The Rift on the Left: An Afterword

Tom Perez is a terrible DNC Chairman. There, I said it. Photo by Mobilus In Mobili (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0], via Wikimedia Commons.

When I started this series, I had hoped to get to the bottom of what ailed American liberals and try to find a path forward, but I soon realized that the rift on the left could not just be examined in one or two posts. I outline my thoughts, but outlines had to be updated and reexamined as I became aware of new information and looked into older developments. My thoughts thus grew into a series and this series became my version of the autopsy for the Democratic Party.¹

If you had hoped this post would provide an answer for uniting liberals and progressives, you may be disappointed because the rift on the left is deeper than I thought it was. At first, you might have thought that the problems on the left all stemmed from the 2016 presidential election. Yet those problems were always there and they were fully exposed during that race.

The truth is, a bunch of conversations have been ignored and put off for far too long. It was only a matter of time before things bubbled up and gave rise to a demagogue like Donald Trump.

As I researched this topic, what I found made me more knowledgeable, but angrier than I was when I started this series. In particular, I became angrier at the leadership of the Democratic Party, although there were a few bright spots. And I was angry at the Democratic Party because I realized the national leadership was the problem.

Donna Brazile said that she “found the cancer” when she investigated a joint fundraising agreement the DNC had with the Hillary Victory Fund, but the party is dealing with numerous cancers, mostly tied to money.

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The Rift on the Left: The Future of the Democratic Party

“Looking good, Mr. Carter.” On November 7, Lee Carter won his race for the 50th legislative District in Virginia. If the leaders are receptive, candidates like him could be the future of the Democratic Party. However, he got where he is with no help from national party.

Admittedly, I have been pretty hard on the Democratic Party in the last few posts. To be quite honest, I didn’t set out to be this negative, but as I looked into the party — and more information became available as time passed — it made me angrier than I’d thought it would. However, I still have the same purpose and getting through the most painful parts of the series allowed me to look into the future of the Democratic Party.

Now, it is obvious that the Democrats have an uphill climb. They need to contend with the deficits they have with the Republicans — in terms of the number of seats held by members of each of the major parties, and in terms of money. Also, the Democrats have to deal with infighting among people in their ranks and resolve the ongoing war the party has with the left.

It’s that last part that has hurt the party most of all. But more importantly, it has hurt Americans. And this is the fight that will perhaps decide the Democrats’ fate in — in more ways than one.

Since my last post in this series there have been some positive developments to discuss. But there are also some things I believe will help Democrats and progressive to capitalize on this momentum and make even more gains in 2018 and beyond.

The Rift on the Left: The Current State of the Democratic Party

No, it’s not fine.

What can I say about the current state of the Democratic Party? Oh, boy …

In late July 2017, the Democratic National Committee’s Deputy Vice Chair of Civic Engagement Frank Spencer spoke during a #DNCTakeBack news conference at Politicon. Mr. Spencer took around ten minutes clarifying some parts of the Democrats’ “bold” new platform. Spencer said that the party had listened to the people and would thus promote a populist platform. During the question and answer section, Spencer admitted that the Democrats tried to run as centrists largely because the party’s donors wouldn’t let the party’s candidates run on populist issues.

As it turns out, that news conference in Pasadena, CA was a fake one. It was staged by The Yes Men, with the help of grassroots activists, for a bipartisan audience of 100 people. Andy Bichlaum of the parody duo played the part of a DNC representative who came to talk about the Democrats’ “A Better Deal,” the platform the party had released a week prior.

Bichlaum had a few people going for a while. Yet sadly, in telling people things they wanted to hear, he made a commentary on the sad state of affairs in “the party of the people.”

With that in mind, Let’s review some things I have already talked about in this series, while discussing what has transpired over the past year-and a half.

The Rift on the Left: The Internal Politics of the Democratic Party

This was not a good look.

Now it is time to address the internal politics of the Democratic Party.  If you manage to get through this post, it might make you mad. You might be mad at me for dredging all this up again. Or you will be mad because you’re being reminded of things that got you hot in the first place. Or I might make you mad because I’m telling you about things you didn’t know and wish you hadn’t.

Overall, there are some truly worrying things happening in the Democratic National Committee and within the party on a national level. Unfortunately, I will have to look at the last presidential election because it exposed the party’s current problems. However, there are more problems that have been developing for decades. I do not trace the latter in this post, but they are apparent.

This post is big because in it is a complex topic and I will be looking at six areas that pertain to the DNC and Democratic Party at large. I will start with the unity tour.

The Rift on the Left: Some Hard Truths About Hillary Clinton

Hillary Clinton is also a lightning rod of emotion, both good and bad. How fair is that and how much can be attributed to her?

Hillary Clinton is also a lightning rod of emotion, both good and bad. How fair is that and how much can be attributed to her?

In the previous post in this series, I talked about Bernie Sanders, what I thought of his candidacy, and why the Democratic Party establishment (and a portion of the voting public) detests him. That is part of the puzzle of what ails the left. Another part of the puzzle is the mixed reaction to Hillary Clinton.

