{"id":8057,"date":"2018-03-12T10:07:59","date_gmt":"2018-03-12T17:07:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=8057"},"modified":"2018-03-12T10:07:59","modified_gmt":"2018-03-12T17:07:59","slug":"did-you-hear-the-one-about-the-party-that-self-destructed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2018\/03\/12\/did-you-hear-the-one-about-the-party-that-self-destructed\/","title":{"rendered":"Did You Hear the One About the Party That Self-Destructed?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"field-wrapper-attribution\" class=\"field-wrapper content-container clearfix inline-fields\">\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-article-date field--type-datestamp field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\"><span class=\"pb-timestamp\"><span class=\"date-display-single\">March 09, 2018\u00a0<\/span><\/span>by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Common Dreams<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-subtitle field--type-text-long field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\">\n<div>\n<p>On the importance of what we do and don&#8217;t know about the Democrat&#8217;s Unity Reform Commission<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"field-wrapper-authors\" class=\"field-wrapper content-container clearfix inline-fields\">\n<div class=\"grouping-prefix\">by\u00a0<span class=\"pb-byline\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/author\/john-atcheson\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">John Atcheson<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"shr_canvas2\" class=\"shareaholic-canvas shareaholic-ui shareaholic-resolved-canvas ng-scope\" data-app-id=\"6840209\" data-app=\"share_buttons\" data-title=\"Did You Hear the One About the Party That Self-Destructed?\" data-link=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/views\/2018\/03\/09\/did-you-hear-one-about-party-self-destructed\" data-summary=\"\">\n<div class=\"ng-scope share_buttons\" translate=\"no\">\n<div class=\"shareaholic-share-buttons-container shareaholic-ui no-print flat  block horizontal mini\">\n<div class=\"shareaholic-share-buttons-wrapper shareaholic-ui\">\n<div class=\"shareaholic-share-buttons-animation-wrapper\">\n<div class=\"shareaholic-share-buttons-heading custom\">\n<div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"ng-binding ng-scope\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"shareaholic-share-button-container\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"discourse-comments-link\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-article-img field--type-image field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\">\n<div><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"caption-processed\" src=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/cd_large\/public\/views-article\/clinton_sanders.jpg?itok=9bwLFUXQ\" alt=\"\" width=\"955\" height=\"500\" \/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-main-caption field--type-text-long field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\">\n<p><em>What will the Democratic Party become? This week&#8217;s meeting of the Unity Reform Commission may offer some clues. (Photo: Justin Sullivan\/Getty Images News\/Getty Images)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\">\n<div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The United States is no longer a Democracy,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/views\/2017\/07\/13\/greatest-story-too-rarely-told-america-oligarchy\">it&#8217;s an oligarchy.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Democratic National Committee is meeting in Washington, DC this week, and one of the main things on their agenda is to decide on whether to adopt rules that could change that. The proposed rules were unanimously approved by the Unity Reform Commission, a group that was established after the 2016 election to try to resolve deep differences between the center-right power brokers who control the Party and their increasingly progressive base.<\/p>\n<p>Oh, that\u2019s not the way the Party would portray it, but with the Democratic Congressional \u00a0Campaign Committee\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.alternet.org\/election-03918\/dc-democrats-try-push-progressive-out-democratic-primary\">undermining progressive candidates<\/a>, telling candidates to offer\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/entry\/dccc-be-careful-parkland-shooting_us_5a9711eae4b09c872bb0da23\">thoughts and prayers<\/a>\u00a0but avoid talking about gun control in the wake of the shootings at Stoneman Douglas high school, and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/newrepublic.com\/article\/147316\/everything-wrong-democrats-one-bill\">seventeen Democrats\u00a0 supporting a bill to deregulate the banks while the Party\u2019s leaders do nothing to mount a fillibuster against this latest giveawy to the ultra-rich,<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0there can little doubt about the Party being in thrall to the oligarchy, and out of step with the voters.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"pullquote\">&#8220;The party\u2019s cynical centrist-one-day, faux-left the next, center-right the next, while pandering to economic elites and corporate America has shrunk the base of the Party from 50 percent of Americans back in the late sixties to less than 30 percent today.&#8221;<\/span>There are two remarkable things about this potentially revolutionary change to the Party.\u00a0 First, the mainstream media is virtually ignoring it, and second if the Party decides to reject or give short shrift to their progressive base, it will be tantamount to shooting themselves in the foot \u2013 or actually, in the head, since it would lead to a poor showing in the midterms and the likelihood that they\u2019d fail to win either House, and fail to reverse their catastrophic losses at the state level.