I’m going to be on a conference call with some pollsters about tonight’s SOTU speech (I don’t know how I got in on this, but I have gotten a lot out of the previous ones). Do you guys have any suggestions about what would be good questions to ask? Obviously, it will depend on what is said, but I feel (maybe wrongly) that there are some deep issues here — how important is to pass HCR soon, how popular is all the freeze talk, do Democrats have a problem with their base, do voters hate Republicans so much that the Democrats look okay politically and so on. So I’d like to start thinking about this now and would be happy for any suggestions.
On a slightly-related note, I liked Oliver Willis’s piece on Obama and the liberal blogoshere, even though I don’t completely agree with it.
BR
I’m trying to think of questions that nudge pollsters in the direction of more liberal framing / language. I get tired of Rasmussen polling and his right-wing frames.
MarineSocialist
If Obama’s strategy going forward on any front requires meaningful cooperation or trust of the Republicans as critical component to proceed, it is sure proof he has no intention of actually enacting any agenda whatsoever.
Period.
If he suggests deference to the Senate in any sense without predicating it on the dismantling of a three-fifths supermajority requirement for all legislative action, he has no intention of actually enacting any agenda whatsoever.
Period.
If either of those things is the case, the only motivation for Democrats whatsoever is to ensure that 41 democrat of Franken’s caliber are in the Senate at all time. Nothing else actually matters in any sense.
Period.
DougJ
I’m trying to think of questions that nudge pollsters in the direction of more liberal framing / language.
Yes, I agree.
Kennedy
Where is our SOTU drinking game thread? I think we need to get started on that.
mr. whipple
I would ask them how they expect to get reelected by failing to produce jobs and a health care bill.
demkat620
Much as I would have liked a President Jed Bartlett, I knew that was not what I was getting. I don’t like the freeze idea at all, I think it is a crock of horseshit but, that being said, He talked an awful lot about deficit reduction in the election and other than not yet completing HCR he has been, IMHO, cleaving pretty closely to what he promised.
Would I like to see more? Yes? But the firebaggers have gone too far. You are not ever going to get everything you want.
Midnight Marauder
I would ask about the mythical “independents,” a la this from Sullivan:
General Winfield Stuck
You lie!
kidding. Tell them polling right now is like counting turds at the stock yard. Means very little and for them to get the fuck off my teevee. I hate ambitious pollsters trying to get famous.
Marlee Matlin is the only pollster of any count and nice legs.
Punchy
Ask ’em why Obama never uses his Negro dialect when he talks to Kobe and his other ballin’ homey young bucks.
Tsulagi
I’m already bummed out about the SOTU. McDonnell will be giving the gooper counter. So would be much better having Bible Spice follow Obama: “We’re in the trenches killing their Death Panels! Also, Too!”
Max
I’d like a definition of the “base” because according to the blogs, as a white woman, who makes a good living as a professional, single, with no kids – I’m not it.
Apparently, only the “base” counts to the bloggies.
Emo Pantload (fka Studly)
Big Eddie is calling for Obama to call Republicans to the carpet for their obstructionism. Ain’t gonna happen, it’s not in his DNA. I’ll be happy if Obama just calls out worthless policies that Republicans typically champion, but I think we can agree now, for better or for worse, he is *not* directly going to tie any albatrosses around their necks.
Napoleon
HCR (specifically what not passing it would do, but maybe that is outside of their purview) and Obama and the base is what I think would be most interesting to hear about.
liberty60
If it was me, I might try to slip in a push poll question like “would you be more or less likely to approve of Ben Nelson if you were told he skull fucked a kitten?”
bedtimeforbonzo
@mr. whipple: If that doesn’t win the thread, it is at least some very sound advice and probably scares the shit out of Dem pollsters and Dems who are up for re-election.
Zifnab
DougJ, I’d love to know what reduction in military spending we can expect to see over the next three years. When over half our discretionary spending goes to the Pentagon, I question whether a spending freeze on non-military spending will bring in sufficient savings.
By contrast, that $10 billion / month we spend abroad…
@Tsulagi:
Yeah, I can’t figure out why Republicans aren’t taking that route, either.
Da Bomb
I agreed with everything Oliver said.
bedtimeforbonzo
@Emo Pantload (fka Studly): Big Eddie is a fighter.
President Obama is not.
Da Bomb
@Max: Didn’t you get the memo, only the netroots are his entire base. That’s it.
