Something about big birds in tuxedos...

Linux is too clean and wholesome of a source code...come over to the dark side Luke...

Which -- ironically -- included capabilities that if used properly would have made Snowden's scoop impossible (the code prevents systems administrators from having access to all the data).

Queue up the Alanis song...

Makes me wonder how much of a hand they had in Unix code.

At Tanagra.

No wimpy negotiation! Alien life? Shoot to kill, shoot to kill!

Just thought I would add that...

मुंगूस, "muṅguus". That word itself is not of Sanskrit origin and seems to have come from the indigenous Korli (Dravidian) population.

...and, if you know me at all then you already knew that.

TYY

when someone called themselves a "son-of-a-bitch" or an "asshole", believe them. They know of what they speak.

There is not a penguin majority in this country.

They rule Antartica, though.

I think the OP is correct about conservative Democrats who think the whole country is conservative.

The last contact I had with a woodchuck was with a shovel and sending it over the garden fence. I marked its direction as it waddled off, found the den, and got some used Pampers from friends with a baby and stuffed them down the hole. Never saw those woodchucks again.

That's how to treat a woodchuck.

The way we Penguins and Mongooses (mongeese?) know there is a large progressive base is that even in states where Republicans won by large margins in 2014, nearly every progressive ballot initiative also won. Even dimwits who vote Republican out of habit know that progressive values are better ones.

Conservative Democrats need to realize the only place they're the majority is within the I-495 DC Beltway and that's why they're not getting elected out in the real world.

And they need to remember that shovel.

Graham in Florida and Ashford in Nebraska. Both are blue dogs who specifically distanced themselves from Obama and the national party.

These are the seats we need to win back. That's going to take more candidates like them.

Was there a progressive candidate who picked up a House seat?

the more Democrats will stay home.

You just don't get it. Business as usual is killing us.

Those two. That was it. (I think there was one other in CA who beat a non-incumbent R in a retiring seat, but I don't know anything about him.)

But the only two Democrats who beat sitting Republicans were blue dogs. Why do you think the party would want to go away from the only group that showed results last month?

Yeah, I thought so.

Garcia (FL-26): pro-choice, opposes repealing ACA, pro marriage equality, opposed to offshore drilling, a chief cosponsor of immigration reform. He's rather to the right on Cuba, but then he's named "Garcia" and is in south Florida. He lost to Curbelo, who ran on tax cuts, increasing the number of for-profit colleges, and deficit reduction.

Barrow (GA-12): Blue dog. This guy got drawn out of his own district twice by the legislature, but hung on until this year. He was the only white Democrat in the deep south. Voted against ACA and to uphold DOMA. Against immigration reform. Weakly pro-choice. Lost to Allen, who ran on cutting spending, opposing gun control, increasing drilling, and cutting taxes.

Schneider (IL-10): campaigned calling himself a progressive. Pro marriage equality. Sponsored a bill to increase the Federal minimum wage to $10.10. Supports ACA. Lost to Dold, who ran on tax cuts, supporting Israel, confronting Iran, repealing ACA, and border enforcement.

Enyart (IL-12): Supports DREAM. Supports raising taxes on the wealthy. Called the Bush tax cuts "class warfare". Sponsored bills to limit government surveillance. Voted to close Guantanamo. Voted to forbid detention of any American citizens. Lost to Bost, who ran on cutting taxes (especially on farms), increasing biodiesel, repealing ACA, and cutting spending.

Horsford (NV-4): Only in for one term, but he was a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Strongly pro-choice. Has called for the jailing of bankers in the wake of the financial crisis. Supports increased education funding. Lost to Hardy, who ran on cutting taxes, cutting spending, expanding charter schools, and introducing vouchers.

Shea-Porter (NH-1): Supports cap and trade. Opposes Keystone XL. Strongly pro-choice. Lost to Guinta, who isn't very far to her right (the two have been handing this seat back and forth for a few terms now). NH Republicans are still NH Republicans.

Bishop (NY-1): Reliably pro-choice. Pro gun control. Pro-environment. Dove. Lost to Zeldin, who ran on privatizing Social Security and "protecting business from the lies of climate change".

Maffei (NY-24): Pro-choice. Pro marriage equality. Voted to include sexual orientation as a hate crimes category. Supports CO2 limits and government investment in renewables. Against "free trade". Pro gun control. Supported DREAM act. Lost by 20 points to Katko, who ran on tax cuts, repealing Obamacare, and opposing equal pay laws (seriously, anybody from central New York know what the hell happened there?).

