-Caveat Lector- A call for Democratic party reform By Carla Binion No other subjects in our current political life deserve as much thorough scrutiny as (1) the stealing of presidential election 2000, (2) the mainstream media's cover-up of the election theft, and (3) the need for reforming the Democratic party. The theft of the election was a covert political coup. Rather than examine what this coup reveals about the condition of democracy and our political system today, most TV talking heads and mainstream politicians are in a big hurry to change the subject. It was only six weeks ago that the Supreme Court stopped the vote count. However, the subject-changers rush to bury the incident, to obliterate the event from the American memory. In The Nation, 2/5/01, author and prosecuting attorney Vincent Bugliosi points out the criminal nature of the Supreme Court's decision to hand the presidential election to George W. Bush. Bugliosi says: "The stark reality, and I say this with every fiber of my being, is that the institution Americans trust the most to protect its freedoms and principles committed one of the biggest and most serious crimes this nation has ever seen -- pure and simple, the theft of the presidency. And by definition, the perpetrators of this crime have to be denominated criminals." Bugliosi laments the fact that most critics of the Supreme Court's behavior have not shown outrage but mere disappointment. Why have so many of the Court's critics responded tepidly? Vince Bugliosi is not the only prominent attorney voicing outrage. Over 500 law professors around the country signed a petition giving similar analyses of the five Supreme Court Justices; and, as Bugliosi mentions, even judicial conservatives such as Terrance Sandalow, former dean of the University of Michigan law school, have criticized the Court. Sandalow, who supported the nomination to the Court of rightwing icon Robert Bork and opposed Roe v. Wade, said the Court's staying the vote count was "incomprehensible" and "an unmistakably partisan decision without any foundation in law." What can be done about this travesty? On MSNBC's Hardball last week, Chris Matthews and his guests agreed that people unwilling to forget the stealing of the election and embrace the Bush Cabinet nominees are not "political moderates," inferring they are a fringe element. There you go! Just proclaim over 500 law professors, including the conservative Sandalow, as "not moderate, but extreme," and you don't have to be bothered with troublesome critical examination at all. One Hardball guest, journalist Elizabeth Shogren said that a moderate would be willing to accept all that happened and go along with the Bush nominations. That definition equates being moderate with being a doormat, supposedly blessedly free of those annoying questions and doubts raised by Bugliosi and others. According to this Orwellian Newspeak, moderates are extremists, and extremists are conservatives. When TV commentators claim progressives and reformers are not "moderate," by what yardstick do they measure? A moderate would not roll over for the theft of a presidential election. The stealing of an election is an extremist act, and a moderate would oppose such extreme behavior. A moderate or conservative would want to conserve democracy and protect our traditional way of life and democratic values, including the vote. A political moderate would also oppose John Ashcroft's extremist views, and Gale Norton's extreme anti-regulatory views and her support of extremist, excessive exploitation of the environment. A moderate or conservative would want to conserve environmental resources and use moderation when it comes to mining, logging and opening the land to oil exploration. A political moderate would want to preserve American jobs, or at the least move jobs out of the country at a slow pace. Media critic Michael Parenti has said that the mainstream media "invent reality" by telling Americans which news events to think about and which to ignore. Thus, we are told it is "moderate" to forget the theft of the presidency and rally behind the beneficiary of the theft. If our TV news media organizations functioned as they should, as institutions mediating on behalf of democracy and the people at large, commentators from a wide range of political persuasions would scrutinize and thoughtfully discuss the views of Vince Bugliosi and the over 500 law professors who protested the Supreme Court's decision. In a viable, healthy political system, news talk shows would feature Bugliosi or some of law professors discussing subjects related to the election, such as our deteriorating democracy, the credibility of the judicial system and voter disenfranchisement. If the mainstream media functioned on behalf of the majority of Americans, left-of-center political analysts such as Noam Chomsky, Gore Vidal or historian Howard Zinn, would be invited to weigh in with their views on the 500 law professors' contentions, to counter-balance the dominant rightwing spin. The expanded discussions might generate workable solutions. However, the rush to change the subject will never generate positive reform. The Republican party benefits from the media's changing the subject for obvious reasons. Less obvious are reasons why certain Democratic party members want to sweep the election theft under the rug and embrace