Another Dem bites the dust

Daily Kos: Mainstream

by kos Fri Jul 20, 2007 at 11:46:56 AM PDT YearlyKos will be addressed this year by just about the entire Democratic Party leadership -- Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, and Dick Durbin. It will feature a candidate forum of all the top Democratic candidates -- Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Barack Obama, Chris Dodd, and Bill Richardson.

A long listing of other notable elected Dems who will attend the convention follows.

And that's the key -- anyone who claims this event is anything but a celebration of the best the Democratic Party has to offer is simply, to put it mildly, blinded by partisan rage and completely out-of-touch with reality.

Folks, I have come to a decision, and it's not one I've made lightly. Over the past several years, I've thought a lot about it, done as much reading as I could, and learned as much as I could from both sides of the political fence. I'm not any sort of political whiz by any means, but I try to pay attention to the things I see. This week, I've come to a sad but probably inevitable conclusion. I've always basically considered myself a Democrat, although I have crossed party lines several times during my voting career, especially during Wisconsin's (closed) primary season. Anybody remember John Anderson and the Unity Party? :-D Okay, it was my very first election. Cut me some slack. Still, even though I know I've gotten more conservative in my advancing age, I *still* was a Democrat. Hey, Russ Feingold is my Senator. Dave Obey is my congressman. I was a member of the party of FDR. Of JFK. A Party that had room for everyone from the hawkish Scoop Jackson to the naked bike riders (Trust me, that link isn't safe for *any* time of day), no matter how distasteful or idiotic I might have personally thought them. There was room for entire spectrum, from those who believe that the Iraq War is an illegal regime change and occupation of a foreign State under international law to those who see it as an inevitable neccessity, better done now than later. There was room for all of us, and more than likely a 2008 Presidential candidate for all of us. There is no longer room for me in this Party, because today I am "completely out-of-touch with reality". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In April 2004 a popular liberal blogger named Markos Koulitsas wrote about an incident in Fallujah, Iraq in which four contractors working for Blackwater USA were attacked by grenade and small arms fire while conducting a food delivery convoy. They were killed, their bodies burned and dragged through the streets of the town before being hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River. Photos of this incident were published on the internet and in newspapers, showing the unrecognizable charred remains of Scott Helvenston, Jerko Zovko, Wesley Batalona and Michael Teague dangling over a grinning gun-waving, cheering mob. Koulitsas-- better known as "Kos"-- wrote of this on his blog the Daily A$$hole Kos:

"Let the people see what war is like. This isn't an Xbox game. There are real repercussions to Bush's folly. That said, I feel nothing over the death of merceneries. [sic] They aren't in Iraq because of orders, or because they are there trying to help the people make Iraq a better place. They are there to wage war for profit. Screw them."

Yes, I saw the post before it mysteriously disappeared from the internet with its tail tucked between its legs. The next day Kos posted an "apology", which was basically a diatribe against evil minions who would take a paycheck to work for the government in a war zone. Since I am the child of a former government contractor, I wasn't overly impressed with his mea culpa. The trouble was that there were some out there who agreed whole-heartedly with Kos' assessment of the situation, and the readership/ membership of the Daily Kos exploded, making this new Left darling a powerful celebrity within the Democratic Party. This rambling all goes somewhere, I promise. This next week marks the 2nd "Yearly Kos" convention, to be held in Chicago. Every major candidate from the Democratic Party will attend this convention. Every. Single. One. Of. Them. All of them will pander to this demigod who said of the burned mutilated bodies of this fellow countrymen: screw 'em, they deserved it. I understand that appealing to special interest groups is part of the definition of the word "politician", but I felt physically ill reading the list of attendees to this gathering. Must have been the "partisan rage" Kos was referring to above, ya think? In light of the dollar signs and campaign publicity opportunities, none of them had the cojones to say that what this man wrote in April 2004 was unforgivable, as is any association with a convention bearing his name. But dear Readers, small and unimportant as mine might be, I *do* have a set. It may seem like a small thing to get worked up about, but it's the straw that broke my camel's back. It's symbolized the Dem's leftward drift into the area of Bush Derangement Syndrome, where the only unity in the Party seems to be in its opposition to anything Bush-like. All ideas, discussion, and policy seems only to be valued in where it stands in relation to White House policy. There's a difference in my mind between favoring an idea after careful thought, and opposing that same idea due to blind hatred. The Dems seem to me to have lost that distinction and I'm beginning to wonder if other voters have noticed. Maybe opposition is not enough. I wonder how many of these candidates are going to show up at the Democratic Leadership Council's conference being held as I write? Oh yeah, *that* DLC--you know them, they're a "moderate" group; heck, they're almost REPUBLICANS! Well, looks like they got at least one speaker. With four days' advance notice, was the DLC scrambling a bit, maybe? So, that's it. I'm out. I will not vote for any candidate who attends the Kos' Kids Konvention. I will not register as, or call myself a Democrat any longer. However, I'll probably follow my ingrained Good Democratic Practices by actively campaigning *against* the policy I dislike, rather than *for* the policy I favor. Whether or not Ronald Reagan actually said "I didn't leave my party, my Party left me" when he became a Republican, I find myself nodding in agreement. The Republicans ain't quite got me yet, but with this public fellating of the Kos nation the Democrats have lost me for good.