I know, I’m the pest who keeps complaining that, for all their heroic posturing, our progressive leaders have been pathetic in refusing to brandish any kind of retaliatory stick while begging the Democratic Party to not turn the healthcare bill into nothing more than the bloody stump of reform. And urging those outraged at those pathetic leaders to start figuring out how to hit the Democratic Party where it hurts.
Then along comes Jane Hamsher. For the record, I had criticized her in my intro to the Full Court Press as one of those progressive leaders who had caved in and was supporting the bill even without the “robust” public option she had once demanded. But then she turned around and came out 4-square for killing the Senate bill. And then, a few days ago, she joined with notorious scoundrel Grover Norquist to demand an investigation of Rahm Emmanuel for malfeasance regarding his relationship with Freddie Mac.
Well, I gotta say the lady’s got guts.
Her move follows one or both of two tracks. It could be seen as an innocent exercise in good government. Or it could be a counterpunch to the way Rahm and the White House have viciously sidelined progressives around, well, everything. Both are valid.
But working with Norquist! the Dems cry while clutching at their smelling salts. Okay, let’s look at the Democrats’ record. The Stupak amendment passed mostly with Republican votes. And then when the House Democrats passed its Stupak-laden bill, they made Stupak their own. They passed a Republican measure.
So the Obamacrats cry “teabagger!” Jane Hamsher is getting her money from Jack Abramoff! Next thing you know, she’ll be leading teabagger rallies. The charges are nonsense, but the underlying politic is worth some thought.
Make no mistake, the teabagger movement is a fascist-led, corporate-funded reactionary movement. But its success is in part a monument to progressive failure. While progressives had dreams of Obama-plums dancing in their heads, they ignored their working class base, which was outraged that Wall Street was getting bailed out while they were losing their homes. They distrust the Fed. They fear a distant government that might do things like, oh, mandating people to buy insurance they can’t afford. The teabaggers were able to merge this righteous anger with backward racist and sexist currents in the American people. Because progressives were asleep at the wheel!