Nevermind anyone else.
rootless_e
Here’s a good question: 2009 was a record year for wind energy in the US, what is being done to build on that and to make sure US content of manufactured products increases?
General Winfield Stuck
@Da Bomb: Yes, almost like he’s channeling what Cole and others of us have been repeating here ad infinitum for months. I will have to start reading Oliver more again.
Max
@Da Bomb: I saw a comment on a PUMA site, in response to the NBC poll that had Obama’s support with dems at like 90%. The PUMA commenter with major ODS said “are we really that small a sliver of the dem party?”
I wanted to register just to reply with, “ah, yes, you are”
Max
@General Winfield Stuck: I love Oliver, even though he’s a Redskins fan. I follow him on Twitter.
cfaller96
I think many, many, many questions need to be asked about WTF President Obama is thinking with his spending freeze/no not really a freeze proposal. But I don’t know how those fundamental economics questions pertain to pollsters.
Nevertheless, I’ll spit out a bunch of questions and hopefully you can glean some value from somewhere in here:
1. What empirical evidence does President Obama have that demonstrates a government spending freeze in the middle of a recession improves the economy and/or employment?
2. At what unemployment rate does a “jobless recovery” not actually represent a recovery at all? 10%? 15%? Etc. What economic conditions must exist for an “employment instead of balanced budgets” policy (aka Moar Stimulus Pleez!) to become a pragmatic government response?
3. Of the voter coalition that put President Obama in office, which demographic groups strongly support a spending freeze in the middle of a recession?
4. Related to #3, which demographic groups that voted for John McCain/Republicans indicate they would increase support for President Obama as a result of his spending freeze proposal?
5. Does President Obama find it an “acceptable” state of affairs for the Democratic Party to have historic majorities in both houses of Congress, but with no demonstrable capability or willingness to pass any significant legislation? If so, then why? If not, then what does he suggest to change this condition?
6. When would President Obama, our Commander in Chief of our armed forces, consider making the Department of Defense eligible for a spending freeze? Spending cuts?
7. In terms of balancing the budget, what effect would ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have? Same question, but in terms of long term “entitlement reform?”
That’s all I got for now. Good luck DougJ.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
I’d like see some pressure brought on the pollsters to get them to stop polling policy issues as a binary choice. We have a country that is deeply polarized, yes. But we also have a political leadership in the WH and the Senate that is determined to sit in the center and a first-past-the-post electoral system which is structured to keep it that way. Which means most policy proposals such as HCR have 3 possible positions whose support needs to be polled to gauge how people feel about it: (1) it goes too far, (2) it is more or less right, and (3) it doesn’t go far enough. Yet too many pollsters are asking questions that lump (1) and (3) together in binary opposition to (2). That doesn’t tell us anything useful about which direction people want the debate to go. Polling along those lines is useless except as grist for a propaganda mill.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
questions to ask pollsters? Or questions for pollsters to ask voters?
Either way, (besides HCR) something about the estate tax and the deficit. I’m so sick of Evan Bayh and Blanche Lincoln being treated as “deficit hawks”.
“Given the national deficit and the state of the economy, do you think taxes on estates of 2.4 million and more should be cut?”
rootless_e
Can we get the “base” recalled for incontinence?
DougJ
questions to ask pollsters?
Yes. I like these guys (I’d say who they were now, but I’m not totally sure I’m supposed to — I’ll say later) and they give good answers.
General Winfield Stuck
@Max: I used to read him every day, but somehow just drifted away for no particular reason. One of the few common sense bloggers on the left, at least these days.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
That’s a good one. I saw an online article yesterday with the headline X% (more than fifty) say “drop health care”. The question was some unbelievably loaded thing like “Should the government reform health care, or fix the economy.”
DougJ
I saw a comment on a PUMA site, in response to the NBC poll that had Obama’s support with dems at like 90%. The PUMA commenter with major ODS said “are we really that small a sliver of the dem party?”
God, that’s perfect.
CT Voter
Although I hesitate to suggest this, I’d like to know why pollsters consider the question of Obama’s birthplace to be a legitimate question to poll. I’d also like to ask pollsters why they never asked the same kind of question about any other president. I say I hesitate, because bringing it up in any way adds some legitimacy to it.
And I second the comment about what defines the base.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@DougJ:
In that case, about the disparity between support for the generic “health care” and the specifics of the Senate bill. It’s the buried lede in almost every story on public opinion on HCR. It’s my hobby-horse du jour.