Gallego (TX-23): (Not to be confused with the other Gallego, who won.) Blue dog. Opposes marriage equality. Supported ACA. Supports DREAM (took some flack from the blue dog coalition for that, in fact). Lost to Hurd, who ran against ACA and scary immigrants swimming into Texas.

Rahall (WV-3): Wants to end mountaintop removal mining (in WV, God bless him). Introduced a bill to ban incandescent light bulb import and manufacture. Of Arab descent, he has been point man on House outreach to a lot of figures in the Arab world. Lost (badly) to Jenkins whose campaign can be summarized as repeating the word "coal" over and over again.

Also, while I'm here, we lost 1 territorial delegate:

Faleomavaega (AS-At large): Kind of sui generis; he's a pro-independence advocate for American Samoa, and lost to Amata, who favors statehood. Not sure what either of their positions on national issues are because the delegates don't vote.

So, of the 10 Democrats who lost, 2 were conservative, 1 was kind of on the line (but lost because he wasn't coal-y enough), and 7 were the kind of explicitly progressive candidate that people swear will beat conservatives.

People make the claim all the time, but I recall no ballot initiatives that would see much separation at all between Dems from the near-Green to the near-Rep. There were no ballot initiatives about 99% tax rates for millionaires, or for nationalizing oil companies, or for slashing the military budget to the level of Spain's or other way-left-of-center revolutionary changes.

There were initiatives for marriage equality, for marijuana legalization, and for minimum wage increases. All of which have massive overwhelming support throughout the Democratic gamut and even some into the Republican. There is much angst that DU is dominated by conservadems, yet posts against such progress are nigh nonexistent, so clearly they are supported by nigh all of DU, conservadem third way Blue Dog DLC DINOs that they are often said to be. There is no indication at all that those initiative voters would have leapt at the chance to vote for a Debs clone but couldn't be persuaded to vote for a centrist Dem.

real thing, and not some bizarre insult (as I've always assumed)?

Man, this thread has turned out to be my Learn Something New Opportunity of the Day (LSNOotD)^TM...

They're cute as can be. There was one near my home last year. I managed to get it to take peanuts in the shell from my hand. It was nervous about it, though.

And yes, they can whistle. Mostly, though, they don't have a lot to say.

Right now, in Minnesota, they're hibernating in their burrows.

I don't necessarily believe that there is a large progressive base that simply stays home - but I do believe that an impassioned campaign led by a progressive candidate who could connect the problems of individuals to the general conservative drift we've seen could inspire people to vote for him or her.

Clinton won't do that - she'll run a safe campaign, holding on to the middle as best as she can, presenting herself as a sensible moderate to the craziness of whoever the Republicans put up.

Bryant

I see slight bobbings up and down on a trendline that has been pretty significantly to the left over the last 50 years. Sometimes a bit more conservative, followed by a larger shift to a bit more liberal.

Put the current legal and social framework into the 1990s, and there'd be a reasonable outcry.

Put it in the '80s, it would be greater.

Put it in the '70s, and it would be even greater.


What's happened is that tolerance and good will have decreased, so the differences that are there are even more stark. Society's become a bit polarized, but mostly we see the extremes. And we assume that what we see and know is all there is. Those that have been on the losing end of the changes--usually well right of center--are those talking the loudest sometimes. And they attract the attention when the trend line bobs a bit too liberal a bit too fast; they're the face of the "bob" to a bit more conservative.

"Penguins" want to think they're in the majority, for the most part. Sometimes that's the group they've surrounded themselves with and they can't see beyond it. They want to see things to fight against, they want to see victories. Or they see themselves surrounded by knuckle-draggers. Sometimes that leads them to highly undemocratic (even if still Democratic) ends. Research shows they tend to be more sure about why people do things than the people themselves--they especially know far more about why (R)s do things than most (R)s are willing to say about other (R)s. Like I said, decreased good will.

I don't know that I'm a "woodchuck" (although I do like hard cider). But during the course of a day I'm around people that are far left to far right and everything in between. The far left are a minority. The far right most people look at with a bit of pity or disgust. Most are in the middle. They're content enough, and when you have "enough" you don't want large shifts. Most change is for the worse.

True believers, right and left, have a difficult time with this. My mother was one. I kept hearing her say, "Change is good." When Reagan won and she was really, really upset, I really, really just wanted her to stop ranting. When I could finally edge a word in sidewise, I just said, "Ma, this is change. And like you always say, Change is good." Most change is bad or neutral. It's like genetic mutations. Thing is, like mutations, most are weeded out quickly and forgotten.

