I believe I'm as liberal as anyone on DU, but I'm concerned.

[BlueStreak]

48. Obama is playing the cards he was dealt. We can criticize how much of a gambler

he is (or is not), but the fundamental problem is the ard in his hand, and most of that is not his doing.

Let's work backwards from where we are today.

1) We have no control over Congress. We could control the Senate with filibuster reform, but there wouldn't be any great advantage in that as long as the teabaggers rule the House.

2) How did the teabaggers control the House? That's all about 2010.

3) How did 2010 happen? Well, we can blame some of that on Obama. Much of 2010 was a reaction to the health care division. We might argue that if he had pushed for a single payer system, maybe the public would have supported Democrats more in 2010. I don't believe that. Moreover, it was academic because there were plenty of Democrats (as well as almost all Republicans) that would kill that.

4) And how is is that there were so many Democrats in 2009-2010 who undermined Obama? Well, we have a lot of worthless, well-bought assholes wearing the Democratic label.

5) And how did that come to be? That goes back a long time, but we can trace much of that to Clinton's DLC.

Those aren't all the important milestones, of course. We lost control of legislatures all across the country in 2010. And why was that? This CAN be laid at least partially at Obama's doorstep. He made the decision to go it alone. IN contrast to the Howard Dean period when the party was strong at all levels, Obama went it alone. He essentially shut down the Democratic Party and ran everything through his own operation. That was great for Barack, but sucked big time for the party. And now we are paying a very dear price for that. This, I believe, is his biggest sin, and one that will haunt us at least until 2022 (the next election after redistricting.)