Why Joe Must Go

Chris Bowers at MyDD (by way of Atrios) says it much better than I can:

As I talked to people in the [Lamont] campaign, who were a healthy mix of political professionals and newly energized activists, one theme kept coming up in my head. This campaign is an accountability moment. For all of the Democrats over the past fifteen years and more who have helped facilitate negative narratives about our party, this is their moment of accountability. For all of the Democrats over the past six years who have helped facilitate the Bush agenda, this is their moment of accountability. For all of the party leaders over the past couple of decades who have told activists that they need to temper their desires, support a politics of triangulation, and fall in line behind candidates, policies and strategies that do not exactly fulfill the hopes and dreams of the activist base, then this is their moment of accountability. The Ned Lamont campaign is the moment where those Democrats and those leaders are forced to be accountable for those actions. Now, they will have to answer to the voters and to the activists who make their positions possible.

I have been saying this, albeit less well, for the past month or so. The Democratic establishment has taken it for granted that they can safely ignore the progressive base and netroots, except to hit us up for money or GOTV. In their comfortable little minds, they have never paid any price for this neglect; they actually believe that they lost the last three congressional elections because they paid too much attention to Those Crazy MoveOn/Michael Moore Hippies, and scared off the Real Americans whose approval they so desperately crave.

The reality is that the Democrats don't lose because they're too shrill and confrontational, but because they're not shrill and confrontational enough. They caved on the Iraq war, they caved on the bankruptcy bill, they caved on Schiavo, they caved on Roberts, they caved on Alito. Sure, they might have lost anyway, but they never even made the attempt. There are far too many Democrats who choose Republican approval and corporate donors over the progressive principles of their party. We need to send them the message that the netroots are a force to be reckoned with, and that they can no longer win without us. We need to get rid of Joe so that the Democrats realize that we matter more than the corporations do.