Reply #32: Too far left .. too far left .... have we gotten that point yet? NOT [View All]

electable!!! <Bangs head on wall then looks around and pushes the gd hammer that keeps trying to hit me over the head away>

No matter who gets president there will be compromise! If you take centrist ideas before repug congress/sentates you get.....?? RIGHT OF CENTER...???

Isn't this where we are now?!

If you want something more than the thoroughly watered down rhetoric that has been pitched to us 24/7 for years now (and gotten us where I might ask), then you had better use this as a wakeup call (bangs the gong LOUDLY) to elect someone WAY LEFT of center in order to get ourselves even partially centered.


If you want to take some time to read the following, you might get a new perspective, a renewed passion about our fight in the upcoming 2004 election and what it is we REALLY want for our country. Just imagine that this is talking about the democratic party and the tories equal the repugs! Let it soak in... ENJOY!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/3153002.stm

<snip>
May 1997 was a unique moment. An abundance of expectation surrounded our arrival. A sense of hope beyond ordinary imagining. The people felt it. We felt it. Instead of reining in the expectation, we gave it free rein. It was natural, but born of inexperience.

We thought change was a matter of will.

Have the right programme, spend the right money and the job is done.

But experience has taught us: the job is never done.

If we expected bouquets every day, we should have stayed in Opposition. We shouldn't want thanks. It's a privilege to do the job, however tough.

And in Government, you expect things to happen but the things that happen are not the things you expect...
<snip>


<snip>
Up to now there has been a ritual to Labour Governments, Euphoria on victory. Hard slog in Government. Tough times. Party accuses leadership of betrayal. Leadership accuses Party of ingratitude. Disillusion. Defeat. Long period of Tory Government before next outbreak of euphoria. We've been far better at defeating ourselves than the Tories have ever been.

Apart from 1974-79, which was fragile from the first, each Labour Government has been a spasmodic interval punctuating otherwise unbroken Conservative rule. For too many of our 100 years we have been a well-intentioned pressure group.

We fight injustice. We argue our causes.

But our psychology has been that of people who know, deep down, someone else is the governing party and we are the ones championing the grievance.

So, after a time, after we have righted the most obvious wrongs of the Conservatives, we fold up. We return to our comfort zone.

Then came New Labour.

From the outset, our opponents hated and feared us. They believe the Tories have a divine right to rule Britain and we are usurpers. They look at their own Party and feel contempt. And they hate us even more because they think we're responsible. And in a sense we are. By occupying the centre ground, by modernising, by reaching out beyond our activists, we helped turn the Tories into a replica of what we used to be. A narrow base. Obsessed about the wrong things. Old fashioned. In retreat.
<snip>

<snip>
they keep trying to reinvent themselves. From cuddly Conservatives to compassionate Conservatives to caring Conservatives. When are they going to realise it's not the first word that's the problem, it's the second.

But one thing they have succeeded in. As they always do. Right from the beginning of New Labour they set up the eternal false choice of progressive politics. That in Government we either revert to the past; or we stand for nothing.

That we are either incompetent or compromised.

That if policy is modernised, belief is betrayed.

And it plays to our own fears.
<snip>


These are excerpts from the poodles 2003 labour party speech. He surely has a way with words and a PASSION for what he believes in. I apologize for so much snippage, but I wanted to get the point across and not require you to read through the whole transcript.

There's still a bit more towards the end of his speech that relates as well, if you have the time to check it out.

At any rate, it would be nice if we, the dems, could take this and make it or something like it into our NEW policy or goals instead of settling for less than we have the right to expect!

AND no I'm not promoting the poodle, but it doesn't mean he might not have a way with words! :hi:

ON EDIT: I'm beginning to wonder if FEAR of TRUE, SINCERE, RADICAL change isn't the TRUE issue behind the, "He's not electable quote", we continue to hear from our fellow dems :shrug: