We elected them.

Pretty much without any Republican involvement at all.

We should all be sure to vote in the primaries next time, and maybe do better. And if there isn't a decent choice, some of us might consider running ourselves.

Otherwise, we should probably shut up and vote for the lesser of two evils come November. Cause the greater of two evils is .... like .... totally more evil.



:)

That's weaksauce. The best thing you got to promote the Democratic Party is that they're the lesser of two evils?

PB

He said pretty specifically that we should try and get better candidates.

But if we can't get better candidates, the Ds are almost always better than the Rs.

Bryant

:rofl:

Have you people ever actually used those arguments to:

Real People, In Real Life?

Really, you gettin' traction out in reality with a pitch like that?

Tell me about the masses of real voters you have fired up in 2012 with that pitch.

PB

What's your argument then? Instead of must mocking the OP and now me, what do you propose?

Bryant

All that would do is split the left. Divide and conquer. 1-2-3 puppy dog - right out of Sun Tzu.

No.

What we need is a better Democratic party - not a fractured left.

There are things we *could* do - but of course, it's much more fun to just bitch, threaten to withhold our votes like 1950's wife withholding sex so Ward will buy her a new vacuum cleaner.

Oh shit, this is rich!

Keep going!

PB

and you took it to mean that I'm forming a third party? :eyes:

Three questions that third party advocates need to ask themselves:

Who are you going to run?

Are they really electable?

What's preventing them from running as Democrats?

I'm X, I'm Y, and when they get into office, they're clearly Z.

:shrug:

it's almost impossible to defeat an incumbent in a primary. You would need a candidate like Ned Lamont - somebody with lots of his own money to spend. Then look at what happens. You are not only running against Senator Shithead, but pretty much the whole party rallies to support said piece of excrement. Another example would be Boswell, which I followed a little bit because I donated to his opponent, former State Rep. Ed Fallon. Much to my surprise, Senator Harkin, who is supposed to be fairly progressive, rallied to Boswell's defense.

About the only way to defeat an incumbent in a primary is if the Party itself decides to take the incumbent out. An example of that would be my own former State Senator Mark Gilstrap. Party actoivists were furious with him, but he got defeated in the primary perhaps largely because the Democratic Governor capaigned against him in the primary. Now the word is that he's going to be running for the seat again as a Republican.

Which is another thing about incumbents, their hydra like abilities. For example Liebermann and Murkowski. Two incumbents who had their heads cut off in the primary, but like an evil weed, still came back and won in the general. Like a herpes virus, they just keep coming back.

We already have term limits. It's called "our votes."

There seems to be lots of conservative democrats on DU these days. Term limits was part of the take back america strategy designed to weaken government. The corporates make out nicely because only the lobbiests know their way around washington and escort the newcomers.

candidates to beat incumbents.

it's almost impossible to get an incumbent out of office. I don't want career politicians.

They want to choose your representave for you. Weiner should have been allowed to serve until the outcome of his next election. It is obscene that Pelosi, Reid, and Obama made that decision for his constituents.