He's been in Congress for fifteen years. In that time something like three bills of his have been made into law. One re-named a post office, one recognized the contributions of some... I want to say Polish... guy to the US. And the third was equally pointless. He just wasn't an effective representative.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
So we get stiff once in a while. So we have a little fun. What’s wrong with that? This is a free country, isn’t it? I can take my panda any place I want to. And if I wanna buy it a drink, that’s my business.
He's been in Congress for fifteen years. In that time something like three bills of his have been made into law. One re-named a post office, one recognized the contributions of some... I want to say Polish... guy to the US. And the third was equally pointless. He just wasn't an effective representative.
Bernie Sanders doesn't have much of a record in that regard either, and Carl Hayden, one of the most widely acclaimed Senators we've ever had, was the same way. Number of bills passed is not the only way to measure a legislator.
He's been in Congress for fifteen years. In that time something like three bills of his have been made into law. One re-named a post office, one recognized the contributions of some... I want to say Polish... guy to the US. And the third was equally pointless. He just wasn't an effective representative.
Bernie Sanders doesn't have much of a record in that regard either, and Carl Hayden, one of the most widely acclaimed Senators we've ever had, was the same way. Number of bills passed is not the only way to measure a legislator.
Kucinich was a lightweight ineffective whack-a-doo though. You can be a liberal and a progressive and not consistently doing everything you can to make yourself irrelevant not only through being on the left wing but by making no fucking sense on the left wing. The reason you knew about him is because he loved the spotlight more than he liked making sense or change.
He's been in Congress for fifteen years. In that time something like three bills of his have been made into law. One re-named a post office, one recognized the contributions of some... I want to say Polish... guy to the US. And the third was equally pointless. He just wasn't an effective representative.
Bernie Sanders doesn't have much of a record in that regard either, and Carl Hayden, one of the most widely acclaimed Senators we've ever had, was the same way. Number of bills passed is not the only way to measure a legislator.
Kucinich was a lightweight ineffective whack-a-doo though. You can be a liberal and a progressive and not consistently doing everything you can to make yourself irrelevant not only through being on the left wing but by making no fucking sense on the left wing. The reason you knew about him is because he loved the spotlight more than he liked making sense or change.
He's been in Congress for fifteen years. In that time something like three bills of his have been made into law. One re-named a post office, one recognized the contributions of some... I want to say Polish... guy to the US. And the third was equally pointless. He just wasn't an effective representative.
Bernie Sanders doesn't have much of a record in that regard either, and Carl Hayden, one of the most widely acclaimed Senators we've ever had, was the same way. Number of bills passed is not the only way to measure a legislator.
Bernie will also vote for Democratic initiatives that aren't perfect.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
A new poll released over the weekend by the Western New England University Polling Institute in partnership with The Republican newspaper of Springfield found Brown leading Warren, his top Democratic challenger, 49 to 41 percent. That closely reflects several other surveys taken in the last month that also show Brown with a lead.
In a handful of previous polls, Warren had led Brown, or come within the margin of error, while Brown’s favorability ratings appeared to be slipping.
As the mood of the electorate appears to have swung toward the incumbent senator, it has shaken much of the early confidence among the Democrats who, thrilled with the energy that went into her first months of Warren’s campaign, were convinced that she would beat Brown in November.
Hahahahah, my cynicism will never not be right. Oh, as always, don't read the comments.
Fuuuuck I had to read the comments after you told me not to read them.
"A vote for Elizabeth Warren is a vote for the authoritarian nanny state."
"...the point here is that Lizzie is employed as a professor at the hard left lib think tank known as Harvard"
"Lizzy Warren is the creater and founder of Occupy, who's signature act is public urination and defecation.
Millionaire Warren burdened our financially strapped cities with millions and millions of dollars in security costs and the cost to pick up her followers filthy trash, belongings, and feces.
NOT a pretty picture. And they never had any sort of a coherent message, other than total debt forgiveness, open borders, and lifetime welfare for everybody on the planet."
I'm going to walk away from the computer and go die now.
A new poll released over the weekend by the Western New England University Polling Institute in partnership with The Republican newspaper of Springfield found Brown leading Warren, his top Democratic challenger, 49 to 41 percent. That closely reflects several other surveys taken in the last month that also show Brown with a lead.
In a handful of previous polls, Warren had led Brown, or come within the margin of error, while Brown’s favorability ratings appeared to be slipping.