Frankly I think there IS such a group, but that it is nowhere near large enough, committed enough to voting, or willing enough to compromise on any less than ideal characteristic, to see such a candidate succeed.

I would vote/donate/work for Sanders or Clinton, Kucinich or Webb, Warren or Schweitzer, with equal effort and fervor simply because I realize the next POTUS will either be the D nominee or the R nominee and, team sport juvenile taunters aside, I would prefer the former in every single conceivable case, bar none, by miles. But many would not, and the opposition will have an easier time with the first of each pair. The little bit more support from the far left that they would get would quickly be countered and massively overwhelmed.

You are NOT talking about how progressive DU members are (relatively speaking, when compared with the country).

You ARE talking about the perception of DU members as to how likely it is a truly progressive candidate (to the left of our current "typical" Democratic politicians) could fare.

That's an interesting way to think about it.

It is one way to slice the pie, I suppose, but I am not confident it really does hit the mark. Food for thought, though (pie? food? I just ate lunch...why am I using food analogies? )

Thank you

I think the issue goes way beyond one big issue that divides us. For the most part imo, it is cliques and alliances by groups here that don't agree on some issue - so off to war we go. Maybe get a 100 reply sub-thread out of it, but NO side will claim defeat.

You have to be right and the other poster has to be wrong and so it goes for a lot of main issues we have here - politics, guns, religion, you name it. The only thing I've really learned on DU is that someone will always come along and contradict you. Just the way of the world.

There's never contradiction on DU!

There has been a decades long effort to slander and demean penguins, originally at the instigation of the wolverines but the woodchucks have been joining in the penguin punching for quite some time now.

And that's a problem. Everybody feels attacked, driven out, besieged, beleaguered, what have you. I can show you penguins and woodchucks claiming that. I can show you penguins and woodchucks complaining that the media is to the right of them (it's telling that nobody that I've seen on DU complains the media is to the left of them).

I've been here going on 9 years now, and as we say in the south "it didn't used to be like this". Maybe when we didn't have the white house the tent could get a lot bigger without consequences; on that same note, maybe criticizing is always easier than creating. I don't know.

I'll say personally I get irritated at facile smears like "Turd Way" or what have you, but that is kind of the nature of the beast (and I fully acknowledge hippie punching happens from my side). But even my "side" framing bothers me, because I guarantee you everybody here other than the shit-stirrers (which, let's agree, exist in both penguin and woodchuck form) want things like universal health care, affordable education, and jobs that will allow two (or, God help us, even one) earners to support a family. We widely diverge on how we can make that happen, but the problem (in my mind) is not that one set of us wants it and the other doesn't.

Anyways, just wanted to throw that out there.

You are exactly right. I left one liberal site before I found DU because I got tired of all the sanctimonious postings.

Back in the day, we had people that we called "fake freaks" or "plastic people". Everything had to be as hard liberal as possible. If you dared to suggest other solutions, or if you weren't liberal enough, that attitude would come out, and you would get this "oh, you cretin" look.

The hard conservatives say rape the landscape and rights for only WHITE men.

I don't like either group, and I think most people are shades of grey in their thinking and their political views. No sitting around the campfire and singing Kumbaya. No wanting women as baby machines and brown people as indentured servants.

And most of all, no attacking ANYONE because of where they live, what they do or what they eat. Like my Mom used to say "No putting you mouth in gear before your brain is engaged." I am the queen of snark, but I try to think before I speak (or type).

I don't post much cos I can't sit at the computer all day and get in a keyboard argument with someone, but sometimes I have to say SOMETHING. This is one of those times.

rabid weasels instead of wolverines...... (Hmmm can weasels get rabies? Not sure but if they did I'm sure they'd vote for right wingers.......)

Also raccoons, badgers, and cats (and of course all canidae, who also get symptomatic).

Armadillos, meanwhile, carry leprosy.

by much of the country as being far to the left of his actual position on the issues.

It is self-evident that a candidate who is perceived as very liberal can nonetheless win a national election. The electorate isn't nearly as ideological as either side would wish them to be.

but what doesn't occur is a coalescence behind the final candidate and/or SITTING PRESIDENT.

What has gone on here with the name-calling and disrespect of this Democratic president is unprecedented and disgraceful.

There is more criticism here of Obama and the ACA, et al than of the repug obstructionists who have plotted and worked to make him fail since the day of his inauguration in 2009.

