Little late for party unity, folks:
One of the problems with some of you Democrats is that you all must have played ping-pong in high school rather than a team sport. I’d just like to give you a brief description of what a team is and how it is supposed to work.
A team is a primarily a vehicle for personal sacrifice. To be a member of a team is to sacrifice. Individual concerns are set aside. Personal will is curbed. Selfish impulses are suppressed. This is done because it is necessary for the benefit of the team. A team ceases to be a team once the members begin to put themselves and their interests before that of the whole. However, even a perfectly cohesive team will have a bad apple or an errant decision. People make mistakes and so do teams. But a strong team, first and foremost, keeps its eyes on the prize and sticks together through thick and thin. There will be disagreements among the members, for sure. But a good team member will keep their disagreements private and resolve themselves to accepting things they don’t like for the benefit of the team. That is how a team player operates.
Everyone knows the most important political principle is kneecapping your own team. It’s been every man for himself since 20 January 2009 at noon, because we all know our own personal issue is the MOST IMPORTANT THING the Democrats must do. And not only that, they have to do it the way you want it done. Why change now?
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Ah, “my” senator, the esteemed Madame Scaredshitless.
Misery Dems worked their assses off to get her elected and she’s been an abject failure. She routinely courts voters who will *never* vote for her. She doesn’t nothing that involves *any* political risk and on *every* core Dem issue that’s faced her since we put her into office, she’s voted like the asshat she defeated, good ole hacktastic Jim (no)Talent.
If I wanted Talent in the Senate, I would have voted for him.
I don’t expect McCaskill to be Chuck Shumer but I sure as shit don’t expect her to be Ben Nelson or Mary Landriueu. But, that’s what she’s turned out to be.
She won’t get a dime of my money and she won’t get my vote in 2012. And she’ll lose given how Robyn Carnahan’s doing this year being another milqtoaste Dem.
PurpleGirl
The Democratic coalition has always been very disparate and varied, coming together with differing goals. Hurding cats describes it very well.
Zifnab
The article referenced how Senator McCaskill simply had to join in with the “Even Some Democrats…” narrative against Conway. The writer is not asking for all the Dem Senators to give each other hugs and jack each other off, like their GOP peers. He’s just asking that Yarmouth and McCaskill maybe not play into the IOKIYAR narrative on attack ads.
Conway is running hard against Paul in a tough state and he’s decided to swing below the belt. If Paul had done the same thing, and a Republican had been asked for comment, the only words past that Republican’s lips would have been concerning what a terrible candidate Jack Conway was.
But heaven forbid the Democrats show the thinnest party unity and not bad mouth their own team.
BGinCHI
If your fantasy was to actually get spanked by Jane Hamsher, I think that’s what you write.
Shorter McCaskill: We want to win arguments, not elections!
Ash Can
Meh. So he blows his stack at people being all sanctimonious about Conway’s ads. Can’t say I blame him. And I understand your point, but this is posted at DKos, the worldwide headquarters of internecine Dem squabbling. So it’s certainly within context.
Dexter
I distinctly remember quite a few democratic blogs also indulged in kneecapping the democratic president’s agenda.
Sue
I’m praying that the polls are wrong and Russ Feingold will win in two weeks, because if he doesn’t, and based on the quality of dems out there, I’m afraid I’ll never have anyone worth voting for again.
geg6
Since, after reading the blockquote, I absolutely refuse to click on the link, what dickhead feels the need to lecture Dems on how to be a team to achieve goals and how the virtues of self sacrifice aren’t a part of Democratic or liberal values? If this is Broder or that smarmy Chuck Todd (who obviously never played a sport in his life except maybe golf and who should refrain from appearing ever again with Donnie Deutsch, who eats him alive every time he does), I don’t care. But if this is a serious Dem, I wanna know so I won’t inadvertantly contribute to such an idiot.
FlipYrWhig
That was one of the least self-aware pieces ever posted on Daily Kos. I was totally stunned to see it.
4tehlulz
So I can look forward to the GOS’s muting its criticism of Blanche Lincoln before the election.
Or does this appeal to unity apply only to darlings of the GOS?
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Here’s the thing, Claire looks at Kentucky and sees her own increasingly red state and still wonders how the hell she ever got elected in the first place. Thus, she says shit like this thinking it’ll placate the wingnuts in this state.
And nothing will placate the wingnuts in this state as they pertain to her being a Democratic Senator. They want her gone. Period.
She simply fails to get that and has failed that way since she was sworn into office. She doesn’t understand that the few independents out here in red, rurl Misery really do want to see a principled Senator, one that takes a stand on *something*. She doesn’t and that’s why indies have abandoned her in droves.
And then you have crawl over glass Dems like me who are sympathetic to her electoral situation here and yet, she bails on the party EACH AND EVERY TIME IT MATTERS.
Fuck her, if we can’t primary her ass outta existence, fine. I won’t vote for whatever batshit, insane wingnut the state GOP will trot out after Blount beats the crap outta Carnahan next month but I sure as shit won’t vote for her.
And yes, I know all the parallels we have this time around, losing the Senate, blah, blah, blah. There’s just so much stink I can tolerate in the booth and if she voted ONCE, just fucking ONCE, on a core Dem value, I’d hold my nose and vote for her. But she’s turned out to be a watered down Jim Talent and believe me, rurl Dems here don’t like that anymore than the dwindling core Dem constituencies around KC and STL.
geg6
OMFSM, it’s that loser McCaskell. I hate, hate, hate her. Perhaps this dumb bitch should take her own advice since it was Dems like me (sadly, I once shot her some cash before I knew what she was) who put her stupid ass in the Senate where she has actively worked against her own team in every way and on every issue. Fuck her with the rusty rebar currently laying on the bottom of my dumpster. Repeatedly.
freelancer
Shouldn’t we, as we typically are always doing, be “snarling at rich people“?
kdaug
I’m seriously becoming convinced that our plutocrat’s game of bread and circuses is leaning too far toward the circuses. They’re not even bothering to foist credible puppets anymore.