As the mood of the electorate appears to have swung toward the incumbent senator, it has shaken much of the early confidence among the Democrats who, thrilled with the energy that went into her first months of Warren’s campaign, were convinced that she would beat Brown in November.
Hahahahah, my cynicism will never not be right. Oh, as always, don't read the comments.
Do we have the crosstabs?
Also, that article is nice and full of weasel words, like "several polls".
The poll that has her down was conducted 'in partnership' with a Republican newspaper, which kind of casts the results in doubt. I'd be curious to see more information on the poll itself.
I wouldn't say shoe-in, but I certainly don't believe that she's down that much right now. As with most things, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle on this.
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lonelyahavaCall me Ahava ~~She/Her~~Move to New ZealandRegistered Userregular
I wouldn't say shoe-in, but I certainly don't believe that she's down that much right now. As with most things, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle on this.
I wouldn't say shoe-in, but I certainly don't believe that she's down that much right now. As with most things, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle on this.
Plus, ya kno, 8 months away.
I think Brown is going to try to pull a Snowe job on MA.
Not sure how he'll be able to do that since he voted for the Blunt amendment. Unless the media there gives him cover and the Democratic and Independent voters gullible enough to believe that and/or not vote.
Not sure how he'll be able to do that since he voted for the Blunt amendment. Unless the media there gives him cover and the Democratic and Independent voters gullible enough to believe that and/or not vote.
Well, look at Snowe herself. In the last few Congresses, she voted lockstep with GOP leadership 90% of the time, yet still had a reputation as a moderate.
Not sure how he'll be able to do that since he voted for the Blunt amendment. Unless the media there gives him cover and the Democratic and Independent voters gullible enough to believe that and/or not vote.
Well, look at Snowe herself. In the last few Congresses, she voted lockstep with GOP leadership 90% of the time, yet still had a reputation as a moderate.
Yeah, Republicans have been pretty successful in shifting the frame of reference for what the extremes and moderation of political ideology are to whatever the fuck they want. They do it with SCOTUS a lot (O'Connor is victim of it) but the biggest example right now is Obama the moderate being painted as the most extremely liberal president ever.
Yes, Kucinich had to be shamed into adopting a more pro-choice stance; I don't see the same happening to Kaptur any time soon. The other points against Kucinich in that breakdown all come down to the fact that he opposed several pieces of fundamentally compromised or outright conservative legislation from the left, instead of sacrificing his principles at the altar of Party Loyalty and voting with the rest of the Dems. Which of course makes him the enemy, because as far as party-line Democrats are concerned, if you're not with us, you're against us.
And when did his opposition actually result in positive change, hm? Or was he more like Ron Paul, an ineffective ranting ideologue occasionally running for President?
I can remember which thread it was but AManFromEarth said it pretty well along the line of, the entirety of politics is give and take, that is the game.
Yes, principles are nice, but you're going to get nothing if you can compromise. The trick is realizing which principles one should not compromise on and when you can afford to compromise on the others. If someone wants to never compromise his values, I suggest he stay out of office and probably always pick none of the above during elections (aka write it in). At least then he won't be obstructing progress, while he stubbornly clinging to the notion that his way is the only way and cooperating with everyone else be damned (the only person that's going to agree 100% with you, is you).
It's funny, in a pathetic kind of way, that the ostensibly liberal Democrats in this forum are perfectly willing to hold any and all left-of-center Democrats singularly accountable for Congress's failure to enact policies that reflect their vision for what the Democratic Party stands for. Some of us would rather see the Democrats move left, or at the very least fail to move further right than they already have, and would rather not see our elected officials voting for (to pick a completely random example) regulatory bills that were written by the very industry they were meant to regulate. But hey, by all means, keep electing Democrats who compromise their principles to conservatives and business interests, keep blaming anyone but the centrist neoliberal Democratic leadership for the party's failure to get behind progressive legislation, and keep patting yourselves on the back for passing "progressive" economic legislation that's more conservative than identical policies that were proffered by moderate Republicans thirty years ago.
