Just heard on MSNBC--for the 111th time--some fool claim that Dems should fear controlling Congress and the White House, because they won't be able to blame the GOP for anything. Any politico who talks like that deserves to get their head kicked in today. It's not that I don't think Dems can fail--they most certainly can. But this idea that somehow standing on the corner theorizing about what you'd do if you had your gun, is superior to being fully armed and taking some shots--and potentially missing--is silly. OK, so I was single eons ago. I know how this goes. I've been the herb sitting across the way with the gorgeous brown-eyed girl staring at him, and thinking, "If she talks to me, I'll most certainly disappoint!" But had I stayed that way, I'd be a man without a family.
People who think losing is preferable to winning everything fall into one of two categories: One--utter and complete Shook Ones. Two--losers trying to make themselves feel better, when they should be trying to understand why they lost. It's hilarious logic. Could you imagine Tom Brady saying, "Man, if we win the Super Bowl, we'll have to defend and then everyone will be gunning for us!!" Or Ali saying, "Man, if I win the belt, I'll have to fight the best boxers in the world!" It's laughable. Of course Dems might fail. So what? Are we bout it or not? The GOP would swap places with them in a second. And if they wouldn't they need to get another profession.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
Copyright © 2009 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All rights reserved.
There were actually people who told Red Sox fans in 2004 that we might be sorry the Sox finally won because now they'd just be another team.
Fucking morons.
That just comes from a man who's been in the game so long that he forgets that politics actually come down to, you know, governing. These are the type of people who'll be treating the next fours years as though it were a campaign. This is how nothing ever gets done. This is how members of Congress vote for a war they don't believe in because they don't want to look 'soft on terrorism' when they're up for re-election. This man is cynical. This man is a coward.
This man is cynical. This man is a coward.
This man is a politician.
It's the norm, not the exception. Let's hope they get some balls for the first 18 months or so at least - they might find they like it.
"some fool claim that Dems should fear controlling Congress and the White House, because they won't be able to blame the GOP for anything."
To be perfectly honest, looking at 2002-2006, I think that it will be more than possible for the party in power with the White House, House, and Senate to argue that anything they failed to do was the fault of the other party.
For too long the Dems have been the party "Never around when the beef cooks"...time to end that.
They're also the same jackasses who didn't take the blame when they had the control.
Thanks, TNC. You're quickly becoming one of my heros for your insight and courage to call bs when you see it.
I related phenomenon I see a lot is the purist loser. If you are sitting outside looking in, it is easy to be holier-than-thou pure in your ideology. If you are actually in a position of authority, you have to deal with messy reality. I think many purists deep down understand this, and are comfortable with idealistic ineffectuality.
Ahh, the good olde counterintuitive arguments. The New Republic writers and alums are the experts in this - Roe versus Wade is bad, we shouldn't push for gay marriage etc etc because it would cause Democrats to lose elections. Hey, maybe we shouldn't win any election at all because that will definitely mean we'll lose the next time around!
Ah yes. I have a friend who works in Democratic politics. He is often confronted by people who would rather stay pure than win an election. His line is, "let's compromise - you vote for the Dem, and then we'll watch this tape of Mondale's 1984 election night so you can get that good losing feeling back again."
Jaybird is on the right track here -- the MSM vastly prefers to discuss politics as strategy/tactics, not as policy-making.
I look at what conservative governance has done (not just over the last 8 years, but the last 40) and think, "Conservatism is wrong and evil." The MSM looks at it and says, "This is what happens when a political party gets too big for its britches."
They aren't really interested in the fact that conservatives and liberals actually want the government to do different things, to pursue different policies, to govern differently. All that, as far as they're concerned, is just b.s. to sell to the peasants outside the Forbidden City. What they're interested in is aristocratic intrigue -- they blame the intrigue, not the worldview or policies, for the GOP's failures, and they blame the 1-party dominance of the GOP for the intrigue. And the MSM therefore sees Dem dominance as a threat to the Dems in the same way.
The MSNBC fool's viewpoint is understandable. It's been the Democratic mindset for the past 28 years. As David Brooks said today, since 1980 there's been conservative dominance in this country; we as Dems haven't really felt powerful in this whole time and we're stuck in this rut of being the bitchers and moaners instead of the leaders, the majority, the ones who own this country. I think after today we'll finally feel some true ownership of America and we'll start taking charge, start taking some responsibility and stop trying to think of every possible way we can blame the GOP.
Remember when Jon Stewart asked Obama if he still wanted to be President, given the condition of the country? It was a tongue-in-cheek question, and not one that really needed a response, but Obama said something like "if you really want to make some changes, then this is the time you want to be President, because you have the opportunity to really do something." And he's absolutely right. Yeah, we might screw some stuff while in charge--the probability approaches 1 pretty quickly as a matter of fact--but you can't run scared. You've got to take the fight you're faced with.
I related phenomenon I see a lot is the purist loser. If you are sitting outside looking in, it is easy to be holier-than-thou pure in your ideology.
I was going to bring this point up as well. There are those who want their respective parties to move further to the extreme. So having pro-market people like Obama and Clinton who aren't hard left push the party to the center, and lefties don't like it. So they may see victory in a loss because they will claim the loss is a repudiation of centrist policies when what really works is old time liberalism or old time conservatism.
