Capitulation

By Robert Fischer | Published: August 5, 2007

I’ve been looking a bit more into DailyKos, because I was surprised by some of the diaries resulting from the I-35W Bridge Collapse (see previous). I’ve continued to be surprised — and impressed — with the condemnations of the Democrats for their shameful showing with the FISA amendment.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/8/5/83958/82889

I know what a lot of you 57 Democratic Representatives and Senators are going to be saying over the next month while you’re speaking on the home turf. You did it to protect Americans. You didn’t want to take a chance. You had to stand up to the terrorists. You really had no choice.

If anybody asks why in hell you chose to legalize what the Cheney-Bush team has been doing illegally since 2001, you’re going to tell us you did it for our own good.

[...]

You’re going to tell us you couldn’t stand up to the blackmail, although that’s not what you’ll call it. You’re going to say Democrats can’t afford to appear weak.

At which point, if I happen to be in the back of the room, your bodyguards will probably have to drag me off. Because I cannot imagine how I will be able to quiet my laughter long enough for you to get on to the next question.

Frankly, you epitomize weak. Your every pore exudes feebleness. You are surrender monkeys. And you’ve just casually tossed away a basic protection as if it were a banana peel.

[...]

Unfortunately, you 57 are not the only Democrats at fault for enabling these unconstitutional abuses. Party leaders bear responsibility for not playing hardball. For not using every technique and every bit of clout at their command to at least attempt to block amendments like this atrocity from becoming law. You leaders don’t have to explain about the paper-thin majority. You don’t have point out that it’s important to choose your fights. Understood. But this isn’t about corn subsidies, or earmarks or resolutions establishing Soap Carvers of America Day. Constitutional protections are at stake. Most people won’t blame you for losing if you put up a good fight. But how can you expect to avoid blame when you don’t?

And it goes on.

Next time you hear a Democratic water-bearer say that the Democrats have to be elected, because only they will stand up to the Bush administration, remember these decisions. This was exactly the same kind of mess we saw with the Iraq funding — lots of bluster, and then capitulation. They are right in that Republicans will capitulate more quickly, and that means that we have two choices: capitulation quickly or capitulation slowly.

This was precisely the prediction that I laid out before the newest election — that electing the Democrats would result in a lot of bluster, but no actual action. Some people will say it’s because the Democrats are weak or afraid, but my belief is that it’s because the Democrats are an easy sell. It’s easy to sell them on empowering the federal government to take away our rights, because they already believe that the state can save us: by empowering the state, you are empowering our savior. This is the same mindset that drives calls for Democratic interventionism (“neo-liberalism”), nationalized health care, and the unification of power in the federal government.

If the Republicans won’t save us, and the Democrats won’t save us, we’re going to have to find some way to save ourselves. Unfortunately, I really don’t know what we have to do. I wish I did.

I suppose I can write my Congressional representatives again, and ask them why they’re weakening an already dubious civil protection, and putting more power into the hands of a scandal-ridden and corrupt executive.

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  • Brian

    One of the problems we as Democrats have is that large numbers of people who should know better keep repeating Republican propoganda. For example, “if you vote against extending FISA, you [will look|are] weak and want the terrorists to win. Or, more to the point:

    This is the same mindset that drives calls for Democratic interventionism (”neo-liberalism”), nationalized health care, and the unification of power in the federal government.

    It’s Republican propoganda, unsupported by the facts, that the Government is always inefficient and corrupt and incompetent. They acheive this outlook by ignoring the huge numbers of cases where the federal government does work- and the state governments don’t. And the corporations sure as hell don’t.

    Go watch “Sicko”. Then explain to me why the hell the Germans, English, Canadians, French, even the dang Cubans, have universal single payer health care that works, and we don’t?

    Our food is safe to eat, because federal government inspections and regulations work. Until, of course, small government advocates repeal the regulations and defund the inspections.

    We haven’t had a major epidemic in 90 years because the CDC works.

    We don’t have grandparents moving in with children, or moving into the poor farm, or being homeless, anymore because Social Security works.

    We have a wonderfull interstate highway system that facilitates commerce and travel, because the federal government built it.

    Our work places are safe because OSHA works.

    We’ve recovered after disaster after disaster, because FEMA works. Or, at least it worked until small government conservatives put a fucking moron in charge, and then went on vacation.

    And I note, this is not a pitch we buy anywhere else. I mean, think about it- “I think you business is unprofitable and going to go bankrupt. You should make me CEO and Chairman of the Board.” Or, how about: “I think your church is immoral and going to drive away it’s members. You should make me pastor and let me give the sermons.” But stand up and say “I think government is corrupt and incompetent- so you should elect me to lead the government” and people say “uh, ok”. Talk about the easy sell.

    The problem is not government. The problem is Republicans.

    I will admit that there are a number of Republicans who have managed to get elected with a (D) after their name. And there are a number of Democratic consultants whom I strongly suspect are in fact Republican plants. There is a lot of house cleaning that needs to be done.

    But that’s to be expected. Politics is less like blitzkreig warfare, and more like trench warfare.

    There are signs of hope, however. In the last 8 years, things have improved remarkably, even dramatically. 8 years ago I was wondering if the Democratic party was salvagable. The political leaders were not only not listening the grassroots/liberals, they were going out of their way to demonstrate that they weren’t listening.

    This year, every single Democratic presidential canidate either attended YearlyKos in person, or sent a high level delegation to attend. And the top three were were all there in person. Every. Single. One.

    The fight goes on. And we’ll lose battles. But that’s the trick- to not give up and to keep fighting. For seven years, George Washington got his butt kicked up and down the whole of the eastern seaboard. But he kept fighting.

    When I was growing up, I was taught that Despair was a cardinal sin, in many senses the cardinal sin. Because despair is what keeps you from fighting, from improving. And that is exactly where the Republicans want us. Repeating their propoganda and despairing.

    Because then they’ve already won.

  • http://www.linkedin.com/in/robertfischer Robert Fischer

    Okay…so how is your comment at all disproving my assertion that Democrats see the government as a savior? In fact, you’ve just given bunches of examples about how the government is our savior.

    And if it’s our savior, then we might as well empower it. Why not?

    It’s an easy sell from that position to giving the police substantial power. After all, state == savior.

    I’m not in despair — if I was, I wouldn’t be posting here or looking for something new to be doing. But I am pretty damn disillusioned with the Democratic party. I was ambivalent on them in 2000 (a deep mistake in retrospect, but I couldn’t vote anyway), and a reluctant supporter in 2004, but the consistent failure of the Democratic party to stand against the Bush administration — the one thing I wanted out of them — has really put me off.

    Now I’m back to feeling like a disenfranchised conservative, and the AFL-CIO debate that I just finished watching hasn’t helped.

  • Brian

    There are things in this universe that are neither Satan nor Savior. In fact, most things are neither.

    Government is a tool- not unlike software. A tool that can be used well or poorly. A tool that is really good for somethings, not so good for others.

    For example, the government can regulate in a minimal way the food industry, to make sure the food is safe to eat. But no one is advocating the Government take over food production. Well, I suppose you could dig up some die-hard communists from somewhere, but no one listens to them anymore. Certainly no one in elected office or anywhere near elected office listens to them.

    The free market is also a tool- usefull in some cases, not in others. The libertarians who insist that the free market is the right solution for every situation are every bit as whacko and wrong as the communists who insist the government is the right solution for every situation.

    I’d even say that the free market should be the default solution, except when there is evidence that it doesn’t work. It’s just that I don’t ignore the evidence that the free market isn’t working, or that government solutions can work.

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