Only 22% of Democrats show interest in 2014 voting. Maybe "purists" need to be heard. [View all]

[madfloridian]

Of course this is an opinion piece, but maybe I am right. Maybe it's time to listen to the growing group of voices that are begging the party leaders to take firm stands on issues.

That percentage is from a recent poll by CNN/ORC International. If the poll is truly indicative, then Democrats need to be concerned. The real reason for the Democratic voter apathy will be spun by everyone on the left or right or center. We may never know.

Just three in 10 registered voters who were surveyed said they were extremely or very enthusiastic about voting in the upcoming elections, which are still nearly a year away. Democrats are less interested, with just 22 percent saying they are extremely or very enthusiastic about voting. Republicans have slightly more interest - 36 percent.

But I have some ideas of my own. Would they work? I don't know. I do know one thing. The more our party tries to accommodate the right wing on fiscal policy, the deficit, cutting Social Security, cutting Medicare, dismantling public schools....the less the enthusiasm from the voters. The more our party avoids speaking out clearly on such issues, taking a stand for the people instead of the corporate right, the more it tries to be like the other side...the less the voters seem to care about casting a ballot.

There has to be a two-party system for a country to survive, and there has to be one side standing up to the radical right. Howard Dean was right in 2004: You can't compromise with extremists. They accept no compromise, they just keep pushing their own values. When they actually do lose a small battle they yell loudly that they have won.

Some thoughts:

Stop using the term "purist" to describe those of us who question party stances.

That sets me off more than any word anyone could use. It angers many, not just me. It is MEANT to anger us, to insult us. That is the worst part. It is a wedge, a warning not to be critical when our party refuses to stand up for the safety nets and for public education. It doesn't work, and it could backfire.

Stop letting a few rich men in think tanks control the destiny of our party. From 2001:
How the DLC does it.

Privately funded and operating as an extraparty organization without official Democratic sanction, and calling themselves "New Democrats," the DLC sought nothing less than the miraculous: the transubstantiation of America's oldest political party. Though the DLC painted itself using the palette of the liberal left--as "an effort to revive the Democratic Party's progressive tradition," with New Democrats being the "trustees of the real tradition of the Democratic Party"--its mission was far more confrontational. With few resources, and taking heavy flak from the big guns of the Democratic left, the DLC proclaimed its intention, Mighty Mouse style, to rescue the Democratic Party from the influence of 1960s-era activists and the AFL-CIO, to ease its identification with hot-button social issues, and, perhaps most centrally, to reinvent the party as one pledged to fiscal restraint, less government, and a probusiness, pro free market outlook.

It's hard to argue that they haven't succeeded.

If they want to get America's teachers on board, teachers whose careers are being destroyed by constant testing....they need to stop Arne Duncan's destructive policies. President Obama needs to recognize the harm his basketball buddy has done and make him step down. Arne's arrogance is surely making many in the education field have a lack of enthusiasm about voting next year. Parents are starting to speak out about the harmful high-stakes testing.

The Democrats who are running for re-election in 2014 need to stop toeing the party line on charter school formations and closing public schools. If not, harm will be done.

They need to be brave enough to stand up proudly and say no cuts to Social Security, preserve Medicare. Perhaps they would win more hearts and souls over by simply saying that the best way to "rescue" Social Security is by expanding it to include more people. The newly added people would pay into the system, thus strengthening it greatly.

I see it this way. I always felt I was a Democrat, not just by name but in philosophy. I felt I was supposed to speak out when I could see the party going down the corporate path, leaving the everyday common people behind.

When many of us did that in 2003, we learned quickly that tactic was unwelcome. Instead of defending their reasons for the rightward turning, many turned their anger on "the left", the "liberals" who were at that time against invading Iraq. Then we fought back against cuts to the safety nets, against privatizing public education. The think tanks began to use the words "elitists" as well as purists. They often used the word "fringe", way too often.

As far I as I know, the budget for next year still includes the Chained CPI, also known as the
Superlative CPI. There is no need for these cuts, and the Democrats running next year need to say so.

Those who call us purists need to stop saying so because we are not. We are questioning policy, which is what the people of any party need to do.

Get seniors and teachers on board by backing off policies that are harming them greatly.

Since appealing to the right instead of the left in the party is apparently not working that well right now.....why not try those ideas that folks like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are tossing out there. When two leaders of a small think tank attack them, let the party's leaders jump to their defense instead of avoiding the topic.