Da Bomb
@General Winfield Stuck: So is Bob Cesca: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-cesca/progressives-vs-the-presi_b_438825.html
@Max: And to prove more about what I have been yammering about for a minute:
A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll finds that just 28% of Americans believe the federal government is “working well” or even works “okay,” versus 70% who think it’s “unhealthy,” “stagnant” or needs large reforms.
“What’s more, a whopping 93% believe there’s too much partisan infighting; 84% think the special interests have too much influence over legislation; nearly three-quarters say that not enough has been done to regulate Wall Street and the banking industry; and an equal 61% complain that both Democrats and Republicans in Congress aren’t willing to compromise.”
Interestingly, the public’s anger isn’t necessarily directed at President Obama.
“Only 27% say they blame him for not being able to find solutions to the country’s problems. By contrast, 48% blame Republicans in Congress and 41% blame congressional Democrats.”
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/NEWS/A_Politics/___Politics_Today_Stories_Teases/10049NBCWSJ.pdf
arguingwithsignposts
@DougJ: I’m not sure I understand what your role is. Are you supposed to be helping them craft the poll, or answering questions, or what?
CT Voter
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: To its credit, NPR did actually mention that disparity–yesterday, I believe. Unfortunately, though, the mention was more in the form of an aside, rather than the central point.
Emo Pantload (fka Studly)
@bedtimeforbonzo:
I would disagree. Obama is not a bridge burner. He’s more like that quiet neighbor that puzzles you with how he hoards a bunch of junk in his garage. But he knows one day he may need that ugly-looking piece of scrap metal to jerryrig the passing of some initiative some day in the future.
Where I’d like to see him improve isn’t in throwing out the red meat, a la Alan Grayson, but rather in presenting a more decisive façade. Republicans (at least, the contemporary iteration of them) will be Republicans. I say, hold the Democrats’ feet to the fire. They’re the ones that hold the cards.
BombIranForChrist
I think this article is disingenuous. It’s not as if Obama has come into office, gotten some things done, but disappointed some liberals on DADT and a few other issues.
He has completely fallen flat on his face on every major issue: HCR, bank bailouts, the economy, DADT, Guatanamo, civil liberties, etc. etc.
The fact that Willis said he was suspecting this might happen gives the show away, imho. He was just waiting for it to happen, and then once he had what he saw as evidence, he sprung this pre-baked theory on us.
What Willis and other anti-hippie / activist / bloggers don’t understand is the anger that is out in the country. Ironically, his “yer just like Fox News, suck on dat liberalz” is exactly the kind of Fox News flame-throwing he is supposedly decrying.
Too bad, I kinda like Willis. Crap article.
arguingwithsignposts
In other news, Howard Zinn has died.
Also, CNN is reporting Obama will mention repeal of DADT in SOTU (acronym overload!). Interesting
freelancer
@DougJ:
How about what kind of polling has to take place to get to the point where Fox News is the most trusted name in news? That really seems like an outlier to me.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Max:
Classic PUMAism. “Oh why oh why can no one seeeeeee!?!” There was a study a few weeks ago, IIRC, saying that only 10% of self-ID’d Dems read blogs, and only some small fraction of those (10%, I want to say) are firebaggers and/or PUMAs.
freelancer
@arguingwithsignposts:
RIP
DougJ
Are you supposed to be helping them craft the poll, or answering questions, or what?
Asking them questions about what their focus group said.
arguingwithsignposts
@DougJ:
Ah. Ask them if their focus group thinks Obama is not being bipartisan enough, being bipartisan enough, or being too bipartisan.
cfaller96
I read Oliver’s post, and I have to say I’m getting really fucking tired of some people denigrating and infantilizing substantive and valid critiques of President Obama. To equate “bedwetting” to the extremely valid economic (and political) concern for even mentioning a spending freeze in the middle of the worst recession in 80 years is just really sad, and shows the author to be someone that doesn’t really understand economics (or politics) 101.
Seriously. This is not rocket science. You do NOT cut spending in a recession, and you do NOT co-opt your political opposition’s framing in response to a special election clusterfuck. These are things I understood when I was in college, when I was even dumber than I am now.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Does Republican obstructionism register with the focus group, and how? Does the name Olympia Snowe mean anything to them?
Sasha
Are you aware of any significant health care reform proposals by Republicans?
Are you aware that no Republican HCR proposal offered to date prevents exclusion for pre-existing conditions and covers 30-40 million people?
Are you aware that the current proposed HCR bill will actully reduce the deficit?
