Tail Chasing

Posted by on . 4 comments.

I’m sure The DCeiver will be by any second to encourage me to throw away my eleven years of sobriety because I have the unmitigated gall to question President Massengill’s political strategy, but until then, consider Joe Biden‘s remarks at a recent fundraiser:

“It’s not that Republicans are bad guys. This is just the bet they’ve made. They’re going to put their chips on movement in the 35 seats in the House that have been traditionally Republican districts and trying to take them back,” Biden said, according to the White House pool report.

“If they take them back, this the end of the road for what Barack and I are trying to do. This is their one shot,” he went on. “If they don’t break the back of our effort in this upcoming election, you’re going to see the things we said we’re for happen.” [my bolds]

Ok, in 2006 Democrats ran on subpoena power and ending the war in Iraq. I honestly can’t think of one meaningful subpoena that came of this, and last I checked we were still fighting in and sending truckloads of money to Iraq. In 2008, Democrats ran on trying to take back the White House so that Republicans couldn’t stand in the way of all the change that was coming our way. The only benefit anyone has really seen is hypothetical counterfactuals: Old Man McCain isn’t President, Palin isn’t VP, and David Souter was replaced with a center-right woman instead of a hard-right Alito/Roberts clone. I’m not sure this counts as Get Out the Vote motivation. So Biden is out there with the message that holding the White House and overwhelming majorities in Congress is nice, but we’re going to take two years off where we pretend Republicans have any power at all, and then after just one more election, it’ll be nose-to-the-grindstone time. Except that there’s always another election. And the next one will be where Obama runs against not-John-McCain, and has to answer for all of the socialism he brought to America, (because he simply refuses to make the Democratic case in real time) and has to run (I’d say to the middle, but really who are we kidding) to the right. The Presidential election season started in January of 2007, just two months after the 2006 midterms, and Congress was not in session in those two months. So when exactly do we get “to see the things we said we’re for happen?”

Winning elections just to win them and keep the other party out of power is just sportfucking. There’s always another election, and the only way to change the country for the better is to win elections and put your plans into place. Accepting bullshit input that negatively affects legislation (stimulus, budget, health care et al) and doesn’t garner any Republican votes only sets that legislation up for failure, and can’t possibly work long term. Again, it’s a vicious cycle of bad policy and bad politics that leads to electoral losses and bad outcomes that tarnish the Democratic brand. I know Obama (and The DCeiver) don’t give a shit about that, but most Democrats will probably not be too happy when this all plays out.

But what the fuck do I know, it’s not like I can predict the future or anything.

Comments

  1. DCeiver says:
    September 22, 2009 at 10:41 am

    I’m not sure it will help to point this out once again, since you’ll just hew to pretending that I “believe” certain things that simply don’t comport to a whole raft of writing I’ve done myself, but I’ll simply once again point out that the defense of your solid macro point doesn’t require you take a stand on a rather indefensible micro point–that discouraging an ineffective, politically wounded, and nearly-universally disliked David Paterson is tantamount to a betrayal of principles.

    I’ll also venture further to suggest that your continual defense of “the Democratic brand” is perplexing to me. It is with great sadness that I report to you that the Democratic brand consists of things like promising to pursue subpoena power and then failing to deliver, beseeching the electorate to provide them with huge Congressional majorities and then squandering them. I think that this demonstrates that the “Democratic brand” needs to be replaced, restored, renewed — something. But I’ll not defend it, because time and time again, on a deeper and more fundamental strata of political principles it reveals itself as phony. Right now, the “Democratic brand” is a lobbyist-loving, bipartisanship-worshipping, incrementalism-fetishizing, progressivism-dissing, half-step-a-rama.

    That said, you cast aside the realities of “historical counterfactuals” too glibly. The facts are these: John McCain ran on correcting the economic downturn with a global spending freeze. Anyone outside of the elite club of conservative partisan hacks correctly recognized that this move would badly prolong and exacerbate the economic downturn. Dividing lines between what we have and what we could have ended up with begin there, and it is not in any way insignificant. (I shudder to think with what might have happened if McCain had been in charge during the aftermath of the Iran election, with his massive chubby for pointless and hubristic demonstrations of vapid “steadfastness” and “determination.”)

