A Challenge To Open Left
I wrote that first "Bush Dog" post not really expecting it to go as far as it did and unfortunately I've had too much on my plate to take part in the discussion that's been sparked because of it. Now I've got a few minutes and more importantly I still believe that I'm right.
As Open Left continues their "Bush Dog" charade my earlier concerns are growing. It's gotten to the point that I now approach everything that they say with the same degree of skepticism I would if it had came from the Bush Administration. Worse, this fighting amongst ourselves has distracted us to the point where we've forgotten that the members of the Bush Administration, not moderate Democrats, are the source of these problems. On this note I'd like to issue a challenge to the administrators and users of Open Left, but first I'd like to quickly run through some of my concerns.
Despite what you think Open Left members, the burden of this falls on you. You're going up against people that were voted in by their constituents and yet the assumption on your part has been that it's those constituents that must play defense on this. This logic is fundamentally flawed. You're the prosecution, the burden of proof falls on you. Before you created a list of Reps. that you labeled "Bush Dogs" it was on your hands to make sure the research was done. Instead you've published your conclusions and demanded that people prove you wrong.
Both Space and Wilson have changed their positions on Iraq since the vote you've cited, even basic research would have told you that much. As for FISA I know Wilson is eager to reconsider it when the act expires. But instead of approaching this rationally and finding out just where things stand you've opted to be impulsive and reckless, perhaps enough so that you've done more damage to your cause than good.
You've also thrown around poll numbers like they are irrefutable proof that your in the right. If these poll numbers are as accurate as you seem to claim they are then why do we even have elections? Why don't we just poll 10% of the people in an area and save ourselves some cash?
And last but not least, you've mislead people. I've heard several times that this is just research and that you aren't planning on trying to find primary challenges to these people. Yet the most recent Bush Dog post (promoted by Chris Bowers" contains the following:
One obvious conclusion from all the above is that generically the best prospects for running primary challenges, if it comes to that, are against the 6 newbies Bush Dogs in safe districts: Wilson (OH-06), Salazar (CO-03), Cuellar (TX-28), Costa (CA-20), Boren (OK-02), Lipinski (IL-03).
These six are the safest seats from a partisan perspective, but the least entrenched officeholders, from a primary potential perspective.
Not planning on primary challenges? For some reason I'm not convinced.
Now the challenge itself:
Are you all prepared to try to continue this campaign in it's current form? Are you willing to stake your reputations on the fact that your campaign is both justified and the right path to your goal?
Consider it thoroughly because this could be your last chance for second thoughts before your plan goes too far to turn back. Are you prepared for the consequences that may result from it? I'm not asking you to sit around and pretend your happy about the votes of the Representatives, I'm just asking you to consider other options first.
In any case I'm done with this waste of time.
5 comments:
I think the real meat of this "argument" is that you have completely missed the point of the Bush Dog campaign.
No "judgement" have been passed. The point of the campaign seems (to me) to be: Collect the names of those who voted poorly an three key votes (key votes as in 'key to Democratic values), profile the members, and then confront them on their votes.
This has been for me one of the most galvanizing endeavors I have seen from the blogs. It gives us a chance to hold our representatives (and by "our" I mean any single representative who holds an office with a "D" in front of their name) accountable for four votes that display a complete lack of leadership and integrity.
In the midst of this petty argument you have caused at least the readers of your blog to lose sight of what is important here. These people voted for War, More War, Burying Habeas Corpus, and extending even more power to a DOJ and AG who have shown us that they cannot be trusted.
I don't know if you are just trying to get traffic to your blog (better ways to do it, man) or if you really are so enamored by a couple of your local reps that you are ignoring a larger, more troubling picture of what is happening in this county.
These votes mean everything, in the sense of what makes us America. I believe it is completely reasonable to at least ask each rep who voted poorly in these instances why they did so.
Your entire argument against the campaign (both in post and in comments) seems to be off the mark on what Open Left is trying to do (have you read the description of the campaign, or did you just start typing because your favorite rep was on the list?).
If they voted for more war, or for the flaying of our civil liberties, they all of America an explanation. If they did it to keep the office, maybe we can help them vote more responsibly and still keep the office (could be as simple as connecting them with some strong funding), if they voted for these things because they feel it is what is best for America, then they render themselves irrelevant to the progressive cause, and should be replaced.
It's not rocket science, it's Democracy.
Jason - you make some reasonable points re: you believe the point of the Open Left list is about the votes on the war.
Here's what your missing:
Over, and over, and over, during the run up to the 11/06 elections, everyone - EVERYONE, Bush included, excepted Ohio and a couple of other states from being places in which Iraq was a top issue for the elections.
Jobs, the economy, education, health care, poverty. Those are the issues that voters used when they assessed who would represent their interests.
This isn't to say that how a candidate would vote on Iraq, or has voted on Iraq, isn't important to Ohioans. But it wasn't the #1 issue.
Do you have numbers that show that among Ohioans, that's changed? Because I haven't.
And so long as that's the case, for other folks, based outside Ohio, to try and force feed Ohioans to MAKE Iraq the number one issue? Feels as repulsive as Bush's dictates.
I'm not from here originally, it's a funky state - no doubt about it.
But Ohioans know what the problems are in Ohio. Are you really telling Ohio's voters to put aside their need for jobs, a better economy, better education, a decrease in the number of residents living in poverty or health care to forget about all those day to day needs and just judge their elected officials on the single issue of Iraq?
You may say, well - Iraq impacts everything else.
Yeah, there's value to that. But this is OHIO - jobs, the economy, education, health care and poverty have been issue for more than a decade, in some cases, more than two decades.
You all come here, live here, suffer here as some Ohioans do - regardless of Iraq - and then tell those folks to forget about jobs, economy, education, health care and poverty.
Those who espouse what you do need to stop missing the point of what David's pointed out and supplanting it with what you see as the more nationwide issue.
Ohio is Ohio - there's just no way around it. And Iraq is not the #1 issue for its voters. It never has been.
Please - prove me wrong.
I'm not going to weigh in on which is the "most important" issue to Ohioans, but I would point out that at the beginning of the month, just about 50% of Ohioans surveyed said that we should get out of Iraq ASAP (while 40% said we should "fight on." (see the poll at: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_2008__1/state_toplines/ohio_toplines_august_8_2007 and look at question 14.)
Anyway, the point of this effort is NOT to tell Ohioans anything about what should or shouldn't be important issues _in Ohio_. It is to call attention to the democrats who are enabling Bush, et al. in this ridiculous and possibly criminal enterprise called the Iraq war. They should be held accountable for their votes, and if their constituents want to send them back to Washington anyway... well, as Jason said, that's democracy.
To defend anyone without asking why they voted the way they did is what leads to misinformed (and therefore poor) voting.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with American's asking any representative, from their state or not, why they voted the way they did, and why they may or may not do the same in the future.
To attempt to quell a campaign such as this "Bush Dog" thing is akin to trying to deter voters.
More dialog is what this country needs, and David, whoever you are, you are more intent on defending a representative then letting your representative defend his/her own votes and positions.
And that is how we ended up with George Bush as president.
Some things we can't compromise on, regardless of how cool you might think your representative is.
Understand what your bitching about before you start ta' bitchin', brah. You made a fool of yourself here. Big time.
I'm not saying we should blindly support Wilson's votes. I'm saying that:
1.) Give him a chance to fix his mistake while applying gentle pressure on him.
2.) It's wrong to judge a Rep. by such a small fraction of his record.
Personally I don't like FISA but I think the Bush Dog campaign is way too broad and premature.
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