Nor have they convinced me of the intelligence of getting rid of Blue Dog Dems in areas where liberals can't win. What is the wisdom of getting rid of someone who agrees with you 50% of the time for someone who agrees with you 0% of the time?

First, you a presuming that the Republican will never agree. Often that is the case, but not always.

But, more importantly, better to have people properly identified, so you know where they stand, because counting the votes is everything. As for a blue dog agreeing 50% of the time... I don't think that's the way to look at it. Do you mean 50% of the votes? Because if you do, I'm damn clear that some votes are more important than others. And the ones that have so many of us here up in arms are those very votes, the ones where the blue dogs have consistently disappointed us. The ones that are about our most basic civil liberties, the liberties that our founders made sure to spell out (as well as they could at that time) because they had been denied them.

It isn't that we don't want the blue dogs to have a voice, too. We just want them to express it under the proper tent with the proper party.

How about this question? Wouldn't it be great to have some Republican congress members who agreed with us 50% of the time instead of never?

We cannot afford to let our party be taken even further off-course by those who would still, even to this day, appease the likes of GWB. And we don't have to make that choice based upon electoral math. The GOP is going down even further this November.

I hardly recognize myself. SCOTUS? Yes, it's important and so are women's heath and reproductive issues, as well as education, SSI, and the whole lot, but they require a firm foundation, and we're in danger of landing in some quicksand.

Darn! Now, I've shown my age. There was a time when every TV show worth its salt would have at least an episode or two each season in which someone would have to be rescued from some quicksand. Too bad we don't see such things anymore. My metaphor would work better.

I hadn't read the rest of the comments before adding my own. If I had, I would have left well enough alone.

#

Kitt

"The difference between you and me is that I.."

The difference between you and I. Carry on.

-- omooex

[Read omooex's other letters]

Permalink Tuesday, July 29, 2008 01:05 PM

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omooex

The difference between you and I. Carry on.

-- omooex

Dang. I knew that. Thanks, ;o). Anonymust will be disappointed in me.

-- Kitt

The difference between you and me is equivalent to saying the difference between us, while saying between you and I is akin to saying between we. Obviously, the first one is correct.

Don't feel too badly, omooex. Lots of people over-correct with pronouns, substituting an "I" when a "me" is actually correct. My grandmother (RIP) taught me to substitute the plural or the singular to "hear" the pronouns correctly.

Now, if Kitt had begun a sentence with "Him and me," then you would have been correct. Unfortunately, not enough people over-correct for that one. I hear it all the time and it grates...

Just remember ...

what happened to the Republican party when they went to oust all the RINOs...extremism and the accumulation of power is, in the end, not well tolerated by the American people. So go ahead and try to 'purify' the party. See how well that works out for you.

-- Independence_2008

is that the Republicans used to have an honorable tradition of a larger tent for their own party, including on civil rights and the environment. Women's reproductive rights, too.

Then the Gingrich revolution came along on the heels of Reagan's galloping into town like a cowboy, and a "cabal" within the party decided to have their own way with it. Anyone who was not for profit above all else, against any kind of regulation, and didn't understand that consolidating power was only a good, would be purged. They pruned their party down to the bone, and an ugly sight it was while it was going on, too. Remember Tom DeLay? Grover Norquist? They were all part of it.

Gingrich instituted a "language" policy (though it was decidedly not PC) and actually drew up a list of epithets that were to be used as modifiers anytime a Democrat was named, or even the word Democrat, or any Democratic policy. Eventually, after losing enough electoral battles, and being called enough bad names that people were beginning to believe them, the Democrats decided to join their enemies at some illusory mid-point. The atmosphere began to look a little friendlier to the blue-dog types, so they ran, got elected, and consolidated their own numbers, gradually doing to the Democratic party what a cabal had done to the GOP.

Now, the campaign going on in Glenn's post and in these threads, as well as at other blogs and their threads, isn't about some kind of purity purge of the Democratic Party. It's about restoration, returning the party to its small-d democratic roots. I honestly don't see how anyone can expect the blue dogs to participate willingly in restoring the party to its democratic ideals when they have played a major role in turning it away from them. Might as well ask DeLay if he regrets any of his power grabs.

I always wondered why it didn't go one step further. If you aren't mature enough to drink at 21, then why are you mature enough to decide to walk around with a gun in another country at 18.

Honestly, I don't think 18-yr-olds should be doing either of those things, but especially they should not be able to do them at the same time. (Maybe that's why they're allowed guns, but no alcohol?)

You mean like the Lobbyists do?