OK, I’ve had about enough with the hyperventilating and weeping and wailing from the left the last couple of days.
They lost an election. It happens. The Democrats still have strong majorities in both houses. They can still get things done, although the filibuster is going to make it very tough to pass meaningful health care reform. But tough is not the same as impossible, no matter what the blogs tell you.
It’s clear that Democrats have a reason to be worried. But enough with the finger-pointing. Simply saying that Dems have to be more ideologically pure, as tempting as that is, is not going to cut it. We can wish that Obama would’ve been more partisan and made this a big fight about good (Democrats) versus evil (Republicans). But he’s never been that kind of guy. The left-leaning blogs see life that way. He doesn’t.
And really, that may be a good thing. After all, isn’t he supposed to be President of the entire country, both D and R? Didn’t we hate George W. Bush because he never listened to the other side? Should we be more like him?
I know it’s not “fair” that Obama got stuck with cleaning up the mess, and the people who made the mess are now saying it’s his fault. But it is reality. It’s his job, and his supporters’ job, to find a way to communicate a better vision. Yes, it’s not “fair” that professional assholes and liars like Hannity/Beck/Limbaugh push and poison the political debate as much as they do. But that’s reality. Obama, and the rest of us, need to find a way to overcome that. And we won’t get there by screaming louder.
So what do the American people want? If we go by the Massachusetts election, we can conclude a few things:
1. “No more back room deals, we want transparency in government.”
2. “We demand deficit reduction.”
3. “Work to help Main Street, not Wall Street.”
4. “Health care reform has to be something that we can understand.”
I think that’s a list that all my Republican friends could agree on. Of course, when Bush was in office, they all said:
1. “We don’t care about that.”
2. “We don’t care about that.”
3. “We don’t care about that.”
4. “We don’t care about that.”
But hey, bygones. The mood of the country has changed, and if voters have unreasonable double-standards, well, welcome to democracy.
The point is, Obama and the Dems need to respond to the mood of the country. They don’t need to become Republicans to do it. After all, transparency, anti-big banks, deficit reduction—those are all things Dems can support, right? Take the message, reframe the debate, move forward and prove your side has the better ideas.
It’s time to get back to work.
2 comments:
The problem is, the right wing is full of people - and politicians - passionately devoted to their ideology. The left is full of people - but not politicians - so devoted. Mainstream Democrats seldom seem enthusiastic and ideologically driven even regarding positions their constituents have whole-heartedly endorsed...so it's not a matter of the blogosphere being way left of the actual public, etc.
Well, to be honest, I dunno. I heard plenty of R's slamming their congress critters for being out-of-touch, complacent, RINOs, etc., when the Dems were winning every election in sight. I find partisans on both sides are quite good at being armchair quarterbacks, but I find it hard to believe that people who go to the considerable trouble of running for office are not "passionate"... I think the crazy idealogues on the right are from very deep Red districts, just as the D's have their Kuchinichses, Sanderses, etc. The problem is, the crazy people on the Right get on TeeVee way more than the ones on the Left do. So, here we are back at the media debate...
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