I'll tell you who is the most deserving of our ire- the Dems OTHER than those 5 who together with Biden could nuke the filibuster any time they wanted to. It's not a fact of nature that those guys are allowed to obstruct the caucus, it's a choice. Never forget that.

As a result of the old boy/girl mentality of the Senate we will have wasted the only two-year period when any legislation worthy of note could have passed. The Democrats will NEVER be able to govern as long as the filibuster exists.

Two words: primary challenges. Nothing else will get the attention of these SOBs. Nothing.

"Dems have every reason to be angry and frustrated, but Dems should also remember who is most deserving of their ire."

Blue Dogs and ConservaDems

I guess this means that our country is simply ungovernable.

Except, that as soon as the Republicans gain even a one-seat majority in either house of congress, they will start to rule with an iron fist. They will pass everything on the GOP legislative wish list, and then they'll write up a new list and get to work on that. And then they'll think about what to do in the second week.

And if Democrats even thinks about engaging in the kind of obstructionism that the GOP has mastered during the last year, the Republicans will shriek to the skies about Obstructionist Democrats violating the sanctity of the Up or Down Vote. And the media will demand that the Democrats explain why they hate America so much that they are willing to bring congress to a halt over something as petty as politics.

Except that the Democrats won't even think about obstructing the Republican agenda, because that wouldn't be nice and people might call them names.

I can't remember the last time I felt such disgust.

Sorry, not buying it this time.

The House Dems could end this right now if they had any brains -- the current bill sucks, but it can be improved through a reconciliation process that requires ABSOLUTELY no support from any Senate Republicans or ConservaDems. I imagine that if Reid and Obama pushed for passage of a public option and surtax through the reconciliation process, they'd have the votes to do it.

But Obama isn't even willing to dirty his hands with the issue anymore. Since the Congressional Democrats have proven to be so incompetent lately, I think the reform push is dead.

Oh well, it was nice pretending that we could govern for a couple of years.

Barrick

Uncommon, I'm afraid this tragedy is going to be played out all the way to its ending. I don't see any way to prevent it. Until ordinary people have been so fucked over that they wake up and take to the streets as our forebears of the Depression era (who clearly were better men and women than we) did, things will only get worse.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/01/some_comments_on_staying_home.html

The Dems, as they *allow themselves to be defined* (by Landreau and Liberman) are gutless turds who define themselves only as "not Bush." That won't work any more. The public sees them as the losers they are, and they will suffer in Nov. The rest of us, except the Banksters, will continue to suffer.

Mary Landrieu and Evan Bayh are telling us they're the next endangered species of "Democrat". The hard-right pendulum will take them next and sniping at liberals is probably their only hope of survival. It's fair to ask if our political survival as a party and a nation is worth it. We fought the nihilists and nearly won. But the nihilists are indefatigable. I have no idea how this nation will function, only that citizens might as well have the first-hand experience of a Randian winner-take-all nation. Give them what they apparently want. Maybe that will wake them up.

Washington DC is basically in gridlock right now.

On the one hand you have folks happy that things are dis-functional and they have gone out of their way to create disfunction.

On the other, you have folks who are not able to function very well as elected representatives, caving into special interests and forgetting the very people who got them elected in the first place.

Curly Howard's immortal words resonate today.

Is our government "in competent hands?" Cointenly we're (they're) all incompetent." Nyuk. Nyuk. Nyuk.

Yuk.

To salvage our country we need to stop pretending that our political process is just and fair.

Once the pretense is gone, we can all decide to spend our energies outside the political process. For, at this point, why bother. (unless ofcourse you are a corporate whore or pimp)

Screw you, Mary Landrieu. Think about all the people you'll help kill over the coming years, you horse's behind.

Landrieu: I can run as a democrat but that doesn't mean I have to legislate as a democrat. Party unity means nothing. Getting reelected as a DINO means everything. The MA election was a blessing to these right leaning dems.

who among us thinks the GOP would have hesitated for even for a second to eliminate the filibuster if the Dems did to them what the GOP is doing to the Dems?

Right.

earlier poster had it right: the Dems in the Senate are CHOOSING to be chumps. They could eliminate the filibuster any time they choose to, and make the system work the way it's supposed to.

