The problem with Democrats is, just like the Repugs, they got bought and paid for by their corporate overlords. It's why they simply cannot ever disagree with GWB in any substantive way. Even thought the K-Street project has cut off the money spigot to a great degree, most currently elected Democrats got there by wallowing at the corporate trough. They can't see the world any other way. They are terrified of the money spigot turning off for good.
But until we, the people who are starting to run the party, understand one thing, we are still going to lose. We've got stop demonizing "Business."
The Democratic party, the real progressives, need to start making a clear and repeated distinction between what 90% of all of us do every day of our lives, i.e. go to work and earn money and drive this economy, and what George Bush, Ken Lay and Haliburton do which is steal from the poor and give to themselves and do all they possible can to destroy the American economy more and more every single day. It's not BUSINESS that's the enemy. It's what I call Raptor Capitalism. It's what the Bible means when it says "love of money is the root of all evil." It's what Adam Smith meant when he said "want is the engine that drive capitalism," not greed as GWB and Gordon Gekko would have it. The inability to care for anything or anyone but yourself and your money is the problem. It's greed and lust and it is, in every way, evil to the core. It's what the Repugs stand for. And it is not Business.
Business is good. Capitalism is good. I like getting paid to do my job. I bet you do too. My boss and I and my co-workers have worked hard to build our business just as millions of other small business owners and workers have. This is a good and noble thing. It's called life. As Democrats, we should celebrate entrepreneurs, workers and business folk every day.
What the Repugs stand for is not noble. They stand for greed and lust for money and power. Every religion on earth and all decent people rightly repudiate this ideology. In a word, it is called Fascism. But because our side always refers to "business" as though there's no difference between Ken Lay and Bob the Grocer down the street, Bob the Grocer is always going to feel resentful of us. This has to stop.
We need to stand not only for the workers at the bottom, but the workers in the middle and, in many cases, at the top. Not all business people are bad. Not everyone who runs a company is Dick (the buck shot stops in your face) Cheney. We need to justly defy and repudiate the Walmarts while celebrating the CostCos. Celebrate unions along with entrepreneurs who work their butts off to pay 30 people a living wage every other week, 26 times a year. These are the people who make America great. These are the people who pay their taxes and raise their families and make America possible. If they are against us (and they largely are because they see us as being against them) we are lost.
We do NOT have to abandon our values to support them. We need to remove our blinders about business and give our wholehearted support to honest, decent, hard working American business people. Until that happens, the Democrats are never going to be in power again unless it's the DLC brand with the Exxon logos on their lapels instead of the American flag. They are the anti-Americans. We need to point this out and join together with good, honest business people in order to make America great again.