the Bush agenda. Today, progressive publications encourage Democrats to resist extreme aspects of Bush's proposals and support the party's base, including minorities, environmentalists, women's groups and Labor. An editorial in The Nation, 2/5/01, said, "We hope and expect that if Democrats prove to be weak-kneed and undependable, the people will organize to keep the pressure on." Unfortunately, most Democratic senators have been weak-kneed regarding the Bush election-theft and the Bush Cabinet nominees. According to The American Prospect (1/29/01, Joshua Green, "A House Divided") some Democrats might also cave to Bush's right-of-center plans for school vouchers, tax cuts for the rich, prescription drugs, Medicare and Social Security. For example, Senator John Breaux (D-La), has proposed what amounts to a Medicare voucher system. Why are Senate Democrats so timid they would roll over and refuse to stand with some brave House Democrats in objecting to Florida's stolen electoral votes? Why are some Democrats willing to give Bush and other Republicans so much slack that they become complicit in the Bush agenda? In "Why I Am A Democrat," Ted Sorensen, author, attorney and former speech writer for John F. Kennedy, says "Democrats masquerading as a kinder, gentler version of Republicans lack credibility." Sorensen writes, "Having served Kennedy when he was senator and President, I know that criticism of presidential compromises that bridge the divide between the parties on a particular piece of legislation comes more easily to legislators and candidates who would rather fight than enact. But it is also true that a party loses the election, loses its way, indeed, loses its very reason for being if it becomes merely a pale imitation of its opposition." Sorensen says he is a Democrat, because the Democratic party traditionally: (1) Serves the public interest over private interests; (2) Guarantees Civil Rights and civil liberties more effectively than the Republican party; (3) Does more than the Republican party to improve health care access and working conditions for the poor and middle class; (4) Wants to salvage Social Security, Medicare and various other social programs; (5) Wants to strengthen family values by strengthening the family's economic opportunity. Traditional Democrats also believe, says Sorensen, that "Government must give priority to the needs of ordinary citizens, workers, consumers, students, children, the elderly and the ill, the vulnerable and the underdog, and not to the needs of those already sufficiently powerful and affluent to afford their own lobbyists." He encourages the Democratic party to once again become the Party of Conscience and says he regrets the "vacuum of moral courage" among some Democrats. Sorensen says in recent years many Democratic officeholders seem "more interested in political contributions than political courage, in holding on by going along with whatever course was easy or popular." He adds that some Democrats have begun "to back away from the party's traditional concern for those most subject to deprivation or discrimination, and to join with the Republicans in delaying the reform of campaign finance and lobbying laws." What could be a better example of Sorensen's criticism than today's Senate Democrats backing away from joining the Congressional Black Caucus members in objecting to Florida's stolen votes? What could better prove that many Democratic senators have lost their courage and connection to the party's traditional values than their support of, or tepid opposition to, the extremist Bush Cabinet nominees? In order to understand what needs changing within the Democratic party, first we should distinguish between traditional Democrats, as described by Sorensen, and so-called new Democrats, as created by the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC). The right-leaning DLC took over the Democratic party after Walter Mondale's 1984 defeat by Ronald Reagan. Journalist Bill Greider (Who Will Tell The People, 1992) says, "The DLC's main objective...was an attack on the Democratic party's core constituencies -- labor, schoolteachers, women's rights groups, peace and disarmament activists, the racial minorities and supporters of affirmative action." In other words, the DLC leadership has attacked many of the very people and policies that once made the Democratic party great according to Sorensen's assessment. The people defining "moderate" and "mainstream" for the Democratic party, says Greider, are the DLC's corporate donors -- Dow Chemical, Prudential Bache, Martin Marietta, the American Petroleum Institute, ARCO, and many others. The Dallas Morning News, 1/21/0l, ran an Associated Press article, "Gore failed moderates, group says." The article reported that some of the DLC's new Democrats believe Al Gore was "unsuccessful against George W. Bush" because of his "steady appeals to the working class." Al From, the Democratic Leadership Council's founder and chief executive, complained that Gore's campaign appealed to the working class but did not appeal to "suburbanites, moderates and the upper-middle class." Here are the flaws in the DLC leadership's thinking: (1) Gore actually won the election, and (2) Millions of working class Americans did vote for Gore. Millions of left-of-center voters, such as Greens, showed up and voted. Tens of