Thing is, on the evidence, the Democratic Party Caucus in the Senate does NOT want the system to work..if they did, they'd have taken care of the problem by now.

Oh boy, Sunny Steve, let's blame in all on those big, bad, fearsome Republicans. It's gotta be them, right? Nope, not our fault, they were mean to us! See how mean they were, we're crying for gosh sakes. Way to be a victim.

Let's trot out Yeats:

"...The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity."

Maybe it's time for a little passionate intensity from our people, too, huh? Is that too much to ask for things so important?

Dems have to give me a reason to vote for them. It has to be based on action this time and not crap marketing talk.

Republicans and corporations have gotten more deliverables, compromises and attention from the Dems than the people who voted for them.

Heck Stupak and many other Democrats tossed me and all women out like ragged worn out underwear. Not getting the representation feeling here.

You can easily imagine an alternate universe in which the Senate Democratic Caucus took an oath of party loyalty, that all 60 Democrats would vote for cloture on all leadership-supported bills, allowing measures to pass with just 51 votes. -- Yglesias

And, as we say in Poland, if Grandma had a dick, she'd have been Grandpa.

Nor do I think that to primary the Dem-lites asses out would help much. Even if we managed to, what are the chances of our candidates actually winning in the general? With whose money and support? Your ten bucks and mine? It had been a hard row to hoe before today's SCOTUS decision but, now?

Landrieu used to brag of how much she voted with Bush. She's his bitch, not a Democrat.

Results ARE all that matter. If the system is broken, then Democrats need to figure a way around it. If all this doesn't resonate with the public, then Democrats need to find a way to make it resonate.

Yes the Republicans are evil... they are bullies... they are ignorant... living under the iron fist of the corporatists for eight years was painful.

But, here's the thing. Health care is one of our signature causes. Today might be our last opportunity for generations to fix this problem. We're on the brink of success (we're first and goal on the one yard line in football speak)...

If I blamed some "broken system" for my failures, I wouldn't be employed long.

And if they can't figure out how to do this... even though it's hard, even though it's scary... they won't be employed long either.

"as a wake-up call to the wing of the Democratic Party that wants the federal government to overreach and overspend."

this is the same senator landrieu that requested $250 billion in funding for the hurricane katrina disaster relief and economic recovery act, yes?

When are the progressives going to target those who stand in the way of progress for political aims and demonize them the way that the GOP does to its "problem children?" I mean more than MoveOn and DailyKos whining - serious challenges by serious, viable candidates and serious pressure.

UncommonSense wrote: "I guess this means that our country is simply ungovernable."

Not at all. It means that our country is governed by the paid agents of corporations.

That is exactly what the Senators of "the Mary Landrieu wing" are: they are the bribed, bought-and-paid-for, paid agents of corporations.

The corruption is blatant and bipartisan.

Just look at how "Democratic" Senator Landrieu is closely cooperating with "Republican" Senator Murkowski to gut the Clean Air Act and block the EPA from regulating CO2 emissions -- with legislation written by lobbyists for the fossil fuel industry.

Then look at the hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal bribes that both Landrieu and Murkowski have accepted from the fossil fuel industry.

That's the "universe" in which Congress functions: a universe of taking millions of dollars in corporate bribes to govern in the corporate interest.

My contributions to the DSCC and the DCCC are HISTORY, unless the House just passes. the. damn. bill.

Why does the progressive majority sit on their hands and wail and moan? Why are we *NOT* taking to the streets ourselves? Why do we not organize?

A very small minority makes a small rally at the capitol and suddenly the politicians are all over themselves to cater to them.

Don't we even remember the Obama rallies of the last election? If we started rallying again we'd sure have their attention. Until then, the backward and the selfish win the day.

AnnaMerkin wrote: "When are the progressives going to target those who stand in the way of progress ... serious challenges by serious, viable candidates and serious pressure."

A "serious challenge" to a sitting US Senator costs millions of dollars. "Progressives" don't have that kind of money. Corporations do. That's why US Senators govern in the interest of corporations, and not in the interest of the American people.

You want to get Landrieu's attention? It isn't hard. You just need to wave a few hundred thousand dollars in her face.

Of course, Mary was not so concerned about big-spending government when she demanded special treatment for Louisiana in the health bill (The Louisiana Purchase).