Activists are always, always going to be pissed off at their own politicians. It's kind of what it takes to be effective. That in itself isn't a problem to me, any more than knee-jerk apologetics for the administration (which I'm guilty of) are.

Where I do really think people are talking past one another is what I laid out: whether or not a significantly more progressive candidate would have electoral support.

(I have my opinion, but none of us actually know; just making that clear. The penguins could be 100% right here because the last "really progressive" candidate we ran was almost 50 years ago.)

Many on the old left used to sport bumperstickers that said "Question authority." I decided many were hypocritical years ago when what they really meant was "Question authority I don't agree with."

I said "many" on purpose. Many of them in authority reveled in being challenged and critiqued.

In some cases people confuse "criticism" and "critique" with "disrespect". All critical thinking is negative, instead of what it used to mean (and still means in some circles): Examine the facts and their accuracy, look for more facts, see how they fit together, consider alternatives and possible logical flaws or conflicts of interests, and evaluate the conclusion. The conclusion might be flawed, but along the way you've seen other possible solutions and considered them. You go with the least flawed.

As a result you can discuss the actual facts without flying off the handle. You've uncovered varying motivations and made clear the values and their ranking necessary to reach a conclusion. When as a result you see somebody coming up with a different "least flawed" solution you often understand where it came from. Sometimes there are missing facts; sometimes you're the one missing facts. Sometimes there are just differences in how to rank priorities--I may think X is more important than Y, you may think Y is more important than X.

This is all hard and takes time. People like quick, easy, transferred or emotional thinking. Many prefer motivated reasoning to critical thinking. They're also reading an Internet board. I hate ebooks because I don't read much fiction; when you read the kind of non-fiction I do you need to stop a lot, go back, consider every word because it's densely written. We're trained when looking at a computer screen to flit quickly and assume information's given in small bits. Many are trained to try to express what they need to express--often emotion more than logic--in 140 characters or so.

But to defend Obama when he does something indefensible just because he's our Leader and our Authority denies the basic premise of critical thinking and the old left's "Question authority."

Then again, there is a lot of the old-time religion in the cry and response of OWS, or instead of saying things in independent or different ways just speaking in slogans and ambiguous symbols. (In line with the OP, I'd add there's a third group: lemmings.)

That was a huge argument here with many agreeing with the sentiment.

That wasn't criticism, it was disgusting and disgraceful.

How about a dove and a chipmunk?

One flies toward an unknown but enticing goal

The other likes to stay safely and contentedly in its burrow.

(Not meaning to be condescending if you're familiar with it.)

I don't watch cartoons.

This Modern World....
http://thismodernworld.com/

One of the better political cartoonists today. But not an animation; political comics.

have I got this shaded correctly?

There are very subtle penguin thinkers here, and very dualistic woodchucks (MODERATION IS THE ONLY WAY GOD DAMN IT!!!, etc.)

I really see it as more about whether we're pulling a centrist vox populi as far to the left as we can already, or whether we're stymieing a public that wants us to be much more liberal than we are.

Just because we all stand under the Democratic banner doesn't mean we all think alike or vote alike or even have the same priorities and that is what I like about the Democratic party. I like that we can have our divisiveness but not hate one another or anyone else because of it.

while slowly reducing it and eventually making a moderately paced change that won't upset my paycheck or suburb.'

Because this shit is not about candidates. It's about policies.

And there's the problem. If we ran national policy plebiscites we would have cleaned the table decades ago.

12 States allow initiative created propositions on the ballot, many others have questions on ballots that are placed there by the legislature. I don't know any State that has 'candidates only' elections. You should be able to name them, so which states are all personalities and no policies ever on a ballot?

They don't exist.

The states with an active initiative process are (from memory) CA, OR, WA, AK, NV, UT, AZ, ID, MT, ND, SD, and that's 11 so I'm obviously missing one (and it's probably not out west which is why I don't remember it -- I do know it's not NM).

As you have pointed out several times: when we get issues on the ballot we win. Americans love liberal policies. Just not the legislators that vote for them.

Federal. Your claim was that only Western States have any sort of policy on any ballot. It is not possible under the Constitution to have national ballot initiatives. The entire country only votes on the President. That's it. That is our only common vote as Americans.

The Initiative and Referendum Institute website gives a list of 23 states with initiative and referendum. (Three of them have Atlantic coasts, or four if you count Mississippi's Gulf coast.)

In addition, there are states where the Legislature can place a referendum on the ballot. I understand you commented specifically on initiatives (bypassing a recalcitrant legislature) but legislatively approved referenda might offer some opportunities to our side. Legislators can vote for a progressive proposal and answer their conservative critics by saying, "I was just voting to give the people the opportunity to decide."