Harper’s this month ran an interview with Alvin Greene (D-can, S.C.) where he’s asked for advice for college students on note-taking strategies. His sage wisdom? “They just have to make sure that they have something to write with and something to write on.”
Look, I know that being born into wealth means your a super-smart person, and that the game is rigged and you can buy any election you want, but honestly – can’t we peons at least get the reach-around of somewhat coherent people to strut across the Washington stage?
milo
And here I sit, thinking I am on team USA. I guess I should think in terms of offensive team or defensive team. Who knew?
Socraticsilence
To continue the sports analogy- Its early 2005 Obama’s Donovan McNabb and a lot of the left seems to think its TO when in fact its Freddie Mitchell.
Brachiator
A couple of related items from the NYT. Democrats are bad at letting potential Democratic voters know what they have done (From Obama, the Tax Cut Nobody Heard Of).
And while there has been a lot of smug chortling over the eventual demographic demise of the Republican Party, apparently the eventual demographic demise of the Democratic Party in the South has also been overlooked (Democrats’ Grip on the South Continues to Slip) :
Hunter Gathers
@Socraticsilence:
I like to think that Obama’s fellow Dems are like the offensive line for the Chicago Bears. They don’t know how to protect the QB, and never see the blitz coming.
DanF
Will Rogers said it first, and he said it best, “I don’t belong to an organized political party. I’m a Democrat.”
Bubblegum Tate
Isn’t this the official motto of the Democratic Party?
Uloborus
How long until this thread degenerates into squabbling about ‘it doesn’t matter because I was betrayed’ or ‘Obama/Democrats have done nothing for me so I don’t have to support them’ or ‘stop being mean to true progressives’? It hasn’t happened as I type, but I don’t think your message has sunk in yet.
Keith G
Did the Sully link to “the Balloon Juice gang” cause a meltdown? Been trying to get here for 15 minutes.
Sentient Puddle
@Uloborus: See the first reply.
Socraticsilence
@Sue:
It would also make the whole “Dems didn’t go far enough to the left” narrative ring as hollow as the “Dems went too far left” schpiel.
freelancer
@Uloborus:
I think Sully’s link is going to derail this thread soon enough.
Corner Stone
@kdaug: Well, to be fair, that is the starting point of any successful strategy for note taking.
jinxtigr
Fucking hell, I’m tired of hearing about tax cuts.
Nice country we used to have, too bad absolutely nobody has any intention of paying for it.
Uloborus
@Sentient Puddle:
I was thinking that was a new one, but on reflection I guess you’re right.
ruemara
@Socraticsilence:
What does that mean?
Corner Stone
@Hunter Gathers: That may be the case, but the QB hasn’t been too freakin good at calling audibles or signaling a protection scheme.
“Tighten govt belt” “no shovel ready jobs” “we know govt can’t create jobs” etc, and so forth.
tomjones
I love how the kossack (who is a front pager) admonishes thusly:
So we are on the team, but he trashes us in the next breath? Maybe there is some difference between “YOU” and “You” that I’m not aware of?
Another Nick
What about doubles ping-pong?
Uloborus
@kdaug:
That’s Greene. Nobody has any idea how he was nominated. It’s so fantastically weird that this man who’s barely capable of speaking the English language and nobody had ever heard of and is operating out of his basement is the candidate that it’s widely speculated some kind of vote fraud was involved. There’s no evidence at all, it’s just… how did ALVIN GREENE get the nomination?
Punchy
How do I forward this to Jay Culter and Carlos Zambrano?
Mnemosyne
I’m glad someone is finally directing the vitriol where it belongs — at the Democrats in Congress who decided they’re better off supporting Republicans than the legislators who are supposedly on their team.
Hint to the emo whiners who are preparing their screeds about how disappointing the president has been: you’re not on the team. You’re the fans in the stands. You can boo or cheer, but you still won’t have 1/100th the influence on the day-to-day workings of the Senate that McCaskill does.
Kryptik
My problem with the calls for unity and party discipline is that, at least in practice, it usually never holds accountable the folks who do the worst damage to party until and cohesion. It’s nice to beat up on firebaggers and the ‘professional left’, and it’s hard to argue that they haven’t done damage. But they get way more attention than folks like Baucus, Lincoln, Nelson, Lieberman (he’s still in our caucus, so he counts), Stupak, Bobby Bright, etc. Folks who have literally done their best to undermine their fellow Dems in congress and go so far as to literally run against the president and party. So where’s the crackdown on those assholes?
We’re worried about a speck in one eye, and ignoring the nail in the other. Both are making it hard to see and move forward, but one is gonna require major surgery and a tetanus shot.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@Uloborus:
I wanna stress, I don’t look at myself that way. I see the importance of having a Dem in the White House every day in my job. The stark differences between the Obama WH and the Cheney WH are, well, starker than stark.
Plus, I don’t expect idealogical purity out of my candidates, particularly given where I live, in this case a county that went 73% for McCain and 75% for Dubya the second time around.
But I do expect Dems to occasionally vote like they are, er, um, Dems. And to date, the only important vote McCaskill has been a Dem on has been to pick party leaders, ie. the usual stuff at the beginning of a new Congress that establishes which party is in charge.
And stfu on issues like the one here. It doesn’t hurt her one iota to not comment about the KY Senate race. But noooooo, she has to open her pie hole and once again confirm what an ever-growing number of Dems in this state think about her.
