Reply #35: One problem at the core of your assertion is that the DLC is a think tank. [View All]

1). The DLC is not a political party and is not a think tank.

Actually, the DLC is a not-for-profit corporation and "The Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) leads the New Democrat movement, a national network of elected officials and community leaders whose innovative ideas are modernizing progressive politics for the 21st Century."

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ka.cfm?kaid=86

Additionally, the DLC has a think tank, and it is called The Progressive Policy Institute:

http://www.ppionline.org

Lastly, The Progressive Policy Institute is funded by is funded by the Third Way Foundation:

http://www.third-way.com/products/national_security.htm

2). You wrote: "The DNC, on the other hand, is a party. A party that funds and runs candidates based on a platform of planks comprised by its members."

Yes, and a substantial number of those members are also members of the DLC, the Blue Dog's, and the Progressives.

The DLC members are, by far, the most influential members of the DNC in matters of national elections.

3). You wrote: "What bothers me about the question is the pretheoretical assumptions. I think this entire paradigm of the "DLC ordering the DNC what to do" needs to be adjusted because I think it's just plain erroneous."

Well, I am not going to try to convince you.

However, decisions of on matters of national significance during election cycles over the past 16 years seem to demonstrate that the DLC's candidates are at the forefront of the DNC efforts, and there must be an underlying reason other than the false notion that local primaries by local Americans just support those outcomes. (For more on the local primary effect look to 2004 when Kerry mysteriously came from behind to take the lead the non-DLC candidate in the primaries. The DNC machine was clearly behind that move to ensure the DLC candidate pulled ahead.)

The DNC can make or break DLC candidates at the grass roots levels in the primaries, but doesn't hinder the DLC candidates paths to election.

No candidates seem to be more preferable to the DNC than the DLC candidates, based on a review of the past 16 years of national elections and the DNC's demonstrated campaigns.

4). You wrote: "Centrists are not a product of an organization. Centrists (and conservative Dems) are a product of their own making."

According to this link at the DLC website, the "The New Democrat Credo" of the DLC states plainly that "we intend to carry on Clinton's insistence upon new means to achieve progressive ideals."

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=86&subid=194&contentid=3775

The existence of the DLC not-for-profit corporation is deliberate and in order to influence politics, including the DNC:

""Al From is founder and chief executive officer of the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), a dynamic idea action center of the "Third Way" governing philosophy that is reshaping progressive politics in the United States and around the globe. He is also chairman of the Third Way Foundation and publisher of the DLC's flagship bi-monthly magazine, Blueprint: Ideas for a New Century.

As a founder of the DLC -- birthplace of the New Democrat movement and the Third Way in America -- and its companion think tank, the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), From leads a national movement that since the mid-1980s has provided both the action agenda and the ideas for New Democrats to successfully challenge the conventional political wisdom in America and, in the process, redefine the center of the Democratic Party."

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=86&subid=191&contentid=1131

Please note the constant usage of "progressive" throughout the DLC website.

Further, "President Bill Clinton, in his speech to the 1998 DLC Annual Conference, said, " are reviving center-left political parties throughout the industrialized world as people everywhere struggle to put a human face on the global economy. Today, less than 15 years after we started, the ideas pushed by the DLC are literally sweeping the world.""

Please take notice that President Bill Clinton used the term "center-left political parties."

I think the president was correct. The formula was working perfectly. The American Public loved the center-left Democratic Party.

(same link)

5). You wrote: "I think I need to go to sleep now. As always, this stuff makes me tired."

Get a good night sleep.