**UPDATED**
“The administration should be worried about the level of despair here.” – Markos Moulitsas
“We look at Wisconsin as a win.” – Howard Dean
NETROOTS NATION was last week. Having gone to the first event but not since, because I’m not a movement progressive, the varying articles on the activist gathering have neglected to mention that these outsiders are now an insider club embraced by the DNC. Access is all in politics and eventually people allow themselves to be swallowed up.
Team Obama’s email to reporters and bloggers on the event finished with the phrase “Obama is Awesome,” which also included the phrasing “And your daily moment of Obama is Awesome…”
Some Latinos are having none of it. Sorry this is from John Fund, but the quote is important.
What participants did address — frequently — was their dissatisfaction with the fact that elected Democrats have failed to deliver on the progressive agenda. During a panel discussion on Latino issues, Gaby Pacheco weighed in. A liberal crusader working to pass the DREAM Act (which would allow the children of illegal aliens to pay in-state tuition at U.S. colleges and also give them a path to citizenship), Pacheco was openly disdainful of the Obama White House. She pointed out that more people (some 400,000 last year) have been deported in the Obama years than at any other time in U.S. history. She compared minority groups to people trapped in abusive relationships they refuse to leave, no matter how bad things get — and in her analogy, the abusive partner was Obama. “That, I feel, is the situation that we’re in,” she told the crowd. “And it’s very hard for a lot of people to stand up to their abusers and say, enough, no more.”
An article over the weekend in the Washington Post ran down the story of Latino fury over the DREAM Act and how one set of activists gets what they demanded, the gay community, while another doesn’t, Hispanics.
Today, as Obama unleashes Spanish speaking ads against Mitt Romney, he’s dealing with another headline about Latino discontent that is driven by Pres. Obama’s deportation policy, which has been more fierce than anything George W. Bush unleashed.
Mitt Romney is abysmally out of touch when it comes to immigration policy and Latinos at large. It’s why from the start Marco Rubio was the first name anyone thought of when the vice presidential nomination came up, with Mr. Rubio playing coy but knowing he could be the man who could save the GOP with Latinos. Considering Pres. Obama’s deportation policy, how much worse could Mitt Romney be?
I’m sure everyone had fun at Netroots Nation, the parties were awesome, and people got to meet each other. But I’m not sure what any of this means if activists are going to remain enablers of a center right Administration, while doing absolutely nothing to challenge it.
I’ll ask it again: What good is a conservative Democrat to progressives going forward, especially when in his second term Pres. Obama will be unleashed to reach for the legacy fence of history? Grand bargain, anyone?
The Tea Party wouldn’t take this crap from a conservative, yet progressives seem to always be saying, more, please.
TM,
This post/thread and the Dylan Ratigan post/thread for me are related. Both posts are excellent.
Ratigan has been great in going after both parties. I particularly love it when he drills Democrats for their obvious lack of courage on clear Democratic principles. But his thrust on money corrupting politics and the theft of the wealth of the middle class and poor is spot on. This is an issue Dems could run on forever and win on. But hey lack the guts and part of that is the vast majority of Dems have not been middle class or poor for decades or generations. they are “soft” democrats with little courage. Their are exceptions but not enough, especially in the Senate. It will have to mean the Dem progressives in Congress are going to have to have some guts and start killing some ConservDem bills that the Pres is pushing, because this ongoing compromise in the hopes of future results for the progressive agenda is clearly not working.
The connection to the Latino immigration issue is one of money. The Gay community has been a source of money for Dem politicians for decades, and despite that it still took forever to move the Gay rights agenda forward. The Latino community, to the best of my knowledge has not been as able to provide money to Dem campaigns, as such moving there agenda is back burnered. I know it is not as simple as that , but the squeaky wheel gets noticed. The squeaky wheel in politics is money.The only recourse for any constituency if their issues are not met is to withhold their vote. But if the latino community withholds their vote to Dems, the Repub alternative that may win in an election may be even more destructive to latinos than the Dem cowardice. Rock and a hard spot choice-not very appealing.
The netroots have been co-oped by the DNC. its a case where the outsiders are given crumbs by the insiders and think its a meal. They need to get off the crumbs and starting hunting for their own food. Adam Greens progressive org and Jim Deans DFA are two groups that don’t seem to care much for the DNC and it shows by the chances they take in supporting progressive candidates. The know they may lose but you have to fight the early battles to win the long game. Pres Obama should show have as much guts as these folks do-if he did there wouldn’t be as much disappointment in him from the left. His absence and leading Dems absence from Wisconsin was political malpractice. Wisconsin Dems have every reason to tell the Pres he is on his own in Wisconsin this November.
If the progressive community/the left/Liberals are to prevail they have to see the whole picture and play as one. The Latino issues are gay issues are the Labor movement issue are women’s issues. They have to be played as a whole. some compromise may be needed in the short run to move the whole agenda forward but that is what needs to happen. the Repubs see all the issues as one connected theme. The left/progressives/liberals need to also. Until the whole agenda is viewed as one and not separate issues or movements it will be easy for the Dems to ignore anyone of them at any given time. Moreover the various interest groups have to view each other as all parts of the same puzzle not lone actors on the stage that once they get theirs its ok to forget the others. As an example it would be great if the Gay community now rallied behind the latino community and their issues. It has to start someplace.
It’s a lot easier to state this that it is to implement, but unless this happens the progressive/left/liberal movement will forever be marginalized within the Dem party.
“It’s a lot easier to state this that it is to implement” — Very true, but the fact that more people are “stating” such things is encouraging. I don’t feel nearly as alone I use to
***It’s a lot easier to state this that it is to implement, but unless this happens the progressive/left/liberal movement will forever be marginalized within the Dem party.***
Excellent post LJ. But I’m not sure that it is all that difficult to implement. It may be by the Democrats and/or the Progressive/Left/Liberal establishment, because as I am forever saying they are completely useless. IMO this is a leadership issue.
At some point a strong leader will come along and s/he will herd all these cats, these disparate groups and we will get our act together. Until then I fear things will continue to deteriorate. Right now, even our union leaders are timid men who cave and rarely stand on principle.
Once we have our strong leadership in place, the organization, the foresight, planning, clear goals, stick-to-itiveness, the backbone, all the ingredients necessary for success will fall into place.
Some of the netroots people have always been “posers” if you ask me more opportunist than anything else: Ms. Huffington, Markos and Josh Marshall come to mind. Not sure any of them was ever progressive. Others have enabled from the start.A few have really disappointed particulary Digby who did not say boop about all of the misogny flying over the net and on her site during the 08 primary.
I don’t really get the Rubio will be good for the hispanic vote meme. It seems to me that Cuban hispanics that are politically active have a whole different agenda than others in the community. Don’t most of them decend from the 1% of the preCastro Cuba? They have certainly recieved preferiential treatment by our governent when compared to hispanics from other countries seeking asylum here.
I will probably get blasted for saying this, and I know that there has been a dark side of Castro’s regime but I would say the poor of Cuba even with all the depivations caused by years long embargos have faired much better under him than they would have by Rubios relatives.
I will probably get blasted for saying this, and I know that there has been a dark side of Castro’s regime but I would say the poor of Cuba even with all the depivations caused by years long embargos have faired much better under him than they would have by Rubios relatives.
Not from me, you won’t.
KInd of surprising to see Howie Dean join the ranks of the sell-outs while parroting such meaningless pablum.
Look for an ambassadorship to Guatamala or something for Howie should Obama win reelection.