DON'T BUY INTO INSIDE THE BELTWAY LIES ABOUT SUPPORTING PARTY-LINE REACTIONARIES

Last week a reporter for a local Pennsylvania newspaper interviewed me about reactionary Democrat Chris Carney. I explained why progressives can't support deceitful, Republican-lite candidates even in red districts like PA-10. In the course of the discussion, he mentioned that he had spoken with someone from the DCCC who said progressives are wrong to oppose Democrats like Carney because we'd wind up with someone worse, a right-wing Republican. He may be correct that we'll wind up with a right-wing Republican-- but worse than Carney? I'm not so certain.

The right-wing Republican won't wreck the Democratic brand and confuse people about what it means to be a Democrat and what the difference is between the two parties. The right-wing Republican won't be pushing the Democratic Party-- from the inside-- towards sell-out positions on every issue. The right-wing Republican won't be supporting faithless Democratic congressional leaders like Steny Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel who will always drag the caucus away from the peoples' interest and towards the corporate interests. Of course, Insider-the-Beltway Democrats need Democratic bodies if they want to keep their leadership perks and fancy offices. So they support reactionaries like Jim Marshall (GA), Gene Taylor (MS), Dan Boren (OK), Dan Lipinski (IL), Heath Shuler (NC), Tim Mahoney (FL), John Barrow (GA), Al Wynn (MD), Mike Ross (AR), Bud Cramer (AL), Jane Harman (CA), Jason Altmire (PA), Ellen Tauscher (CA. They even supported the ultimate treacherous actor, Joe Lieberman (CT), who has turned around and stabbed them in the back in the only way that really matters to them-- by endorsing Republicans; very fitting and I hope Reid and Schumer choke on it.

Unlike Lieberman, Wynn, Lipinski, Barrow, Harman, and Tauscher, most of these reactionary Dems are in very Republican districts. So the argument for them, as for Mary Landrieu-- and Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor, who is also coming up for re-election next year and who also has a pitiful, Republican-lite  voting record, nearly as bad as Landrieu's-- is that we'd never get a real progressive so why not be happy with a moderate Dem instead of a right-wing Republican?

Fair enough question. But let's take out the Fox News propaganda point of calling reactionary and arch-conservative Democrats "moderates." They're not-- not even close. A moderate would be a Democrat like Lois Capps (CA), Lloyd Doggett (TX), Nita Lowey (NY), Tom Udall (NM), David Obey (WI), Tom Lantos (CA), Jim Clyburn (SC), Sander Levin (MI), Bennie Thompson (MS). These are members who vote with us sometimes and with the Big Corporate interests other times. They're decent middle-of-the-road legislators who are generally doing what they think is best, not triangulating and not currying favor with the bad guys. On the Senate side, it would be members like Chris Dodd (CT), John Rockefeller (WV), Dianne Feinstein (CA), Byron Dorgan (ND), Joe Biden (DE). Sometimes they vote the peoples' interest; other times they vote corporate interests. Harry Reid fits in with that group as well, by the way. It's the moderate bloc. Members like Ben Nelson (NE), Max Baucus (MT), Mary Landrieu (LA), her Mini-me, Blanche Lincoln (AR), Tom Carper (DE), Mark Pryor (AR) vote too frequently with the Republican extremists on crucial matters to be considered moderates. All half dozen of those Democrats have worse, more reactionary voting records than Bush's favorite senator, Joe Lieberman! An example: they all voted to confirm right wing activist extremist Supreme Court nominees Sam Alito and John Roberts, who were then able to set about destroying the social fabric of America. Is that "moderate?"