Again, why not resurrect the Republican argument for the "nuclear option" on judicial appointments (Frist, 2005), and throw it back in their faces extended to the filibuster in general?

Yes Secular, and today's SCOTUS decision simply solidifies the hold of corporations on us.

As someone mentioned above, I don't think I have ever felt such disgust in my life. Not even in the darkest days of the Cheney regime.

What really pisses me off is that we as citizens of this country have allowed it to happen. Think of the frog in a slowly boiling pot analogy.

I fear however that the days of massive, organized protests such was were witnessed in the 60's are over. And I just don't see our government cleaning it's act up. We're too far gone.

Only revolution can change this, but the new season of American Idol is back in full swing, so I'm, afraid our citizenry has other priorities.

Jesus Steve, when are you ever going apply a logic check to your basic assumptions about how the whole system works. A few weeks ago you told us Fox and people who watch it were "idiots".

Then you told us that in fact Fox makes more money than all the other cable news outlets combined.

Then we discover that those "idiots" listening to Fox managed to knock off the blue-state Massachusetts Democratic candidate.

Now you're telling the problem in the Senate isn't the "feckless" Democrats but those darn Republicans.

If your side is so smart and the other side and their boosters are so stupid then how come even when you win, you lose?

In fact, solving the Senate "problem" is easy. It just takes elected politicians with some backbone and objectives they want to accomplish. Bush did it; his tax cuts were passed without 60 votes.

Obama could do it but we learned he didnt' even pick up the phone to pressure Lieberman.

Reid could do it but we learned that he's feckless with no balls. There is no Republican leader in recent memory who would have let Lieberman hold a committee chairmanship while threatening to filibuster a Republican bill.

You should just face the uncomfortable truth; elected Democrats seemingly have no guiding principle that they will stand by except apparently campaign contributions and fat industry scam paychecks for their wives.

Their appears to be no discernible principle that your side is willing to stand by.

Feckless and corrupt.

Maybe if Obama cried. That always worked for John Boehner.

Seriously, that's all I had, because Uncommon Sense already laid it out like a butterflied leg of lamb.

And because John Boehner disgusts me.

Mary Landrieu seems to have forgotten that if her last name were not Landrieu she'd probably be cleaning toilets in the Super Dome now.

Great commentary for the last couple of insane weeks, Steve..this again is so painful to read but incredibly informed observations.. and I don't know how you do it..but NO..you didn't pick the wrong profession.

I'd be less frustrated if I had the slightest evidence that Obama was *against* these rightwing Dems. Instead, he pre-emptively shot off in their direction, and in the direction of corrupt corporate lobbies, on every important issue. He never ONCE turned to the public to put pressure on them. On the CONTRARY, he had Emanuel scream four-letter words at MoveOn to take the pressure OFF the Blue Dogs.

It comes down to two things:

1. Procedurally, when will we get up the audacity to end the filibuster, or to make the GOP pay a huge political price for using it? Until then, nothing happens for us. That means, at a minimum, Reid has to be retired and the person in his place has to be a whole different species, preferably not of the worm family.

2. Politically, are Dems a pro-corporatist, DLC-Blue-Dog party, or are they pragmatic center-left and recognizably Democrats and heirs to FDR when he said of the plutocrats, roughly, "they hate me, and I'm glad they hate me." Corporations are the single greatest evil facing this country, at the root of most of the problems we are suffering right now, and the Supreme Court just gave them another blank check. Do you really believe there is room for a Larry Summers wing in this party? As long as you do, it is going to be a fact that a lot of what Democrats do will actually be massively bad for the country, because it will be corrupt, pro-corporate, and rightwing.

The party is going to HAVE to choose. If they choose the DLC, they are roughly indistinguishable from the GOP and have a big target on their backs at every election because they won't be doing anything much the GOP wouldn't have done. If they choose the pragmatic left, they can actually stake out a different position from the GOP, restore a balance of power and equity with the corporate/plutocrat class, generate *real* economic growth from the bottom up, and return us to a healthy prosperity. But if that is ever going to happen, there will have to be an absolute consensus that it is laughably absurd to even consider having anyone like Summers or Geithner within a thousand miles of this party.

