Here is the image pair from two Valentine's Day web posts:
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| Down With Tyrany - this item |
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| Digby - this item |
One not knowing for certain might presume somebody did some Photoshopping.
Down With Tyranny has its posts indexed at the end of each, see, e.g., posts indexed per "The Republican Wing of the Demcoratic Party." The authors there name names. Too many names, a list that needs primary thining, ASAP.
DWT, here:
Why The Cult Of Republican-Lite Doesn't Work-- Case Studies In Florida
Republicans are campaigning too-- and with the DCCC as an opponent, you'd think the odds would be stacked in their favor. Problem for the GOP, though is that the NRCC is almost as inept and incompetent as the DCCC. Almost. The letter below didn't come from the NRCC, it came from the campaign of Scott Sturgill, the lead dog among the 4 Republicans who would like to take on wretched freshman Blue Dog Stephanie Murphy in the suburbs north of Orlando. [...]
The NRCC, desperate for candidates nationally, has included Sturgill in their Young Guns program, one off only 3 in Florida, freezing out state Rep. Mike Miller (who's raised nearly as much money as Sturgill) as well as Vennia Francois and Judson Sapp. [...] In his kick-off statement, Miller, generally considered a far right loon, said "This district should no longer be represented by someone whose vote is controlled by Nancy Pelosi and the ultra-left." Odd thing to say about one of the most conservative Blue Dog Dems in Congress? Not at all... if you live in Republican fantasy-land.
In fact, yesterday, I got the same kind of malarky from Sturgill's campaign:
Hey, Howard--
I appreciate you taking a minute to read my email. I wanted to ask you… do you know Scott Sturgill?
Scott’s a true conservative champion running for Congress in Florida, and he could really use your help.
His opponent, Stephanie Murphy, is about as liberal as it gets: she supports Obamacare, sanctuary cities, and-- this is the worst part for me-- abortion after the unborn child is more than twenty (20) weeks old and can feel pain.
The good news is that even with her liberal pal Hillary Clinton on the ballot driving up Democrat turnout in Florida, Murphy was only able to eek out a win with 51.5% of the vote. This year, if conservatives like you and me stand up and make our voices heard, we can send her packing and put a true conservative like Scott in that seat. [...]
I’m proud to call Scott Sturgill a friend, and I know he’ll make a fantastic congressman. Unlike Stephanie Murphy, he takes a strong stand against wasteful spending and demands that politicians must adhere to the same rules as everyone else. He’s not a career politician, and he’s only going to Congress because he’s sick and tired of feeling sick and tired-- and at some point you’ve got to stand up and fix it yourself.
These are some very conventional Republican talking points that they send to their moron followers everywhere in the country. And they underscores something that many establishment Democrats simply do not understand. The GOP will unleash their trip against any Democrat no matter how they actually vote. They’re going to say the same things about you, regardless. Stephanie Murphy, like I said, is about as right-wing as a Democrat can be. ProgressivePunch rates her a solid "F," not even close. [...] In fact, the only Democrats who vote against progressive proposals more frequently than her are Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Henry Cuellar (TX) and Collin Peterson (MN). When Ryan and McCarthy want to call one of their horrifying bills "bipartisan," they go right to Stephanie Murphy. That's not going to help her with the Koch brothers-financed attack machine goes into action. It may help her-- and eventually it will for sure-- turning off base Democratic voters, once they figure out how she votes.
Another clueless Blue Dog from the area, former Congresswoman Suzanne Kosmas, represented chunks of what is now district. She fretted over every vote, trying not to give the Republicans anything that they could use against her, and then they ran $2 million of ads against her for destroying Medicare. She never saw it coming. And she lost her seat to crackpot teabagger Sandy Adams. Republicans though she was a Pelosi-clone liberal and were willing to vote for the crazy teabagger instead of the conservative Democrat. And progressives in the 2010 midterm election just stayed away from the polls, saying too themselves, "why should I vote for this drunken Republican-lite turd?" (Yeah, she was all that). And she lost-- in a 60-40% landslide-- to a silly extremist, who held the seat for one term, just as Kosmas had.
The DCCC wastes its time recruiting these Blue Dogs and New Dems from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party and they waste their money supporting them. They kill momentum for the kind of legislation that would make the Democratic Party popular (instead of--barely-- the lesser of two evils) and if they're in swing districts they lose anyway, once voters figure out how terrible they are.