OK, the next piece of this argument is less intuitive. It's about how hopelessly red the districts are and how progressives could never get elected in them. Well, unless we wind up educating voters about what progressive values and principles and ideals really are-- a job politicians are supposed to do-- the citizenry will, indeed, never come along. You know, progressive Democrats have been elected in the South. Gore's father was a New Deal Senator from Tennessee. Ralph Yarborough was a liberal Texas senator until 1971. Doug Wilder, grandson of slaves, was elected governor of Virginia in 1990-- with a long and progressive record of service in the state legislature (fair housing, union rights, equal opportunity for all people regardless of race). Populist Huey Long (LA) was to the left of Roosevelt in terms of redistributing wealth to the working people. James Fulbright was the powerful and respected senator from Arkansas for 30 years, from 1944 to 1974, where he had a mixed record-- fighting McCarthyism, championing the UN, opposing the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, opposing the War in Vietnam pretty early on, opposing Israeli aggression against Palestinians at a time when that was unheard of, leading the opposition to the radical right, like the John Birch Society, that was beginning to take hold and led directly to this contemptible Bush Regime; on the other hand, it wasn't until very late in his career that he took a stand against segregation, having supported it for most of his time in the Senate.

Today we think of places like Idaho and, to a lesser extent, Montana, as bastions of right wingnuttery. Idaho actually is, but Frank Church was a fighting liberal senator from 1957 'til 1981 (4 terms), and was one of the first members of the Senate to oppose the War in Vietnam and was one of the first modern day environmentalists in Congress. He won over and over in a very conservative state because he had the ability to communicate the values and ideals he stood for, just the way Bernie Sanders does today. The whole state of Montana has been turning around and now has a Democratic legislature, Democratic governor and 2 Democratic senators (although one, Max Baucus, tends to vote with Republicans as much as with Democrats on substantive issues). And most important of all, the people of Montana have opened their eyes and seen the light.

Mary Landrieu is not fit to be in the Senate or even in the Democratic Party. She's a corporate hack of the worst kind. She stands for nothing whatsoever, at least not beyond greed and avarice and petty politics. Democrats will never make any progress with candidates like Landrieu representing them. She may be better than the Republicans around the edges but-- to the average voter-- "they're all the same."

I can't say I was "glad" Corker won the Senate seat in Tennessee last year. I am, however, very glad reactionary corporate whore Harold Ford lost. The Democrats would be worse off with him, pushing the party, Lieberman-like, to the right, always voting with Republicans and prancing around on Fox News undercutting Democratic positions. He's where he belongs, chairing the corporately-owned DLC (Lieberman's old position) and with his endorsements, warning us, albeit inadvertently, of which candidates are unfit to be elected. It's time for progressives to send a message to Democratic power players Inside the Beltway that it's our party at least as much as theirs. As citizens we owe it to our country and our families to look into what the candidates-- regardless of party affiliation-- stand for. A Mary Landrieu has less in common with progressives like Jack Reed, Sheldon Whitehouse, Ben Cardin, Ted Kennedy, Barbara Boxer, Bernie Sanders, Barack Obama, even Hillary Clinton, than she does with utterly contemptible corporate shills like Bob Corker, John Warner, George Voinovich, Norm Coleman, Susan Coleman, Ted Stevens, Gordon Smith, John McCain and other right wingers the Republican media tries to pass off as "moderate."

After the primaries it's usually too late to cure what ails the Democratic Party. I know I brought this up yesterday, but it can't be said enough, if you want progressive Democrats in office, now is the time, when candidate selection is being sorted out, to get into the game. After February it won't matter who you want to win in Maryland's 4th CD. The next member will have been chosen. It will either be a sterling progressive activist or Harold Ford's corrupt, hack reactionary incumbent, Al Wynn. In Illinois' 14th congressional district the Democrat to challenge Denny Hastert, or whatever clone of his the Republicans replace him with, will either be an independent-minded working class progressive, John Laesch, or some puppet of the Inside-the-Beltway interests. Angie Paccione (CO-04) and Victoria Wulsin (OH-02) face similar challenges before they can face, respectively, far right extremists Marilyn Musgrave and Mean Jean Schmidt. Now's the time we can act, not after the primaries. In November it will be too late. Picking between Al Wynn and a Republican or between Marilyn Musgrave and a spin-off of the Salazar machine, leaves progressives no choice. Please consider acting now.