far, far better President than Trump.
That’s why I’m going to refrain from making arguments against Gabbard or any other candidate which stand a chance of damaging their general election prospects. Sure, this is a small Pond, but we should model behavior here which helps the prospects of our Party nominees for President and other offices. Rhetorical habits we establish here will form our habits elsewhere. It’s also important to consider how our expressions affect other community members. Let’s try to avoid saying things which are hard to take back, particularly things which are not well supported by the record. Let the conservative movement and Republican Party be the ones which engage in factually dodgy baloney.
Finally, it’s going to be a challenging task ahead of us. It’s going to be important for us to engage in the best faith. Here’s another portion of the FAQ’s here:
If I don’t consider myself a Democrat, am I welcome at the site?
Yes. You are. Everyone is welcome at the site regardless of political self-identification. I don’t care how you are registered to vote, who you have voted for in the past, or who you plan to vote for in the future.
The only restriction on non-Democrats is that they be respectful of the mission of this site, that they don’t post Bill O’Reilly-like talking points, and that they don’t engage in trollish behavior.
If you are pro-life or anti-gun control, no one should down-rate your posts or make you feel unwelcome at this site, or in the Democratic Party. This site is not for the enforcement of any orthodoxy on its members. Principled disagreement is always allowed. Just don’t act like Sean Hannity and be an idiot.
Let’s repeat this portion, for emphasis:
“The only restriction on non-Democrats is that they be respectful of the mission of this site, that they don’t post Bill O’Reilly-like talking points, and that they don’t engage in trollish behavior.”
I believe the mission of this site is captured in the “What’s This Site All About?” section. This sentence is particularly pertinent: “However, the Democratic Party is the only institution in this country that is capable of combating the (Trump) administration’s agenda, or of offering a realistic alternative to the GOP’s control of…Congress.”
It is vital for community members to engage the community honestly about what they wish to accomplish, and how “…the only institution in this country that is capable of combating the (Trump) administration’s agenda…” can effectively and realistically respond to their wishes.
I’ll make a declaration which responds to these vital needs; this declaration is largely consistent with what I’ve shared here in recent months and years.
It is possible that a good Medicare for All Bill could be created which would likely improve health care quality and access and reduce costs; the last outcome would be particularly likely. It is also possible that a bad Medicare for All Bill could be created which would not improve health care quality and access; these bad outcomes could destroy any political popularity which might come from cost savings. More problematically, the American voting public is simply not sufficiently supportive of Medicare for All or other single payer options at the State level.
We need to continue to change public opinion before committing our Congressional representatives to make a real Legislative attempt to pass a Medicare for All Bill. Public opinion at this time makes it certain that such a Legislative effort would be crushed by the sustained and extraordinarily well-funded attack it would get from the businesses which have vested interest in our current health care system.
My opinions in this area have me strongly supportive of prioritizing improvements on the ACA such as a public health insurance option which could be offered on the State and Federal marketplaces. My opinions also have me ready to support candidates who do not have Medicare for All as their top priority.
This doesn’t mean I will oppose candidates who have Medicare for All on their platform. It simply means I’ll be disinclined to have faith in a candidate who promises to work with Congress to pass Medicare for All in 2021. That will be what an energized portion of the Party primary voting base will want to hear, but I believe such a promise will be happy talk which fails the test of being real with the voters. We won’t have sufficient majorities entering the next Congress to to pass Medicare for All. We will need a few more years to get voters more comfortable with public health insurance programs before we make a serious attempt to pass M4A into Law. We should make use of those years to debate and form the best policies.
I’m ready to hear from community members who have different opinions on this and other issues. I’m ready to oppose the views of community members who attempt to demonize candidates running for our Party’s nomination. I’m also ready to call out community members who attempt to cloak their own ideology, policy preferences and social views behind demands of Party leaders which are in substantial opposition to the community member’s own views.
Exceedingly clear call-outs have been made by me against a community member here who continually attempts to demonize Democratic Party institutions and leaders for being, by his claim, destructively “centrist”. This community member claims he wants the Party to move “…way Left and way quicker…”. All the while, this same community member holds a number of policy positions which are radically right wing, such as his frequently defended desire to break up the United States. This strikes me as remarkably dishonest behavior which meets common definitions of trolling.
I’ll concede that in exasperation I’ve made attempts to demonize this community member in recent months. My rhetorical escalations have happened after repeated attempts to get this community member to engage honestly. To repeat from BooMan’s FAQ’s:
“If you are pro-life or anti-gun control, no one should down-rate your posts or make you feel unwelcome at this site, or in the Democratic Party. This site is not for the enforcement of any orthodoxy on its members. Principled disagreement is always allowed. Just don’t act like Sean Hannity and be an idiot.”
I’m ready to hear the arguments of non-Democrats and other people whose policy preferences run counter to the interests of the coalition the Party represents and which are not in the current Party platform. I simply ask that if, for example, you make the case repeatedly that all Federal social welfare programs and Civil rights laws and rulings should be discontinued, you participate in an honest community discussion about the outcomes which would result from that policy position, and a consideration of whether those outcomes have any chance at all of being supported by today’s Democratic Party coalition.
This isn’t much to ask. I expect that community members, whether they hold views which are far left, far right, centrist, or a mix of these, can meet this request for honest, respectful engagement which gives us the best chance of winning the 2020 election and getting good things done through that victory. I think it would be healthy for the community if we managed to achieve this.