If you are still a supporter of Hillary Clinton this post will be tough for you to read (but please read this post in full before commenting). And to be honest, this isn’t an easy post for me to write. It has not been easy to criticize Barack Obama, either, but there are valid criticisms of him, too.

If any part of those post angers those who read it and I lose followers because of what I have to say, so be it. That can’t be helped, because we all need to be honest about HRC’s candidacy regardless. And we need to do an honest evaluation before we can even begin to talk about unity on the left.

If you manage to read everything I have laid out here, you might think I am being mean-spirited or that this post is one-sided, but that’s not what I want to do. If anything, this is tough love. Because Clinton was the Democratic nominee, we need to get to the heart of her campaign’s flaws and understand the anger surrounding her loss.

The Rift on the Left: The Bernie Sanders Effect

Sen. Bernie Sanders is a source of hope and disdain, depending on whom you ask (on the left). Why is that so? There are a least a few obvious reasons.

How did Bernie Sanders become a factor in the 2016 election and what were the long-term effects of his candidacy?

To be quite honest, I never really heard of Bernie Sanders until a few years ago. That should tell you how little I paid attention to politics.

Yet from 2010-2012, I could only find one person who consistently praised Sanders. I thought, “What makes this Senator so special?” without bothering to do much research on him. At the time I was preoccupied with life in general and trying to finish up school.

By the time 2016 rolled around, I began to know more about this independent Senator from Vermont. And it became clear why he had a growing following. But he was running as a Democrat and going up against the eventual Democratic nominee. The odds were stacked against him and I never really expected him to win.

However:

As the primary went on, Sanders was closing the initial gap between him and Clinton. At the same time, the race on the Democratic side was getting more contentious. Naturally, there was bickering as the Clinton and Sanders factions were getting louder.

The acrimony between the factions increased as Sanders supporters accused the DNC of collusion and vote-rigging and they were being chided for various reasons. I will get into these accusations in subsequent posts, but I address part of the anger here.

The Rift on the Left: We Have to Revisit the 2016 Presidential Election

Finally! After months of research, I can now present my in-depth breakdown of the 2016 presidential election. In keeping with the overall theme of this series, this post will cover a lot of the narratives an immediate fallout.

Originally, I wanted to take a look at the highlights I can remember from the past election, beginning in the spring of 2015. However, I thought about it and realized that I needed to simplify things for myself by separating the overall themes and making a timeline later, for my own purposes. I still ended up putting some extra work in.

Unfortunately, it’s hard for me to summarize the election without going through all the important highlights (and there are so many to mention). Therefore, I am skipping to the end and pointing out some things I feel are important.

That said I cannot get into the aftermath without first looking at the important issues leading up to the 2016 presidential race and discussing the three most important players in the race. And after that, I want to discuss the following narratives that came out of this election.

On Second Thought … (Blog Update for September 14, 2017)

This is an impromptu blog update, but I wanted to fill my readers in on what I plan to do and to briefly discuss some current events.

Shmaltz’s Political Dictionary

Today, I had originally planned to post a News Roundup, but I’ve been falling behind. I just need to read the news for myself right now and try to put up something for my readers by the end of this month. For now, I thought I’d write up a political dictionary instead so I could have an early post for this week at the very least.

What is a political dictionary, you might ask? Well, it’s no different than a normal one, except it focuses on political terms. Mine will be a little different, though.

I want to primarily focus on terms I know and want to address for clarification. For example, I want people to be clear what I mean when I refer to “progressives.” There may be other terms my readers may be unfamiliar with, so this will be a place to store that information.

In addition, there may be terms that deal with Internet fights or movements which might not look political on the surface but turn political and/or overlap with politics.

At the time of publishing, this post will be incomplete because I will only leave you with a few terms. Some of the terms may have already been addressed in some of my previous posts, but the definitions here will be short anyway.

Of course, there may be new terms which arise in the future. In any event, this post will be updated.

Edit (July 27, 2017): This list of terms is based on my likeliness to use them for my Rift on the Left series. I will link back to specific terms so readers can quickly find my definitions.

Edit (February 13, 2018): Whew! I’m finally done with the list. I just need to go back and code the page for easier navigation. By the way, I’m thinking of making a real dictionary to include far more terms.

(11:03 PM PDT): Done!

The Rift on the Left: An Overview

The 2016 U.S. Presidential Election started in earnest, but things soon became heated between two factions: The Hillary Clinton wing of the party and the “insurgent” Bernie Sanders Wing of the Party. This is an overview. Image via Disney | ABC Television Group/Flickr (Some rights reserved).

Just like I did for my Sexism in Naruto series, I’m going to give an overview for this one. It’s been awhile since I made the introduction for this series, so I want to leave my readers with something.

Now, I have already started writing a couple of posts in this series, but I cannot move forward until I write the 2016 Presidential Election Recap. That will be the hardest post for me to write but only due to the sheer volume of research and writing I still need to do.