It's funny, in a pathetic kind of way, that the ostensibly liberal Democrats in this forum are perfectly willing to hold any and all left-of-center Democrats singularly accountable for Congress's failure to enact policies that reflect their vision for what the Democratic Party stands for. Some of us would rather see the Democrats move left, or at the very least fail to move further right than they already have, and would rather not see our elected officials voting for (to pick a completely random example) regulatory bills that were written by the very industry they were meant to regulate. But hey, by all means, keep electing Democrats who compromise their principles to conservatives and business interests, keep blaming anyone but the centrist neoliberal Democratic leadership for the party's failure to get behind progressive legislation, and keep patting yourselves on the back for passing "progressive" economic legislation that's more conservative than identical policies that were proffered by moderate Republicans thirty years ago.
Most of those comments are not written by the 'liberal' Democrats but by the alienated former Republicans who loathe their former party's current incarnation. We have very, very few actual left of center Democrats who post things like that because the Democrats are not a true leftist party and a great deal of their support is coming from people who are very right of center right now. Mostly because the true believer leftists have abandoned the party in droves.
It's funny, in a pathetic kind of way, that the ostensibly liberal Democrats in this forum are perfectly willing to hold any and all left-of-center Democrats singularly accountable for Congress's failure to enact policies that reflect their vision for what the Democratic Party stands for. Some of us would rather see the Democrats move left, or at the very least fail to move further right than they already have, and would rather not see our elected officials voting for (to pick a completely random example) regulatory bills that were written by the very industry they were meant to regulate. But hey, by all means, keep electing Democrats who compromise their principles to conservatives and business interests, keep blaming anyone but the centrist neoliberal Democratic leadership for the party's failure to get behind progressive legislation, and keep patting yourselves on the back for passing "progressive" economic legislation that's more conservative than identical policies that were proffered by moderate Republicans thirty years ago.
What did Kucinich ever accomplish?
What did Obama?
There's your answer.
Hint - one of these lists is alot longer then the other.
It's funny, in a pathetic kind of way, that the ostensibly liberal Democrats in this forum are perfectly willing to hold any and all left-of-center Democrats singularly accountable for Congress's failure to enact policies that reflect their vision for what the Democratic Party stands for. Some of us would rather see the Democrats move left, or at the very least fail to move further right than they already have, and would rather not see our elected officials voting for (to pick a completely random example) regulatory bills that were written by the very industry they were meant to regulate. But hey, by all means, keep electing Democrats who compromise their principles to conservatives and business interests, keep blaming anyone but the centrist neoliberal Democratic leadership for the party's failure to get behind progressive legislation, and keep patting yourselves on the back for passing "progressive" economic legislation that's more conservative than identical policies that were proffered by moderate Republicans thirty years ago.
In December, I posted ratings for each Democratic Representative based on how they voted on 10 key agenda items in 2009. The idea was to see how each Democrat voted relative to the partisan slant of his district; a Democrat voting for the cap-and-trade bill in a Republican-leaning district would get quite a bit of credit for that, for instance, while one voting for the same measure in a district with a PVI of D+15 would get almost no credit for the vote since almost every Representative from such a district voted for the bill anyway. The analysis concluded that TN-6's Bart Gordon, who voted with the Democrats on 8 of 10 key agenda items in spite of coming from a R+13 district, had provided the most value to his party on key votes. (Unfortunately for Democrats, Gordon is retiring.) Artur Davis of AL-7, who has voted against several major agenda items because he is running for governor in Alabama, was the least valuable Democrat.
The original version of the ratings built in an exception for what I termed "liberal nos": votes that a Democratic member cast against his party's agenda, but which he justified by stating that the policy under consideration was not liberal enough. We did not count the liberal no votes as yes votes -- we just threw them out, treating them as non-votes instead.
But what if we don't build in an exception for the so-called "liberal no's" -- that is, simply take every vote at face value? It turns out, then, that Davis is no longer the least valuable Democrat. Instead, it is Dennis Kucinich, who voted against health care, the hate crimes bill, the budget, the cap-and-trade bill, and financial regulation -- all ostensibly from the left -- in spite of coming from from the strongly Democratic Ohio 10th district near Cleveland.
Kucinich's score of -4.22 is not only worse than that of any other Democrat: it is also worse than that of all but 22 Republicans.
Obviously, I think a reasonable case can be made to build in an exception for opposition from the left, which is why I did so in the first place. On the other hand, the fact is that Kucinich isn't taking just the occasional symbolic stand: he's voting against his party on key agenda items about half the time. Perhaps by so doing, he's moving the Overton Window to the left, or perhaps he's just being a pain in the butt. We crunch numbers, you decide!