    At any rate, there is no worthy cause or crusader in all the world who benefits from an unwanted David Paterson running for Governor of New York. I rarely comment on blogs, at all. It’s redundnant: I have plenty of spaces to register my opinion, and mostly, I’d rather people just go their own way. And I typically agree with this site’s content — your weird and constant insistence that a vital and effective and progressive “Democratic brand” exists notwithstanding. The only reason I bothered in this case was simple that defending Paterson on that score was really, really pointless and obstinate. Seriously, stunningly so. My comment was motivated out of pure dumbfoundment.

    But, you’ve managed to get a lot out of it! I am very good, that way–always enriching discussions! It’s a pity that being broadly mischaracterized comes with that! Part of me writes it off as “whatever, it’s the internet, and I guess broad mischaracterizations are what the internet does best.” But another part of me wonders: “Matt? Don’t you have your own job to do?”

  2. matt says:
    September 22, 2009 at 11:47 am

    i figured you would come to this all by yourself, but paterson isn’t running for governor of NY just yet, he’s planning to run in a primary. and if his presence is so abhorrent to you and so many others, wouldn’t he be handily beaten by nearly any Democrat with a Q rating? i really have no idea what’s pointless and obstinate about advocating that the small d democratic process be allowed to play out.

    as far as obama’s reaction to the credit crisis vs mccain’s, count me among those who see the medium term result being just about the same.

    the bit about the democratic brand being fucked is of course true. but that doesn’t give obama license to pervert it further. and it certainly won’t stop me from advocating what it should be, no matter what name it is called.

    how exactly have i mis-characterized you? the only comments of yours i remember have you attacking me for pointing out obama’s bullshit. certainly seems like a pattern, happy to be proven wrong, and if so i’ll apologize.

    i do in fact have my own job, but it affords me plenty of time to defend my positions against dense people who refuse to actually address my points. which you haven’t done.

  3. DCeiver says:
    September 22, 2009 at 12:30 pm

    Well, it’s a misrepresentation to suggest that I ever said one shouldn’t question Obama’s overall political strategy, as you suggest in graf 1. And I think I’ve ably demonstrated my position on what “brand” I feel deserves me “giving a shit about” as well. Additionally, you suggested that my opinion w/r/t Paterson can be transferred wholesale to what’s going on in Colorado. I never said, suggested, or implied anything of the sort. The fault here is yours, by the way! This is just something you made up, out of whole cloth, because you felt like it. I’ve very specifically restricted my remarks in this regard to the New York Governors’ race. So there’s three points you can walk back and correct, for the record, as soon as you clear your throat.

    Right now, 71% of New Yorkers want the candidate known as “Not David Paterson” to be their governor. In a Democratic primary, Andrew Cuomo would win by over forty points, according to current numbers. By any measure, encouraging Paterson to quit the field can correctly be seen as not just as being in the best interests of New York, but also in David Paterson’s.

  4. matt says:
    September 22, 2009 at 12:46 pm

    >Well, it’s a misrepresentation to suggest that I ever said one shouldn’t question Obama’s overall political strategy

    who said anything about “overall”

    >And I think I’ve ably demonstrated my position on what “brand” I feel deserves me “giving a shit about” as well.

    the Not Democratic one?

    >Additionally, you suggested that my opinion w/r/t Paterson can be transferred wholesale to what’s going on in Colorado. I never said, suggested, or implied anything of the sort.

    my point was that obama is being anti-democratic in multiple venues. if you disagree with him in the other venues but not this one simply because the other 3 seats will be won no matter what, then i consider your position to be bullshit. again, it’s a primary in a heavily democratic state with a more than viable challenger to an unpopular incumbent. why do i need to keep repeating this?

    >In a Democratic primary, Andrew Cuomo would win by over forty points

    why can’t you see that you’re making my case for me, not yours?

    >By any measure, encouraging Paterson to quit the field can correctly be seen as not just as being in the best interests of New York, but also in David Paterson’s

    a primary is in NY’s interest, and paterson is an adult, he can make his own decisions as to what is in his best interest wholly without your input or obama’s.