Take your choice.

"You should just face the uncomfortable truth; elected Democrats seemingly have no guiding principle that they will stand by except apparently campaign contributions and fat industry scam paychecks for their wives."

Oh how I'd love to prove that statement wrong. But I can't. If these fucking people were on fire I wouldn't piss on them to put them out. Of course, if the Democrats were on fire, they'd probably:
* take three polls on the popularity of fire;
* ask the GOP if it were ok to put it out;
* declare that it's ABSOLUTELY IMPERATIVE to put it out by next Thursday (and fail.)
* tell the world they were for fire before they were against it
* get a lecture from Joe Lieberman on why they should be tougher on fire
* pose for photo ops with firemen
and of course...
* spam us all begging for $1,000 contributions for this week's Fire Emergency Action Fund.

Fired up! Ready to go! To the motherfucking bar!

"The principal hurdle, in other words, standing in the way of the party delivering on its agenda is a dysfunctional system that empowers a small congressional minority to kill the majority's agenda -- and creates an electoral incentive for the minority to do just that."

NO. The principal hurdle is senate leadership (Reid, et al) who are afraid to deal out some MAJOR pain to republicans and recalcitrant dems because they are ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN that they will soon be back in the minority and have that same kind of pain visited upon them.

Of course, that attitude makes minority status a certainty, so it is a self-fulfilling prophecy.

If you PLAY TO WIN, you will stay in the majority.

"as a wake-up call to the wing of the Democratic Party that wants the federal government to overreach and overspend"

You have to love a political system where a politician can refer to an attempt to save tens of thousands of citizens' livse as "overreach" and not have anyone call her on it.

Seriously, if trying to keep your own people alive is "overreaching", just what the Hell are any of them doing there?

Used to post (rant?) regularly when Steve ran the old “Carpetbagger” site but have taken a year’s holiday in hopes that the Democratic administration and Congressional majority might get a few things right…as of today the legislative and executive branches hold a once-in-a-generation alignment of power (even with the loss of the Massachusetts Senate seat) but you’d never know it with all the procedural nonsense emanating from the Senate…in the words of Howard Beale I’m “mad as hell and I can’t take it anymore…”

• The Senate is plainly dysfunctional and its rules need to be overhauled pronto. Nobody, and I mean nobody, in the general public understands why the Senate is incapable of legislating. I posted a couple times at the old Carpetbagger site that the filibuster had to be ended and the healthcare clown show of the past year has made this evident more than ever. Prescription: Obama needs to begin distancing himself from the Senate - perhaps actually campaigning against it - and begin demanding reform of its rules beginning with the filibuster and the “hold.” The notion of unlimited debate is at best a quaint relic of the 19th century and, in practice today, plainly pernicious to the progressive movement…Obama must demand that the Senate end its arcane, anti-democratic privileges and get on with the people’s business.
• The Senate health care bill?...WTF is the Democratic majority thinking?…and anyway, how the hell were they going to market that corporatist giveaway to the middle class in the November elections - bottom line, the Dem's are now forcing me to buy insurance from the very corporations who are preying on me and ripping me off in the first place?...there are lots of physicians in my family (including my dad) and I like to think I know something about health care…I loathe the insurance companies and only the Dem’s in their DC echo chamber could concoct such a braindead plan. Prescription: expand Medicare pure and simple…in this legislative session drop eligibility to age 60 with the understanding that it will be dropped to age 55 ASAP in follow up sessions and so on and so on…enough of the mandates, and the excise taxes, and god knows what else was in the wretched 2000 page Senate bill…
• And today’s final observation…Steve might remember that I held profound reservations about Obama’s qualifications for the presidency…in the primaries I wrote something to the effect that he was untested, unvetted, and would face an enormous learning curve once in office - after all, the man had no executive experience. One year into Obama’s administration I think we’re looking at something on the order of Jimmy Carter - a man who is well-intentioned, a moralist, but someone supremely out of touch…Prescription: I don’t know what impetus finally gets Obama off his ass - I’ll hold that thought - but can he at least get a working laptop on the HMS Resolute desk in the Oval Office?...it might begin to re-assure some of us that he is at least tracking the day’s events…oh, and no more trips to island tropical resorts in winter with his entourage (even if it was his hometown back in the day) while the rest of us struggle to pay the heating bills…talk about tone deaf…more on Obama later…

which is why the senate dems should have immediately moved to reform the filibuster at the beginning of the legislative session. if the senate dems had the cajones, we'd be living in a very different america.