I don't agree with Nate - I don't think that there should be an exemption for "protest votes", because we should not be letting the perfect be the enemy. The fact is, Kucinich was a useful idiot for the GOP, more concerned with image than actually doing his job. And when the Democrats logically fired his ass, instead of taking his loss like a man and showing some grace, he went out like a petulant toddler.
And he wasn't shamed into being pro-choice, he only converted when he decided to run for the Presidency, and it's quite clear that it was a conversion made of political expediency rather than any genuine change of heart. He even voted to prohibit contraception coverage in federal health plans during his Congressional career. So trying to argue that he was somehow "better" is belied by the actual record.
You know what the best part of Kucinich going down in flames is? It's the final, definitive refutation of the "progressives" claiming they are the party base. The fact is, "progressives" are only a small faction, and one that seems unwilling to work with the other parts of the Democratic constituency. It's no wonder that when the party was given the choice between an ineffective ideologue and an effective legislator, they chose the latter. If progressives want to get the Democratic Party to back their policies, it's time that they started working with the party.
I don't agree with Nate - I don't think that there should be an exemption for "protest votes", because we should not be letting the perfect be the enemy. The fact is, Kucinich was a useful idiot for the GOP, more concerned with image than actually doing his job. And when the Democrats logically fired his ass, instead of taking his loss like a man and showing some grace, he went out like a petulant toddler.
And he wasn't shamed into being pro-choice, he only converted when he decided to run for the Presidency, and it's quite clear that it was a conversion made of political expediency rather than any genuine change of heart. He even voted to prohibit contraception coverage in federal health plans during his Congressional career. So trying to argue that he was somehow "better" is belied by the actual record.
You know what the best part of Kucinich going down in flames is? It's the final, definitive refutation of the "progressives" claiming they are the party base. The fact is, "progressives" are only a small faction, and one that seems unwilling to work with the other parts of the Democratic constituency. It's no wonder that when the party was given the choice between an ineffective ideologue and an effective legislator, they chose the latter. If progressives want to get the Democratic Party to back their policies, it's time that they started working with the party.
A passionate assessment, but most likely wholly inaccurate.
Kaptur has represented Ohio's 9th Congressional District since 1983. All research on the matter shows incumbent candidates - regardless of their legislative history - are almost always favored on election day. Thanks to electoral gerrymandering, Kucinich found himself vying with another incumbent politician for the same seat in the House. Without knowing the precise breakdown of the Democratic demographic following the redistricting, one could just as easily make the argument 9th District Democrats were merely displaying observed electoral behavior, not "firing" anyone's "ass".
Kucinich represented the 10th District since 1997. During those years, he won four primary campaigns against Democratic competitors, and defeated every would-be Republican challenger by considerable margins. It would seem odd, then, that between 2010 and 2012, Ohio Democrats, out of the blue, became disillusioned with progressivism, and selected Marcy Kaptur, a member of the National Progressive Caucus, wouldn't it?
He was moved into Kaptur's district. He's from West Cleveland, that was added to NW Ohio along Lake Erie towards Toledo, where Kaptur is from.
In that case, Kaptur's name would have been first on the ballot (assuming Ohio holds to that tradition), and she would've, by that factor alone, been given an edge against Kucinich.
Not sure if this is the right place to ask but you dudes are my go to for politics.
I found out last week I got redistricted out of a solid blue district in MD (the 8th) into one that has had a republican incumbent since 93 (the 6th). Now the redistricting has made the seat pretty competitive I think, but now I am faced with a primary in April with 8 people running. I think it has already been paired down to 2 guys Rob Garagiola and John Delaney.
My gut is to go with Garagiola as he is the currently sitting Maryland Senate majority leader and endorsed by MoveOn.org, just helped to get the gay marriage law passed, and seems on the progressive side of the scale. John doesn't seem bad either and is mostly focusing his campaign on economics from a small business perspective. I heard John got endorsed by Bill Clinton and Washington Post which honestly kind of turned me off of him.
I live in a solid blue state and that means I think I should be pushing for the most liberal guy I can (especially in the primary), but I am concerned that the district includes some of the most conservative areas of the state.
Anyways, any of you guys have thoughts on this primary or maybe even live around here?
Not sure if this is the right place to ask but you dudes are my go to for politics.