I just want a real Democrat to fix this mess. The closest thing we have right now is Bernie Sanders. Elizabeth Warren is a close second. Together, they are a dream team who could and would win it all. I *hope somehow the woodchucks can decide they like the penguins and want to play ball with them. (Ok, so maybe I am a penguin?) LOL

voter for 25 years, voting for Reagan and Bush and bigotry and racism and worst of all Trickle Down economics I am never sure how they work that out. When Hillary voted for Bill, as I did, Warren voted for George Bush. Did you?
If Warren was our nominee, then both Party nonminees will be Reagan/Bush voters. Is that sparkly and progressive? Or is it just sort of nauseating?
If she's changed, she needs to talk about her former social policy positions and how she stopped being a homophobic anti choice voter cheering for racist speeches about welfare queens. That's what I think.

Joined in and declared Hillary as a Republican I guess to try and throw crap into the fan and hope something sticks. While Hillary was pushing Democrat ideas Warren wasn't. It would be proper to say Warren has moved very far left and now she is even with Hillary.

I'm still not sure what that exactly means, but I know it includes Hillary.

That sounds dismissive (and it kind of is), but it's real. Something about her rubs a lot of the left the wrong way now.

Accepted money from corporations. When some do not have any good reasons to trash Hillary they come up with this crap, just endless words. BTW, no candidate will be able to have a successful run for the presidency unless corporations donate.

These are the words of Democratic congressman Carl Levin; the chaiman of The Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.

time, contributions for campaigns, it happens to all including Carl Levin. This tagging some with this title is not facing the real truth, we in the 99% sure don't have the funds necessary to fund campaigns so it comes from corporations. I have ask several times who is willing and able to step up with the necessary funds to halt the corporate contributions and have yet to have anyone pledge to knock them out.

Saying that Goldman Sachs is "just another corporation" is like saying a vulture is just another bird.

I prefer a candidate that tells it like it is (Bold added for emphesis):

then the money will have to come from elsewhere, get the campaign funds together for all the candidates running and there will not be a need. Warren whom you shared a picture in your post also told it like it is, she took money from corporations, she is one of the bunch who takes money from them. Can you get your friends together to provide the funds to halt this operation? If not, they will continue to take funds from corporations including Warren.

For example:

Cosco is a corporation. They had NOTHING to do with the financial melt down and is NOTHING like GS.

Costco has morals and pays their workers a decent wage. Believe it or not not all corporations are like GS:

Thanks for the good story on Costco, think, you brought me a smile. That's just so cool! There are some good ones out there. I hope Costco inspires some others to follow their lead.

leading in part to one of America's worst financial meltdowns in history.

DNC needs about $100m per candidate per state. Unless this amount comes from the 99% there will still be donations from corporations, don't like this, then start fixing the problem. You can ride the Goldman Sachs for the next 100 years it will not change the fact corporations donates to campaign funds and puts lots of money into lobbyists.

Conflating Goldman Sachs with all corporations is ridiculous. That is unless one thinks all corporations are as unscrupulous as GS.

It's not about corporate donations in general. It's about the specific corporations who a candidate accepts funds from.

Some corporations do great things. Others nearly plunged America into a great depression.

THERE IS A HUGE DIFFERENCE.

Candidates getting money from corporations who aren't screwing over the American public is no big deal. People get that.

No one is saying "all corporations bad" and it was never implied.

This is specifically about a corporation that was at the heart of the financial melt down where a congressmen in charge of the investigation openly stated that

"Goldman Sachs’ actions were deceptive and immoral.”

People might try and downplay the GS problem but it is real and it is HUGE.......

For campaign funds or not, you can't jump in and say it is okay for some corporations and others not to do so. Facts are facts and you can moan about Goldman Sachs but the contributions will continue. Don't complain about any corporations giving donations unless you can fill their funds.

They use the government as an extension of their corrupt business.

They need to be STOPPED from continuing to infiltrate our government & from deciding policy which benefits their heinous criminal activities.

and voting for candidates that are taking money from companies that are obviously involved in such activities while willfully ignoring the unscrupulous actvities of the corporation doesn't seem like much of a solution.

from corporations, can you provide the funds for all the political campaigns? Can you gather enough funds to handle the campaigns from others?

Yes, American politics tend to hew to the middle, because Americans generally don't see the need for great change...except when they get so fed up with the status quo that they're willing to go to extremes. 1932 was a year that they did; 1980 was another. So the question is not whether the American people will support ideologues, but when -- and whether now is such a time.