"Instead we have unprecedented obstructionism from a right-wing minority..." Steve Benen.

Not unprecedented; read about the actions of the Southern Representatives and Senators prior to the War of Southern Treason.
I don't think today's Republicans would go that far, but the teabaggers? I really don't know...

Being mad at Republicans is like being mad at gravity.

How unPC of Steve, after advising us ad nauseum how crazy the Republicans are, to then then blame those poor afflicted souls for not negotiating rationally.

So, whom do we want to run for POTUS as the Democratic candidate in 2012?

Right now, I'd have trouble voting for Obama. I love the man, but he was elected to accomplish change, whip the banks in line, get a health care bill passed, and he keeps thinking that he was elected to end partisan bickering in Washington. Instead of challenging the conservative narrative that has broken this nation, he has fed it.

John Edwards is out. Would Hillary have been better? No way to know, really, but I think the Coakley loss was a big clue. So where is our progressive leadership?

Do away with the filibuster, or I'll join the bloodletting in the midterms.

The problem is, yes, the Republicans are Republicans -- but the Democrats are still Democrats. No one has learned anything at all.

Knowing who is deserving of our ire - could the Dems suck it up and get rid of the filibuster? No, of course not. They COULD - the GOP would find a way in their position, Republicans being Republicans, but the Dems being Dems won't. They'll fold and walk away because that's what they do.

I'm starting to think that blindly supporting the Dems because the GOP is so much worse has made me an enabler. They got to work for it a little bit. I'm tired of getting taken for granted.

Yes, and what would have happened if such "obstructionism" had been reversed -- it was a band of Democrats engaged in it against a bunch of "good acts" that a majority Republican Senate and House wanted to do?

What would have happened is that their opponents would have used this to make Democrats look even worse, by controlling the debate. Yet Democrats are allowing this by their opponents, and playing into it. This phenomenon extends beyond Congress, by the way, to the broader Democratic Party.

Democrats can use what their opponents are doing to further define their opponents, and the issues, or they can keep playing right into it, all the while lamenting it.

The Republic is dead. Has been since 2000. Much like the transition in Rome from Republic to Empire, only now they will let us go on with charade of elections but they are meaningless. The power does not lie with elected officials. Today's SCOTUS decision just highlights the fact. Barry's limited room to do anything is a simple survival instinct. We would all like to see him live out his four years. Forget it. We are all wasting our time. "A Republic, if you can keep it"

Well, we couldn't.

When you realize how much money it takes to get elected, is it any wonder that most elected officials are pompous asses?

Is it any wonder that lobbyland rules the show versus "call/write/email your senator now" pleas?

Is it really so hard to see how f**ked up our supposed system of government is?

The solution? A strong third party financed solely by lottery ticket sales.

Jesus, now we have General Jack D. Ripper posting here.

You can easily imagine an alternate universe in which the Senate Democratic Caucus took an oath of party loyalty, that all 60 Democrats would vote for cloture on all leadership-supported bills...

holy crap! That is some wild-ass imagination. Nothing remotely close to that has happened in Yglesias' life-time. A boy can dream though I suppose.

what we have is at least 50% spineless corporate good for nothing flotsam vichy dems, another 25% shit-bird republican DINOs that have no business any near the Democratic caucus and should be forced out, and another 25% true blue progressive dems. That mix (mess) gets you nowhere near what Yglesias is dreaming.

I'm starting to think that blindly supporting the Dems because the GOP is so much worse has made me an enabler. They got to work for it a little bit. I'm tired of getting taken for granted.

the system is rigged against voting FOR anyone. It is totally built for voting AGAINST people.Voting FOR anyone is playing into the hands of those you LEAST want to rule you. Keep your attention on voting AGAINST republicans and you'll be doing the best you can in THIS system. It IS the way it works and was intended to work.
.

As I've said here before, our objective should be to cleanse the party of the five scumbags you mentioned. These are the motherfuckers who really killed the bill with their incoherent babble talk. Lying fucking corporate fellaters.

