Honestly, it is a democrat issue. It’s but another laboratory learning experience illustration of why the framing of issues is so important.
Republicans have framed themselves as the party of small government since the days of Regan and may as far back as Goldwater. They can be obstructionist and shut the government down, because it is a natural extension of the small government paradigm.
Democrats on the other hand, have framed themselves or allowed themselves to be framed (not sure which it is) as proponents of government. A well-functioning government administration, with all departments doing their respective duties is essential to the modus operendi of democrat politics. Threatening to shut down government from a democrat point of view, is political suicide as they are operating outside of their core framework.
As a progressive, I find myself rather confused about how the progressive leadership actually intends to win anything in the foreseeable future.
For the last year, we’ve endured from the old-growth progressives the “resist” movement, the bury ‘em with factoids approach, the impeach agent orange approach. We have endured the Bernie Bro’s who think they are being virtuous by not voting for Felonious Nixonious Der Von Pantsuit.
And while the old-growth progressives have firmly established that the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave is a felonious scallywag, they don’t appear to have a solution to connect the 55-60% of the “didn’t get off my ass and vote party” to the values they claim to hold.
Making sure Sen. Tester has a landslide victory is far more important than impeaching Agent Orange. Replacing Greg Ganggreenforte with someone who believes government should help the depressed and downtrodden rise above their circumstances and be successful, that protecting the environment and increasing its resilience is a paramount issue, and that the ill shouldn’t have to chose between fancy feast and going to a doctor. The people with these beliefs are not going to get elected unless progressives begin connecting these values to the masses who didn’t go vote.
Progressives ought to absofukcinglutely own environmental protection issues. This should be a slam-dunk bread-and-butter issue. And yet what will we see. Likely a doubling down of factoids and other meaningless crap. Even if Agent Orange is impeached and stuffed in a empty barrel of 2,5,4T and dumped in the ocean, that event, by itself, does NOT translate into a win for progressives. Progressives MUST begin investing in the 20 plus year project that lays ahead to frame the issues in a meaningful way so voters can relate and connect with those values. Voters make decisions based on their personal values, NOT on the factoid of the day.
