Let's Stop Agreeing: The Republican Victory of 2014

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday November 05, 2014 · 7:32 AM PST

2014/11/05 · 07:32

What strikes me about how the Democrats have evolved over the last six years, is just how cowardly, how easy to disillusion, how easy to discourage we've become, and just how little will we have to treat Republicans like the Bullies they are, instead of trying to reason with everybody else to reject them. The truth of the matter is, there is no secret logic out there we could use to get Republicans off our backs, to give ourselves the opportunity to reason with Americans. Their tactics were built on social engineering and social dominance, not some competing mode of logic. In that lies their strength. In that lies their weakness.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday June 30, 2014 · 1:59 PM PDT

2014/06/30 · 13:59

I keep on hearing the same refrain: they're no different. I keep on seeing things go further to the right when they take over, further than if we were in charge.

Truth is, giving up is what gives the right it's power. They don't quit applying pressure or voting for right-leaning candidates when they get confounded. Quite the opposite. But we do, and we expect our people to take it as punishment. We lament voting for the lesser of two evils.

Tell me: would you prefer voting for the greater evil that allowed the Hobby Lobby case and so many others to go the way they did?

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday May 21, 2014 · 1:05 PM PDT

2014/05/21 · 13:05

Show up at the polls not because you are enthusiastic, not because your choices are perfect, not because nobody has disappointed you, but because only by persistent political pressure from below will things change, and only by determining who wins in November can we avoid certain outcomes.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday November 03, 2013 · 11:25 AM PST

2013/11/03 · 11:25

This won't take long. Obama said, if you like your insurance policy, you can keep it. Was that the entire story? Was he simply making a promise out of the blue?

No. He was not. He was responding to something. Remember what Republicans and Tea Partiers were saying, what they're in fact still saying: that Obamacare is something closer to what the British have, the single-payer, government-mandated system. They're saying it's a takeover, rather than a massive expansion of the private markets.

That put the reassurance in a different light: He wasn't telling people that Obamacare wouldn't put an end to some kinds of policies. He was telling people that Obamacare would not end the insurance system as we knew it, and that most people would keep their policies, because they were worried because of the lies that the Republicans were spreading. That right there is the critical point. Obama was responding to conservative lies about the Affordable Care Act, so the meaning of "keep your policy" changes dramatically.

I think the best response to these accusations is to present these circumstances, and then ask another question right back: why is Obama the only person being held to account for perceived dishonesty. These people talked about Death Panels, alleged a government takeover that was completely unlike what was actually there! Why are they not held accountable for their lies? At worst, what the President was only a little untrue. What the Republicans have been saying from day one has been fundamentally dishonest, and it's time to stop playing this game on the defensive.

A Moment of Clarity: The Voting Rights Act Decision

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday June 25, 2013 · 3:12 PM PDT

2013/06/25 · 15:12

Today's decision tells us that the consequences for failing to deliberately and effectively compete for power in today's political environment reach far. We are far too fond of blaming ourselves as much as our opponents for such defeats. We should realize something simple: they want us to fail, they engineer our failure. Collapsing into mutual contempt only furthers the defeat, it doesn't prevent it.

They are not bothering to play fair. They are not bothering to treat us with respect, or to acknowledge common cause with us, even where it's justified. This modern Republican Party has been raised on an increasingly insular diet of propaganda that has these people thinking they are the saviors of American Democracy, even as they curtail the voting rights of millions in their quest for power.

They aren't shy about it. They want control. They will do what it takes to get it, and not just when they feel like it.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday June 06, 2013 · 9:05 AM PDT

2013/06/06 · 09:05

In my last entry, I argued about Bradley Manning's conduct. I guess some people just didn't register my chief objection. Manning never turned himself in, he was exposed by another person. He didn't walk into the FBI or Army Investigative or whatever headquarters and say "I'm here, and I did this."

I never argued that he should have been mistreated, but some have conflated mistreatment with the fury with which the Government's gone after them. Well, I'd say to him that it's far easier to disappear after leaking a few hundred secrets than when you leak a few hundred thousand. You can't do a document dump of that magnitude and not draw a whole lot of unwanted attention. You also can't really read through all you're going to release, and make sure it's stuff that SHOULD see the light of day.

If you want your source to remain secure, the secrets can only come out in dribbles and drabbles. Otherwise people will notice, and will look for them. If you really want the truth to come out in greater amounts, we need to change the law.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday June 04, 2013 · 12:41 PM PDT

2013/06/04 · 12:41

I don't admire what Bradley Manning did, but I don't like the things the Bush Administration did, either. In particular, I did not like what Karl Rove and Company did to Valerie Plame.

For political reasons, for the support of a war many on the right considered justified, they were willing to break the law, and then try and get away with it. Whether you consider right and wrong absolutes or not, the reality is, people have many different ideas about what is right and wrong.