In her “defense”, the “every person for himself” is pretty much how Dems operate here. At the party top, it’s all about rice bowls, promoting one’s own candidates, etc. The fall of the Democratic Machine in Misery would sadden Truman. But he’d see the rise of the Repup Machine here and see something he knew very, very well. So, in Claire’s world, utterances like hers are how Misery Dems treat each other on a day-to-day basis.
I’ve gotten the sense that she’s looked to Feingold as her model, ie., someone who is far more conservative then his public persona. We see how well that’s serving him this year.
Socraticsilence
@Brachiator:
This is actually kind of amazing- I mean to think that Southern Dems had somehow held the majority of chambers post-1964 and LBJs “betrayal” on “states rights” is just astounding.
Dennis SGMM
Shit, let’s just all put on our Happy Helmets and SING!
cat48
Hopefully, this wasn’t one of the “Kill the Bill” people. They were split on that last I checked there this yr.
Hunter Gathers
@Punchy: Speaking of Chicago sports, the Cubs just named Quade manager and gave him a 2 year contract. Quade sure will pack ’em in when the Cubs are their customary 20 games out of first in July. If Sandberg has any success in his first managing gig in the bigs, the Bleacher Bums are going to start a riot.
MoZeu
Well, there is a rich irony in reading this on DKos, of all places, but better late to the party than never.
DickSpudCouchPotatoDetective
Issue Democrats care about being a team the same way that the Republicans care about facts, science and the Constitution.
Socraticsilence
@ruemara:
Essentially, Obama’s been good-to-great at his position while not being transcendent as some expected, some on the left think they’re this essential extraordinarily dominant force while in fact being a minor player with an inflated sense of self-worth.
Corner Stone
@Uloborus: Why would anyone go to the trouble of voter fraud on Alvin’s behalf? He certainly could not have orchestrated it himself, so some other third party would have had to set it up.
And to what end? What D could you run in SC that had more than a 1 in a million shot at DeMint?
IMO, it speaks to general voter error or malaise or apathy or whatever name you assign to it.
That other elected state D official would have done nothing but blow more money on a dead race.
kdaug
@Uloborus:
Speculated? You don’t say.
By the offices of Jim DeMint, no less? Slanderous.
All to advance the Christianist/right-wing agenda? Heresy.
Uloborus
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage:
You argue that well. I wouldn’t call it whining, no. At some point you do hit a dividing line where someone is doing as much damage being your your team as if they were on the other team. Unfortunately there’s a lot of sensitivity here because we have regular commenters who put that line somewhere around ‘anyone less liberal than me’.
Paula
@Mnemosyne:
oh noes hippie punching … !
FlipYrWhig
@geg6: Actually, it was a DailyKos front-pager, chastising people like McCaskill. The comment is indeed true to the original vision of DailyKos as a place that understood that in a large number of districts, even conservative Democrats are better than the Republican alternatives. (I still remember actual excitement about the Brad Carson run for Senate against Tom Coburn in 2004.) But given that DailyKos showcases people like Cenk Uygur and constantly gets bogged down in whatever the Outrage Du Jour is, talk of being good team players is like a lecture from the makers of _Saw_ about Hollywood’s love of splatter.
Marmot
Aw hell, kneecapping your own team has been in vogue since Clinton’s Sister Souljah moment, and only gained popularity with the Lewinsky affair. Ya rookie!
Uloborus
@Corner Stone:
(I can’t edit my last comment!)
Yeah, there’s no evidence at all. It’s just so WEIRD. Even for a case of extreme and absolute voter apathy it’s weird. I wasn’t saying I think it’s voter fraud. Just that it’s weird enough the idea comes up regularly.
Pangloss
When the Democrats form a firing squad, they put their guns to their temples.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@Kryptik:
It’ll only happen at the ballot box (or in the primary) and then people like me will be stoned for not thinking about the big picture, holding onto the Senate, yada, yada, yada.
I hate being in a position like this and wished Claire would say something, vote one way, JUST FUCKING ONCE! Gimme a lifeline please.
We had a saying at the Pentagon, “one aw shit wipes out ten attaboys.” When dealing with craptastic “Dem” Senators like McCaskill, if you’re a glass crawling Dem, you turn it around “we’ll overlook your ten aw shits if you’d just give us one attaboy.”
The ironic thing is that Claire was an early supporter of Obama. For her in this very bigoted state, that was a huge gamble. And since then, she’s been running as far away from him and the party as she can.
And don’t think if the Dems majority in the Senate is razor thin for the next two years she won’t be courted heavily to ensure her reelection here in 2 years. It’ll be interesting to see if she changes her stripes after 4 years of stamping them firmly for everyone to see.
chrismealy
I’m all for Conway’s bruising but is a democratic senator from Kentucky going to be any better than one from Nebraska or Arkansas? I mean, I know it’s vital to holding the senate but I’m sure if he gets elected he’ll drive us crazy.
Zifnab
@4tehlulz: DKos came out hard for Bill Halter, and since the election it’s actually done a good job of shutting the fuck up on the entire election. The worst I’ve seen is a few backhanded “And Lincoln is so far behind in the polls, she’s not worth mentioning”.
If she were running neck and neck, I suspect the community might even be supporting her on the grounds that control of the Senate is worth her dumb ass.
Conway / Paul is a dead heat right now, and McCaskill isn’t running one of the leading national left wing political blogs. She’s just running her mouth.
Apples and Elephants.
Corner Stone
@freelancer: Sully will never get it. He’s a useful idiot, or more appropriately, just an idiot.
Thank you sir, may I have more?
