Where are Dem leaders?

A question from a con on a local mixed forum:

"Why, while the Rs are preoccupied with Terry Shiavo and generally messing up everything else, the Ds can't capitalize with some concrete, progressive ideas on SS or Healthcare or Energy or Immigration or Our Global Relations? Just curious. Seems like a golden opportunity being wasted. "

Do we have any leadership, any plan, any direction at all these days in DC? Dem leadership seems to be a rudderless ship at this point.

is @ a stand still because the RW can't pull away from the shiny ball.

Let's sit back and watch the GOP go over the cliff on this one. It is a no win situation if we step in blabbin all over the place.

A strategy of standing by while waiting for R's to screw up isn't a strategy.

We need to be making plans of our own, ready to take advantage when the opportunity arises.

We are rudderless.

this issue. It isn't a winning strategy to run around screaming hey over here, they aren't doing the country's business, they are playing political games.

Why?
Because the country already sees that.

... and no party ever will. Like usual, the Dems are in a coma, and failing to capitalize on an opportunity -- chiefly because they are too cowardly to speak up for fear of offending some zealot who isn't ever going to vote dem anyway.

Our agenda is great. Our politicians SUCK so bad.

They know this full well. This dog and pony show is a Rove concoction from start to finish, and the MSM is only going to broadcast what the Rove Daily Talking Points memo tells them is news. And of course, that is NOT the deficit, SS, the war, the deficit, the war, medicare, the deficit or anything else that really matters. It is All Schiavo All The Time until Rove blows the whistle and moves them on to the next distraction play.

NEW NBY Toon - "Pachyrus"

:bounce:

no one hears about it. not taken seriously. and are ignored by the majority repug

conservitve ought to think twice about giving all the power to one party. this is what it looks like

As near as I can tell, they also have no media strategy to advance their agenda. They're all still babbling on with no unified, concise or consistent message. Most of them couldn't win a race today for dog catcher if they had to run against an incumbent.

do you live on????

No media strategy - how could they if MSM only gives you little to no air time if you are a member of Congress and there is a "D" after your name?

You obviously do not read much on this board. There are gazillion posts about the Dems strategy. I guess you believe if it is not on TV, it ain't so.



:hippie:

the gazzillion opportunites, say Joe Biden has to babble or Hillary Clinton has to blur the edges just to make the Democrats look like they are adopting the Right's game plan.

Sure is enough time and opportunity for them to do that.

pinning the death of their brother in a bar brawl on the IRA.

And looky there, there is Ted Kennedy patting their heads.

So, while we have Bush adding fuel to every hot spot on the globe, little Teddy, representitive Irish-American bar none, is bringing up the rear?

Some leadership, eh?

Busy forming their next capitulation strategy?

They are giving the Repukes enough rope to hang themselves with.
The less they do right now the better, for the simple fact that the Repukes are praying that the Dems do something that they can bash and spin thier propaganda web across the MSM to take the heat off of them. We don't have a majority, we don't have real media, nothing we propose will succeed. We need to just keep our heads down, come up with a solid plan for '06 and ride this wave into the next elections without giving them a chance to get off the hook. All of these issues will be addressed and harped on by the Dems come election time, when it will matter and the media will have no choice but to cover it. Let them all keep setting their house on fire while still inside it. Let them continue to alienate their own party. It's not our job to do as long as they are willing to do it themselves.

to have a strategy of our own. Letting the R's hang themselves isn't a strategy. It didn't work in 2004, it won't work now.

As long as their approval ratings continue to decline, why give them ammunition to fight back? Take this time to work on strategies for the next elections. They have been BEGGING us to put some ideas on the table so they can trash them and put the spotlight back on us. So your in favor of giving the Pukes what they want?

24/7 Terri on the cable news nets. The oxygen is being burned so hard and fast by this controversy that there is none left for anything else. A damned shame but true nonetheless.

Where is the Democratic Party on these issues and when are they going to start fighting against the bush foreign policy agenda?

1. 14 permanent military bases are being built ... has the Democratic Party talked about these bases?
2. will the Democrats insist on assurances that no US presence will remain in Iraq long-term?
3. will the Democrats talk about the missing $9 billion? ... only 3 Democrats attended the hearing on the missing money ... why not more ??
4. will the Democrats keep the heat on Halliburton, Bechtel and other trans-national corporations and their roll in Iraq?
5. many anti-war Democrats believe Syria and Iran are next ... has the Democratic Party spoken out about those countries? is it just possible that funds allocated for Iraq will be used to begin operations in Iran and Syria?
6. the destabilized Middle East has resulted in record profits in the oil industry directly attributable to rising oil prices ... why should oil companies profit from US military actions in the region? have the Democrats called for an investigation of the oil companies and their "excess profits"?
7. it's absurd to say that naming any timeline would jeopardize US efforts ... will the same argument be made a year from now? 3 years? 10 years? 25 years? When will the Democratic Party finally decide enough is enough and stop supporting bush's PNAC agenda?

my view is that the Democratic Party has totally abdicated its role on foreign policy ... elected Democrats seem to be quietly going along ... they may not have the power to change the vote but they still have an obligation to "lead" on these issues ... and don't blame the media either ... yeah, the media are "neo-con-trolled" by the corporate state ... but the last time i looked, the Democratic Party still had its own website and the resources to send out email ... i haven't heard them answer any of the questions raised above ...

something the dems as a whole have not gotten thru their corporation loving skulls. with some exceptions like Howard Dean, John Conyers, Boxer and a few others, the dems are not opposing.

the family values party and religion (dems and xians) have screamed for spousal rights and are now destroying those rights - there will be time to point that out after the death of the republican poster girl.

