I'm a sports fan, so I'm going to use a sports metaphor. "Take it one game at a time." So with that huge caveat in place, let me say, I'm a total geek, so I'm going to use a chess metaphor. "Anticipation is good preparation".
What will a series of netroots victories in 2006 mean for the establishment/anti-establishment conflict within the Democratic party?
Okay, I know I'm probably way behind the curve here, but I just finished reading "Crashing The Gate". I read it in about 8 hours straight, I found it so engaging. Apparently, I have been staggeringly naive about the (not so) pragmatic machinations of a Democratic party which, for better or worse, I've somewhat reflexively supported my whole life.
So I've just started thinking about the insider->outsider shift within the party, and wondering about the "long now" as it applies to us.
Will the beltway consultants be kept suckling at the teat? Will they be completely deposed, as they should have been long ago? Or will they adapt and start caring about winning instead of collecting bigass commissions off our dime? Or are we already working together in better fashion than 2004?
What would a 2006 victory mean for us in terms of the coming 2008 primary battle? Can "we" defeat the Hillary with some more viable anti-Hillary (apologies to Hil supporters)? Is a big knock-down dragout between netroots and beltway a good thing, or will it telegraphed as weakness for the party as a whole?
Dean is building a new, powerful party machine, a la Huey Long, but a national one. I think its a great. Can he become similar type of "kingmaker" and obtain enough leverage to topple or co-opt the weak, big donor losers in D.C.?
I realize these questions are of the looking-glass variety, and perhaps not worth considering when we're less than 2 months from an election. But still, I find myself asking - are we really getting as much as possible from our investments of time and money in this party, when its still controlled by a nexus of fatcats and triangulating wimps?