FlipYrWhig
@Mnemosyne:
w00t! I think I might put it slightly differently, but I totally agree that the reason Why We Can’t Have Nice Liberal Things has much, much less to do with Obama than it does with the conservative elected Democrats who feel — perhaps even rightly! — that they are better served proving themselves to be better and more decent people than those _other_ Democrats than by presenting a united front and concentrating on providing effective policy and governance.
Sly
A man becomes preeminent, he’s expected to have enthusiasms. Enthusiasms. Enthusiasms….
Daveboy
What a Bad Post from John Cole. I absolutely hate this attitude: I should take one for the team: I should continue to “personally sacrifice” what I want, and to keep my disagreements private, lest the team suffer. While of course the right-wingers need to do none of this. They get everything they want: endless Middle Eastern wars, continued tax cuts, ballooning military spending, a Health Care plan that 15 years ago they themselves could have written, etc.
Let’s pretend that if I just shut up and do nothing I’ll somehow get the results that I want. Oh wait, that’s not working, so I’m getting radicalized as sure as any right-winger. I know their idiot ideas won’t work and will hurt this country, so I’ve gotten to the point where I throw up my hands and say, “Let the Republicans run this worthless country and it’s uninformed, cowed citizentry into the ground. Let the people work a 6-day workweek for a barely living wage while they’re corporate masters hit the golf courses and the spas due to their intrinsic Galtian majesty.” But I’m tired of helping this tired, crummy system limp along. Fuck it. Let it burn.
Dracula
@geg6:
Come on. This is just a little over the line, IMO.
Zifnab
@chrismealy: If Conway gets elected, there’s a chance he’ll vote our way on some issues. If Paul gets elected, there is absolutely no chance he will vote our way on any issues. What’s more, Paul will be more than happy to vote for crazy toxic legislation that Conway likely won’t touch. Repealing the Voting Rights Act, abolishing the Department of Education, Impeachment, that sort of thing.
So when the choice is between middling Democrat and gonzo Glibertarian, the choice is clear. I’ll take Nelson over Inhofe and Lincoln over Hatch – hell, I’ll take Lieberman over Graham – pretty much any day of the week.
Uloborus
@chrismealy:
Conway’s fairly cool, actually. In the debate they were talking about what he’d like to remove from the HCR bill, because he has to frame it that way in Kentucky, and he blithely turned it around and said that he’d like to remove the restrictions that prevent Medicare from cracking down on the prices charged by pharmaceutical companies.
Corner Stone
@Paula: What she did was not hippie punching, just more stupid blather for no reason.
Yeah, really? We the unelected blog mob have less say so than an elected US Senator?
Well golly fucking gee! Hoocoudanode?!
She’s just being a stupid douche for no actual outcome, as usual.
So thanks for playing along.
Ash Can
@Hunter Gathers: All jokes aside about the Cubs’ ability to start winning once they were mathematically eliminated, Quade did a heck of a job with the new, young Cubs in their preliminary rebuilding phase when he took over for Piniella. Plus, he has considerably more experience coaching/managing in the Cubs’ organization than Sandberg does. He definitely earned the position.
This is not to say I wouldn’t have been happy seeing Sandberg get the job. He was clearly the sentimental favorite, for me included, and he was definitely fast-tracked for a managerial position in the show. But it’s entirely understandable that Quade got the job instead, and if he can pick up next spring where he left off last month, it would definitely take the sting out of seeing Sandberg manage elsewhere (which, sadly, I think is pretty likely).
wrb
Obama just failed to realize that Arianna is his head coach.
He’s the bad team player.
Pooh
Way OT, but Joe Miller, everybody:
good times.
WyldPirate
this is pretty rich, Cole, coming from someone that expected a goddamned letter from his “government” about the hole they were digging for his new outdoor water meter.
It’s just all about “you” isn’t it, JC?
Glass houses, rocks and all that rot come to mind….
MikeJ
@MoZeu:
Not really. The front pagers have always been about electing Democrats. The diaries are where the crazy lives, but the front is mostly sane.
Mnemosyne
@Daveboy:
Dude. It’s not about you. You’re not on the team. You’re a fan cheering (or booing) from the stands. McCaskill is on the team, and she keeps letting the quarterback get sacked.
Relax. It’s not about you.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@Zifnab:
Similar situation here but replace gonzo Gliberatarian with classic southwest Missouri Wingnut and you’ve got the picture.
Like I did with McCaskill, I’ll gladly pull the lever for Carnahan because we all know how odious Roy Blunt will be in the Senate and if he’s in there, he’ll be there for the rest of his life.
I’m under no illusions about Carnahan, she’s got all the signs of being Claire II but on first elections like this, I’m more than willing to give the candidate the benefit of the doubt.
Paula
@Corner Stone: Lolz, so upset … ! And I wasn’t even trying to get a rise out of anyone!
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Aww. It always hurts your feelings to discover you’re not as important as you think you are, doesn’t it? Poor schnookums.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@MikeJ:
Exactly. I’m a rescue ranger over there and believe me, going thru the swill that is the regular diaries to find a gem or two is a chore. So, when people generally hurl aspersions at the GOS, I always assume it’s at the diarists and not the front pagers.
If I weren’t a RR, I’d never read the diarists. But the Front Pagers, routinely good stuff there.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: Yeah poopsie. It’s about me.
I’m not the idiot preaching to people on a blog that they have less power than a sitting US Senator.
Just stupid nonsense from you for no reason, as per the yoozh.
Origuy
@Corner Stone: I saw speculation that the SC primary had been tampered with as a beta test. Trying it out on a race that no one would investigate, because the winner had no chance in the general. Since it worked, they can go on to do whatever they were supposed to have done in a race that matters.
I’m not saying I believe this, though.
