It looks like Mark Warner is going to find a spot in Senate Democratic leadership. The majority of Congressional Democrats showed themselves to be suicidally incompetent in the last election. Listening to the corporate wing of the Democratic Party means that, unless you are in the deepest blue part of the country, you lose. When austerity obsessed candidates run, even deep blue starts looking purple.
Lets face facts, there is no place for progressives in the modern Democratic Party. Corporate money is what fills the party coffers, and to get it Democrats are willing to be Republican lite. Unfortunately, Republican lite loses elections. Corporate Democrats are drawn to losing campaign strategies like a moth to a flame.
Right now, the progressive movement is wedded to the Democratic Party by two things. First, much of the Republican Party seems B*tsh*t insane. When you are opposing dangerous extremists, any viable candidate is going to look good. Well guess what, THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY CONSIDERS US DANGEROUS EXTREMISTS! Not the Republicans. Sure Tea Party members have held ARMED political rallies and called for THE OVERTHROW OF THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, but hell those pesky liberals are talking about inequality!
We are being held in place in the Democratic Party by the hope that 2016 will be a good election year. Hilary's polling looks good, for now, and the Republicans have a number of senators up for election in 2016. All well and good. To keep the madmen in the Republican Party from harming our families and communities, Progressives are willing to hold their nose, vote for those they don't like, and hope to sort things out later.
And if the Democrats don't win? Does anyone really think that, if Republicans control the presidency and both houses of Congress, they won't kill the filibuster and render the opposition powerless? What point is there for Progressives to remain in the Democratic Party? If every Democratic win means embracing an electoral strategy that insures the loss of two other seats?
We should send a clear message to the leadership of the Party. Lose in 2016 and face a third party on the left. Yes, this would split the liberal vote, and turn the country over to the Republicans. Avoiding this outcome as why many Progressives are still in the Democratic Party. Once the Republicans are firmly in control, this concern no longer remains an issue. If that comes to pass, no reason exists to give legitimacy to a Democratic Party that will have become, in essence, a safe official opposition party in a one party state.
10:37 AM PT: Just to clarify. I believe that the only thing that will reform the Democratic Party is the prospect of a revolt from the left. You may call me non-helpful, but realize that I'm suggesting forming a third party after the election of 2016. If Democrats suffer another dubbing in 2016, like we suffered in 2014, then it doesn't seem that there will be much of an effective party left for people to fight about.
11:25 AM PT: A description of elections in Texas under the election laws passed in 1903:
Each polling place used four ballot boxes. At the start of the day, votes would be placed in box one. An hour later, box one would be removed from the polling place and votes placed in box two. The election judges would then open box number one at some offsite location, count the ballots, and place the counted ballots in box number three. The next hour box number two was brought to the election judges and box number one returned to the polling place and so on throughout the day. During the box exchange, the law required those returning the now empty box to inform precinct workers how many ballots had been found in the prior box. All spoiled or unused ballots were to be placed in box four. Instead of a list of voters added to as the day went on, voters would be checked off of a list of poll tax payers. In effect, the law called for the removal of ballot boxes during the election, their opening, sorting and placement into a master ballot box. Members of the public unaware of this procedure saw their votes go into a single ballot box and a single ballot box opened and counted at the elections conclusion.
One party has shown its willingness to use fraud, voter suppression, poll taxes (voter ID laws) and outright fear to win elections. Not only is it possible for a party to seize power and insure that nobody can challenge them, it has happened before in the American South. If the other party is willing to allow such tactics without objection, maybe that party is part of the problem.
11:57 AM PT: A thought, for the last 10, living in three different locations in the Deep South, there have been no Democrats on the ballot for anything but statewide races. Nobody for school board, nobody for state legislature, hell not even anyone for congress! I have a fairly good idea of what would happen to the career of anyone who tried to run.
If a party recruits zero candidates because people are literally afraid to run under its banner - perhaps the time has come for a different party. It certainly isn't going to be taking any votes from, non-existent, Democrats around here.