Primary challenges to these five pieces of pretense. That's all I intend to contribute to for the next few years. I'd take Olympia Snowe over this scum any day. At least she is coherent.

You can easily imagine an alternate universe in which the Senate Democratic Caucus took an oath of party loyalty, that all 60 Democrats would vote for cloture on all leadership-supported bills, allowing measures to pass with just 51 votes.

they should take the oath of party allegience before the election, so constituents will know.

I voted for Obama, but I will not again.

pluege on January 21, 2010 at 9:08 PM is basically right.

Don't know how much life there is in this thread but I'm going to be a broken record in proposing this plan of action for disaffected Democrats:

1. Donate and volunteer all you want for better primary candidates. Sure, the pandering centrists will say there's no way a Democrat with conviction will ever win a general election, but you can prove them wrong.

2. If better candidates don't win, hold your nose and vote for the Democratic coward. Just the fact that they're taking a seat away from a Republican will limit Congress's ability to screw things up. (Have you forgotten 2001-08?)

3. Education yourself about better electoral systems such as proportional representation and instant-runoff voting that would improve this mess. Bring them up often to the candidates from steps 1 and 2.

Oops, educate yourself, even.

Since everyone here is so flustered and frustrated with so much flying, perhaps hearing from a different point of view might provide some clarity and provoke a thought or two.

I guess as a conservative I am supposed to be happy at the Brown victory but I am not jumping for joy. While I'm glad to see the Tea Partiers can operate on their own outside the major party structures and do so effectively, the Tea Partiers were basically duped into supporting the kind of Republican they would normally call a RINO. The kind of Republican that helped to create the Tea Party mood in the first place. But alas, a few GOP web flunkies (Patrick Ruffini being one of them) made it cause celebre to have Brown be the 41st Senator and they fell for it hook, line and sinker. Their activism was used by the powers that be.

There's no question the GOP wants to co-opt this movement, because it's the only activist movement on the Right. Despite the boogeyman you supposedly fear in "religious right" (This Week in God anyone?) its basically a spent and shattered force. The leaders that created the religious right movement are either too old, batshit insane, dead or well past their primes and burnt out. The younger evangelicals really aren't all that interested in politics or if they are it's in different forms and with different issues. Rick Warren and Joel Osteen are more about aroma therapy for the mega-church masses, not marching on Washington.

So the Tea Partiers are a force, but they're not a majority by any means and they're also old (most, not all but most are between 45-70). The long term trends still favor the Left (youngsters still voted for Coakley) but you may very well have to wait 20 years for another chance comes around on health care when the "we've got ours, you can't have yours crowd" (remember it's the "Me" Generation)finally croaks or is retired to the old folks home.

Yet you all know that the system empowers minorities. Not just because it was initially designed to resist the tyranny of the majority, but because of the way politics is disseminated through the media in manner of "conflict" and "contention" and the way campaigns and elections are set up, minority groups can exercise great power because they are organized. That's why the Tea Partiers have been so successful. They were at the town hall meetings and the Left was not. They were out campaigning in the snow in Massachusetts, the Left was not (not until the final week). They're the ones organizing the rallies, the Left is not. How can you expect the politicians to stick their necks out and support health care reform, when those who are supposedly the most passionate believers in it don't fight for it like they did for civil rights or voting rights? Martha Coakley may very well have been the lousiest candidate this side of Michael Dukakis. But what does it say when health care's most passionate supporters in Ted Kennedy's home state couldn't muster the enthusiasm for the cause in spite of her? This was just as true back in 1993-94. That's why health care never passes, because the opposition reform provokes is greater than the support there is to sustain it. Health care is like weather, everyone complains about it, no one does anything about it because nobody can agree upon what to do.