Sentient Puddle
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage: See, here’s where I’m getting tripped up:
I read things like this and wonder if I even live in the same universe as you. Granted, I’m not intimately familiar with her legislative record, but a quick sample from Wikipedia turns up things like…
And while not mentioned in the article, I do remember her in 2009 raising a gigantic stink over bank CEO bonuses, and proposing legislation to cap their pay at around $400,000 (number might be a bit off).
Beyond that, what? I would assume that you have cases in mind where she sabotaged Democratic initiatives, things along the lines of Lieberman vetoing Medicare buy-in. What is there? And more importantly, is it about shit that actually matters (such as the aforementioned Lieberman), or some stupid shit that nobody will really care about in a few months (talking crap about an ad another Democrat ran)?
Corner Stone
Hey blogland! Did you know you don’t have a vote in the US Senate?!
Cuz you don’t, you poor schmoes!
Now have some dry roast and settle down.
Zifnab
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage: McCaskill voted for HCR, she voted for Financial Reform, she voted for the Stimulus – I mean, show me something she didn’t vote for that we wanted to see passed.
She may be a wavering vote and she may be an obnoxious twit on TV, but she’s there in the end. In a Senate where you’re always scratching for that 60th vote, she’s no less vital than Barbara Boxer or Russ Feingold.
The problem with Blanche, Bayh, Nelson, and Lieberman is that they CAN’T be counted on for that 60th vote. That’s one reason I’m not crying too hard as I watch Lincoln get shown the door. If she won’t vote for cloture, she’s not worth fighting for.
cat48
@Brachiator:
Well, if they didn’t know abt the tax cut, they probably weren’t home during the day or never bothered to watch a youtube of him discussing it. I heard him explain it several times……what was in the stim and he always said “one-third of the stimulus was tax cuts for those earning $250,000 or less……
Most of them always clapped & nodded like they knew. It’s all sorta baffling to me because he did mention it several times. Of course they probably heard “It didn’t work! It was a boondoggle!” Sigh
Ash Can
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage: I agree. I have to get back in the habit of going over there just to skim the front page. Bill in Portland Maine always gives me a laugh, and Haole in Hawaii is one of the best nature photographers I’ve ever seen (besides being a pleasant person). And that’s in addition to all the good substantive stuff.
I think I started to get jaded when I saw I’d have to go to a different site to read Bonddad. Now I’m just lazy.
Shalimar
The prize is getting team members reelected so they can make their fortunes as lobbyists selling their services to the highest bidders when they retire, right? Because I don’t think there is anything else that every single member of our big tent of elected Dems agrees on.
Corner Stone
@Origuy: That’s an interesting theory I guess.
But in the end maybe self defeating. The best conspiracies leave no one wondering “what happened?”.
Or at least that’s IMO.
Maybe better to have a tight race between the establishment D and Alvin, just to see how far the tweak could go in the future.
Ah, who knows anymore.
Brachiator
@DickSpudCouchPotatoDetective:
Speaking of which, apparently Christine O’Donnell and the Constitution are not quite on speaking terms:
You says it’s in the Constitution, well, you know….
Corner Stone
@Paula: Hilarious.
Corner Stone
@Brachiator: I’m sorry, but I just don’t trust analysis by anyone named “Wesley Leckrone”.
Davis X. Machina
@MikeJ. This has been my impression, too. Rejoice, brothers and sister, because there is more rejoicing in Heaven over the one lost sheep who returns than over the 99 sheep who never strayed. Thus it was also for Brother Cole.
El Cid
Except for some of the more recent organizations like DFA / OFA, Move On, or whichever you would judge to properly be on that list, I’ve traditionally only seen organized “team” efforts for support of Democrats by labor unions, local Democratic Parties (and their university affiliates etc), and black civic and church organizations.
That there’s now internet-based commentary (versus a few prominent leftist magazines) where there appears continual dissent against Democratic policies or politicians or power figures or public intellectuals by individuals is not really surprising. I wouldn’t have expected otherwise.
How could a media environment in which any individual can post commentary and be read be any different if not part of a larger and more disciplined organization?
Is it realistic to expect any differently?
Chris G.
@Corner Stone: DeMint was very likely to win no matter who his opponent was, but there was a perfectly respectable sacrificial lamb candidate — a former state legislator and judge, IIRC, who would have made a decent showing and been able capitalize on any unforeseen scandal or a decision by DeMint to go raise goats in New Zealand or something or DeMint getting super-reverse-double-teabagged in the primary. And I recall one poll early in the year that suggested DeMint was only up by single-digits. At the very least, a halfway credible challenger could have kept DeMint pinned down at home, as Jim Webb did with George Allen in 2006. This, honestly, is not that different from what the DSCC did in recruiting Chris Coons in Delaware, and that looks like it will work out pretty well for us.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@Sentient Puddle:
FISA and the Climate Change bill are two biggies that I remember off the top of my head.
Also, and I can’t find the link right now, the WaPo did an analysis of how Senators voted. If you count how all the members of the Senate vote with the party, McCaskill was ranked 79th, meaning there were 78 Senators (of both parties) with a higher level of voting than her.
Okay, comparing Dem Senators to Republican ones is clearly apples and oranges. But Joe Lieberman has a higher level of voting for the Party than she does.
Joe. Fucking. Liebermann.
Actually, she’s a lot like Jim Webb in voting patterns and VA shares a lot of demographic commonalities with MissouRAH in terms of voting patterns.
Hunter Gathers
@Ash Can: It’s not that Quade isn’t worthy, but Sandberg deserved the job. He did what he was asked to do, and won at every level in the minors. This is more about Hendry than it is about Ryno. Hendry wanted his own guy managing, and Sandberg was never Hendry’s guy.
Yes, Quade got them to play well after he took over, but they were way out of contention, and garbage time doesn’t count for much.