<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s look at each in turn.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Unity Reform Commission\u2019s recommendations \u2013 the greatest story never told<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Last December after seven months of negotiations between the various factions in the Party, the Reform Commission came out with a set of recommendations that would democratize the nominating and voting process the Party uses in the primaries. \u00a0The Commission\u2019s key proposals included reducing the number of Super Delegates by 60 percent, making participation in caucuses less difficult, providing incentives and penalties designed to encourage states to open up the primary process, and making the Party\u2019s financial transactions more transparent.\u00a0 Progressives on the Commission also won a hard-fought battle to include an Ombudsman Council responsible for assuring transparency and accountability in the Party\u2019s financial transactions.<\/p>\n<p>The press largely ignored this, other than a few outlets mentioning it last December, and the Party itself acted as if it were a national security secret.\u00a0 In fact, the most high-profile story on it may well have been an idiotic guest editorial in the New York Times on December 11<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0entitled,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/12\/11\/opinion\/democratic-party.html?action=click&amp;pgtype=Homepage&amp;clickSource=story-heading&amp;module=opinion-c-col-left-region&amp;region=opinion-c-col-left-region&amp;WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region&amp;_r\">Is the Democratic Party Becoming Too Democratic?<\/a>\u00a0One of the articles more lunatic suggestions was that Party bosses were better placed to pick winners. This, after the Democrats managed to lose to Trump, the most unpopular candidate in the history of polling, while losing both Houses. And this loss came on top of the fact that Democrats have been getting crushed at the State level for several decades now.\u00a0 Hard to justify letting the \u201cbosses\u201d retain control with a record like this, unless, of course, you\u2019re a boss.<\/p>\n<p>In another guest op-ed the\u00a0<em>New York Times<\/em>\u00a0ran in January\u2014entitled &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/01\/25\/opinion\/politics-amateur-politicians.html\">Politics Shouldn&#8217;t Be Like Open Mic Night<\/a>&#8220;\u2014the authors, Jonathan Rauch and Raymond J. La Raja, decried what they called the amateurization of American politics. Really?\u00a0 Aren\u2019t we the people supposed to make the choices here?\u00a0 In an age when money talks and the people walk, are we supposed to relinquish control to those who take money from moneyed interests?\u00a0 I thought the point of democracy and our constitution was precisely to give everyone an equal shot at the mic.<\/p>\n<p>Fast forward to this week. The Democratic Rules Committee of the Democratic National Committee is meeting in Washington to decide\u2014or maybe by the time you read this has decided\u2014whether or not to adopt the Unity Reform Commission\u2019s recommendations.<\/p>\n<p>You\u2019d be hard pressed to know about this, though. The only thorough report focusing on it in the lead up to the DNC\u2019s meeting I found was by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ourfuture.org\/20180305\/pushing-for-real-change-in-the-democratic-party\">Robert Borosage<\/a>, at Our Future.Org. The article was picked up by a few progressive sites, but in general, this potentially revolutionary change to the Democratic Party was ignored by the mainstream press, which focused on the usual fare of insane tweets, \u201cthe Russian\u2019s done it\u201d stories, the latest incriminating behavior of Trump and friends, or the hemorrhaging White House Staff.<\/p>\n<p>A call to the DNC on Thursday to check on the status of the vote, yielded nothing.\u00a0 Is there anyone there who knows anything? \u201cNo.\u201d Is there a way to reach them at the meeting? \u201cWe\u2019re trying to get \u2026 information, but as of now, no.\u201d Does the DNC have a position on this? \u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Bottom line? The mainstream media has barely covered this attempt at democratizing the Democratic Party. Why?\u00a0 Well, they\u2019re\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/views\/2017\/07\/13\/greatest-story-too-rarely-told-america-oligarchy\">members in good standing of the oligarchy<\/a>, that\u2019s why.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Preferring power to victory<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The fact that a little over 27 percent of the eligible voters put Trump in office is directly a result of the fact that the Democratic Party isn\u2019t democratic. How?\u00a0 Well, if you read Clinton\u2019s latest book, or the misguided ramblings of neoliberals like\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/10\/17\/opinion\/why-democrats-need-wall-street.html?_r=0\">Doug Schoen<\/a>, or look at the latest antics of the DCCC, the neoliberal mafia that administers the orders of the Democratic Party leadership still seems to have no clue that they enabled his victory by refusing to stand for the vast majority of Americans who are\u2014and have been for some time now\u2014getting screwed by the party\u2019s decades long allegiance to the uber wealthy and elitist interests in lieu of the people\u2019s interests.\u00a0 The party\u2019s cynical centrist-one-day, faux-left the next, center-right the next, while pandering to economic elites and corporate America has shrunk the base of the Party from 50 percent of Americans back in the late sixties to less than 30 percent today.