That's why I don't think you've accurately characterized the big divide on DU, because you're focused on a "political base." When figures from outside the mushy middle win the presidency, it's not because they've found some magical, hitherto-not-voting base; it's because their message and the historical moment are so in sync that they are able to pull other other away from their bases.

Personally, I don't think there's strong support for every last part of a progressive agenda out there. But it's clear that the economic messages of Warren and Sanders resonate (why else would Lady Inevitability be appropriating them?) and may be powerful enough to pull in voters who normally might not vote, or vote Dem.

Which is pretty much the magic ticket to win the Presidency.

FDR ran on cutting taxes and removing the heavy hand of government, and then threw everything possible against the wall and saw what stuck.

Reagan was the only Union organizer to ever win the Presidency, and ran with more Union endorsements than Carter (including, ironically, PATCO -- Carter had pissed off most of aviation by deregulating it).

Both of them also inaugurated new political alignments, which I would also argue Obama is doing, though like with both FDR and Reagan it won't be obvious for a bit.

Neither of them ran as centrists. They may have both run as pragmatic -- in the sense that they ran as guys who could do things -- but what candidate doesn't? But more to the point, neither of them appealed to a "base"; they instead cut across bases to build new coalitions. Obama may have done that as well (though, honestly, I'm not sure he has; he hasn't really pulled people out of the GOP the way FDR did, or the way Reagan pulled Democrats).

Still, even taking your point at face value, wouldn't, say, Warren be running as a "pragmatic centrist outsider"? Of course she would. And there's no question that defending the middle class from a predatory Wall St. is a message that cuts across party lines. The only question is whether the time is right, and it may not be, just as it wasn't for Reagan in '76.

In fact, if she's nominated, I guarantee she'll do that.

was more "progressive" than the present day one from the DP,

and considering that (no matter in which states) most progressive

initiatives were voted for, yet not the corresponding Dem candidate,

I have to say that the party has gone backwards economically and

ecologically speaking. I would like us to move forward instead. If

even only 20 - 30% of the country would hear Bernie's message,

they would vote for him. Alas, they don't know it!

And if your concern is that the Democrat wasn't progressive enough, there was a Green candidate on the ballot statewide. He got about 0.02% of the vote.

that we have always been told not to vote any other party
than one of the two. Thus, when people believe that, they
prefer not to vote for candidates of any party.

Citizens of Arkansas may initiate legislation as either a state statute or a constitutional amendment. In Arkansas, citizens also have the power to repeal legislation via veto referendum. The Arkansas State Legislature may also place measures on the ballot as legislatively-referred constitutional amendments or legislatively-referred state statutes.
Crafting an initiative

Of the 24 states that allow citizens to initiate legislation through the petition process, several states have adopted restrictions and regulations that limit the allowable scope and content of initiated proposals. These regulations may include laws that mandate that initiatives address only one topic, restrict the range of acceptable topics for proposed laws, prohibit unfunded mandates, and establish guidelines for adjudicating contradictory measures.

I'm not seeing your point.

We both agree that in circumstances where progressive policies can get on a ballot, they tend to do well (there may be particulars where that isn't true, but as a large measure -- even Mississippi voted down a personhood amendment).

You're right: Americans like progressive policies.

That doesn't seem to make them elect progressive candidates, though, outside of progressive districts.

We penguins are not generally in the habit of holding a position contrary to evidence. Woodchucks, well, I'll leave it to others to suggest what goes on there.

Tom Tomorrow uses them in a satirical way. He makes fun of their predictable, safe, hedging answers to everything. I use the avatar because Tom's portrayal of "reasonable" dems is so spot on.

[font size=3] that corporate Democrats have the same goals as liberals.[/font size]

What utter nonsense. Corporate Democrats have corporate goals.

We are not dealing with a slower or more pragmatic journey toward the same liberal goal. We are dealing with a corporate propaganda machine pretending that corporate Democrats *have* the same goals.

The absurd claim by Third Wayers that corporate Democrats have merely been obstructed by Republicans is so inconsistent with blatant reality and has been demolished with lists and lists and evidence of that reality so many times here that its repetition at this point can only reflect a repeating advertising/propaganda machine rather than attempts at good-faith discussion. We can post it all again and again and again: the relentless corporate appointments, the executive decisions, the slimy deals in which just enough corporate Democrats reliably appear to ensure that promised liberal legislation can't pass, the betrayals of liberal candidates and deliberate throwing of elections...

