[Peace-discuss] DIGBY: Using The Party As A Fire Hydrant

[Jenifer Cartwright]

Fyi, fwiw... --Jenifer
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DIGBY'S HULLABALOO

Using The Party As A Fire Hydrant

by digby

Howie compiled some interesting stats about the Blue Dogs who ran
against the Democratic party and specifically Nancy Pelosi:

Let's revisit the post from yesterday about the Blue Dogs and other
conservatives who threw Pelosi-- and the Democratic brand-- under the
bus to try to save their own asses.

The question was, "did it help any of them?" Well, every single
challenger who came out with idiotic statements like, "I'll support
Allen Boyd for Speaker" (grotesquely corrupt Alabama lobbyist Steve
Raby), was defeated. The three most aggressively anti-Pelosi Blue
Dogs, Bobby Bright (AL), Jim Marshall (GA) and Gene Taylor (MS), were
defeated. Blue Dogs Mike McIntyre (NC) and Jason Altmire (PA) managed
to survive the slaughter. More than half the Blue Dogs were defeated
or retired. Only 47% of them, a number which will go down when Jim
Costa's (CA-20) likely loss is announced later today) were reelected.
Contrast that to the 95% of the Congressional Progressive Caucus
members who were reelected.

And among the Democratic incumbents who wanted it both ways and said
they might vote against Pelosi, losers included Walt Minnick (Blue
Dog-ID), Bill Foster (IL), Baron Hill (Blue Dog-IN), Frank Kratovil
(Blue Dog-MD), Travis Childers (Blue Dog-MS), Ike Skelton (MO), Mike
McMahon (NY), Scott Murphy (NY), Zack Space (Blue Dog-OH), Stephanie
Herseth Sandlin (Blue Dog-SD), and Chet Edwards (TX).

 Jim Matheson (Blue Dog-UT), Mark Critz (PA), Pete DeFazio (OR), Heath
Shuler (Blue Dog-NC), Joe Donnelly (Blue Dog-IN), John Barrow (Blue
Dog-GA) and Mike Ross (Blue Dog-AR) managed to hang on, barely. It
certainly wouldn't surprise me to see some of this lot, plus Dan
Boren, jump the fence and become Republicans soon. Can't happen soon
enough.

In 1994, there were a slew of conservative Democrats who jumped the
fence, even some like Ben Nighthorse Campbell who had just been
elected for the first time as Democrats. It will be interesting to see
if any of them do it this time.

What Howie says about Pelosi is pertinent. I think when you run
against your own party in this age of polarization you are begging the
electorate to vote for your opponent. We aren't in an age of ticket
splitting and the parties are breaking pretty clearly along
ideological lines (even if the Democrats haven't figured that out
yet.) They do have the money chase in common, but the next few years
are going to see a split there as well, with one party coming up with
a convincing rationale for why they are a party of whores and the
other one being forced by the structural nature of parliamentary
politics to take the other side. (I'm not entirely convinced at this
moment that it will break the way we might assume.) In any case, if
you don't clearly identify with the party to which you ostensibly
belong, people will figure there must be something shifty about you.
When you see the two national parties in pitched battle all the time,
you are right to wonder why in the world you should continue to
support someone who can't --- even if they wanted to --- adequately
represent your interests.

This new era is going to require more partisan cohesion to get
anything done and to stop the things the Party doesn't want done. This
seems like a good thing to me. Fewer Blue Dogs means fewer saboteurs
within the party creating the illusion that there is a progressive
governing majority. And that means that if the Republicans want to
pass their destructive agenda, they will have to take sole
responsibility for it instead of passing it under the rubric of
bipartisanship --- or worse as Democratic policies --- and then
blaming the Democrats when their policies don't work.
Responsibility/accountability are much clearer when the parties are
philosophically distinct.


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digby 11/03/2010 05:15:00 PM Comments



 


      
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