Democrats 'Blue Dog Mafia' prepares to wage war against progressives

It's no secret that the Democratic Party would rather lose to a Republican than win with a progressive. The Democrats prefer to at least pretend that they embrace progressive values, and thus get those progressive votes...until now.

A few weeks ago the DCCC attacked a progressive candidate in Texas that was running against a union-busting lawyer and a Goldman Sachs banker. Democratic voters in Texas reacted by voting for the progressive candidate.
However, with the slim election victory of Republican-lite candidate Conor Lamb, the Democratic establishment totally forgot about the lesson from Texas and are preparing to take down progressives in California.

Facing the risk that the party could get shut out of the general election race for one or more competitive Republican-held seats, liberal groups formed to attack Republicans now say they are at least considering spending money to support particular Democratic candidates in the primaries. National Democratic officials say all options are on the table in the lead-up to June – including launching negative attacks on members of their own party, a tactic that stirred controversy in the Texas primary.
...
Katie Merrill, advisor to the Democratic Super PAC Fight Back California, still intends to target Republican incumbents in key California congressional races – its original purpose. “But if it looks like we’re in danger of a Democrat not advancing to a general election as we get closer to June, we might have to – and other groups might have to –focus on supporting a particular Democratic candidate.”
...Groups like EMILY’s List and Democracy for America also plan to support their endorsed candidates in several of the seven Republican-held districts.
An aide at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) confirmed that the party committee hasn’t ruled out supporting or even attacking a particular Democratic candidate in California, despite the backlash that produced in Texas last month.

Siding with a candidate before the primaries is controversial enough, but attacking another Democratic candidate is inexcusable.

When it comes to the Dem establishment, their preference is always toward the most Republican-like candidate, never once toward the progressive.
In case you didn't believe that, check out these recent articles.

Democrats have shot at flipping the House if they can stay in the center

The clear path to winning back the House is to recapture the votes of Trump defectors in red states and swing states by leaving behind polarizing positions and revitalizing the centrist Democrat.

Another round of Schumer's “For every blue-collar Democrat we lose in western Pennsylvania, we will pick up two moderate Republicans in the suburbs in Philadelphia, and you can repeat that in Ohio and Illinois and Wisconsin.”
Because that worked sooo well in 2016.

Democrats' 2018 midterm hopes strengthened by decline of liberal 'purity tests'

Rather, Democrats have begun to fall head over heels in love with the goal of defeating Donald Trump and his agenda. And to achieve that, it seems more and more Democrats may be willing to check progressive purity at the door in favor of progressive pragmatism.
...The sense was that these progressive perfectionists were ready to abandon the Democratic Party completely — or at least stay home during the midterm elections — if this didn’t happen
Flash forward to March 2018, and I’m now hearing some of those very same Bernie purists say that if the candidate has a “D” in front of their name, they will vote for them.

Considering that he refers to them as "Bernie purists" and "progressive perfectionists" I'm willing to bet $5 that this guy hasn't heard anything like that. He's made this up whole cloth to fit his agenda.

However, this article below is the one that tells you all you need to know.

Inside the Democrats' efforts to elect more Conor Lambs

The effort ramped up in the fall, when the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee invited a group of moderate Democrats that put them in the majority in 2006 to talk through a winning strategy.
The committee gave the "Blue Dog mafia," as some call them, free rein to work with candidates on campaign operations in some of the toughest districts on the expanded Democratic target list.
The group, made up of former policy and campaign aides who now work at DC lobbying shops, consulting firms and industry groups, have set up their own satellite political operation to help vet candidates, determine who is viable to beat the Republican nominee in November, and provide support to build volunteer networks, set up digital operations, and make fundraising connections.

It just proves that the DCCC has learned nothing from the defeats of 2010, 2014, and 2016.
Absolutely nothing!

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Arrow's picture

All you get is...cola!

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I want a Pony!

and the Dead Dog Mafia. Now I know who not to vote for. Bastards!

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@Snode
Their friends "The Family"

Blue Dog Democrats in Congress played a “magnificent” role in blocking health care reform during the Clinton administration and now, under the “courageous” and “smart” leadership of House Pro-Life Caucus leader and Michigan Democrat Bart Stupak, and with the support and prayers of Republicans categorically opposed to the Democratic Party’s health care reform effort, the Blue Dogs may be able to do it again.

That’s what Stupak’s caucus co-chair Chris Smith (R-NJ) told his audience at a “townhall” panel event last Friday at the Family Research Council Action’s Washington DC 2009 Values Voter Summit [see video, below]. Another Republican at the event, Tom Price (R-GA), suggested that lockstep GOP opposition to health care reform affords the Blue Dogs “an opportunity to show some backbone” and “stand up to their leadership to say ‘no more will we allow this travesty to go on.’”