On the right, you will certainly have people pulling the same thing after the election, by saying McCain was too soft on conservative issues and Republicans need to get back to Reaganism.
The other part of the argument is that for over 40 years, whenever one party gains a huge advantage, bad things tend to follow quickly for those who win. (1964, 1984, 1992, 1994, 2004.)It isn't an argument to not win, but when one side does, they should temper their arrogance and not overreach.
The MSNBC fool's viewpoint is understandable. It's been the Democratic mindset for the past 28 years.
Right. To put in another way, while there are differences between the two parties, they are both neoliberal corporate supporting parties. Media, punditry, politicians, etc, included.
Why else Iraq policy and FISA after Democratic majority rule and, of course, banker bailout? Why else the ridiculous premise that after electing a black man as president along with huge transition in Congress, the country should still govern as center-right?
Obama said something like "if you really want to make some changes, then this is the time you want to be President, because you have the opportunity to really do something."
Isn't this what "Shock Doctrine" is all about?
Agreed x 10. It reminds me of middle school or elementary school when people lose at something. Is the emotional maturity of these people really that low.
THANK YOU!
OH! The burden of governing! Woe is me! To hell with that.
The GOP is trying to frame this so the Dems are afraid of their own shadows, too concerned with holding their well-earned gains than with actually governing like they believe in government, which is the REAL conservative nightmare.
If you BELIEVE in government, then universal healthcare can be achieved. If you BELIEVE in the rule of law, then that can be achieved with an upright and aggressive Justice Dept. If you BELIEVE regulations need to be enforced, then government agencies can have some teeth.
The GOP has invested a ton in starving this beast of a government. The Dems need to just feed the government a nutritious meal to nurse it back to health (without bloating it unecessarily).
Bout it, bout it, TNC.
Let's do this thing.
Jaybird gets it exactly wrong, as usual: "To be perfectly honest, looking at 2002-2006, I think that it will be more than possible for the party in power with the White House, House, and Senate to argue that anything they failed to do was the fault of the other party."
The problem wasn't what the Repiglicans DIDN'T do. The problem was that they DID do. Cleaning up after that nightmarish shitstorm of incompetence and corruption is going to take up most of the time for this new administration for the next couple of years.
I don't think there will be much of a "honeymoon," but I do think most people understand that Dumbya's complete failure won't be reversed overnight.
I don't remember. Did anyone issue such cautions to the Republicans? Did any of these clowns scoff when the Repugs started screaming "It's Clinton's Fault"! and when that got old "It's Carter's Fault"?
If Not
Then
StFu.
Isn't this what "Shock Doctrine" is all about?
No. The Shock Doctrine was about fucking up the system deliberately so you could then go rampaging through stealing everything that wasn't nailed down. Obama is saying that a true leader wants to rise to the occasion and face down tough challenges. Otherwise, why go through all the crap necessary to get the job in the first place?
Incertus: That's not necessarily true. The Shock Doctrine doesn't just involve generating crises. It also involves taking advantage of crises that happen on their own.
TNC – Good analysis of people. Bad analysis of what’s going on. Political parties are not analogous to teams, because control of the party is just as political as control of the government. The people that are saying this are people who want a conservative, Washington-insider Democratic Party, run by people like Chuck Schumer, Rahm Emmanuel and Mark Penn. They would rather lose the game but control the team. Those people have already gone into full gear in spinning what this election is about, in order to maintain their own power. If we only see the inter-partisan battle, and not the intra-partisan battle, they will son us yet again. The Democratic wing of the Democratic Party needs to fight back.
Klein cites a passage written by Friedman that "best summarizes the shock doctrine":
Only a crisis--actual or perceived--produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.
The above shows your interpretation to be contray to the author's. However, Klein does have a screwy way of defining it when she uses examples like accusing Clinton of using the Shock Doctrine in Kosovo or the Communists in Tiananmen Square. Of course, this applies to all drastic change, Democrats can only pass universal health if there is a health care system disaster, just like it took the Great Depression to enact the most sweeping changes in our history.
Klein also differs because she considers Obama to be part of the University of Chicago network. Not quite Friedmanesque, but pretty damn close
I love when you touch on things no one else does (or at the very least people rarely do)! I totally felt your example of assuming you'll disappoint if a beautiful girl talks to you (although - and I hate to admit it - growing up in South Dakota I did have to look up "herb" at UrbanDictionary.com :P); I've felt that for a good deal of my life.
BUT, I agree completely that such a mindset not only encourages personal failure, it very nearly preordains it. And that I'm not all about! Props for a great post!
Erm, LMJ?
The "repiglicans" that I talk to about stuff like "making the tax cuts permanent", say, or about "reducing the size of government", about "doing something about the Department of Education", or... hell. Name anything that your typical "repiglican" in 1999 would say they want.
If you ask them why they weren't able to accomplish these things, they say "the Democrats".
I like Shook Ones Part I way better than part II. Much creepier:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vN-4Xwy-Cw
"Two--losers trying to make themselves feel better, when they should be trying to understand why they lost."
I felt this way about Ross's post Ta-Nehisi referenced yesterday. Lots of questions, not many answers.
thank you thank you thank you! this is perfection.