I found out last week I got redistricted out of a solid blue district in MD (the 8th) into one that has had a republican incumbent since 93 (the 6th). Now the redistricting has made the seat pretty competitive I think, but now I am faced with a primary in April with 8 people running. I think it has already been paired down to 2 guys Rob Garagiola and John Delaney.
My gut is to go with Garagiola as he is the currently sitting Maryland Senate majority leader and endorsed by MoveOn.org, just helped to get the gay marriage law passed, and seems on the progressive side of the scale. John doesn't seem bad either and is mostly focusing his campaign on economics from a small business perspective. I heard John got endorsed by Bill Clinton and Washington Post which honestly kind of turned me off of him.
I live in a solid blue state and that means I think I should be pushing for the most liberal guy I can (especially in the primary), but I am concerned that the district includes some of the most conservative areas of the state.
Anyways, any of you guys have thoughts on this primary or maybe even live around here?
According to Kos, the new MD-06 was a 56% Obama district. Bill Clinton's support has been linked to Delaney being a big HRC bundler in 08. Going through http://www.dailykos.com/news/MD-06, Delaney did a max R donation in '10 and Garagiola has the endorsements of MoveOn, the Sierra Club, SEIU, NEA and the AFL-CIO.
Looking at his positions on his campaign webpage, I don't see anything I would find objectionable. Pro-infrastructure spending to create jobs, pro-education spending, pro-gay marriage, anti-privatization of Medicare/SS, little vague on FP and fiscal matters, but no more so than most.
Given he seems to be the favorite, with a State Senate seat overlapping the district, and more extensive support among labor, liberals and environmentalists I don't really see a reason to go away from him.
You know what the best part of Kucinich going down in flames is? It's the final, definitive refutation of the "progressives" claiming they are the party base. The fact is, "progressives" are only a small faction, and one that seems unwilling to work with the other parts of the Democratic constituency. It's no wonder that when the party was given the choice between an ineffective ideologue and an effective legislator, they chose the latter. If progressives want to get the Democratic Party to back their policies, it's time that they started working with the party.
The Democratic party leadership and the Democratic voter base have precious little in common, given that the party's been dominated by Third Way-style centrists for more than two decades. The left wing of the party (who you inexplicably call "progressives" and "liberals" both derisively and unironically) are definitely to the left of the base, but the centrists who dominate the top-level decision-making process are well to the right of the base on every key issue. Of course, the progressives are the only ones expected to make sacrifices in the name of appealing to a base that frequently disagrees with them. The centrists are willing to compromise, but only by pushing further right to capitulate to conservatives - but calling the centrists out on that just wouldn't be kosher, because something something political realities, something something don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, something something political capital, something something President Santorum. God fucking forbid that anyone try to improve or constructively criticize the Democratic Party from within.
You know what the best part of Kucinich going down in flames is? It's the final, definitive refutation of the "progressives" claiming they are the party base. The fact is, "progressives" are only a small faction, and one that seems unwilling to work with the other parts of the Democratic constituency.
They're a small faction since the Democrats have barely any interest in actually trying to get or keep their votes and have no interest in converting more voters to liberal ideology, only centrist ideology. When Democrats insult and ignore one faction don't blame them for turning on the party.
It's no wonder that when the party was given the choice between an ineffective ideologue and an effective legislator, they chose the latter.
Because the latter generally fucks them when they get into power.
If progressives want to get the Democratic Party to back their policies, it's time that they started working with the party.
Liberals have been working with the party with little to show for it. Obama's made inroads but for every good thing he's done the party does just as much to alienate liberals. Always being the first faction being thrown under the bus to get bills past without even a hint of fighting for their causes won't earn Democrats any loyalty. Liberals have more to fear from the DLC and Blue Dogs then Republicans with bills because they'll defang anything appealing to liberals before it even gets to the Republicans. Some allies they are. Not even high profile Democrats are immune from that, either. Howard Dean was a chilling example for what the party thinks about liberals. Had it been Rahm Emanuel in that scenario centrists & conservative Democrats wouldn't accept it, so why should we?
Posts
He wanted to lower the voting age to 16.
I think that says all you need to know about him.
And the Rep that defeated him, Marcy Kaptur, is a Progessive who has actually done shit. And she'll be running against.... Joe the Plumber who won the Republican primary.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
That's disappointing.
Hope she destroys him.
She's hardly got a progressive voting record when it comes to reproductive rights.
