Hmmm, this is not a good way to achieve Unity

From NewHampster, who got it from Politico, we get this take of complete and utter takeover of the DNC by the Obama campaign:

Obama moves DNC operations to Chicago

In a major shakeup at the Democratic National Committee — and a departure from tradition — large parts of the committee’s operations are relocating to Chicago to be fully integrated with the Obama campaign.

The DNC’s political department, housed in Washington, D.C., will be dramatically rebuilt, with staffers offered a choice of moving to Chicago, joining state operations, or staying in Washington, DNC spokeswoman Karen Finney said.

But the power will clearly be shifting to a centralized Chicago hub.

The DNC’s key role in coordinating political operations with state parties is expected to largely be taken over and overseen by Obama’s senior staff in Chicago, state party officials said.

“This is part of the implementation of the plans Paul [Tewes] discussed last week with the state party chairs,” Finney said. “As part of the efforts to fully integrate DNC operations with the Obama campaign here in Washington, in Chicago and in the states, political, field and constituency operations are moving to Chicago to work in the Obama headquarters. The goal is to consolidate these efforts into one operation and effectively drive one national strategy.”

People familiar with the plan said that state party staffers paid for under Howard Dean’s 50 State Program would be shifted to working for the presidential campaign, at least in targeted battleground states.

The move reflects Obama’s desire to maintain an unusually streamlined campaign, as well as his swift and complete takeover of a Democratic Party that isn’t always known for its unity. The move may also save the campaign money, as the Obama campaign can use DNC salaries and staff to pay for elements of its organizing campaign and avoid some of the duplication that has often dogged presidential efforts.

What are we to make of this? Well, from what I read, there is a clever use of words that reminds me of a real estate add. For a house, “cozy” means “small”. In the above passage, I’m guessing that “streamlined” means “pared to the bone for cost reasons”. “Consolidate” means “have Obama hire the staff because the DNC can’t pay them”. Is it that Obama has highjacked the DNC or is it that the DNC is forced to go this route because the fundraising machine has dried up over the outrageous treatment of Hillary Clinton? And if it is the latter, how long will it take before it cries “Uncle” and ceases to exist as a party apparatus at all?

My take is that Howard Dean’s single minded determination to remake the party in his image and his tying the DNC so completely with Obama means that when Obama goes down this November, Dean will go down with him.

Good.

We Interrupt to Bring You A Brief Moment of Sanity from the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court issued a historic opinion today, ruling 5-4 (yeah, you know which 4) that foreign terrorism suspects held at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba have constitutional rights under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment to challenge their detention there in United States courts.  In the decision, Boumediene, et al v. Bush, http://supremecourtus.gov/opinions/07pdf/06-1195.pdf,  Justice Kennedy, writing for the majority (yeah, you know which 5) declared that “The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times.”  Kennedy also wrote that

“To hold that the political branches may switch the Constitution on or off at will would lead to a regime in which they, not this court, say ‘what the law is,’ ”

citing the Supreme Court’s seminal 1803 decision in Marbury v. Madison. 

Many of us are rightly angered by the collaboration between the DNC, the Obama campaign and the MSM in denigrating Senator Clinton both as a person and as a candidate during the primary campaign.  Many of us have decided that we cannot vote for Obama.  However, we can’t leave future Supreme Court appointments to the whim of a Republican president.  To me, creating and preserving a majority that will rule in favor of personal liberty and due process and against the Reign of the Unitary Executive is an even more important priority than preserving Roe v. Wade.   The Boumediene decision makes clear that, whoever becomes president in 2009, it is critical that future Supreme Court appointments be subject, at the very least, to the confirmation power of a Senate with a working progressive majority.  So whatever you do with your presidential ballot, I implore you to support and vote for Democratic Senatorial candidates in those states where Senate seats are at stake.   You don’t have to give money to the DNC; just find out which Senate seats are in issue and support the Democratic candidates’ campaigns directly. 

 

Thursday: Walk it back, Dr. Dean

There is a reason why PUMA is going viral.

There is a reason why Latinos are threatening to defect to McCain.

There is a reason why Fundraisers are vowing to starve the DNC beast.

There is a reason why perfectly ordinary non-politico, non-blogger voters are approaching me at company picnics to tell me they will never vote for Obama.

Not after the RBC hearing. Not after the screaming for Hillary to get out before the primaries were over. Not after the pressure on her to release her delegates before the convention. Not after the attempt to stifle her voice at the convention at all. Or calling her and her supporters racists. Or bitches. Or stupid, old, uneducated women. Or bitter working class rubes.

It’s called betrayal.

One of the things that got me suspended from DailyKos is that I wrote a diary about how the Obama supporters were behaving like a bunch of jihadis. Maybe that diary had some traction or the behavior is more noticeable now but I’ve heard and read others refer to them in that way as well. The attitude is you will submit or will be crushed. No dissent is tolerated. There is only one candidate and Obama is his name.

And here is where Howard Dean and Donna Brazile are running into problems: The party has never been an authoritarian one. The Democrats are legendary for being unable to corral its members. It is easier to herd cats than control the members of the Democratic party. Party unification for uscan not be a top down decree. This isn’t the Unification Church and Howard Dean is no Reverend Sun Yung Moon.

What we have here is Movement Obamaism, no less destructive to the Democratic party than Movement Conservatism was to the Republican party. It is an amalgamation of different factions that does not have core Democratic principles as its center. What it looks like to the typical Democrat, that loyal party stalwart, is a takeover. I don’t think Obama or his enablers would disagree with this. But they have picked the wrong party. Their analysis of demograhic trends may show younger people as considerably more tractable and more enthusiastic about following RULZ, but these people do not typically join the Democratic party. There is a reason why we have a two party system. The Republicans are into maintaining the status quo, evolving slowly, uniformity, discipline and party above individuality. The Democrats are more like the G*d Damn Independents, free thinkers who come together around their principles, not mandates. Coming together for us can not be forced. It must be based on consensus.

That is not what we have witnessed this year. What we have seen is heavy-handed, Republican inspired authoritarian tactics applied to OUR party. It was as if Dean, Axelrod, et al had a meeting and concluded, “Well, it worked so well for the Republicans, let’s see if it works on the Democrats!” The results have been predictable. The party is roughly split in half with the slightly larger half going to the losing candidate. That is the true Democratic party. Right now, they have been betrayed. They always knew that there was skullduggery but never have they seen it displayed so obviously and against themselves. And the superdelegates who were created to prevent this kind of thing from happening are going along to get along.

The party has betrayed us. It has sought to manipulate us and when that didn’t work, it used brute force. The party and its presumptuous nominee are failures. They miscalculated, cynically using the tools of authoritarianism against us and we will have none of it.

Walk it back, Dr. Dean. Better get Obama to stop ignoring those of us he *thinks* he has in his pocket so that he can be free to pursue the religious right. The number of trolls on our site has increased many fold and the messages are all carefully crafted to elicit the correct response but we’re not buying it. We know what’s going on here. You can pretend we aren’t needed but your messages to us say otherwise.

Better start fixing this problem before the convention because afterwards, our hearts will be hardened and we will follow our consciences in the voting booth. And from what I’ve been hearing, no one this year is inclined to reward a traitor.

This song goes out to all you sweeties. We know what you’re going through. But we’re not going to sign onto Obama without making him earn it. We do not subscribe to the “Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?” philosophy of the current Democratic “leadership”. Too bad for you. Whether you like it or not, you gotta marry us before we put out.