No Democratic majority short of sixty can effectively govern as long as the Democrats, and not the Republicans suffer for the filibusters.
The travesty that occured in the Senate is not about the Democrat's failure to over match the Republicans politically. This is about the Republicans not giving a damn because nobody makes them give a damn out where they get the votes.
When are we going to quit the politically self-destructive play of tallying this up to Democratic Party weakness? When are the Republicans going to get punished for their incivility and hypocrisy?
This is not a matter of Democrats winning cloture votes, but then losing on the actual tally. This is a matter of the Republicans repeatedly employing this tactics, again and again, on every bill of any importance that they can get away with.
Why do they do this? So Democrats get blamed for the shortfall. So Democrats look weak. How complex does the calculus have to be, folks? Republicans are winning because it makes them look glorious to their base. The fact that they are violating a basic part of our Democracy in the process is besides the point. The ends justify the means.
Folks should be at their throats. They, not Obama, have taken our advances away from us. They, not Obama, truly destroyed the public option. They, not Obama destroyed the Medicare Buy-in. They, not Obama, not Most Democrats, have lead one bill after another to win majority votes, but fail the supermajority standard.
Blaming the Democrats for this failure of the Senate is like spanking your son for letting the bully take his lunch money.
You want people who fight? What the hell are we doing? Did we lead demonstrations, demanding that the Republicans release the Senate they hold hostage, demanding that they let the mandate of the voter be fulfilled? No, we attacked our own party for being weak.
We don't unite behind our causes anymore, until it's safe, until we don't have to deal with messy disagreements anymore. We wait for politicians to get stronger and more assertive. We wait for things to get easier on their own, for the American people to finally learn, by themselves, with no guidance from us, that the Republicans are bad and evil and they shouldn't vote for them.
Maybe that works in the times where people are already furious at the Republicans, already hate them, and are ready for the alternative. But that's no way to lead a party or push a movement. Blaming the Democrats for the shortfalls is the passive way to do things. Blaming a lack of party unity is the lazy way to do.
We are in competition with folks who have no illusions about what would have happen, had we had a clear field to legislate from. They deliberately murdered our agenda, murdered American's hopes, murdered the democratic spirit of the Senate, and set out to crush our morale.
They WILL continued to do this, now that they've succeeded so marvellous, now that so many of us have declared that the dream is over and have sunk into passive cynicism.
They WILL continue to do this, rewarded by their constituents.
There is no passive solution to this. Nothing will get better while you lay back and keep your own party accountable, despite this being your larger, and more important problem. Our party will not magically regain the initiative. It must be seized. We must peel back their fingers, elbow them in the face and take it from them.
In the nicest, most sympathetic way possible, of course. ;-) No, seriously, my point would be that we ought to be at least assertive, and not be continually knocking ourselves down, even while we're trying to reach our goal. The Republicans are more than ready to try and knock us down themselves. They don't need competitors from within our party, either blue dog or progressive.
Keep our leaders accountable. But have the brains to acknowledge that you don't have a winning alternative, that you'll have to be more subtle and sociable about it. You have to convince the more moderate Republicans and independents out there that when it comes to "us vs. them", that we're all on the same side, and it's the far right and hard right that controls the GOP that's the problem.
We have to stick up for ourselves, and encourage other Democrats to raise their voices and preach their political gospels. We can't simply expect what we want to see will just happen by magic, or by the nature of the world. This is a game played with the will of the American people, and if we feel we're above trying to persuade people to turn that will against the Republican Party, the GOP's certainly not going to return the favor.
They will not admit defeat any time soon. They will compete. They will fight against us to ensure that their point of view, their politics, triumphs at our expense.
It's time to fight for what we believe in, not just sit back to watch and critique those who we choose to delegate the fight to. Even the best of our leaders will fall without support. Many of you loved Russ Feingold and Alan Grayson, but without support from Democrats and others, they fell.
Nobody's immune. If we want our politics to triumph, it's not simply a matter of waiting for the folks who will actually do our will, it's not a matter of waiting for the best conditions to evolve. We have to remake this country with our own hands, not expect others, especially those of differing opinions, to remake it for us.
Take the fight to the Republicans, who richly deserve it, who stand as the greatest obstacle to change. Take the fight to them, or make plans to lose political battles as far as the eye can see.
Democratic Party, Republican Party, 2012 Election, enthusiasm gaps, political initiative, Omnibus Spending Bill, Filibusters, Political consequences