jac's: an election 2008 diary: my favorite reaction so far....

Friday, August 29, 2008

my favorite reaction so far....

Now that the Democratic party has "installed" a nominee using a sham roll call vote in a rigged nominating procedure that had more in common with the government of Iran or China than anything American the question is what to do next.

The leadership of the Democratic Party, along with those who have chosen to go along with it, has subverted and undermined every democratic and Democratic principle to an extent most people would not have thought possible and they did it under the noses of an inept and biased news media who did not seem to notice.

What matters now is that the Democratic Party not be rewarded for their efforts. And that it's time for Democrats in November to put principle before party.

It's time for people to start making decisions. Whether to choose loyalty to your party, or loyalty to your principles - that's a tough choice. However, the party chose to force us into this choice. To me, that suggests that the party is not worthy - that when they forced such an awful choice, they lost any right to demand loyalty.

We are Democrats and we believe in the things the Democratic Party has stood for. But all those principles were corrupted this time. If it takes a Democratic Party defeat for President to rid the party of the elements that so corrupted the process and everything the Democratic Party has stood for, so be it.

I agree wholeheartedly with this sentiment.

4 comments:

Unknown said...: This is a continuation of the discussion in "Spoils of War," now that I've had time to think about it.

What I've been reading -- rumours so far, but I expect the facts to come out -- is that enough delegates and superdelegates were so anxious about Obama that Hillary could have come away with the nomination, and Pelosi had to stop it fast. I think Hillary went along with it because, due to the incessant demonization by those in her own party, the story would have been "Hillary stole the nomination from the black man," and she would have been savaged by those in her own party in the general election. She would have been fighting the Democratic machine as well as the Republican machine.

We were right to keep faith in her, as she kept faith in us. And it's not over yet. I want to see her as Senate Majority Leader in the McCain administration.

McCain just announced his VP pick, Sarah Palin. Brilliant move. He at least pretends to respect women, and will be chivalry in action in exposing the Obots, who are already turning their misoygnistic glee against Palin. She's young, countering his age and Obama's youth advantage. She's got at least as much experience as Obama. She will be attractive to a lot of the independents and Republicans who were looking forward to voting for Hillary. They respect her, where her own party fears her.

I think the Republicans wanted to lose this election and let Obama and the Dems get blamed four the next four years. (I think the Dems wanted to lose, too, so long as they picked up down-ticket seats. They didn't count on how embarrassing the ordeal would be, with their machinations exposed and their corrupt, inadequate candidate soon to be exposed. Bill O'Reilly is working on a 25-part (!) series on Obama to run in September.) I want McCain to win -- let the Republicans take the blame for the whole mess they've left us with, and spare us the prospect of President Jeb. It's going to be awful, but not as awful as the Obama legacy would be. And we get to clean out the viperous Kennedy/Kerry/Reid/Pelosi/Clyburn et al. crowd.

Hillary's and Bill's speeches reminded us of what Democrats are supposed to be about. I'm not counting them out yet.

I also think the party leadership is in the pocket of a faction of the "superclass" (see the very interesting comment at http://anglachelg.blogspot.com/2008/06/media-whores-online.html), and that this accounts for the strange inaction of Congress over the past two years. They should have been pushing bill after bill, demanding Administration compliance on documents and witnesses (rather than just issuing sternly worded letters), refusing to rubber-stamp Bush appointments and legislation, and generally making a record to campaign on of what they stood ready to do with a majority and a Democratic president. Now it all makes sense.

It's a strange election -- both parties wanted to lose.

I'm looking to support down-ticket Dems who supported Hillary. No more Blue Dogs!; August 29, 2008 at 4:27 PM
Unknown said...: P.S. I sent McCain an email yesterday begging him not to pick Romney, because McCain is kind to animals and Romney put his dog on the roof for a twelve-hour drive. Maybe he listened to me!; August 29, 2008 at 4:33 PM
jacilyn said...: I also think the party leadership is in the pocket of a faction of the "superclass" (see the very interesting comment at http://anglachelg.blogspot.com/2008/06/media-whores-online.html), and that this accounts for the strange inaction of Congress over the past two years.

I absolutely agree with you.

Also with your other points.

I don't know what Hillary is doing but I am hoping quite intensely that she is going to keep working hard to get representation for our principles.

I do agree that Sarah Palin is a brilliant pick. I think McCain may have just won the election. I'm wondering how far in advance the Republicans planned our election outcomes - but what can be done, when our party collaborates? The Dems didn't have to let this all happen.

And I am REALLY GLAD that Romney isn't the pick.

Not just because of his poor traumatized dog, either.; August 29, 2008 at 8:32 PM
Unknown said...: No, of course not just because of his dog, but the dog was emblematic for me -- just as the freezing tenants in Rezko's buildings were of Obama. And I thought that since McCain's fondness for animals was the only good thing I know about him, I could be sincere in my appeal. (I wrote, "Senator McCain, the best thing I know about you" instead of "the only good thing I know about you.")