<\/p>\n<p>This rudderless, amoral approach to governance is why just\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/the-fix\/wp\/2017\/07\/18\/a-majority-says-the-democratic-party-stands-for-nothing-except-the-only-thing-that-matters-in-2018\/?utm_term=.f31410f02ed1\">37 percent believe the Democratic Party stands for something<\/a>.\u00a0 And what the neoliberals just don\u2019t get, is that what Americans want are candidates who back a progressive agenda.\u00a0 Oh, yes, the terms liberal and progressive have been smeared by the Oligarch\u2019s skillful use of branding to make them unpopular terms, but on an issue-by-issue basis, Americans are\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ourfuture.org\/report\/american-majority-project-polling\">overwhelmingly progressive.<\/a>\u00a0 The only reason the Oligarch\u2019s branding effort worked is because no one countered it.\u00a0 In fact, the neoliberal\u2019s embrace of free markets, trade agreements, deregulation, and militarism reinforced the conservatives\u2019 narrative.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s possible that by the time you read this, the DNC will have embraced the reforms proposed by the Unity Commission. But the fact that you probably haven\u2019t seen it discussed in the press or heard about it on the airwaves, and that the DNC is trying to make the decision in secret, tells you how completely the Oligarchs are controlling our national narrative, and the Democratic Party.\u00a0 The only hope of this passing is if Democrats realize they\u2019ll lose even more power if they don\u2019t start making the interests of the people part of their calculations.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, forget the Russians\u2014when it comes to messing with our political system, they\u2019re pikers compared to the Oligarchy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"field-wrapper-copyright-cond\" class=\"field-wrapper content-container clearfix\">\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-copyright field--type-text field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\"><em>This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"field-wrapper-fundraising\" class=\"field-wrapper content-container clearfix\">\n<div class=\"content-prompt clearfix\">\n<div class=\"slim-header-content\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box;\" data-cta-slim-header=\"&lt;i class='fa fa-info-circle'&gt;&lt;\/i&gt; &lt;strong&gt;Did you find this article useful?&lt;\/strong&gt;Support our journalism.&lt;a href='https:\/\/secure.actblue.com\/donate\/free-and-independent?refcode=winter18_cta2' target='_blank' class='btn text-center'&gt;Donate Today&lt;\/a&gt;\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"cta-content-block-one\">\n<div class=\"card\">\n<div class=\"card-header\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"card-block\">\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-author-profile field--type-entityreference field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\">\n<div id=\"cdreams-profile-6905\" class=\"cdreams-profile teaser author\">\n<div class=\"content clearfix grid-size-16\">\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-profile-img field--type-image field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\">\n<div><a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/author\/john-atcheson\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"caption-processed\" src=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/cd_bio_small\/public\/authors\/atcheson.jpg?itok=e7WZJ9IP\" alt=\"John Atcheson\" width=\"65\" height=\"65\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"field field--name-field-desc field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden\">\n<div class=\"field__items\">\n<div class=\"field__item even\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/author\/john-atcheson\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"image-right caption-processed\" src=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/sites\/default\/files\/users\/user20\/screen_shot_2017-07-26_at_9.09.47_pm.png\" alt=\"screen_shot_2017-07-26_at_9.09.47_pm.png\" width=\"130\" height=\"195\" \/><strong>John Atcheson<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0is author of the novel,\u00a0<em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/A-Being-Darkly-Wise-ebook\/dp\/B006ZGQE8U\">A Being Darkly Wise<\/a><\/em>, and he has just completed a book on the 2016 elections titled,\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/s\/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&amp;field-keywords=WTF+America+How+the+US+Went+Off+the+Rails+and+How+to+Get+It+Back+on+Track\">WTF, America? How the US Went Off the Rails and How to Get It Back On Track<\/a><\/em>, available from Amazon. Follow him on Twitter\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/john_atcheson\">@john_atcheson<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>March 09, 2018\u00a0by Common Dreams On the importance of what we do and don&#8217;t know about the Democrat&#8217;s Unity Reform Commission by\u00a0John Atcheson What will the Democratic Party become? This week&#8217;s meeting of the Unity Reform Commission may offer some clues. (Photo: Justin Sullivan\/Getty Images News\/Getty Images) &nbsp; The United&#8230; <a class=\"continue-reading-link\" href=\"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2018\/03\/12\/did-you-hear-the-one-about-the-party-that-self-destructed\/\"> Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr; <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8057"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8057"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8057\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8058,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8057\/revisions\/8058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}