Stop it.
It is counter-productive and it wont work.
First, there is nobody who has the political muscle to get away with it. Name somebody willing to do it if you can. You can't. Everybody with an inkling of common sense knows that talking about it just talk. Nobody is going to do it. Nobody is willing to do it. Nobody could get away with it if they tried. So forget it. Quit thinking about it because all you are doing is entertaining a fantasy.
Second, even if there were someone willing and able to do it, it wont work. You wont be able to find, in the modern history of American politics, a case where an incumbent president was challenged for his parties nomination, the challenger won it, and then went on to win the general election. It had never happened and it wont happen anytime soon. But here's another factoid you might consider: Every time the incumbent president has been challenged, his party has gone on to defeat in the general. That happened to Truman in '52, Ford in '76 and LBJ in '68, and Carter in '80. And George H.W. Bush in '92. So the odds are heavily against you. A primary challenge will result in a Republican President. Probably Perry. Bank on it.
Third, face up to some difficult news: We are going to sink or tread water with Barack Obama. Face it. Its Obama or bust. Nobody likes to hear that because this has been the most politically feckless Administration since Jimmy Carter. We've possibly never seen such an astounding turn of fortune in modern political history as we've seen in the past two and a half years. We've gone from "permanent majority" to "can we hold on" in what seems like a fortnight.
If Obama goes down, rest assured...we're all going down. It will be a presidential election year. There is no feasible way we will be able to get our voters to the polls in sufficient numbers by simply focusing on Congressional and statehouse races. The presidency is on the line. This is for all the marbles. You'll be hard pressed to find a case where the incumbent president went down to defeat but his party won Congress. It doesn't happen and it wont happen next year. Face it. As much as it sucks a big pair of salty Texas longhorn balls, we are either going to survive or go down with Obama. It sucks. Live with it.
Finally, what are you, and by you I mean you who keep calling for primary challenges, to do? I suggest this: You need to hold your nose, suck in your pride and your principles, and just do your best to get Mr. Compromise re-elected. Because that is the only way we are going to get the House back and at least get somebody in a position to push back against his moderate Republican agenda. Or, at the minimum, stop the successful push being carried by the GOP. Even if we can squeak him back in, we may lose the Senate. So all our marbles are on getting him re-elected to so we can snatch back enough of these northeast and midwestern seats Obama carried last time to get a slim Democratic majority in the House. Hell, we may be able to get enough to expand the Progressive Caucus and get a strong House sans blue dogs.
So stop reacting based on how you feel about Mr. Rudderless Leadership-in-Chief. He's going to do what him and his incompetent advisers think works, no matter how stupid that seems to be. The only influence we can have on that is to continue to bash him for doing stupid shit and make a lot of noise about their fuck-ups. Hopefully somebody with some good sense with get them to try a new direction. Lord knows the current one is a political disaster. You are absolutely right to feel like cursing the heavens over the leadership we've been getting from our party leader.
This whole situation fucking sucks.
But in the end, he's all we've got. Lets try and get him straightened out as best we can so we can at least hold back another tsunami.
Sun Sep 04, 2011 at 4:20 AM PT: Excellent discussion. And almost no pie fighting. You all must be learning how to do this! Thanks to you all for the sharp, interesting, challenging discussion.
My responses are here.