It's hard not to view this as a coup of the right, however you slice it.
Between the Blue Dog Democrats on the one hand, and the now-mainstream Republicans on the other, we have what are essentially The Party of Reagan and the Party of Pinochet.
The Blue Dog/Reagan analogy isn't 100%. Obama would never use the "welfare queen" language (Rahm? Maybe). Reagan wouldn't let any of his staff call fellow party members "f**kin' retarded." Reagan was bold, radical, and unapologetic about his cowboy agenda and love-affair with Wall Street. He didn't blame the other party for his own policies that stole from the poor and gave to the rich. He wouldn't have done jack for Lily Ledbetter, or even given lip service to HCR, "green" anything, unions, DOMA, DADT, or job stimulus. He didn't make a pretense of populism, he didn't triangulate, and got much of his agenda through with a minority in Congress, which made him look like a winner, not a "governing is hard" guy. And, like most Republicans since Eisenhower, Reagan's focus was mainly on gleefully making a mess, not cleaning one up.
Another difference is a predictable IOKIYAR double-standard. That is, the creeps with whom Reagan surrounded himself actually allowed him to transfer the guilt for the evils of his administration. Pretty sure Obama will be held accountable for his choice of advisors and close appointees.
That said, on one side, we have a Stupak Amendment, free-trade, war-happy, "fiscal discipline" party headed by guys who, despite fine rhetoric, don't demand "fiscal discipline" from the most egregious offenders--banks, the Pentagon, the State Department, or overfat recipients of "entitlements" (e.g., Big Ag).
We have folks who find torture unseemly, but don't mind outsourcing that dirty work, and wouldn't dream of prosecuting anyone else for doing it. We have guys who talk up civil rights but hold prisoners indefinitely, keep ubiquitous spy networks in place and shrug off much of any oversight for them. They talk up peace and reducing spending, but wage expensive wars against "terrorists" in countries that just happen to be major routes for gas/oil and drugs. In theory they want to help "regular" people, but in practice appear to help big corporations and the rich. Did I mention their leader is a Great Communicator?
On the other side, indeed, we have a Pinochet party. This crowd is baldly, brazenly fascistic. They're loud and proud about torture and rendition. They love wars--the less-justified, the better. They speak openly of kidnapping, torturing and murdering "ter'rists"--foreign or domestic--who disagree with them.
They don't mind stealing or fixing elections. They believe in unfettered corporate rule, even if it bankrupts the treasury, corrupts the entire political system, wrecks the environment, poisons your food, water, and air, overtakes your schools, forces you to worship their God, takes your home, and forfeits your job to anyone (onshore or off) willing to work for a pittance under slave conditions.
They won't bother setting up "Black Sites" in Latvia--they'd pay Halliburton to set them up outside major American cities. They'd be happy to cede public control to Blackwater/Xe or any other Mugabe-flunky outfit offering a good price. Human rights? Civil rights? Only for Party members in good standing. And people willing to mindlessly worship Trailer Evita.
Given this choice, our hands really do seem to be tied. Naturally mainline Democrats will get angry and scared when we don't back up the imperfect, gradualist, corporatist, anti-choice but decisively-not-Pinochet Democrats. Naturally they'll ask us to reign in our attacks on the only party between ourselves and the Praetorian Guard. Naturally they'll beg us to stop running down our president who, though far from an economic FDR or LBJ, does not pass for Mussolini anywhere in the world.
But also given this choice, of course liberals who worked their asses off to get Obama elected will be apoplectic that a Democratic majority and presidency, in practice, looks like Reagan minus the bravado. Of course they're pissed off that, after a brutal battle to not have Hillary, "change" looks like the Clinton years minus the prosperity. Of course they're cynical and bitter that 12 years of Friedmanism proved its essential folly, but now, from Democrats, we're looking at--more Friedmanism.
The question is, what do we do now? Step up the infighting? Step up the pressure from the left? Start using "primary" language? Take what we can get and cede the field to the Reagan Democrats, because the alternative is so apocalyptic?
Whatever strategy you endorse (and you may push for different tactics depending on the proximity of elections), have some fucking compassion for your fellow Dems. Reagan vs. Pinochet is a shitty choice, especially to people who really believe it didn't and doesn't have to come down to this right wing theater of good cop/bad cop.
It remains that if the jackboots start stomping, we the people will be on the same side again right quick. The accusation of "collaboration" with the US forces of Pinochet--either through weakness, constant, duplicitous sashaying to the right, or through co-signing a petition--aren't going to amount to much when it's too late.
Better we find ways, as regular citizens, to have each others' backs, rather than wasting a lot of energy casting blame on fellow non-DC Dems. And for every criticism you level at a DC Democrat ("progressive" or "centrist"), level twenty at Republicans, and remind people exactly what they are about.
The Party of Pinochet smells blood in the water, and they're eager to let the new SCROTUS (Supreme Court Republicans of the US) ruling sweep them back into power.
Whatever else we do, let's find ways to unite as neighbors, friends, bloggers, and citizens to fight that horror, and to help the Democrats in power to do the same.