...but the Third Way "2+2=5" drones on.

That's what corporate usurpation of politics does, after all. Corporate money pouring into government and politics means the replacement of good-faith efforts to represent citizens with what corporations do instead: advertise, propagandize, and sell a product for profit, no matter how viciously and pathetically the shiny picture on the box misrepresents the product.

The corporate talking points, the propaganda machine, and the rewriting of reality get so old.

Shun the Third Way talking points with extreme prejudice.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5767160

Honestly I have no idea what "corporate" even means on DU anymore, other than "doesn't agree with me".

GS pays heavily to craft the law so it isn't a crime when they commit their sins.

Corporate politicans oblige these oligarchs to garner future favor...

"moderate", "centrist", "pragmatic", "conservative", "liberal" None of them really mean anything concrete any more if they ever did.

There are idealists and there are pragmatists, neither of these descriptors are pejoratives, they are simply what exists. The idealists envision what should be and are frustrated it is not being done and that pragmatists keep pointing out the difficulties. The pragmatists see the steps needed to even come close to bringing even a part of the idealists' vision and are frustrated that the idealists can't accept the difficulties as being real.

To achieve any progress, both are needed, the idealist and the pragmatist, imo. The idealist is needed to provide the vision, the pragmatist is needed to develop the steps to get close to or actually make the vision a reality.

Two very different groups that can sometimes align. I think outside of the single issue bomb throwers things probably went off the rails starting with the Occupiers. Some people saw revolution, others merely saw vagrancy.

That was kind of a big moment in the "break up". I guess those Madison Avenue guys who came up with it really knew what they were doing...

running progressive candidates everywhere, and take the risk because the woodchucks who work along side the republican gophers will e.ventually help destroy the garden, and it is better to go down fighting than live in holes in the ground

You know you're going down the rabbit hole when you start talking in code.

woodchucks, penguins, I don't care enough to even figure out what the fuck you are talking about.

and look ridiculous doing it......I see it every day

and they never get called on it

the jury system is no replacement for good mods, that's my impression

I don't agree 100 persent with her but I think she is the most qualified of our candidates and has a better chance of winning.

Others have different opinions and competition is good and we will have a vigorous debate here. My only concern here is when it gets personal.

But wood doesn't chuck itself. Penguins still manage to be pretty cool, despite their disdain of wood chucking.

Your summary of the penguin position has a connotation of an extreme conclusion: that all we have to do in 2016 is nominate a ticket of Sanders/Grayson and we'll win with 400 electoral votes. I don't think many DUers believe that.

The parallel extreme conclusion on the other side would be: the Democratic Party should move as far to the right as possible, so that it is just barely to the left of the Republicans, because that way we'll pick up all those centrists who think the Republicans are too conservative. I don't think many woodchucks on DU believe that (although their eponym might -- you'd have to ask Tom).

I reject the first position because it assumes that the necessary "large and disaffected political base" is already out there. Those scores of millions of people are indeed out there but they're not a base -- not yet, anyway. The Democratic Party can't just suddenly run a bold progressive ticket and expect that it will instantly overcome the effects of decades of timidity, co-optation, and outright betrayal.

Nevertheless, I feel closer to the first position than to the second. The woodchucks, starting from the premise that the disaffected voters can't be mobilized to swing the very next election, often seem content to write them off entirely. The woodchuck strategy seems to be to assume that each major party has its 40% of the vote pretty much guaranteed, and that the way to win the next election is to wrestle with the elephants (hey, you started this animal metaphor) over the people who are up for grabs -- specifically, for the swing voters from last cycle's electorate. Woodchucks therefore shy away from anything that might be depicted as "radical" or "fringe" by the corporate media. Their reasoning is that such campaigning might alienate the cherished swing voters, who are assumed to be ideological centrists. There's a big problem with that approach, though. The right wing's superior media operation produces a constant conservative drift in the policy set that the MSM commentariat treats as being worthy of discussion. As an example, anyone who today proposed a return to the tax rates that existed under Richard Nixon would be dismissed as a far leftist who was engaged in class warfare. They're even trying to make "populist" a dirty word.

My statement of position is along these lines: There exist scores of millions of adult citizens who are disaffected and who seldom or never vote, but who could be mobilized to vote if they were convinced that it would do any good; and progressive politicians are the ones who can, albeit gradually, convince them of that. We saw some evidence of this in 2008. Obama won more votes than any other candidate in history, and it was partly because he inspired an expansion of the electorate.

