Decius wrote:

Congressman Brian Baird (D-3 Vancouver, Washington) hosted a town hall tonight at Fort Vancouver High School. It was Baird’s first appearance in front of his constituents since reversing his position on the war. ALTHOUGH he’s been an adamant critic of the war—he voted against the war and the surge—he announced last week that he thinks the surge is working and he wants to give it time.

He spoke in a high school auditorium that was packed with at least 500 people who were overwhelmingly vocal in their opposition to Baird’s new stance. There were also protesters outside calling for Baird to resign.

I also talked to several people as they left the auditorium and asked them if they found Baird—who was there to explain his new position—to be persuasive. To a person, everyone shook their head “no way,” including Doris Holmes, active member of the 18th district Democrats, who said, “He lied. He’s toeing the Bush party line. I can’t believe he’s a Democrat.”

You can follow links through to Baird's editorial if you wish. The bottom line is that this sort of thinking simply isn't allowed in the Democratic party. "I have committed even before setting pen to paper the essential crime that contains all others unto itself."

Actually no, the bottom line is this sort of thing is par for the course among Democrats. It may make it damn hard to get elected or re-elected, but that is a different question.

As K puts it there are 5 issues the congressman's argument rest on, and I'll steal them for use here.

a) things are now changing for the better,
b) the soldiers want to finish the job; not letting them would be doing a disservice to their sacrifice,
c) we destroyed Iraq, so it's up to us to fix it,
d) leaving will, at least, embolden terrorists and at worst permit a complete fundamentalist takeover of the entire middle east,
e) we're substantially leaving anyway... all we're talking about is leaving some people there to help out.

So let's do some more breakdown on them. The issue that seems to have tipped the matter is A and is based on what Petreaus is saying and the recent NIE which seems to say things are getting better. Except it seems that Petreaus may have caused the NIE to come out better that originally written. That position is convoluted at best, and I am sure open to different interpretations by different people. The majority position is the war is a total botch, and a change in one area (the military position) won't make any difference at all, but on top of that, the comments that things on the ground are better are hard to balance with the morbidity and mortality numbers coming out of Iraq. Representative Baird may be seeing the sunnier side of the coming... [ Read More (0.5k in body) ]

Decius wrote:

Congressman Brian Baird (D-3 Vancouver, Washington) hosted a town hall tonight at Fort Vancouver High School. It was Baird’s first appearance in front of his constituents since reversing his position on the war. ALTHOUGH he’s been an adamant critic of the war—he voted against the war and the surge—he announced last week that he thinks the surge is working and he wants to give it time.

He spoke in a high school auditorium that was packed with at least 500 people who were overwhelmingly vocal in their opposition to Baird’s new stance. There were also protesters outside calling for Baird to resign.

I also talked to several people as they left the auditorium and asked them if they found Baird—who was there to explain his new position—to be persuasive. To a person, everyone shook their head “no way,” including Doris Holmes, active member of the 18th district Democrats, who said, “He lied. He’s toeing the Bush party line. I can’t believe he’s a Democrat.”

You can follow links through to Baird's editorial if you wish. The bottom line is that this sort of thinking simply isn't allowed in the Democratic party. "I have committed even before setting pen to paper the essential crime that contains all others unto itself."

So, it seems to me that having an opinion that falls outside the party lines is "... simply isn't allowed in the Democratic party."

This is the reason I don't follow party politics, it's time for this country to find a better way to represent ourselves, because this polarized party system breeds a dangerous hotbed of thinking among the American people. Republican v. Democrat / Conservative v. Liberal, these are dangerous distinctions today.

Personally, my views are mostly moderate, however they can sway from far left to far right, depending on the issue. I want to be able to find someone that clearly represents my views. Of course that's not going to work all the time, but I'd like to actually vote for the best person for the job, not the best party.

dc0de wrote:

So, it seems to me that having an opinion that falls outside the party lines is "... simply isn't allowed in the Democratic party."

I can't even begin to describe how far off the mark this is. While being pretty much uniformly against the war is one thing that the Democrats agree on, there is a very wide margin as to degree and reasoning. In this case Representative Baird has taken a position that if the military aspect of the surge really is working, the cost of not seeing what happens is very high. I can understand that position, and at the same time have a very different opinion about it.

That (to use a Reaganism) "Big Tent" is not just related to the war but on pretty much every level. If it's a point people can have a reasonable disagreement about, and you can explain why you're positioning on one side or the other, then there's room. Where Baird is having issues with his constituency is his explanation is pretty light, and if he wants to keep them he's going to have to win them over to his side. This is in severe contrast to say Joe Lieberman, whose explanations have been mealy-mouthed crap at best, who if the majority in congress were another vote or two in the Dems favor, would likely have been ejected.

This is the reason I don't follow party politics, it's time for this country to find a better way to represent ourselves, because this polarized party system breeds a dangerous hotbed of thinking among the American people. Republican v. Democrat / Conservative v. Liberal, these are dangerous distinctions today.

Personally, my views are mostly moderate, however they can sway from far left to far right, depending on the issue. I want to be able to find someone that clearly represents my views. Of course that's not going to work all the time, but I'd like to actually vote for the best person for the job, not the best party.

Personally, I'm a a fiscally conservative social liberal. That puts me squarely on the Democratic side, because the other side blows through money like it were going out of style and tries to shove its Cromwellian agenda down my throat.

As Edmund Burke said, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Staying out is doing nothing and why I watch these things.

Mike the Usurper wrote:

dc0de wrote:

So, it seems to me that having an opinion that falls outside the party lines is "... simply isn't allowed in the Democratic party."

I can't even begin to describe how far off the mark this is. While being pretty much uniformly against the war is one thing that the Democrats agree on, there is a very wide margin as to degree and reasoning.

Beyond which, it's quite clear that one of the biggest structural difficulties the Democratic Party faces -- contrary to the Republican Party -- is precisely that it is extremely fractious and far ranging on all issues.

The GOP is far more (not completely so, but substantially) monolithic. The very liberalism that characterizes left-of-center America gives rise to, i think, very destructive cliqish behavior in which the hyper-idealists of one stripe can't get on board with those of another because of some perceived failing in compatibility with their personal priorities.

It's perverse and kind of strange that the most cohesive aspect of the party is that when some members of it piss off others, the attack is against "The Democratic Party" not against the specific others. We're quick to dismiss the Party as not representing us, and terrible and molding it into a compromise platform that's largely unified in voice.