That's how it works in these meta wars. One side lobs a bomb, the usual suspects all take the usual positions. The only difference is that every time around the horn it gets a little nastier and a little more cynical. we talk about each other now in almost completely dehumanizing terms. Every once in a while we fake an interest in unity, but in truth that isn't possible.
The whole exercise mirrors the larger political landscape. It is a culture war.
Well don't expect me to try and end it. I'm not that naive. There have been hundreds of "Can't we all get along" diaries. The kumbayah is always short-lived. Nope. I m not writing this to make peace. Nor am I going to indulge in the fake democratizing of blame that usually accompanies pleas for peace. I don't think the blame is equal. But I also don't think that assigning blame is all that useful.
Nope - I am a card carrying bot. Look through my history on this site and you'll note that I was among the very first to jump head first into supporting Barack Obama for president. I am proud of that. I am proud of my tiny role in electing him President and I am proud that someday I will be able to honestly say that I had his back when much of the country all but abandoned the best President of my not-all-that-short-anymore lifetime.
So given that - yeah...I opened this diary with the intent of lobbing another bomb back at all the folks braying like hyenas in that dairy. But then I did something I've been doing with a lot of loud Obama critics lately. I used the search function to read some of Slink's diaries before the election and during the primaries. As generally seems to happen, my negativity towards these folks tends to fade as I read their words. I begin to understand how they got to where we are today, and even what my role was in helping get them there.
From time to time we all point out to each other that there are real people behind these usernames. But more than that - there are real hopes and dreams and frustrations. People who follow politics as closely as all of us do, do so for a reason - we cannot accept the status quo. We need to feel like we are part of the solution. I am not the first person to note that we are all united at some level in wanting most of the same things. What divides us is a very real difference in opinion on how we think change is best achieved and in our expectations of our leaders.
I won't lie. I still disagree with the "oppose from the left" strategy. I think it is almost tragically counter-productive. The subtext behind tonight's "I Blame Slink" diary is the notion that vocal Obama admin critics on the blogsphere lost us the 2010 election. I would be tempted to call that a giant strawman were it not for the fact that I have indeed seen that argument made before. I've even made it myself in a fit of laziness. It is a stupid argument that I hope will fade into history. Nobody here lost us the 2010 election. The economy did.
But that said, I think the temptation to argue that the progressive blogsphere hurt us in 2010 comes from this small grain of truth that many of us simply articulate badly: We failed to leave it all on the road in 2010. We may not have cost the election, but there was an opportunity cost involved in choosing to oppose our own when they were already facing such fierce opposition from the right. We may not have been able to turn the election around, but we will never know. And given the stakes that were involved, for many of us that is hard to live with.
Now I don't mean to imply that Obama critics did not go out and try and elect their congressperson, or even that they did not support the President strongly at times. I know that this is not true. But we'll never know what kind of power we could have had if we had all spoken with one voice to empower the admin.
And I suppose the counter argument would be, we will never know what we could have pushed him into being if we'd have all spoken in one voice to pressure him. I get that. But I think it is based on a bad premise - namely that the President wanting something enough or arguing fiercely enough will make it happen. I don't believe that a President Kucinch, Grayson, Sanders or Feingold could have gotten a public option through congress. In fact I am virtually positive that folks here would be every bit as disappointed with any of them if we could peer into the alternate universes that might have elected them instead of Obama.
Despite all of the sad meta and all of the acrimony, I've listened carefully to the arguments made by those I disagree with here.. Many of you have caused me to question my own assumptions of how change happens. I have come to the conclusion that both of the basic approaches argued here are valid, but not in every circumstance and not in equal amounts. Thus our real argument is not whether dissent is important, but when it is important and in how much measure. The same with support. It would be really fantastic if we could have a real dialogue on this subject without having it devolve. I won't hold my breath, but I invite those that are willing to pivot in that direction.
In conclusion, I'd like to say publicly that I really do understand and am moved by all of the disappointment in this administration. I get a lot of the reasons and even share quite a few of them. I was fond of saying during the campaign that I knew that the best President would break my heart at some point. I never had the expectation that everything was going to change when he was elected. I cannot help but think that the great tragedy of the left's reaction to Obama's election was that we allowed ourselves to view it as the finish line rather than the first hurdle in a long marathon. For many I suppose "hope and change" meant an end to struggle. i viewed Obama as a demarcation point from the stale paradigm we'd been mired in. As a chance to rewrite our narrative. In that regard, though people sneer at it, I think the notion of "clapping louder" actually had some situational efficacy. Just as Ronald Reagan's status as the perfect conservative was a useful fiction for them, we really could have used the legend of Barack Obama to our advantage had we chosen to invest in it.
Of course legend or not, I happen to think the guy is a pretty big plus for us even as is. But for a supposed middle of the road, moderate, triangulating, centrist, incrementalist apologist monkey, I am actually pretty ambitious about change.
Anyhow - I've rambled enough. Hope my stream of thought yammering made sense to somebody. I'm not going back to fix typos, so mea culpa and goodnight..