Outrage DU jour

Yes, it was disappointing. Yes, I'm disappointed in my Senator (Leahy), but this is yet another tempest in a DU teapot.

The Senate is at war with us!
Cowards!
Wholly owned corporate whores!

And on and on.

The Senate DOES need to hold the feet of the repukes to the fire. And they are not doing nearly a good enough job on that, but this vote is not some symbol of how they're all useless.

Are they playing politics? You bet your ass they are, that's the frame work they operate within. Was this "good" politics? I don't think so, but it's not that big a deal, and it doesn't mean that they're all traitorous scumbags.

I expect my elected representatives to disappoint me from time to time. It doesn't shock me, and as long as they're on the right side of issues the majority of times, and fighting for those issues, I'll accept that they screw up and disappoint me on some issues.

I know it's not nearly as satisfying as full tilt outrage, but that's where I'm at.

a couple of hundred tempests will break the tea pot.

Yet somehow, we seem to be getting there.

of (white) people in boxcars.

A very good point about the small steps.

Seven years of abandonment and abuse by Dem leaders in Congress wears thin on a lot of people. Not everyone is susceptible to the abused spouse syndrome.

Thanks for the sloppy and meaningless analysis. God I get tired of stupid.

Am I repressing the memory or something?

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

this measures about a 3 on my outrage meter. The whole thing was bogus and bullshit. It's just a meaningless and pointless distraction and not worth even thinking about any more.

I do notice that the same people keep using these opportunities over and over again to bash the Democratic party though. Quite a bandwagon they have going.

your opinion and your one of the reasons I appreciate DU, I may not always agree with your point of view but it is good in my opinion to have such a diverse crowd sharing their thoughts and or opinions on such a wide variety of issues especially sane ones for those of us who are simply not as well versed in the political arena but have a desire to learn all they can no matter how long it takes it should be considered worth it to many more than it ever has been.

If perhaps I had been more conditioned early on to be more involved in politics and I have no doubt many more such as me perhaps the government would not have been able to do as much damage as they have been able to do and what apparently seems to have been fairly easy for them to accomplish by having not enough American citizens paying attention to what is important but once thought not.

I value your voice as well. I think what Virginia said on this thread is dead on. And she made another point in another thread that one thing the dems did today was take away this MoveOn issue from the repukes. They can try to keep beating on a dead horse, but it won't be effective.

there is nothing wrong with admitting you were wrong inititally.

Actually, that is exactly what this is. It encapsulates all of the sniveling, appeasing cave-ins of the last several months by the MAJORITY PARTY because they're so afraid of being smeared by the MINORITY PARTY.

For myself, I've ranted a bit, and I've also donated today to Moveon.org, letting them and my Senators why I am doing so, and in hopes that Moveon will turn up the heat.

Screw the cowards. It took me a long time to learn the lesson that bullies can never be appeased, and the more you cave, the more they come after you -- and the more they, and others, despise you for your weakness. So even if you don't think this is a big issue, I think it goes to the heart of the dysfunction in our political system right now.

The IWR vote or this one? This vote is relatively meaningless. If you don't know that, you don't know much about the political structure.

...and don't try and tell me what I know or don't know.

And the IWR vote? When was that, again? And was that not a perfect example of Dem politicians who were scared shitless of being smeared by the rabid right, so they voted to let Bush get his war on? So now years later, when they are in the majority, they once again cave to the same bunch of conscienceless, soulless bastards who smeared OUR decorated veterans with impunity.

There's political structure and then there's people power. The political structure isn't working that well right now, truth to tell. Time for a change. If you don't know that, you're not paying attention.

against the IWR, along with 22 dem Senators. And here's why I still support my Senator:

He voted against the IWR. He's one of the strongest legislators in either body on civil liberties. He wrote and sponsored the Habeas Restoration Act. He's voted against supplementals- and that's how they've funded this war. He wrote and got passed legislation restricting the selling of cluster bombs. He wrote and sponsored the War Profiteering Prevention Act. He voted for this piece of shit.

... where I said that I was not going to vote for a Democrat, or not going to support my Senator on other votes?

(added on edit) -- And by the way, while it is true that a majority of Dems voted against the IWR, it was not enough to keep it from being passed. And about those who voted for it -- do the names Hillary Clinton and John Edwards ring a bell? And their votes were all about pandering based on political calculations, and fear that they'd be smeared by the then-majority Republics. And here they are, still afraid of being smeared by the minority party. I'm sick of politics as usual and I'm not going to be silent about it.