Msongs
www.msongs.com/political-shirts.htm

it's interesting that you cited Howard Dean ... it seems to me he will now be much less likely to speak out on issues that may contradict positions held by elected Democrats ... perhaps that's a good thing ... i supported Dean for Chair in the hope he would bring about substantial reforms and give a much greater voice to ALL Democrats ...

i can't buy the "distraction of the day" argument as an excuse for Democrats to remain silent, especially on foreign policy ... there will always be a headline of the day ... Jackson, Peterson, the Pope, Reagan dying ... American news is People Magazine on parade ...

but the issues are always there to be addressed ... there is just no excuse for Democrats to bury their collective heads and not address these issues ... if Democrats can't convince Americans that they know what they're doing and that they have strong, clear positions on the issues, little teeny weeny issues will always obscure their voices ...

i agree with your call to make the corporate control of our government the issue that ties all other issues together ... we have lost our democracy to big money and the Democrats refuse to OPPOSE the power elite on the issue ... Democrats lack a bold vision for progress ... we support minimum wage but don't call for a major strengthening of unions or restrictions on the power of corporate management ... we support campaign finance reform but refuse to say that corporate money has corrupted our government ... and we criticize bush's handling of Iraq but then continue to vote more money for war ...

until elected Democrats understand that they can't "play it safe", we will remain a minority party ...

The strategy now seems to be to fight and to let the GOP overstep, as they are showing they are willing to do. Fighting IS doing something -- the Republicans managed to get into power by fighting Bill Clinton -- this when the county was in much better shape than we're in today.

In terms of new ideas and new proposals, bills, etc. -- maybe that should be the Dems 2006 version of the Contract for America that worked so well for the GOP in '94. (Of course that would have been more appropriately called the Contract on America.) Almost anything the Dems throw out there right now will be ignored by the Congress, ignored by the media and thus ignored by America.

For now we hang on and try to stop them from blowing it all sky high. There's not a lot more Dems can do in March of 2005 except make the case against the GOP and look to 2006.

yes, we've all noticed the Dems have little power ... and i suppose one strategy is to wait for things to get bad enough that voters, while not specifically supporting the Democrats, will reject the neo-con agenda ... that was essentially the vision of the ABB agenda in the last election ...

but sitting back and not making our case to the American people, or at least to registered Democrats, is a prescription for failure ... education MUST be an ongoing process ... we have to lay the groundwork now, and everyday, if we want our ideas to prevail at election time ...

see my post above to see how totally absent the Democrats really are on foreign policy ... you're right to point out that we can't control much in the Congress and that the MSM is useless but you're wrong to think Democrats don't need to aggressively do all they can to take positions on the issues and use every available avenue to communicate that message ... if "There's not a lot more Dems can do in March of 2005 except make the case against the GOP and look to 2006." then Democrats are going to remain the minority party after 2006 ...

on SS, Democrats have decided it's good politics to make the republicans put a specific plan on the table before they offer one of their own ... i have no problem with that ... it's good politics on that issue ... but Democrats still need to provide much more of a vision and a framework on foreign policy ... the "war on terror" and the "war in Iraq" probably decided the last election ... and where are the Democrats on these issues? a Party that refuses to engage the opposition on foreign policy is doomed to irrelevance ... it's too easy for the neo-cons to make their PNAC case when no one stands and speaks in opposition ... what's going on in the Middle East is wrong and is costing America dearly ... and few Democrats seem willing to stand up and say that ... that's not what leadership is about and it doesn't make for good politics either ...

I just think it's tough. They have to expend so much energy fighting that there is little time for setting a new path -- and no is listening to them, even the majority of people who voted Democrat last time around have drifted back to paying little or no attention. I wish everyone were as involved and active as those on these boards, but it's not the case.

Again I agree with you & I don't think that means they shouldn't do anything, but there is a time and place for setting a new agenda, and the last election exhausted many people's taste for politics for a while -- I just don't think they're paying attention. And if they are, only the slightest bit to the headlines that are currently making the Republicans look bad on Social Security, Schiavo, etc. Continuing to make the case against the Republicans is a decent strategy for now -- assuming of course that anyone offers an alternative course before 2006 and 2008. Hopefully by late this year or early next year we'll be seeing some Dems step up in new ways. Otherwise we will lose again, as you suggest.

welcome to DU, ProgressiveDepot.com !!!

but that's the problem, the Democratic Party is NOT making the case against the republicans ... at least not on foreign policy ...

162 of 201 Democrats voted in the House last week to give bush an additional $81.4 billion to continue his empire-building in the Middle East ... and even if they agree with his policy there, which is worse than hideous, they still need to, as you said, "make the case against the republicans" by warning about not going into Syria and Iraq, by setting a timeline on the occupation in Iraq, by telling the American people that it would be wrong to build permanent military bases in Iraq, that we cannot afford endless global war and we are not doing enough diplomatically to make peace with Islamic nations and on and on and on ...

the Democrats should indeed be making the case against the republicans; with very few exceptions (SS, judges, Medicare - all domestic issues), they are not doing so ...