thousands, or possibly hundreds of thousands, of working class or left-of-center voters protested the Bush inaugural. It is likely that working class and left-of-center voters greatly outnumber alleged Democratic moderates, or, rather "moderates" as defined by spokespeople for the chemical, oil, and defense industries and other corporate DLC-backers. Bill Greider refers to a Washington Post report saying that at the DLC's 1990 conference in New Orleans, the audience was not pleased when some speakers promoted tax cuts for the working class, "since the majority of the [DLC] conference was composed of corporate lobbyists, many of whom were not even Democrats." That's right -- the DLC is strongly influenced by corporate lobbyists, many of whom are not Democrats. DLC leaders, says Greider, often belittle labor, minority, civil liberties, environmental and women's organizations as "activists" or "interest groups," even though those groups are the Democratic party's most loyal voters. John Nichols (editorial page Editor of The Capital Times of Madison, Wisconsin) writes about the DLC in The Progressive, October 2000. Nichols reports that former-Representative William Gray (D-Pa), once a DLC governing board member, said the DLC's agenda on affirmative action and other African-American concerns "sounds like David Duke." Is it any wonder many DLC-influenced new Democrats did not stand with disenfranchised African-American voters, did not strongly oppose the stealing of the election, and did not firmly oppose extremist Bush Cabinet nominees? The new Democrat is a sci-fi horror story clone-gone-awry version of the traditional Democrat. Al Gore has been a loyal supporter of the DLC. The above-referenced AP article says Gore aides claim that in his campaign he tried to blend the DLC's "moderate" rhetoric with an outreach to the poor and middle class. Gore's running mate, Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman, is current president of the DLC. According to John Nichols, Lieberman told a Wall Street Journal reporter that Gore's attacks on corporations were just "rhetorical fourishes." Bill Greider has suggested that an obstacle to reforming the Democratic party is that "no one who now shares power in the party structure, however marginally, will be in favor of it." Real change, says Greider, would have to originate with grassroots groups willing to attack the status quo. Should we expect our Democratic senators to stand up against an obvious Republican coup or oppose extremist Bush policies and Cabinet nominees? Ted Sorensen was right to call on Democrats to again become the Party of Conscience, but how can that happen when the DLC is beholden to Dow Chemical, et al., and exhibits contempt for average citizens? If progressive-thinking Americans are to make needed changes, we have to understand exactly what is wrong with the institutions that should be supporting rather than undermining democracy, including both major political parties and the mainstream news media. Among our first efforts should be to (1) Put pressure on traditional Democrats in Congress to reclaim the party leadership from the DLC, or (2) If the DLC stays at the helm, then create a separate, strong Progressive party and encourage all traditional Democrats, labor, environmental, Civil Rights, civil liberties and women's organizations to join. Ted Sorensen says, "I am one of countless Democrats who look back with pride on the accomplishments of FDR's New Deal, Truman's Fair Deal, JFK's New Frontier, and Johnson's Great Society." The DLC and many new Democrats have moved away from FDR, Truman, JFK and Johnson's policies and instead primarily serve corporate interests and go along with Republican plans to limit government regulation of industry and the market. Sorensen continues, "The market's 'invisible hand,' as posited by Adam Smith, makes wheels turn and steamships steam, but sometimes that hand is a clenched fist that knocks many people down and some people out. Governments are needed to tame these excesses, to temper their consequences, and to protect investors, consumers, workers, and others from such market distortions as monopoly, manipulation, discrimination, and exploitation." Markets by definition, writes Sorensen, "are founded on self-absorption and self-interest (usually spelled G-R-E-E-D.)....Public policy, in contrast, must involve considerations of conscience, community and responsibility to others." If the theft of a presidential election and the new Democrats' yielding to the Bush agenda is not enough to wake up traditional Democrats, what would be? We need traditional, as opposed to "new" Democrats -- political representatives courageous enough to forcefully oppose Bush's extreme proposals. We can't expect to reform the Republican party, because it has traditionally existed to protect the wealth of five-percent of the population against the needs of the remaining ninety-five percent. Either moving the new Democrats back toward their traditional Democratic roots, or creating a viable Progressive party (which would amount to recreating the traditional Democratic party) would be the only moderate, thoughtful responses possible to the stealing of election 2000 and the complicity of the DLC-brand of Democrats. <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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