Are you aware that the current Senate HCR bill is actually bipartisan and contains hundreds of amendments proposed by Republicans?
Are you aware that Republican DeMint encouraged his party to stop healthcare reform so that it would be Obama’s “Waterloo”?
Are you aware that the use of the filibuster, a procedure that prevents a simple majority up-or-down vote, has been used by the minority Republican party a record number of times since 2006?
Do you believe that it is right for a single anonymous Senator to prevent legislation favored or an appointment be filled via the filibuster?
Do you believe that in a democracy, Senators representing less than 40% of the American public should reflexively block legislation favored by Senators representing over 60% of the public?
Do you agree that if the Republican party cannot propose a HCR bill that at least equals the amount of coverage and protection offered by the current bill by September, they have a moral responsibility to allow the current HCR bill to come to a majority up-or-down vote?
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@freelancer:
Breaking news: Thuggee is the most trusted name in cults.
Of course they are the most trusted. All that tells us is that the people who follow them follow them more blindly than folks who look elsewhere for their news.
cfaller96
Ask them if the focus group mentioned if they were ok with Senate Democrats doing nothing even though they have an 18 seat majority.
I really think this a nuclear bomb that the Dem Party hasn’t quite figured out how to defuse, or just plain doesn’t think is a problem. If Democrats pitch “well we don’t have 60 and Republicans are being mean” in November, voters are going to go ballistic.
freelancer
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Yeah, someone here riffed on that the day it came out.
“Breaking News: Fox News audience least skeptical out of all news audiences.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@cfaller96:
I agree with everything you say, but there is, quite simply, a lot of whining bullshit on the lefty blogs. Go read a couple of threads at Eschaton (where diehard Clinton supporters are now raving Kucinichites, and “progressives” were actually saying that Obama cares more about Haiti than America). People don’t want to accept that the filibuster is real; that there is little that Obama can do to lean on people like Blanche Lincoln and Ben Nelson; that there were never fifty votes for the public option, much less sixty; that the legend of LBJ’s muscle with legislators are 1) exaggerated 2) anachronistic. etc etc
Typical exchange over there: Them: “Obama could have gotten the votes if he really wanted to! (x 5)”. Me: “How?” Them: “Shut up OBOT DLC TROLL!(x1,000)”
rootless_e
@cfaller96:
Well that’s good, because (a) he’s not cutting spending, he’s increasing spending and (b) he’s been positioning himself as the cutting waste guy since the primaries.
So you are cool with it, I guess.
Bad Horse's Filly
Have them ask if anyone gives a fuck about the administration getting bipartisanship or getting actual work done with the majority that they have.
MJ
@Da Bomb:
Word!
FlipYrWhig
@cfaller96:
I think one effect of having had the Bush crew in charge for a long, LONG eight years is that we all learned to assume that everyone involved in the government was either stupid or evil or both. Now what happens is that every time the Obama crew does something that feels wrong, everyone jumps to say it’s stupid, evil, or both.
But I’m still fairly confident that when Obama and his people decide something, _it’s not because they’re a bunch of stupid morons who don’t know what the fuck they’re doing_. People caricature this view as belief in “11-dimensional chess” — why is it always 11, incidentally? — but it’s truly how I feel. They may well do things I don’t agree with and that make my Proggy Sense tingle, but I doubt that those choices arise from panic or cynicism or stupidity.
cat48
I liked Oliver’s piece also. The blogs attacking I have become used to, but Ed, Keith, and Rachel are not helpful when they use the Fox News talking points that Oliver referred to in the post on a regular basis to attack Obama. It is counterproductive. Disagree fine, but Keith did a Special Comment the night before the inauguration. They have been totally unbelievable. They went nuclear about the Public Option–unwatchable. Tweetie was the only reasonable one!
PurpleGirl
I am going Galt on politics tonight. I participated in a fiber jewelry workshop this afternoon and enjoyed it very much. I even finished one piece. It definitely helped my mood. Politics tonight would only mess up my mood again, so I’m going to play classical music and surf fiber and craft web sites. (Then maybe tomorrow I’ll be in a mood to job hunt again.)
Anne Laurie
@PurpleGirl:
Can’t fault your decision. I just hope John’s Mom can keep him focused on “Chuck” and other nice non-tense-making programs. And I hope your job hunt succeeds, and soon.
cfaller96
I’ll take exception to a little bit of that passage.