Anyway, somebody (whose sources I don't know, but she's pretty well informed) told me that McCain was going to pick Romney but last night a constant stream of Republicans called him up and said the conservatives wouldn't go for him, and the other available women weren't antiabortion, so Palin it was. I would prefer to think that he picked Palin as a thumb in the eye to the Dems, but it seems more a matter of securing the religious bloc.

"I'm wondering how far in advance the Republicans planned our election outcomes" -- well, Donna Brazile was taking advice from Karl Rove.; August 30, 2008 at 12:24 AM

Post a Comment

quote, unquote

...not just party officials, but also the intelligentsia that formulates the political philosophy and the echo chamber that shouts its approval, is running a campaign on little more than class resentment against former Democratic constituencies. (White) Race is elided with (working) class to create the ultimate clash of culture – to make racist demons out of people asking to have their material interests defended.

It is no less than the mobilization of resentment of the socio-economic winners against the losers. How dare you not keep us in power, when we have done so little for you and promise to do even less?

...

The ultimate shadow of Reagan is that you don’t win by defending losers, only by securing the interests of the winners. That is the dark heart beating in the chest of the Unity Democrats. They are done with the losers.
- Anglachel

They're just not used to somebody really smart. They’re just not used to somebody who’s really well educated. They just don’t know quite how to handle it. Cause if he’s as smart as Barack is he must not be from my neighborhood.
- Joe Biden
(on why "Republicans and blogs on the far right" are 'mischaracterizing' Obama)

One of the things I really like about PUMA is that, unlike an unfortunately growing faction of the Democratic Party, there are no loyalty oaths, no uniforms to wear, no hierarchical leadership structure to pay homage to or suck up to, and no demagoguery to reflexively swallow. I’ve read and participated in many disagreements on The Confluence, esp. recently with regard to voting McCain, and never once been told ’you’re not a true PUMA!’ or had ’you’re a Republican/bitch/trailer trash/freak because you disagree!’
- commenter, Corrente

Whatever Palin’s political impact, her cultural significance is profound. For better and for worse, she introduces a new and likely long-running cultural type to the national stage—the red-state feminist.
- Kay S. Hymowitz, City Journal

The vice-presidential candidacy of Sarah Palin is, in part, an effort to wrest the leadership of the feminist movement from the elite and militant left, and to put it in the hands of a silent majority of relatively traditional but ambitious women. It is a bold move to try to separate abortion from other issues generally associated with women’s rights.
- Conrad Black

I think we need to add a new term to the lexicon to sum up that prevalent bit of sexism. I'm calling it Penis Years* (not a coincidence that it echoes the term dog years.)

*Penis Years: Each year of any experience of a person with a penis is equivalent to five years of experience by someone without a penis.
- The Confluence
(alleging bias in the media's treatment of female candidates Clinton and Palin, as compared to the media's treatment of Obama)

Her greatest hypocrisy is in her pretense that she is a woman.
- Wendy Doniger, Newsweek

They believe that the Democrats are right in the same way, to the same degree, that 2 plus 2 equals 4 and the Earth revolves around the sun. They take the ‘rightness’ of liberal and Democratic views as such a given, that they are not even able to think within any other framework.

Conservatives, and I am one, understand that some people disagree with us and it’s up to us to sell our ideas and get their vote. Liberals think that their correctness is self-evident and that those who don’t agree are uninformed, stupid or evil. They should be lectured and if that doesn’t work, mocked or ignored.
- commenter, FT.com

[Democrats'] concern is real and admirable. The trouble is, they lack respect for the objects of their solicitude. Their sympathy comes mixed with disdain, and even contempt.
- Clive Crook, columnist

She added nothing to the ticket that the Republicans didn't already have sewn up, the white trash vote, the demographic that sullies America's name inside and outside its borders yet has such a curious appeal for the right....

...Palin was not a sure choice, not even for the stolidly Republican ladies branch of Citizens for a Tackier America. No, she isn't even female really....

...Palin has a toned-down version of the porn actress look favoured by this decade's woman, the overtreated hair, puffy lips and permanently alarmed expression. Bristol has what is known in Britain as the look of the teen mum, the "pramface." Husband Todd looks like a roughneck; Track, heading off to Iraq, appears terrified. They claim to be family obsessed while being studiously terrible at parenting. What normal father would want Levi "I'm a fuckin' redneck" Johnson prodding his daughter?

...Palin has it all, along with being vicious....
- Heather Mallick, CBC

Sarah Palin thinks she is a better American than you because she comes from a small town, and a superior human being because she isn't a journalist and never lived in Washington and likes to watch her kids play hockey.
- Michael Kinsley, TIME

...those numbers showing a 20-point swing in the support of white women have got to be in error -- unless of course, they meant to say ditzy white women, and the first adjective was omitted in error.
- commenter, TalkLeft

On the day McCain announced her selection as his running mate, Palin thanked Clinton and Ferraro for blazing her trail. A day later, Ferraro noted her shock at Palin's comment. You see, none of her peers, no one, had ever publicly thanked her in the 24 years since her historic run for the White House.
- Tammy Bruce, San Francisco Chronicle

