While the Democratic establishment pulls the party hard right, the grassroots is trying to pull the party to the left. Both are having some success, which is creating a huge divide in the party.
Nowhere has this been more obvious than in Rhode Island.
You would never know that we are seeing a once in a lifetime populist revolt going on from watching cable news.
Holyoke Mayor Alex Morse has closed to within 5 points of Rep. Richard Neal despite an unprecedented smear campaign by the state Democratic party.
If Morse wins that would make four successful primary challenges to longtime Democratic incumbents.
Before I talk about the Democrats, let me just say that if Trump loses (and it appears that he will), the GOP will descend into a civil war that will make the Democrat's civil war look mild in comparison. Trump's hyper-loyal base has gone off the deep end, immersing itself in konspiracy theories while rejecting logic and fact-based reality. It's not a group that will simply accept their hero losing.
Say what you will about Bernie, you have to give him credit for making it a movement, rather than something that's just about him (cough: Obama).
The progressive insurgency has a chance of scoring its biggest victory yet.
Most of the conflict I've had on C99P has been about my support of the new progressive insurgency in the Democratic Party, and those who think I'm being suckered.
Most responses have been something like "We've seen this before in 2008 and 2016."
I finally figured out a way to empirically prove to those doubters why it's different this time, and it should've been obvious to me long ago.
It's the money!
“The question that comes up all the time is, is there anybody internally assisting and abetting, encouraging people to run against incumbents?”
- Rep. Bill Pascrell
You know you've gotten their attention when your opponents get paranoid.
Sure, I know most of you have completely given up on the Dems.
Nevertheless, it's still a good thing by anyone's measure to see the Democratic establishment forced to have to publicly fight it's own base's demands for reform.