1. If the filibuster is real, then bluntly it needs to be broken/removed/something. There are ways to do it, none easy or simple. It doesn’t matter that it’s hard or complicated, though, because it’s necessary– a Senate that literally cannot function is an unacceptable state of affairs…for everyone.
This isn’t on Obama per se, it’s really Harry Reid’s fault and it goes back to 2007. But as we saw with the chairmanship of Joe Lieberman, Harry Reid will (from time to time at least) do the bidding of President Obama. And again, this is a necessary task that has to happen before anything else good can happen, so I think President Obama can be criticized for being either unwilling and/or unable to recognize this problem (he was in the Senate, remember).
2. I always take a skeptical eye towards “there were never enough votes for X” statements, simply because I think the dynamic of actually having a vote changes the political calculus for the person making the vote. (This is also why I think no matter what the whip count says Nancy Pelosi should schedule a vote for the Senate Bill). It’s one thing for a moderate Dem to have “concerns” about a health care bill with a Public Option, it’s quite another for that moderate Dem to actually vote “no” on health care reform.
You may accuse me of “magical fucking thinking,” and that’s valid- I don’t have evidence. I view it differently, though- I liken it to “playing poker” with people who are not exactly examples of intestinal fortitude. Yes there’s risk, and yes there will be failures, but IMO there will be more successes than would happen if we never scheduled votes because we just took all these public statements at face value and oh god where are the votes?
And even if I’m wrong about that, there is still value in calling these bluffs because at least everything was tried and everyone has resolution and closure on the issue.
3. I agree that certain Dems on certain issues will never be flipped, and President Obama shouldn’t be faulted for not overcoming that. Leaning on Blanche Lincoln or Bill Nelson, however, wouldn’t be a necessity if problem #1 (breaking the filibuster) was taken care of. This is Harry Reid’s “original sin” that we now see is causing huuuuuge problems for President Obama, Democrats, and the country at large.
Again, President Obama needs to recognize this as a serious problem that will hurt his agenda, hurt his party this fall, possibly harm his own chances in 2012, and possibly harm his own legacy. At some point he has to get involved on this, and sooner rather than later.
For my emotional health and general sanity, I try not to delve too much into comment sections that either A) have become too long for me to contribute anything meaningful, or B) are at a site that is just too huge to hope that the thread won’t be hijacked with hyperbolic vitriol. This is why I only lurk at DailyKos, Atrios, BooMan, etc.
FlipYrWhig
@PurpleGirl:
Ooh, you might like this Etsy shop.
cfaller96
A) In a time of recession, even mentioning a spending freeze is horrible economic policy. The psychology that underlies economics is too often ignored, and a lot of what goes on in an economy is based on what people think is happening and is going to happen. Thus, by even mentioning the possibility that government will not be priming the pump in the near future, a lot of employers’ and consumers’ sphincters just tightened, and a lot of wallets just snapped shut. Heckuva job.
B) If he’s simply fulfilling his promise of “cutting waste,” then there is no reason the Department of Defense should be exempt. But it is, which means that this is not delivering on a campaign promise but some sort of posturing.
…
True, the Administration has been trying to walk back its initial comments about the scope of the freeze, but that only begs the question: what was the point of this proposal anyway?
The best thing you can say about this proposal is that it’s a meaningless political gimmick. Which I’m not cool with. So no, not in any way am I cool with his spending proposal.
cfaller96
(Reposting because the pottymouth filter moderated me)
Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’ll take exception to a little bit of that passage.
1. If the filibuster is real, then bluntly it needs to be broken/removed/something. There are ways to do it, none easy or simple. It doesn’t matter that it’s hard or complicated, though, because it’s necessary– a Senate that literally cannot function is an unacceptable state of affairs…for everyone.
This isn’t on Obama per se, it’s really Harry Reid’s fault and it goes back to 2007. But as we saw with the chairmanship of Joe Lieberman, Harry Reid will (from time to time at least) do the bidding of President Obama. And again, this is a necessary task that has to happen before anything else good can happen, so I think President Obama can be criticized for being either unwilling and/or unable to recognize this problem (he was in the Senate, remember).
2. I always take a skeptical eye towards “there were never enough votes for X” statements, simply because I think the dynamic of actually having a vote changes the political calculus for the person making the vote. (This is also why I think no matter what the whip count says Nancy Pelosi should schedule a vote for the Senate Bill). It’s one thing for a moderate Dem to have “concerns” about a health care bill with a Public Option, it’s quite another for that moderate Dem to actually vote “no” on health care reform because it has a Public Option.
