It's pretty clear to me that Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid hates democracy, at least within the Democratic Party, and that he at least tacitly supports the destruction of Social Security.
I'm not kidding at all when I say that.
Despite the Democratic primary likely being tantamount to election in the race to replace retiring Democratic U.S. Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland, Reid has decided to back U.S. Representative Chris Van Hollen, a corporate Democrat who, among other things, supports the Simpson-Bowles plan to cut Social Security benefits and destroy what little remains of the middle class, for the Democratic nomination in next year's Maryland U.S. Senate race despite the fact that several other Democrats, including Baltimore Mayor and DNC Secretary Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, U.S. Representative Donna Edwards, U.S. Representative Dutch Ruppersberger, and Former Maryland State Delegate Heather Mizeur are, last I knew, considering running for Mikulski's seat in the Senate.
It's pretty clear to me that Harry Reid is afraid that an actual progressive, such as Representative Edwards or Former Delegate Mizeur, might actually win the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Maryland, win the general election, and oppose whatever plan Reid has of selling out to the far-right Republicans by supporting some part of their corporate, anti-middle class agenda. The fact that Reid would back a corporate Democrat like Chris Van Hollen while several other Democrats, some ideologically similar to Van Hollen and others considerably more progressive than him, are considering running for U.S. Senate in a heavily-Democratic state proves that Reid, as well as many others in the failed, out-of-touch, out-of-ideas Democratic establishment, view progressives who support restoring the middle class, not Republicans who want to impose a destructive far-right agenda on the American people, as the real threat to his political power. Reid thinks that the Democratic Party is his personal fiefdom and that he can dictate to his fellow Democrats who they should support. While many in the Democratic establishment like to refer to the Democratic Party as a "big tent", they certainly don't act like the party is a big tent.
The top-down party mismanagement of the current leadership of the Democratic Party is exactly why right-wing and far-right Republicans like Larry Hogan, Bruce Rauner, Joni Ernst, and Scott Walker are able to win statewide races in states that don't strongly favor Republicans. I'll flatly say that, if Donna Edwards decides to run against Chris Van Hollen in the U.S. Senate primary in Maryland, I'll proudly endorse her campaign despite the fact that I live in Illinois. She bravely stood up to the Democratic establishment once when she took on corporate Democrat Al Wynn and defeated him in a contested U.S. House primary, despite the fact that most of the Democratic establishment supported Wynn and opposed her campaign. She took on the Democratic establishment once before and won, and she can do it again!