Besides leading anti-abortion Democrats in the House, Stupak is a longtime member of the mainly-Republican radical free-market, union-busting theocratic Washington fundamentalist group known as “The Family,” which runs the “C Street House” registered as a church where Bart Stupak has enjoyed Christian fellowship and cheap rent for years. Stupak’s former “C Street” housemate Senator James DeMint (R-S. Carolina) has vowed to make the fight against health care reform President Barack Obama’s “Waterloo”.

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@gjohnsit As long as there's a 'd' after the name they're 'more and better democrat's material. Bastards x2

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JekyllnHyde's picture

@gjohnsit

Funding illegal foreign wars? No problem for Blue Dog Democrats. More tax cuts for the 1%? Ditto. Approving bloated defense budgets? Sure. Allocating any money to provide universal healthcare for the poor and needy? BIG problem!

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A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma

This is what drove me out of kos - they shoved HRC down our throats, one of the most baggage-laden, conserva-dem, serial-lying, flawed candidates in recent memory and viciously went after any and all who thought it dead wrong, or even umwise. Shumer, HRC, Wall St., MIC, all aimed at keeping money coming in and the riff-raff OUT.

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"Fear is the mind-killer" - Frank Herbert, Dune

@p gorden lippy Any take down of corporate democrats is met with counter attacks defending them with the usual personal attacks Put down HIllary and you get a time-out. The Russia conspiracy is believed on total faith and any skeptics have left or remain silent. It is totally a propaganda arm of the corporate DNC.

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Once one DINO won, then that is the justification for nominating more corporatists, which also gives an excuse for establishment to actively suppress and attack progressive candidates. Good article on this from Rolling Stone:

Why Democrats Should Worry About Conor Lamb's Victory
Dems pick up a House seat in Pennsylvania – but is Lamb the start of a winning strategy or the establishment sidelining the Trump Resistance?

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/why-democrats-should-worry-ab...

Lamb, for all his fresh-faced charm, ran and won as a Trump Democrat – a flashback to the "Republican Lite" candidacies the Democrats specialized in during the Clinton '90s and '00s.

...

But the Democratic establishment doesn't just see Lamb as a model for running in deep-red districts that are overwhelmingly white. They want him to be a model for Democrats running everywhere – to see Lamb's victory, in Jonathan Chait's words at New York, as "proof of concept for a strategy that could replicate itself across the country." And so, of course, do the conservative Blue Dogs. ...

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@MrWebster
They tend to be right once a decade and think that it's the fault of progressives why they don't win the other 9 years.
Same with neoliberals of both parties. If the economy sucks it must be because of spending on the poor.

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Wink's picture

are running, though, to make a difference. In 2020 we need as many progressives running as we can support.
@gjohnsit
Since we get no help (or money) from anybody else that leaves it all on us to get it done. All hands on deck. Otherwise we continue to get Connor Lamb Repub Lite candidates running as Dems (as happens Way too frequently here in NY), and we dig ourselves an ever deeper hole.

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the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.

dance you monster's picture

. . . as admitting the party is leaving it to lobbyists, consultants, and industry shills to choose who should run as a Democrat. Can't have any candidates who would actually imagine serving the voters.

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dervish's picture

They learned how to effectively subdue the progressive agenda. That is their only goal, and it's always been that way.

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"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

@dervish
Democrats are the "Good Cop" to the Republicans "Bad Cop".
Democrats "just want to help you, but they can't unless you cooperate".

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@gjohnsit
the bad cop gets back and takes charge.

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The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.

liar , libeler and all-around useless fucking creep.

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The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.

Wink's picture

Full speed ahead!

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the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.

is still reaching into and fucking up our government. The goal? Create god's kingdom on earth so the groundwork is laid for Jesus's second coming.
I kid you not.

Meanwhile, Bernie got 1.7 viewers peeking in on his Economic Inequality talk.

It's coming folks.... if they don't shoot us all first.

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"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin

With Peters and Stabenow crossing over to deregulate Wall Street, I've now decided not to vote green or not at the federal level. If we get an establishment Dem for governor, then I'm just not going to vote for her either. I hate to see Trump and the GOP win, but I can't go from the frying pan into the fire and vice versa anymore.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

OzoneTom's picture

@dkmich
I know that that it is fashionable for Dems to accuse the left/progressives as being "same as the Tea Party" -- but in this respect I would agree that it is self-marginalizing to "hold your nose" and just do what they tell you to.

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@OzoneTom
sounds like a good idea to me.
It's hardly an insult.

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SnappleBC's picture

Surely you cannot think that they are genuinely unaware of the mood of the country? I think the only lesson they need to learn is how to peddle their dog food in an era when everyone knows it tastes like crap. They tried, "Well it's not as crappy as that other brand of dog food" and that hasn't worked so well but they really don't have many other choices. It's not like they can start selling real food.

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A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard

...It just proves that the DCCC has learned nothing from the defeats of 2010, 2014, and 2016.
Absolutely nothing!

Unless the purpose is to ensure that the Repubs get the number of seats required to get that 'Runaway Con Con' and the corporate rewriting of the US Constitution which ALEC and the Trilateral Commission have been jonesing for so long. They may have learnt reward-training toward that end.

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.