I was initially surprised to see that some voting for the DNC chair feared that Ellison would "push the party too far to the left". "You're kidding, he's mainstream", thought I. Then, the part of my mind that has been a close observer of and sometime participant in history for about 60 years remembered. "Were'nt the self-styled liberals, nearly all of them mainstream Democrats, the folks constantly sushing everybody on the left throughout the late fifties and the sixties? Were they not those folks who constantly tried to suppress the public expression of any arguably left-wing proposal, plan, agenda or idea because some faceless and nameless "they" would think we were commies, or at least say or insinuate that we were commies, pinkos, socialists, Reds, or whatever?"
That led me to recall that the Democratic establishment doesn't use the word, or understand the concept "left" in the same way as Europeans, historians, and probably the entire rest of the world does. One has to recall that the Democratic establishment found LBJ to be horrifyingly leftist, so much so that they blamed "the left" and the "leftist tilt of the party" for the decline in Democratic electoral success caused by the withdrawal of the Dixiecrats from the party (over racism v. Civil Rights.) They've continued to perpetrate that myth as an excuse to keep the left out of policy decisions ever since.
(As an aside, I will acknowledge that some were reluctant to admit that the Dems had, until then, been the party of racism. This could especially be true among all of the NIMBY racists who feared somebody pointing out that only the open, hard-core racists left and that many who stayed only opposed racism in theory and in the South, but not at home in their districts and neighborhoods.)
So, what was this terrifying far left agenda. What was it that they feared so much that it required daily demonization.
Right off the top, LBJ enacted socialized medicine Medicare, and the Civil Rights Act 1) The street left pushed for civil liberties & civil rights; freedom and equality, for all 2) LBJ went along with civil rights part and, as noted, enacted the Civil Rights Act 3) The street left often called for various types of public social programs including access to health care 4) LBJ called for a War on Poverty + The Great Society and, as noted, signed Medicare into law 5) The street left called for peace and so did some otherwise mainstream Dems. 6) The street left also called for an end to imperialism and reigning in the MIC
That's it. That's the horrible, terrifying leftist agenda: civil liberty, civil rights, equality, medicare and peace. It still terrifies them, which could be why some of them felt that Ellison would "push the party too far to the left".
It could all boil down to the anti-war, anti-imperialism and peace message of the old street left too. Not only did many on the left openly call for such things, but the other programs diverted funds from war, the war machine, the MIC, and imperialism. Who knows, that might still be the big problem, especially for the "fiscally responsible" DLC, New Democrats & Third Way.
OTOH, I haven't studied the man, but, afaik, Ellison has no strong neo-liberal cred. In the post Reagan-DLC-Bill Clinton world in which we live that is the same as being a commie, pinko, socialist, Red, or whatever. This is the "Far Left" that is so seriously terrifying to the New Democrats, who eat, sleep, & breathe Chicago School Economics above all other things. We are back in '64, or '66, or thereabouts, and anything leftish is "far left" and scary as hell except that today, "leftish" is simply no more than "not actively neo-liberal"
At any rate, it raises the question of what do they expect and what the public can expect. What change, if any, is in the wind? Now that they can see some point vaguely near the imaginary "ideological center" dimly in the distance off to their left will they change from conservatism to reaction? Or, all terror aside will they face their fears and continue to stand for the status quo? Will their be any hint of progressivism or will the Democratic Party's message still be little more than "We are the lesser evil"?
Only time will tell, but how much patience is the public going to exhibit? How long is it wise to leave them dangling?
crossposted from http://caucus99percent.com