The Cubs are going to be really, really shitty next year. They won’t be able to hit worth a crap, they have 4 shitty contracts (Soriano, Fukodome, Zambrano, and Ramirez) and their middle relief is atrocious. Those shitty contracts are going to keep them from getting the hitter they need (I don’t want to watch Adam Dunn boot ground balls at 10 mil a year), unless Hendry is able to fleece somebody.
The other thing that gets me is with the younger kids getting some time in the Show is that they all played for Sandberg in the minors.
By this time next year, Hendry and Quade will be gone after finishing behind the Pirates. If Sandberg has any success outside the organization, Ricketts is going to kick himself.
Face
OT:
Tom Bosley just kicked.
RIP, Mr. C
Corner Stone
@Chris G.: That’s interesting. And I admit I do not follow SC politics at all. But my understanding was that any D candidate would have a huge hill to climb against DeMint.
I think the George Allan analogy is off base, at least IMO.
Virginia was much more purple, especially in NoVa, from what I recall, than any part of SC.
Just IMO, but I do not believe anyone was going to damage DeMint. And if he did anything less than being filmed blowing small children he would cruise to reelection.
Just IMO, I’ll happily cede to anyone with more knowledge of SC.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@Zifnab:
McCaskill’s saving grace is that she does provide a reliable cloture vote.
But those here who follow Missouri politics closely also know that she doesn’t see any political harm in such votes since in many cases, everyone would expect her to vote against it should it hit the floor. And she knows full well a lot of these bills won’t hit the floor because while she might vote for cloture, she knows there’s not enough votes for cloture on any given bill.
The TARP vote, again, wasn’t one with political risks at that time. Lotsa people voted for TARP. Believe me, I’m shocked she hasn’t uttered something against that lately if a teevee camera was in her face and somebody actually thought to ask her about it.
That’s simply how cynical many Dems have become over her.
Oh yeah, and this:
http://www.progressivepunch.org/members.jsp?chamber=Senate&sort=benchmark-percent&order=down
She’s ranked 54th, just behind Blanche Lincoln, 4 slots behind Evan Bayh, 10 slots down from Jim Webb. In this snapshot, Lieberman does trail her–this is newer data than from the Post piece I paraphrased earlier.
JPL
@Brachiator: @<a From the LATimes
The last sentence is the reason I don’t want to vote for my neighbor. I want someone who understands the Constitution.
Shinobi
I actually think that the main difference between Democrats and Republicans is not their political position, but their level of authoritarianism. Republicans are either Autocrats or minions (mostly minions, obv). Whereas Democrats are independent thinkers, and that is why I think they come up with some of the best solutions.
I think a team play attitude would quickly turn the Democrats into a party that I hated. There is nothing I hate more than being told to shut up and deal. And frankly I think the capacity for dissent is one of the Democratic party’s major strengths. I tend to think of the Democratic party more like a family.
Like any other family things are not perfect. We don’t all get what we want on our birthdays, sometimes there just isn’t enough money in the budget. And so we whine, and complain about it. But at the end of the day we are all still part of the Democratic Family, because lets face it, we have no where else to go.
One thing I will say is that people should not be bad mouthing their family members to outsiders.
Mike from Philly
Yeah nothing says team spirit like being told your are “fucking retarded”, having your ideas mocked by smartass bloggers and having your coach tell you that you need to be drug tested.
All this after these same people kissed your ass to get you to give up your saturday and join the team in the first place of course.
Yeah – its baffling why people don’t want to get involved. You know what might fix it? A big smartass HA HA HA diary telling us what douchebags we are. I’m sure we’ll fall right into line now.
Flowers
@geg6: Isn’t this the ‘serious Dem’ that is blocking one of Obama’s economic advisors because of the offshore drilling ban. Which has since been lifted, except the hold still hasn’t?
Brachiator
@cat48:
Sadly, there has to be an almost deeper stupidity or denial going on here. You would think that the average person would know if they paid more, less, or about the same federal income tax as last year. And for most income levels, especially for married couples with children, they have either had lower taxes or larger refunds than last year. People also took advantage of new credits and deductions (education credits, new car and first time home buyer credits), and yet (Fox News?) somehow missed seeing how this was a tax break.
I can understand how in some states (e.g., California) people could see a federal tax cut and a state tax increase and figure that they were barely breaking even. But still, to not know that Obama cut their taxes just beggars belief.
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
/can’t reply. Is too fully concentrated on rocking quietly in the corner in order to not think about this fuckery.
MikeJ
@Face: He’s sitting on it with the angels now.
JWL
I won’t click on the link, either.
It reminds me of DeNiro’s ‘baseball’ lecture in The Untouchables.
Jules
Fucking Sully.
He just does not get it.
What an ass.
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/10/the-successful-ctd-1.html
and I hate how at the end of some posts he says “discuss”…how can you discuss anything with Andrew if he does not allow comments?
Chris G.
@Corner Stone: Oh, I agree that it would have been the longest of shots. But even losing, I’d rather lose with a decent candidate who might force DeMint to come home and campaign once in a while than an Alvin Greene. Basically, I think the Dems need to recruit decent candidates even when they’re doomed because there’s a right way and a wrong way to lose elections. And weird shit happens, and if you’re positioned right you can take advantage of that. Just look at Delaware.
UPDATE: Here’s the site for the intended sacrificial lamb in SC.
Jules
The thing about Claire is I can’t figure out why she even felt the need to open up her pie hole and comment on Conway’s ad.
Paul is a nut who wants to allow business owners the right to refuse service to blacks, why should Dems care if Conway calls him on the AquaBudda bullshit.