In 2012, Obama's share of the popular vote dropped (from 52.93% to 51.06%). It's also notable that, although the population increased over those four years, the total number of votes cast for President dropped (from 131.3 million to 129.1 million). I believe that both these declines are related to Obama's failure to hold the allegiance of the new voters he had inspired in 2008. One can debate the extent to which this was his fault. I personally believe that he was partly to blame, both by being too conservative (as in going along with making permanent most of the Bush tax cuts, including big benefits for the rich) and by being too nice to Republicans (as in not using "Give-'Em-Hell-Harry"-style speeches to call attention to Republican obstructionism and to, for example, the success of the stimulus package). Obama was also partly not to blame, because there actually was Republican obstructionism, and it's easier to sell results than blame, and because hopes for him were so high that some disillusionment was inevitable.

The lesson I draw is that the penguin approach is the way to go but that it won't be easy and won't happen overnight.

Any set of values can achievable any set of credibility by association a personally strong candidate.

Find a candidate with the personal charm as a demi-god, and they'll sell whatever agenda you want.

Or pick some snivelizing schmuck who belongs in a Harvard seminar to make tough cases to the American people, and good luck.

That's not neither side realizes yet.

Candidates win elections, not issues. Issues win or lose depending on the candidates they've become associated with.

What it wants are politicians who will actually produce real solutions to widespread problems in the system.

They'll take them from politicians who call themselves liberal or progressive just as readily as they will take them from those who call themselves moderate or conservative.

The focus needs to be on solving real world problems that voters identify with. Those who do will win and maintain office. Those who do not address those problems will lose elections.

Ideology only really matters to political junkies. Everyone else could give two squats, as long as the job gets done.

which engage in feeding frenzies on both penguins and woodchucks periodically.

vs. those who don't accept the system as it is and thought Obama as President could make it other than it is somehow.

Thus you see idea that the President alone can change the world if they just had the right Messiah, he or she will nationalize the banks, prosecute the corporatists and the banksters, along with Bush, etc., distribute all Wall Street money to the poor and middle class, stop all wars, stop all free trade with other nations, legalize marijuana and other drugs, disband the CIA and the NSA and allow complete transparency to everyone in the world of our security operations, and start a single payer system all while thumbing their nose at Congress and the Courts and the States.

In other words, smart people like you can excuse any policy move by president Obama as forced by the system.

Whereas anyone who criticizes what the president has (or hasn't) done is a dumb ass who doesn't have a clue how the world works.

Your response is unrelated to the content of my post.

That is about the size of it.

What troubles me is that I don't really know what the Democratic party stands for anymore. We've always had splits over such things as the Vietnam war, where the majority of the party supported it under Johnson. Or racial issues, pre-Johnson.

But, in the past, the Democratic party almost universally was the champion of the little guy over the moneyed interests. We were the party of pro-active government to make people's lives better.

I don't see that anymore. The party has been co-opted by the money machine. Our leaders are often active supporters and also generally complicit in advancing the interest of big money corporatism. I understand the practical reasons for this: if you want campaign cash, you've got to dance with the devil.

Frankly, I would rather lose fighting the good fight promoting better lives for the vast majority of our people than occasionally win by accepting and adopting the policies of the moneyed interests.

What animal does that make me? An ass? An ostrich? A blowfish?

There was a time that it was so intoxicating and so wonderful that I had my home browser page set to it and couldn't wait to log on in the morning and reluctantly logged off at bedtime.
My issues are, that no matter what statement that I make--no matter how innocuous it may be--there are a handful that chase me around and call me a liar. It gets old. It does.
So, just like any other meth addict, I keep coming back looking for that high that I once got from here, only to find that I can't reach it again, no matter how hard I try. I still stop in. I still click on a post that interests me...I still respond and I still get someone that wants to pick an argument.
I don't know if this is everyone's experience, I can't pretend to know. I only know that it is mine...but if others have similar dealings, I can see why they don't come back. Or maybe they have just finally broken their habit...I don't know. I do know that I am close to breaking mine and pretty certain 2 to 3 postings in the primary cycle will be enough.

one is practically immovable but always cranky and enraged. The other is so rarely seen many believe they don't
exist.

They throw their captives up on the beach rarely, but those damaged goods are our only choices for president. And the monsters lurk in the shallows to attack anything else that tries to do something different.

We're not fighting cute little woodchucks and penguins. We are fighting old and entreated monsters.

The biggest problem is overcoming the 24/7 corporatist media propaganda and getting people to see what is as plain as the nose on their face.