Sunday: Guns and Roses

A couple of days ago, Joseph Cannon responded to this “make nice” sentiment from someone at Democratic Underground who wanted to put the bloody primary battle behind him:

Sure the Primaries were brutal around here and I’m told I was lucky to have joined after the 2004 election. I know I’m still nursing bruises from this one.

Maybe it’s the “hippie at heart” in me but, peace, guys and gals. Can we put the flowers in the barrels of our rifles for awhile and agree to disagree on how our new President is doing without becoming generic internet assholes to each other?

Joseph Cannon wants an apology.  With all due respect to Joe, an apology is pretty pointless if the offenders don’t know what to be sorry about.

So, to any of you DU lurkers who are out there, let me tell you what the problem is.  The primary *IS* the problem.  It isn’t merely that our gal lost, though from what we can tell, she really didn’t. No, the problem is you didn’t see what really happened.  Now, that the glamour has rubbed off of Obama and he is revealed to be just another human being and shmoozer extraordinaire, you are upset that he isn’t listening to you and responding to your perfectly acceptable demands for ending the war and holding the finance industry accountable.  Now, you are looking around for allies hoping that we can all get along to *do* something and hold Congress and Obama accountable.

But the end of the primary was conducted in such a way as to make your input unnecessary, even irrelevant.  This is what you agreed to when you did not stand up at the RBC hearing and demand fairness.  Your cheering of Obama or even silence in the matter gave the party permission to ignore you in the future.  THEY knew that Hillary was the true winner and that Obama ran a lousy campaign.  That’s why they gave him 59 unpledged delegates from Michigan plus 4 of his opponents.  They did it so he could beat her.  He couldn’t have done it otherwise.  He didn’t have sufficient votes and FL and MI were going to have to count no matter how you do the math.  So, they rigged the vote.

Now, you may say that we keep coming back to this like we are bitter deadenders and why don’t we get over it.  To be honest, it wasn’t about Hillary after May 31.  Oh, we still wanted her and we hadn’t finished exhausting our options.  We had an obligation to see it through to the very end so we could give everyone time to come to their senses and realize what they were about to do.  And we were faithful to her and ourselves as long as we could be.

But the question is not why we don’t get over it but why you guys still haven’t got a clue.  The party, for whatever reason, wanted Obama in the worst way.  The big money was lavishing him with scads and scads of cold hard cash.  The party wanted to win at all costs.  So, they chose the candidate and created “UNITY” by throwing out all of the votes that did not conform to that choice.  All Hillary voters were gone; all other voters were unified.  It was so easy to do because they flattered you and played on your emotional weaknesses.  Once you let them get away with rigging things, there was no further reason for them to pay attention to you.  You missed your accountability moment.  You, the voter, are now superfluous.  They can rig things anyway they like now, take as much lobbying money they want, break as many promises as they like and there’s not a damned thing you can do about it.  You showed them that they would not be held accountable for cheating.

As far as I can tell, the roses in the guns aren’t going to help us.  We who were scorned, called racists and Republicans and generally treated like stupid old trailer trash have been vindicated.  He is everything we said he was.  We stayed true to ourselves and our values.  You guys have to examine your conscience and figure out if the Obamagasm frenzy was worth it.  The party is now divided against itself.  How conveeeeenient.  Going forward, the elements of the left will try to come together in fits and starts but it will be a cold, hard slog.  Some of us will never trust each other again.  Others will only remain viable if they take money from Obama’s extended financial network and they’ll never raise their voices when they need to.  The only way to reconstitute the left that remains scorched and burning after Obama’s triumphant march through it, is for those of you who zealously supported him to go back to that day in May and realize what that momentous day portended.

No apologies needed.

Here’s a little something to help you remember.  This is Harold Ickes, advisor to Hillary Clinton.  He is the son of Harold Ickes Sr., one of the engineers of FDR’s New Deal.  Let that sink in for a moment while you contemplate the current financial crisis.  May 31, 2008 was chock full of symbolism. Women vs African Americans, rich vs. poor, The New Deal vs everyone for themselves, Michigan, auto workers, unions, fair reflection.  It’s all there.  Forget Hillary for a moment and feel the shame.

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