Paul’s stands do make one wonder what kind of Christian he is.
gene108
@Brachiator: The problem the Democrats face is liberals have not invested in media infrastructure like conservatives have.
(a) The traditional media – evening network news, national magazines like Time and Newsweek, as well as prominent newspapers like the Washington Post and New York Times – have significantly slipped as the means by which people get there news.
(b) The MSM doesn’t always report things very well these days, because they seem to be competing with so many other media outlets and news has to be reported almost instantaneously in the internet age, so whatever fact checking may have gone into breaking news – when breaking news meant it was going into the morning paper and not up on line as it was happening – has gone by the wayside.
(c) Print media, which compromised a large chunk of the very serious reporting the MSM did is dying and / or close to dead
(d) People don’t want their assumptions challenged by facts they don’t like and there are places they can go to get their biases reinforced.
The fact that in 2008 the Democrats got a good bit of media attention is basically because the Republicans had arguably the worst President in U.S. history, George Bush, Jr., in the White House and the worst economic crisis in 80 years on their hands.
In a typical year, without petty things like Lehman Brothers collapsing, the run on IndieMac bank and the collapse of WaMu, you’d have seen a lot more chatter about the useless things Republicans like to talk about like Bill Ayers, Rev. Wright, flag pins, etc.
Right now the Republicans have reset the status quo to where it has been since the mid-1990’s, with regards to what gets out in the media.
NR
And what do you do when the leader of your team is more interested in working with the other team than he is with you?
Gregg and Ryan are two of the worst fiscal trainwrecks in Congress, but apparently Obama would rather have them shaping economic policy than anyone even remotely progressive.
But I guess we need to just shut up and be team players, even though our team’s leader would rather be on the other team.
burnspbesq
“There is no ‘I’ in team” and “where’s my pony” are difficult principles to reconcile.
In other news, dog bites man, sun rises in east, and Mets management is incompetent.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
I don’t understand why people don’t agree with President Obama and Mr. Cole that Republicans make the best Democrats.
tomjones
@NR: Oh yes, Pres. Obama’s clear preference for working with Republicans over Democrats comes through loud and clear here:
These truly are the words of a man smitten with the Republicans in Congress.
/eyeroll
Brachiator
@Corner Stone:
Ha! This is a ridiculous name. But somehow fitting for a political consultant.
gene108
@Socraticsilence: Yup, the left do have an over inflated sense of importance.
I was talking to my brother, who doesn’t frequent many blogs and he asked me “what’s the lefts position?”. Posting to other dirty-fucking-hippies on the web isn’t getting your message out to the broader public.
On a side note, I think part of the failing of Democrats to foster a sense of unity is the weak leadership shown by Harry Reid in the Senate. The White House did what it could to push Congress to tackle and pass major legislation. The House did its job, with pretty good regularity. Conservative Dems didn’t always vote in lock step with the Party, they weren’t usually preening primo-donas single handily derailing things either.
eemom
@Jules:
He probly means discuss here at BJ, likely recognizing as his due the insane amount of attention he gets on this blog, which seems to increase exponentially in direct proportion to the stupid tone-deaf cluelessness of whatever his latest pronouncement is.
marcopolo
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage: As a liberal living in St. Louis who worked to get McCaskill elected there are plenty of times her position on issues has fallen well short of where I would like. But then there is no way in hell that a person as liberal/progressive as I am could be elected to any government position that would require a statewide vote. Despite Obama only losing Missouri by ~4000 votes in 2008 Missouri is one of the most conservative states in the country–take a look at the state legislature. When you consider the universe of who is electable in this state I will take McCaskill over any Republican so I am not quite sure where all the vitriol you are directing at her is coming from. Perhaps you can tell me how our current Dem governor, Nixon, has been more liberal/progressive than McCaskill since I find he is also much more conservative than I am. In particular, what “big” votes has she cast that you have an major issue with where she has worked against the Democratic majority? Here is her voting record.
As for the point at hand, my biggest gripe with McCaskill is her tendency to broadcast her views on everything into the ether, especially via twitter, whether she knows what she is talking about or isn’t informed. I suspect I have problems with most folks using twitter to share their views with the world since it is such a compromised format seemingly designed to draw the stupid out of people but there you go. On the positive side, when McCaskill has sent out twitters stating positions I think are wrong, for whatever reason, it has given me the heads up to contact her office and try to set them straight.
Finally, as a person who has pretty much been disappointed to some degree by virtually everyone I have ever elected to any office above class president, I just want to say get over it to the all the folks who express such animosity towards the politicians they have helped elect who don’t legislate as purely as they would like (unless, you know, we are talking about folks like Ben Nelson and Mary Landrieu and I don’t think McCaskill comes anywhere close to their seeming disaffiliation with their party). If you want someone who will vote the way you want all the time then run for office–and then you will see that even then you probably can’t vote the way you want to 100%.
@geg6: Don’t know who you are but once again what I said above and that last part of your comment is truly ugly. This may be the internet and you are writing anonymously and I understand and occasionally use hyperbole but your comment is directed at a real person and despicable.
Mnemosyne
@Shinobi:
That would be nice, but with all of the “Chocolate Carter” bullshit coming from the left, I don’t see that happening anytime soon.
FlipYrWhig
@NR:
Looks like he was specifically asked about “Republicans” he could “work with.” And, accordingly, there’s OBVIOUSLY NO MOTHERFUCKING WAY TO ANSWER THAT QUESTION BY NAMING SOMEONE “EVEN REMOTELY PROGRESSIVE” YOU OBTUSE FUCKING DUMBFUCK.
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig: I think you’re losing it dog.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
Please name the “remotely progressive” Republicans that Obama is supposed to be working with since that was the actual question, not a general question about any member of Congress regardless of party.