One ''hot-button'' issue is whether a woman with young children could be a good president and still handle her domestic obligations, or would she become conflicted, so that, say, if the Russians were getting ready to launch nuclear missiles at us, and the president was supposed to get on the Hot Line, she would instead be seized by an uncontrollable maternal instinct to make a pediatrician appointment.I don't know about Palin. But I do know this: women in general are WAY better at work/home multi-tasking than -- to pick another gender at random -- men.
- Dave Barry

She was put on this earth to do two things: kill caribou and kick butt. She's all out of caribou.
- Jonah Goldberg
(enthusing over Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin)

And Hillary….I know you want to keep your job but for God’s sake woman how much abuse are you willing to take?
- Mountain Sage

There is always talk of conservatives loving to start cultural war when they are down, but I can’t say that I’ve found this any more sickening and disgusting than the liberals’ tactic of belittling and demonizing much of the population of this country. I’ve found it incredibly hard to get mad at their usual attacks on liberals when my fellow liberals attack with the same degree of ferocity, but in a different way. If they are stereotypically “cheerfully vicious”, than we are most definitely “blissfully smug”.
- commenter, Corrente

What is it about Republican Conventions that bring out America's inner police state?
- Tennessee Guerilla Women

He's a one-trick (unity) pony, whose trick has been trotted out once too often. His sole and only schtick – standing at a podium in front of huge crowds and offering himself as their mirror – is already so yesterday that nobody can even work up much energy praising it anymore. Witness the speeches at this convention. All anybody could say on his behalf is that he isn’t John McCain.
- Falstaff (on Obama)

The reason that some of us will support Palin, even though we may not agree with all of her political positions, is that she is not an illegitimate candidate. She did not steal votes from her opponent. She did not smear us with charges of racism. She actually has a lot in common with some of us (mother, businesswoman, athlete, etct). And the man that will be her boss showed us that he is at least listening and aware of our presence. He didn’t flick us off his shoulder and tell us we weren’t needed. He didn’t play the abusive boyfriend and say “where else are you gonna go babe?”.
- The Confluuence

Party bosses fixed a title fight between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. In bare knuckles Scranton where I’m from, that’s tantamount to treason. So they better watch out when I come looking for a rematch.
- Steve Corbett, talk show radio host

All those years I took pride in my party loyalty and now I realize I was just a fool, because I was telling the Democratic party and candidates they could take me for granted and ignore my wants and needs. The could pursue their own agendas without interference from me, because no matter what they did (or failed to do) they could count on my vote.

If I had been more disloyal they might have offered to pay me for my vote instead paying me no attention. Who knows what I could have got in return for my vote? I might have universal health care right now instead of my current plan which is called “don’t get sick.” We might even have “Congressional oversight” of the Bush Mob.
- Klownhaus

Nancy Pelosi said not too long ago that she supported Obama because he has the judgment to be President. This is of course, like a homeless person giving advice on how to fix the housing crisis.
- Marc Rubin

The Republicans couldn’t have come up with a better way to destroy the progressive movement from within if they’d invented him. Which maybe they did.
- Reclusive Leftist

Resolved, that 18 million Americans voted for Hillary Clinton, more than any other presidential primary candidate in history, and they have a right to help shape the agenda and processes of the Democratic Party.
- Declaration of Objections

I know that candidates usually run toward the center during the general, but, damn, they don’t usually run all the way to the opposite goal!
- commenter, Corrente

who I am

I am an alienated former Democrat, who intends to vote independent from now on.

I took down my blogroll because I don't want to belong to any communities at the moment. I think groupthink is the biggest threat there is right now.

I always did like to play devil's advocate, and I think an honest debate is worth more than a hundred "right" opinions. Two hundred if it's lively.

I'm not ashamed to place myself near the center of the political spectrum. I have little respect for people who are way out on either wing, who see nothing but their own little bubble, and hear nothing because they can't listen to anyone but themselves and their mirrors.

I am an unashamed member of the low information bitter small town gun totin' hick crowd, though I've lived in cities too.

I've been a Democrat ever since I could vote, but I'm fed up with the sneering contempt liberals have aimed at everyone outside their little gated-community world.

To me, the word elitist brings up images of Brad Pitt on ice skates, and it is exactly how I think of the Democratic party. And, no, "elitist" has nothing to do with how wealthy you are. It is merely the opposite of someone who believes in equality (or, ironically, democracy), but who believes that 'some pigs are created a little more equal than others'.

I don't pretend to be particularly well-educated; I have no fancy degrees and I've learned (the hard way) to be very cautious of assuming a fancy degree is worth jack.

I care about eradicating poverty and I care about dignity for all (even poor people, trailer trash, Southerners, and Republicans). I care about education, equal access to opportunity, FDR's Four Freedoms, minimum protections for workers, and a fair shake for anyone willing to work hard and obey the rules.

I care about an honest dialog, and the idea that everyone ought to have a voice. I care about fair and honest elections. I am angry about how manipulative the media is. I care about procedures being followed and process being respected.

Also: when I comment on other blogs - which I don't usually do ever since I noticed someone going around posting this site as his or her personal link (??) - I use this Blogger account. If the name is the same as mine, but it's not a Blogger account - it isn't me.