I am pissed at this vote, how it was mishandled, and how a large number of our Senators caved. I am pissed that the Senate will condemn Moveon for the exercise of free political speech. I am pissed that the MINORITY PARTY was able to frame it in a way that connected Moveon to the Democrats, who have no control, none whatsoever over what Moveon says. I am pissed because they never condemned the sleazy bastards who defamed Democratic war heroes. They never condemned Rush Limbaugh who is one of the worst bags of putrid crap to ever pollute the airwaves with his political hate speech.

If you don't understand that then fine. I don't care. You can go around all day telling us it's faux outrage. I don't get this outraged very often, and I don't give a rat's ass what you or anyone else thinks of what issues are my hot buttons. Free political speech is one of them. Appeasement is another. And given the current political situation, this kind of weakness will NEVER get us where we need to go politically.

Oh well -- no use beating this dead horse. You have your opinion, I've got mine, we disagree, oh well.

I've already contributed to Moveon, and let them and my senators know I have done so, and why. Hopefully that is a positive action, and hopefully Moveon will turn up the heat.

I keep thinking about the Democratic National Convention of '68-- the apex of civil dissent and the swan song of actual fascism in this country. It appears to me that everything that's followed since are merely bad, illegible carbon copies of actual tyranny.

If something... anything even remotely approaches the scope and the scale of the oppression viewed that week, I'll be outraged. Until then, I can only see a lot of the reaction here as opportunistic outrage for the sake of righteous indignation. Not that it's necessarily a bad thing, but I certainly don't see it as a good thing either.




"...heads were cracked, tear gas billowed, police lines advanced through demonstrators—and television cameras captured some of the graphic scenes. The eyes of the nation focused on Chicago and we decided who we were, what side we were on, and what we would fight for. Chicago changed minds, Chicago changed politics, Chicago changed the Left, Chicago changed the media, Chicago changed those who were here and those who watched from far away, and Chicago changed Chicago." (Dean Blobaum)

I changed it. Can't wait until the supplemental vote rolls around and some of DU's new Senate heros vote for it. Yowzer.

They're weak and pathetic, and nothing you can say will change that. This one would've been so easy to win. A stupid, useless vote, and they still couldn't even satisfy the base.

but let me ask you this; should I stop supporting Senator Leahy? He voted against the IWR. He's one of the strongest legislators in either body on civil liberties. He wrote and sponsored the Habeas Restoration Act. He's voted against supplementals- and that's how they've funded this war. He wrote and got passed legislation restricting the selling of cluster bombs. He wrote and sponsored the War Profiteering Prevention Act. He voted for this piece of shit.

How should I weigh these votes?

Dems go from hero to villain and back again every day here. Someone is a hero one day for a speech or a vote, then the next day he is weak-kneed, spineless tool of the corporations, then the next day he is a hero again for a great speech or a courageous vote.

Maybe it is the nature of a board like this that most posts address "What have you done for me lately?" not someone's body of work.

...

You are one of my very favorite posters.

Reason and logic are still functioning within you somehow, especially when DU goes off one one incredibly freaky illogical meltdown over the smallest of issues.

I think I'm far more folks' unfavorite poster. (And I confess I am often snarky)

My recent thread to the effect that the Dems are about as useful as wetsuit in a desert has to do with the fact that these spineless cowards folded on something as inconsequential as Sen Cornholes amendment.

This isn't a "taser" post, or a "circumsion/breast-feeding/fuck-da-man" type outrage-of-the-day post, this is a post about the fact that our alleged elected representatives STILL DON'T FUCKING GET IT!!!

This shows perfectly just exactly how friggin' useless they are.

If the Dems ran a mortuary people would stop dying.

They couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery.

They couldn't muster enough votes to stand up to the electioneering of a right-wing blowhard.

Sorry, but they are fucking useless.

And if that doesn't outrage you then you simply aren't paying attention.

I EXPECT them to have tough, uphill battles on the big, constitutional issues like, oh I dunno, illegal wire-tapping, war-funding, habeus corpus....but for fuck's sake a resolution condemning a newspaper ad they can't figure out how to defeat?

Fucking. Useless.

but in truth I'm not a big fan of outrage, and I prefer to target it judiciously.

And of course, I don't agree with you.