Bernie will also vote for Democratic initiatives that aren't perfect.
Fuck you, Angus King.
She should have been faster about filing her paperwork.
The dude with the huge ego and no principles would still run though.
Hahahahah, my cynicism will never not be right. Oh, as always, don't read the comments.
"A vote for Elizabeth Warren is a vote for the authoritarian nanny state."
"...the point here is that Lizzie is employed as a professor at the hard left lib think tank known as Harvard"
"Lizzy Warren is the creater and founder of Occupy, who's signature act is public urination and defecation.
Millionaire Warren burdened our financially strapped cities with millions and millions of dollars in security costs and the cost to pick up her followers filthy trash, belongings, and feces.
NOT a pretty picture. And they never had any sort of a coherent message, other than total debt forgiveness, open borders, and lifetime welfare for everybody on the planet."
I'm going to walk away from the computer and go die now.
Do we have the crosstabs?
Also, that article is nice and full of weasel words, like "several polls".
But, I gotta hand it to Chellie, even though she would have the thing pretty much sewn up, she's not going to risk losing the seat overall.
So now we just start pressuring Susan Collins.
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
Plus, ya kno, 8 months away.
I think Brown is going to try to pull a Snowe job on MA.
Well, look at Snowe herself. In the last few Congresses, she voted lockstep with GOP leadership 90% of the time, yet still had a reputation as a moderate.
Yeah, Republicans have been pretty successful in shifting the frame of reference for what the extremes and moderation of political ideology are to whatever the fuck they want. They do it with SCOTUS a lot (O'Connor is victim of it) but the biggest example right now is Obama the moderate being painted as the most extremely liberal president ever.
http://balloon-juice.com/2012/03/11/its-not-kucinichs-wackiness-its-his-fecklessness/
Yes, Kucinich had to be shamed into adopting a more pro-choice stance; I don't see the same happening to Kaptur any time soon. The other points against Kucinich in that breakdown all come down to the fact that he opposed several pieces of fundamentally compromised or outright conservative legislation from the left, instead of sacrificing his principles at the altar of Party Loyalty and voting with the rest of the Dems. Which of course makes him the enemy, because as far as party-line Democrats are concerned, if you're not with us, you're against us.
Yes, principles are nice, but you're going to get nothing if you can compromise. The trick is realizing which principles one should not compromise on and when you can afford to compromise on the others. If someone wants to never compromise his values, I suggest he stay out of office and probably always pick none of the above during elections (aka write it in). At least then he won't be obstructing progress, while he stubbornly clinging to the notion that his way is the only way and cooperating with everyone else be damned (the only person that's going to agree 100% with you, is you).
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
Most of those comments are not written by the 'liberal' Democrats but by the alienated former Republicans who loathe their former party's current incarnation. We have very, very few actual left of center Democrats who post things like that because the Democrats are not a true leftist party and a great deal of their support is coming from people who are very right of center right now. Mostly because the true believer leftists have abandoned the party in droves.
What did Kucinich ever accomplish?
What did Obama?
There's your answer.
Hint - one of these lists is alot longer then the other.
No, we're holding Kucinich accountable for being a bad Democrat. And this is not subjective opinion, this is a matter of cold, hard math:
I don't agree with Nate - I don't think that there should be an exemption for "protest votes", because we should not be letting the perfect be the enemy. The fact is, Kucinich was a useful idiot for the GOP, more concerned with image than actually doing his job. And when the Democrats logically fired his ass, instead of taking his loss like a man and showing some grace, he went out like a petulant toddler.
And he wasn't shamed into being pro-choice, he only converted when he decided to run for the Presidency, and it's quite clear that it was a conversion made of political expediency rather than any genuine change of heart. He even voted to prohibit contraception coverage in federal health plans during his Congressional career. So trying to argue that he was somehow "better" is belied by the actual record.
You know what the best part of Kucinich going down in flames is? It's the final, definitive refutation of the "progressives" claiming they are the party base. The fact is, "progressives" are only a small faction, and one that seems unwilling to work with the other parts of the Democratic constituency. It's no wonder that when the party was given the choice between an ineffective ideologue and an effective legislator, they chose the latter. If progressives want to get the Democratic Party to back their policies, it's time that they started working with the party.
A passionate assessment, but most likely wholly inaccurate.
