It's April, and the fight for the middle is on. But what does an Obama re-election win in November truly mean? What I mean by that is: what does an Obama election truly give us? I'll explain my thoughts below the fold.
When the 2010 midterms happened, Democrats had been demoralized by what felt like a never ending struggle to get anything accomplished at the federal level. Thus, turn out for democrats cratered, and thanks in part to the birth of the tea party (which now claims 42% of the country as adherents!), they swept the house, put the squeeze on the senate, and really dug in at the state and local level. As a result, we (democrat voters) got what was coming to us when these legislatures started focusing on screwing over as many people in as many different ways as possible, all the time.
Now, everybody who still has a conscience and a pulse, who can still feel anything is nice and frothing mad for November, when we can send these vultures packing into whatever hole they came out of. But is that enough? When we re-elect Obama, putting him back into the White House, can we rest on our laurels, claim our job is done?
First, simply having Obama in the white house only gives democrats realistically veto power. Republicans, the ones who wouldn't be shell-shocked that he was re-elected, would immediately set out to filibuster and prevent any legislation from getting passed. Whether Democrats would be able to negotiate and compromise with the American Taliban is unknown, but the reality is that expecting much from the Federal Government without a Democrat super-majority is highly unlikely. Simply protecting the gains we've made since 2008 (the ACA, repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell, thankfully not having to worry about Zombie Osama) may be all that can be hoped for, with a radical conservative set of justices in the Supreme Court.
So, where then, does power really lay? At the State level. It's there that the Republican war on women, on minorities, on poor people, for rich people, is really taking place. The number of legislative pieces that have already been pushed are too numerous to consider, but the reality is this: Instead of expecting that putting Democrats into the US Congress will change things, it may be that the only way to accomplish change that progressive democrats can turn into a meaningful difference for people is to work at the state level. And that leads me to an interesting question.
Once Obama was elected, the populist right led a complete purge of their party of anybody they truly believed was a "moderate" or "RINO". We've seen numerous primary challengers to what were supposedly "moderate" republicans, and the tea party caucus in Congress is 80 strong, and in control of the Republican party, both at the Federal and State level. There's plenty of debate about whether they will self-destruct, or become the last strands of old ideology to remain in a new America, but the reality, as I pointed out above, is the fact that a full 42% of Americans recognize themselves as tea partiers, and they've had phenomenal success in reaching their objectives. Consider that Scott Walker, one of the worst governors that Wisconsin has ever had, is polling ahead of his democratic primary opponents. This might change once a clear leader is present, but there is a good possibility that he might survive his recall.
So what am I getting at? If the purity purge on the Right has paid such enormous dividends, what about Left? It's obvious that Centrist Democrats, our wonderful Third Way brethern, lean far more right than left. Would conducting a purge of the left of these elements, leaving only the progressive seekers work? If we didn't need to worry about Democrats siding with Republicans, would our agenda become stronger for it?
Even if the centrists were to leave, and a hypothetical third party emerge that represent "moderates" as they were, wouldn't that leave Progressives in a stronger position for elections?
The flipside of that would be what would an ideological purge on the Left even look like? Loyalty pledges? A promise that all legislators join MoveOn? But when there are democrats who belong to ALEC, it leads me to wonder if our greatest enemies aren't just on the Right, but the ones who wear our colors, while providing succor for our enemies.
Tis just a few silly thoughts by a frustrated progressive.