That being said, you could be the political consultant for a candidate for student council in junior high and yet still tell the the Dem' politicians in Washington the best course they can take is just to pass the Senate bill, promise to fix it later and then change the subject and 10 months later no one will care how it got passed. Certainly that's what the GOP did after the 2006 election. They actually doubled down in Iraq with the "surge" and offered no apologies. But then again both parties tend to view election results differently. When Republicans lose, they tend to feel they didn't do enough. They always think the solution is more green eggs and more green ham. When a Democrats lose, they tend to feel like they did too much and acted ashamed that they actually tried to carry out their campaign promises. If Coakley (and boy what it must be like to known forever as the person who killed or who almost killed health care reform) lost because the base Democratic turnout was down, (and it's a good thing Obama did show up, otherwise she would have been hammered)what are the results going to be when even more Dems' stay at home this fall? The same dynamic that killed health care reform in 1994 is once again rearing its ugly head: prissy liberals who let the perfect be the enemy of the good (Jim McDermott and Pete Stark anyone?) and preening centrists looking to cut deals for themselves (Remember Jim Cooper and John Breaux?)

But geez, January isn't even over yet and already it's the "Do-Nothing Congress" for 2010. If health care is dead what else can they possibly move on or support? Spend the money they didn't want to spend for health care on a jobs bill? Never have I seen such a craven, stupid and cowardly bunch of politicians in my life. I do feel bad you're stuck with such wusses, both in Congress and in the White House. Living in the Upper Midwest, perhaps I'm spoiled to have been around such men like Russ Feingold and Paul Wellstone. I didn't agree with them, but I always respected them because they lived out the courage of their convictions and the fact they were passionate and tough. Boy, if only Paul Wellstone could see all this now.

Then again it will be fun watching Evan Bayh flay all around Indiana this year campaigning on, well...I guess on himself. "Vote for Me because I'm Evan Bayh!" His old man may have lost to Dan Quayle in 1980 but at least he went down as a true-believer. His son will go down (hopefully to John Hostettler and not the GOP flunkie Mike Pence) as a mush-mouth. If nothing else if Bahy and others who are heading for the hills go down in November it can finally disprove the centrist theory that a party can be successful by attacking and ignoring its own base of voters (the GOP went through a fit like this this past spring). In fact, you all can aid in this process. That's why one GOP operative said no Dem' is safe in 2010, because he knows the base won't turnout if health care is not passed.

So Obama could very well face a Republican Congress in 2011. But then again that Congress could very well overreach and over-inetrpret its mandate as usually do and Obama can run against them to win re-election in 2012. So we could very well be going back to the dreary politics of the 1990s where Republicans consume themselves trying to destroy a President they hate while standing for nothing other than "Obama Hatred" (which will work about as well as "Clinton Hatred" did) while the Dems' will have to play defense for six more years. At least back then the Republicans had a few ideas to run on even if you didn't like them. Now they have nothing, and so long as nothing works they'll continue to be the party about nothing. Besides, they nearly tore themselves apart last spring trying to come up with an attractive new form of Rightism. Being the "Not-Obama" and "Not-Democrat" party does have the advantage of submerging their differences in a common cause. That's why any Democrat on the Hill or in the White House who thinks the GOP is going to offer support for any health care measure or any stripped down bill should be carted away to lunatic asylums muttering "Bipartisanship, bipartisanship, David Border, reach-across-the-aisle, statesmanship, get things done." Olympia Snowe or other GOP members of Congress may very well have health care ideas of their own, but they also want to be committee chairmen and women too and if they see their chance, they're not going to help the Dems out of their own tar pit.

The downside of that of course is if the GOP actually wins. Given the fact they've pretty much given up on reducing the size of government, Republican rule tends to mean the worst of both worlds: a party that hates government but won't reduce it. You can even make the argument, I suppose, they deliberately prove government doesn't work in order to get votes saying it doesn't work. This is also true when it comes to Congress. Democrats still care about Congress as an institution and still act as though they're interested in legislating, getting majorities for legislation from both sides of aisle, the comity of serving in representative government. Republicans tend to view Congress as a place for ideological combat. They act like a parlimentary party, enforcing iron discipline and all voting together on the leader's whim. The problem is this is not a parlimentary system and that's why gridlock exists.