Kaptur has represented Ohio's 9th Congressional District since 1983. All research on the matter shows incumbent candidates - regardless of their legislative history - are almost always favored on election day. Thanks to electoral gerrymandering, Kucinich found himself vying with another incumbent politician for the same seat in the House. Without knowing the precise breakdown of the Democratic demographic following the redistricting, one could just as easily make the argument 9th District Democrats were merely displaying observed electoral behavior, not "firing" anyone's "ass".
Kucinich represented the 10th District since 1997. During those years, he won four primary campaigns against Democratic competitors, and defeated every would-be Republican challenger by considerable margins. It would seem odd, then, that between 2010 and 2012, Ohio Democrats, out of the blue, became disillusioned with progressivism, and selected Marcy Kaptur, a member of the National Progressive Caucus, wouldn't it?
In that case, Kaptur's name would have been first on the ballot (assuming Ohio holds to that tradition), and she would've, by that factor alone, been given an edge against Kucinich.
He's still totally useless though.
I found out last week I got redistricted out of a solid blue district in MD (the 8th) into one that has had a republican incumbent since 93 (the 6th). Now the redistricting has made the seat pretty competitive I think, but now I am faced with a primary in April with 8 people running. I think it has already been paired down to 2 guys Rob Garagiola and John Delaney.
My gut is to go with Garagiola as he is the currently sitting Maryland Senate majority leader and endorsed by MoveOn.org, just helped to get the gay marriage law passed, and seems on the progressive side of the scale. John doesn't seem bad either and is mostly focusing his campaign on economics from a small business perspective. I heard John got endorsed by Bill Clinton and Washington Post which honestly kind of turned me off of him.
I live in a solid blue state and that means I think I should be pushing for the most liberal guy I can (especially in the primary), but I am concerned that the district includes some of the most conservative areas of the state.
Anyways, any of you guys have thoughts on this primary or maybe even live around here?
According to Kos, the new MD-06 was a 56% Obama district. Bill Clinton's support has been linked to Delaney being a big HRC bundler in 08. Going through http://www.dailykos.com/news/MD-06, Delaney did a max R donation in '10 and Garagiola has the endorsements of MoveOn, the Sierra Club, SEIU, NEA and the AFL-CIO.
Looking at his positions on his campaign webpage, I don't see anything I would find objectionable. Pro-infrastructure spending to create jobs, pro-education spending, pro-gay marriage, anti-privatization of Medicare/SS, little vague on FP and fiscal matters, but no more so than most.
Given he seems to be the favorite, with a State Senate seat overlapping the district, and more extensive support among labor, liberals and environmentalists I don't really see a reason to go away from him.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
The Democratic party leadership and the Democratic voter base have precious little in common, given that the party's been dominated by Third Way-style centrists for more than two decades. The left wing of the party (who you inexplicably call "progressives" and "liberals" both derisively and unironically) are definitely to the left of the base, but the centrists who dominate the top-level decision-making process are well to the right of the base on every key issue. Of course, the progressives are the only ones expected to make sacrifices in the name of appealing to a base that frequently disagrees with them. The centrists are willing to compromise, but only by pushing further right to capitulate to conservatives - but calling the centrists out on that just wouldn't be kosher, because something something political realities, something something don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, something something political capital, something something President Santorum. God fucking forbid that anyone try to improve or constructively criticize the Democratic Party from within.
That's one of the reasons that the DNC isn't a lefty party. The main reason being the US isn't a left leaning country.
Be the change you wish to see in the world, yo.
They're a small faction since the Democrats have barely any interest in actually trying to get or keep their votes and have no interest in converting more voters to liberal ideology, only centrist ideology. When Democrats insult and ignore one faction don't blame them for turning on the party.
Because the latter generally fucks them when they get into power.
Liberals have been working with the party with little to show for it. Obama's made inroads but for every good thing he's done the party does just as much to alienate liberals. Always being the first faction being thrown under the bus to get bills past without even a hint of fighting for their causes won't earn Democrats any loyalty. Liberals have more to fear from the DLC and Blue Dogs then Republicans with bills because they'll defang anything appealing to liberals before it even gets to the Republicans. Some allies they are. Not even high profile Democrats are immune from that, either. Howard Dean was a chilling example for what the party thinks about liberals. Had it been Rahm Emanuel in that scenario centrists & conservative Democrats wouldn't accept it, so why should we?