Reading comprehension is your friend.
marcopolo
@Corner Stone: Probably just a result of the closeness of the midterms but it seems from my reading of folks comments like a lot of us here at BJ are closer to that line right now than would normally be the case.
NR
@FlipYrWhig: Apparently you’re forgetting the fact that OBAMA ASKED GREGG TO BE HIS COMMERCE SECRETARY, YOU OBTUSE FUCKING DUMBFUCK.
maus
@Jules:
Retweeting him so it increases pageviews, I suppose?
Corner Stone
@marcopolo: IMO, it’s due to a number of people bifurcating as we move forward.
Their internal belief set is in one location, and reality is in another.
It’s hard for some to keep re-aligning those two things as we move forward.
brewmn
To the Cubs fans upthread, you do know that Ricketts’ is one of the largest contributors to the Brady and Kirk campaigns here in Illinois, don’t you? In fact, his contributions have gone 100% to Republicans.
http://www.newsmeat.com/sports_political_donations/Tom_Ricketts.php
Fuck Ricketts, fuck the Cubs, and fuck Republicans.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
Name the current Secretary of Commerce. No Googling.
Yep, that sure was a high-profile, super-powerful position that Obama wanted to put Gregg into so the Democratic governor of Gregg’s state could appoint Gregg’s successor.
mclaren
Absolutely! Party unity comes first. So when President Obama orders an American citizen assassinated without charges and without a trial, our first duty is to salute and shut the fuck up.
geg6
@Dracula:
Dude, I can only assume you are new here. This is a common sentiment here. If you can’t deal with that, you can’t deal with BJ.
FlipYrWhig
@NR: True. Of course, that would have been a better point than to attack Obama for answering a question about what Republicans he could work with by naming, you know, actual Republicans.
geg6
@marcopolo:
I don’t know you either and don’t really want to now. Go fuck yourself. I come here to vent, often. I don’t need your sanctimonious concern trolling about my language or imagery. That dumb ass McCaskell, desperate attention whore that she is, should just shut the fuck up about a race that has no connection to her in any way. She does this shit all the time, running to find any camera or microphone she can in order to pronounce the stupidest shit ever uttered or tweeting her ignorance for all the world to see. She’s not running for office. She’s not in the party leadership. She needs to STFU. Sorry your fees fees are hurt about that. Where’s my MNgrrl? If you think I’m bad, you ain’t seen nothing.
Uloborus
@mclaren:
Ah, this old chestnut again. Note: A court found that he gets neither because he refused them. Which is settled law, it just doesn’t come up much because it’s really HARD to make yourself unable to be forced to stand trial. Next contestant, please?
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage:
I can understand your frustration. I just think you are out of luck. You live in a conservative state where an actual liberal Democrat has a snowball’s chance in Hell of ever being elected.
McCaskill may be ranked 78th in how much she votes with her party. She may be a ‘watered down Jim Talent’. But she’s not a full-on Jim Talent, Christopher Bond, or a Roy Blunt. In the state of Missouri, you are either going to get a conservative Republican who votes with the Republican party 99.9% of the time, or you are going to get a conservative Dem who doesn’t vote with the Democratic party nearly as often as you like. Those are the only realistic choices you are going to get. If you aren’t satisfied with that, then you have two choices: pout or move.
Lit3Bolt
@Jules:
It’s actually kind of endearing to watch Sully do the Pac-man on his own blurbs of bullshit. Someone said it earlier, I forgot who (sorry), but James Joyner and Sully actually believe their own bullshit of the endlessly victimized rich. So it’s hard to be angry with someone who has this storybook mentality of class and wealth.
This allows them to accuse liberals of waging class warfare while also claiming liberals are too mean and envious of the self-made Randian Ubermensches we should be grateful for (for what, exactly, is never quite stated. I guess we should feel grateful that the rich magnanimously pay their taxes. Yay).
And if anyone has the common decency to feel offended by their sanctimonious pity party for the poor poor rich, they gleefully hop on the martyrdom bandwagon of conservative victimhood.
Clayton
Maybe after years of living over the boarder in Kansas and enviously seeing democrats get 40% in a senate race and, hell, even win sometimes, the degree of hate for McCaskill seems a little ridiculous. When you have two right wing nut jobs for senators, McCaskill starts to look like a freaking progressive champion. Not only did she vote for health care reform, she publicly came out against the heinous Stupak amendment. This seems a lot like the purity arguments I see on conservative blogs supporting Christine O’Donnell. I don’t really like that she’s jumping on the criticism of Conway, but when some people here literally say shes exactly the same as Jim Talent? Seriously?
So long as a democratic senator votes for democratic SCOTUS judges, I would always support them. PERIOD.
burnspbesq
@marcopolo:
In time, you’ll figure out who the ignorant and bigoted among this commentariat are, and understand that there is nothing to be gained by engaging with them.
AxelFoley
Heh. This. All this.
AxelFoley
Oh, and this reminds me of a diary that Cenk posted the other day asking for unity and shit.
I had to laugh at this muthafucka, because he’s one of the main ones over there stirring shit up. Hell, just about two weeks ago, he posted a dairy full of bullshit against Obama. Now this asshat is calling for unity.
Fuck you, Cenk, you rat bastard.
AxelFoley
@Uncle Clarence Thomas:
I don’t understand why trolls like you and NR waste time and bandwidth posting here.
Andrew
Well, whatever your feelings about Claire McCaskill, her kids sound alright:
gerry
What BS. A team isn’t about sacrifice! It’s about achieving a common goal. If the team captain doesn’t pursue my goal, I lose my motivation. Unfortunately, there seems to be no team for me. Do I HAVE to join a team? The Dems are just a slower road to hell.
Corner Stone
@gene108:
No. He didn’t.