You may accuse me of “magical f–king thinking,” and that’s valid- I don’t have evidence. I view it differently, though- I liken it to “playing poker” with people who are not exactly examples of intestinal fortitude. Yes there’s risk, and yes there will be failures, but IMO there will be more successes than would happen if we never scheduled votes (because we just took all these public statements at face value and oh god where are the votes?).
And even if I’m wrong about that, there is still value in calling these bluffs because at least everything was tried and everyone has resolution and closure on the issue. Moderates seem to not understand this about liberals- we’re okay with failure, we’re NOT okay with failure to try.
3. I agree that certain Dems on certain issues will never be flipped, and President Obama shouldn’t be faulted for not overcoming that. Leaning on Blanche Lincoln or Bill Nelson, however, wouldn’t be a necessity if problem #1 (breaking the filibuster) was taken care of. This is Harry Reid’s “original sin” that we now see is causing huuuuuge problems for President Obama, Democrats, and the country at large.
Again, President Obama needs to recognize this as a serious problem that will hurt his agenda, hurt his party this fall, possibly harm his own chances in 2012, and possibly harm his own legacy. At some point he has to get involved on this, and sooner rather than later.
For my emotional health and general sanity, I try not to delve too much into comment sections that either A) have become too long for me to contribute anything meaningful, or B) are at a site that is just too huge to hope that the thread won’t be hijacked with hyperbolic vitriol. This is why I only lurk at DailyKos, Atrios, BooMan, etc.
FlipYrWhig
@cfaller96:
IMHO it’s possible that mentioning a spending freeze actually unclenches the sphincters of people like Evan Bayh and even Jim Webb or Mark Warner. I think it’s a gambit meant to shore up that center-right flank of the House and Senate. It’s like a passing-centered offense calling a run once in a while — it could be setting up something later in the game.
jenniebee
I’d like to know, especially in light of the Abramoff scandal, the Yoo memos and the latest O’Queef Watergate redux, whether the public now perceives Democrats as the party of the Rule of Law and Republicans as a party that condones criminality, and especially criminality in pursuit of political power.
FlipYrWhig
@cfaller96: Did the filter catch you for using the name of a popular card game? I’ve never been stuck in limbo for using (fuck shit piss) profanity.
contessakitty
Ask them about the IOKIYAR rule.
Ask them why the right wing politicians and right wing pundits are NEVER EVER challenged by the media and if Obama burped by mistake it’d be seen as a treasonous act or an act of disrespect.
Ask them why journalism has been replaced by rip and read from AP News or why investigative reporting has now been replaced by reporting whatever Republican talking points are out that day.
Let’s see if the fuckers dare to answer.
jenniebee
Once again, step 1) follow a link to Oliver Wills, step 2) read 1.5 grafs, step 3) close window and ask self what else I expected, really?
The Republican candidates in the primaries were perceived as “center-right”? By whom? And what were they on? And why didn’t they share? Are these the same primary candidates who stood on a stage and raised their hands to announce that they didn’t believe in evolution? Are these the same primary candidates that included Mike “so what’s a little rape between friends” Huckabee and Tom “if I wanted you to pick my crops I’d have grown them in Mexico” Tancredo? The eyes boggle, the mind reels. Does he even understand what “Goldwater disciple” means and that McCain is one? Goldwater isn’t “center right” just because the country’s drifted towards him; we’ve got seriously nutty so-cons but we’ve still got a long way to go to get all the way to Goldwater and his devotee John McCain.
If it wasn’t for that “center-right Republicans” nonsense, I wouldn’t be nit-picking on the “center-left Democrats” BS. But these candidates were the same kind of crop that drove so many progressives to vote for Nader in 2000 and 2004. The difference in outcome this time was partly because both Obama and Clinton were landmark candidates, and also because it has by now been well drilled in to progressives that the country cannot afford for us to abandon a coalition with flat out anybody that will allow us to keep power out of the hands of those seeking radical right-wing change.
We call Republicans the Party of No because they engage in active opposition, but the truth of the matter is that we have not, as a party, agreed on an agenda of our own to enact, and the primary reason we give to supporters to justify their support is that they cannot risk allowing the opposition to win. “Party of No” isn’t a course of action for us, it’s our whole damn raison d’etre. As cynical as that sounds, the only thing that could prove it wrong is full commitment across the party to enacting a progressive agenda, and that ain’t happening.