The Future of the Democratic Party

Recently, Spacedark did me the service of posting a piece of an email I wrote not long ago regarding my concern that too many progressives were toying with the concept of withholding their allegiance from the Dems. The quote was fine, as far as it went, but I'd like to provide you the whole context. Note the parts of this that discuss Attorney General designate Gonzales are a response to an earlier post by Prodigal Son. Here is my whole comment, word for word.

"First, I think it goes without saying that all of us contributed to the past campaign in large measure because of a certain amount of anger. That anger is a good thing, because it is justified and helps fuel our commitment. The question is whether it is more important to be angry for its own sake or to commit ourselves to change. Anger and self-righteousness are certainly easier. Change in a democracy is a long process that requires us frequently to make common cause with others who wish to help, even though we may not be in complete agreement. Now, let's be clear. If the Democratic Party as we know it today did not exist, we would be forced to create it. Fortunately, there is no need to reinvent the wheel. There are flaws in our party, as there are in every human organization. That is not a reason to jump ship. After all, if there were a third party, who would join it? Only truly pure liberals? What does that mean? I'm aware of several "liberal" parties that already exist and are available to join, but none of them has ever won a national election, nor come close. Why don't they unify? Mostly because each of them is too interested in their particular brand of philosophical purity to dilute it with others. Each lives under the illusion that they can convince large numbers of others to join them. Anyway, even if all Democrats and other progressives joined a new party, it would only constitute the Democratic Party by another name. But don't believe me. Try listening to none other than Howard Dean, who said the following just last month (the highlights are mine; the full text is available at http://www.democracyforamerica.com/).

CLICK HERE to read the rest . . .