People can and will justify many different things they do on the grounds that they believe it was right. They might justify blackmail on the grounds that the money was for a good cause. And perhaps it was. But if we accept that defense, because we sympathize with a person, what's to stop the next person, who has no such redeeming goal, from making the same defense? The law depends on consistency, and on provable tests of behavior. Bradley Manning, whatever you think about what he did, can be proved to have done it.

The law is about right and wrong, but right and wrong codified consistently to prevent behavior that, in general, we don't want. If we don't like the law, or its uses, then we need to seek out the political power necessary to change it, not simply defy it and expect no negative consequences.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday May 16, 2013 · 9:22 AM PDT

2013/05/16 · 09:22

I had a very conservative Civics teacher in high school, to say the least, and my hand ached from writing notes at the end of her classes. But she did me one favor for this liberal here: she opened my eyes to just how complex our government is, how it's really structured.

Make no mistake, Obama's election was an important step, a good step to recovering from the Bush years. But it was never enough, and it won't be enough in the coming years.

The American system of government is multitiered, multi-branched, and although the Presidency is certainly a bright, shining, attractive target, it can't be the only target we aim for in our political efforts. We have to elect more Democrats in all kinds of places, promote our politics on all kinds of levels, if we want the balance of power to change in real terms.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday April 24, 2013 · 9:04 AM PDT

2013/04/24 · 09:04

Why is the filibuster a problem? That's a question whose answer should start with the Republicans. I know some want to say that if we were more smashmouth about this, they wouldn't be a problem, so we bash Harry Reid for letting the Filibuster continue, and Obama for not having the political badassery to scare the Republicans out of it. Bring us LBJ or FDR, we say.

I won't argue against the idea that Harry Reid is wrong for continuing to hold on to naive hopes, and let the filibuster reform be delayed. But would it even be an issue without the Republican's deliberate strategical blockade of the Senate? No. It would be a hypothetical point.

Mitch McConnell and the Senate Republicans are the ones who have made such a response necessary, by abusing the Senate rules. This was a deliberate act on their part. We need to realize that however wimpy Harry Reid has been on the subject, he is, as problems go, a much smaller problem than the Republicans, and Obama smaller still.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday April 17, 2013 · 9:50 PM PDT

2013/04/17 · 21:50

This isn't a glass half-full, or glass half-empty exercise. Put simply, Most Republicans, if not all at times, are behind the filibusters. The provide, even in cases where Democrats are involved, the solid base for the numbers of people required to prevent debate from being ended. Without their united efforts, much of what we sought to pass would have have passed.

It is supremely annoying when Democrats joined with Republicans on filibusters, and forced things rightward. It was likely what got us looking feckless after 2008, so Republicans could win 2010.

But what you ought to realize is, this was a deliberate policy decision on Mitch McConnell's part, and he has boasted about that fact, and his clear goals are to divide the Democratic Party, and suppress its goals, tearing us apart and halting our agenda with his obstruction.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday April 17, 2013 · 11:59 AM PDT

2013/04/17 · 11:59

There are all these Democrats who are wailing and whining about having lost votes on Gun Control, and perhaps on Immigration reform. Frankly, I'm asking, what do you expect?

The same intransigence you talk about daily from the Republicans is what makes this possible. And why can they do this? Because quite simply, they're unconcerned about reconciling themselves with public opinion. There's no negotiated solution to this, at least not at this point.

What we need to do is face a basic fact: Republicans are willing to do a shitload of hard and nasty things in order to gain power, while we float around, trying to be idealists about things, hoping that Obama somehow twists the arms of every Republican, as if the Republicans of today were anything like the GOP of LBJ's time.

Stephen Daugherty

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday April 10, 2013 · 11:06 AM PDT

2013/04/10 · 11:06

I am a supporter of Obama, and I think he made a mistake by including Chained CPI in his budget. I'm a political realist, which means I don't go around thinking that savaging my President is a good idea, with Republicans the way they are.

So, what do we do? Get Sixteen. Get Sixteen what?

Get Sixteen Senators, at least, to openly say they will oppose voting for Cloture or voting on any budget that carries it. More would be even better, but this at least forces the President's hand on giving up, since it would require Democrats to vote for cloture, something we will tell them that we will punish.

Newer
Older

RSS

Let's Stop Agreeing: The Republican Victory of 2014

Hobby Lobby - This is Why You Vote for Democrats.

Deliberate Choices

What did the President mean by Keep your Insurance?

A Moment of Clarity: The Voting Rights Act Decision

Leaking Is Important, But Legal Disclosure More So

Bradley Manning Broke The Law

Gears of Government: Why Obama's Election Was Never Enough

In Order of Severity: A Philosophy about the Filibuster

The Republicans Are To Blame For ALL Filibusters

Hate Losing? The Hardnose Pursuit of Power

Get Sixteen And End Chained CPI