If nothing changes and the Dems' are crushed this November, you may want to think about forming a new party if you can't get rid of all the deadwood. However you may want to look at this link I've provided from Kirkpatrick Sale (http://attackthesystem.com/why-the-radical-left-should-consider-secession/)and think about a different course of political activism. Why continue to tilt at windmills in Washington? Why should one state like Texas control textbook content for the entire nation as whole? The Kossite Plan to elect centrist Dems' to Congress so there could be liberal committee chairmen and leaders in Congress worked for a while, but it still cannot change the fact the Democratic Party, the most broadly based national party, simply cannot function cohesively anymore and if such a party cannot then the nation as whole, or the Empire better, cannot either. The Dems' had their chance to stop the war and they blew it. They had their chance to overturn the national security state and they accepted it. And they had their chance at health care and despite coming closer than ever before, they want to piss it away. Maybe that's a signal it's time to take the activism away from the national and bring it down to the local, especially if you think the Supreme Court basically legalized the corporate takeover of U.S. national political discourse.

You may think secession is right-wing cause, I assure you all it is not. Check out the website for the Second Vermont Republic (www.vermontrepublic.org) and the online journal Vermont Commons (www.vtcommons.org) to see Leftists actually thinking globally and acting locally instead of wasting their time around Potomac fever swamps. You might actually accomplish something.

So goodbye for awhile. The blogging, et is not fun anymore, and for the short term there will be no more money or time or reading emails for OFA, DFA, MoveOn, etc. No more listening to MSM, or even Stewart. Time to plan the garden, volunteer somewhere, etc. Sick of it all.

My one parting thought for awhile is that while there is blame to be laid at Reid, Pelosi, Obama, the process, Faux infoeroticapsycholtainmentdonews, etc., we need to realize that some of this is blaming a bank that gets robbed for having the money, rather than blaming the robbers.

NOT ONE prinicipled Republican stepped up in the last year, ON ANY ISSUE. Sure, Reid et al were suckered by "the gang of 6 negotiations", and should not have, and the D's have done a bad job of hanging the sorry shit of the economy, Iraq, etc on the R necks, etc., but as Sean Scalion points out, No republican now represents "small government, limited government" or even is putting the countries interests before their own or their party's. Hell I bet a lot of us would enjoy finding that person, but they are a mythical beast, at least in the elected cadre of R hacks, liars, whoremongers, adulterers, and thieves.

Hillary C. gave a speech a few years ago and said the growing issue will be that the R party, as it is evolving, is interested in power. Not governing, not shrinking the size of govt, not in anything but having power and lining the pockets of their money interests. More should have listened.

Not one R really stood up to Fox, to the birthers, the 10thers., etc. Whenever something has happened, they ALL, in lock step, blame, lie, etc., and for the sanctimonious few who didn't activley participate, [Hi Snowe, Collins} they stood by while their friends yelled, lied, and made disingeneous comments for the public that made it sound like they cared, but we know now, they don't. So they are all crowing, with the gift of the pro money, anti individual supreme court decisions. Maybe a 3rd party; maybe something else. Maybe some dems grow a pair; who knows. But the new world order of fauxnews whipping up frenzy, and the mob mentality that ensues, could very well bit the R's in the arse as much as anyone. It is a new game with new rules, but I am not convinced anyone actually knows what all the rules are, or even what the shape of the field is.

It is going to be ugly for awhile. I won't watch or participate anymore.

Reid and Pelosi and Obama deserve blame here because they failed to raise holy hell after the second or third time the Republicans pulled these dirty tricks. They should have sounded the alarm and raised a stink. Instead, they normalized it, establishing minority obstructionism as standard operating procedure. They are complicit through negligence.

So, Steve, what do we DO about all this? Keep voting for Democrats? And expect something different? Right.

It looks to me like the Supremes yesterday officially declared the US a fascist state (corporatocracy, plutocracy, whatever you prefer to call it). Corporations in America have the same rights as actual humans, along with far more money and power. No doubt (at least in the minds of Roberts, Scalito, Thomas) the founders intended the bill of rights to apply to legally manufactured fictitious beings. Why don't we just give them the right to vote, create a couple of hundred million of them, and be done with the fiction that non-plutocrats have any stake in the system?

Politically active people who are not aligned with corporate interests are just going to frustrate themselves with their political activism. Although things are crumbling for the average American, it's likely to take some decades before things get as bad as they are in other third world countries. The best thing to do is focus on things other than politics in the meantime while we aren't yet living on cat food in cardboard hovels. At least that way there's a possibility of being happy accomplishing something. Which means I don't need to be wasting any more time reading and posting here.

Bye.