If you are getting a sense that the author is frustrated, perhaps that is correct. See the DevCrabgrass sidebar, "MISSION STATEMENT OF THIS BLOG." All the sentiments in that DWT post I share, so quoting at length with actual examples sets the story better than writing on my own would. Moving on - Digby:
It was inevitable that what's left of the Blue Dogs would end up pulling their punches when it comes to Trump:
Moderate House Democrats are launching a new effort to highlight Russian election interference — while not directly tying the issue to President Donald Trump in a way that could alienate crucial swing voters in November.
The push by the Blue Dog Coalition — a group of 18 center-left House Democrats — comes as Democrats have struggled to determine their messaging on the Trump-Russia investigations ahead of the midterm elections. [...]
Liberal Democrats have been happy to talk up the Trump campaign’s potential collusion with Russia in 2016, going so far as to call for his impeachment and forcing impeachment-related votes on the floor. Democratic megadonor Tom Steyer continues to pressure lawmakers to back his multimillion dollar campaign calling for Trump’s impeachment.
But the aggressive progressive push has put centrist Democrats in an awkward spot. They too think the Russia investigation deserves attention, particularly with the looming midterm implications, but worry that tying it too closely to Trump will politicize the issue in a way that will drive away critical voters.
Democratic leaders are also wary of how much to highlight the Russia investigation in the months before the midterms.
This tracks nicely with news from yesterday that "strategists" are warning Democrats not to talk about Trump and instead concentrate on issues that people really care about. Those ladies of the Resistance should just shut up and fill envelopes. They don't know what they're doing. [...]
One would think that a group that fashions itself as national security and fiscal hawks would go hard after the miscreant in the White House on just those issues. He is a disaster on national security and has just hiked the deficit by the trillions. But no. Instead they feel the need to shy away from criticizing the president, just like their cowardly GOP cohorts.
It makes you think that maybe they aren't all that sincere about their "issues" and instead just want to align themselves with Republicans, no matter what they do, without having to say so.
Just like their spiritual twins The Tea party and the Freedom Caucus, that cowardly inability to stand for anything, even their own alleged principles, is leading them inexorably to Trumpism.
If you follow Digby's last link, to a Real Clear Politics, Feb 13 post, you will find which "ladies of the Resistance" make the item's header banner photo, the item, without too extensive an excerpt stating:
The memo comes as Democrats have sought to harness the anti-Trump fervor among their base while crafting a longer-term message to regain voters it lost in the last presidential election. While Trump has energized the opposition more effectively than Democratic leaders could, the party's path to majorities in the House and Senate includes districts and states the president won. And while some fundamentals still favor Democrats ahead of the midterms, the memo warns that the party is losing focus, and could give up those advantages by focusing too much on Trump and not enough on its own message.
[...] The memo argues that majorities of voters share Democrats' concerns that the new tax bill and Trump's economic policies will enrich the wealthy and big corporations while hurting the middle class, but it notes that the party's related messaging isn't penetrating. "When voters have heard messages from both Democrats and Republicans on the tax bill, Democrats have won. Unfortunately, that debate has been relatively one-sided recently and voters have not heard nearly as much from Democrats," reads the memo.
Republican groups, meanwhile, have shown they are prepared to spend what it takes to improve public support for the tax law, which the GOP touts as a key accomplishment. The Koch brothers, for example, announced last month they plan to spend $20 million promoting the tax overhaul as part of a $400 million investment in the midterm campaigns.
That Republican tax dog don't hunt. But it has to be hammered home over the noise that this is so. Rob Porter will fade as news, and a progressive [Feel the Bern] agenda, hammered home by repeating as Bernie did, will resonate and win. Pelosi and Wasserman Schultz unfortunately do not have that fire in their bellies. Pelosi's portfolio income likely will benefit from the Ryan-Trump tax monstrosity, and Pelosi is no deficit hawk to argue the other side of tax and spend.
Progressives can win. Blue dogs are Republican lite, and the Republicans always will vote for real Republicans.
Only dunces would say the election will be about Trump. It might win and include that focus, but not if it is mainly focused on clucking over the Trump persona and personalities. The winning narrative must, instead, focus on how the Republicans, [with blue dog aid and acquiescence] are fucking over the 90%. Never mind Romney's 47%, it's a bigger pool of disadvantaged citizens than the lowest 47% economically. It's Iron Workers like Randy Bryce in WI CD1; or an active campaigner like Leah Phifer in MN CD8, or a bilingual and passionate Central Valley Ricardo Franco running in CA CD22. It is not an election won via the Schumer/Ossoff conjecture nor by pushing nationwiide an image tuned for affluent Wasserman Schultz district denizens, nor one honed for the Pelosi family which is rolling in money. The banner image mentioned earlier, with the little monopoly man with the money bag background, and those two foregrounders is ironic, to characterize it gently.
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| RCP image |