Are You As Sick Of Dems Whining About Kerry As I Am

[Beloved Citizen]

Poll question: Are You As Sick Of Dems Whining About Kerry As I Am

[RandomKoolzip]

1. Who's Kerry?

Hey guys, did you hear that Reagan died?!

[rogerashton]

2. It's time to get out there and accentuate the positive.

We can bitch and moan after he is elected.

[Solidarity]

6. Whining Is A Loaded Term ..... A Biased Poll

No you can't! And it's unlikely that very many will no matter what John Kerry does as President. After all .... if you disagree with the government, even one headed by a Democratic politician, that's downright un-American!

[Beloved Citizen]

17. Maybe we should have a poll about guilt tripping...

...and absurd accusations. Of course, since such things seem to be your primary modus around here, you'll probably squawk about that as well.

[porphyrian]

50. What About Whining About People Whining?

Is it un-American to whine about Americans who whine about other whining Americans? I'm just so fed up with it, I had to post!

[NewJeffCT]

3. please - whining is the American Way!

Instead of sucking it up & going forward and doing something about it when you can, most Americans prefer to whine, complain, moan and gnash their teeth until it's too late to do anything about it.

[bryant69]

4. It depends on why they are whining

I certainly have no problem with Democrats trying to prod Kerry into adopting their positions; that's the American way after all. He's our candidate, why shouldn't we criticize his positions that we don't agree with?

But complaints that he's just the wrong guy or a loser or that we should have someone else are not productive and annoying. I mean if you want to make the campaign stronger that's fine, but sowing despair is not the best way to get Bush out of the white house.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[trogdor]

13. sowing despair is not the best way to get Bush out of the white house

Hear hear! We nominated him. We should support him. Those who did not cast their primary votes for him need to remember what the goal is - sending Bush home.

You people who piss and moan about how Kerry is Bush Lite (TM) should STFU. You know who you are. Sometimes it's better to go with the devil you know. This is NOT one of those times.

[I thought so.]

19. Blogs suck.

Ego with no output.

[hiphopnation]

49. hear hear! n/t

[sangh0]

27. "no problem with Democrats trying to prod Kerry"

How about members of some other party who pretend to want to help Kerry?

[mstrsplinter326]

5. Being critical of governmental figures, how unamerican!

You're either with us or against us! (que starwars imperial march music)....

[ACK]

7. Critical? I wish for more critical discussion.

There are a couple of folks that just pull cheap shots on any pro-Kerry thread.

This has become as bad as the folks who bust on every single thread critical of Kerry on a single issue.

Ok, I am voting for the man.

I still can't buy his endorsement of the Sharon plan.

I admire his record on the environment, voting with unions, women's rights and just about everything else except ....
Yes, the IWR vote and the Patriot Act.

This does not mean that I am anti-Kerry or just a ABB voter either.

I like the man. I am voting for the man. I understand he has flaws.

People are soooo freakin' extreme. But on a site like Democratic Underground you have to kind of expect it.

Still ....

Can't we have a critical discussion that does not come down to Kerry sucks he is as bad as Bush or Kerry is the great and perfect god come to save us line of thought?

Nope? I didn't think so.

x(

[mstrsplinter326]

9. we've had lots of issue centered debates here

I've been a part of many of them.

And I know exactly how you feel, the pro-kerry crowd always takes cheap shots at nader or michael moore when either of their names are mentioned - only problem is, when pressed for issues, they no nothing of nader's or moore's stances.

I would love to have a true, all out liberal dem vs. middle/conservative dem debate about issues, but it is enivitiable that many people would sign on with "Nader sux" or "Kerry's a puss" or whatever. Maybe there is some way a forum could be set up in which all such posts would be banned, but I don't know how it would be done...

[ACK]

16. Listen I am not going to name names

But there are people of both sides of the Kerry issue that annoy the hell out of me.

The person that rips every anti-Kerry remark with shut ups or you are with us or against us remarks which you seem to be reacting against.

There are also those folks that cannot let a Kerry post slide without jumping in and hurling insults that are fit more for a school yard than a real discussion of facts.

I am more liberal than my voting record I will put it that way.

I understand Moore has to get a reaction but I like his books a lot more than some of his comments in interviews if that makes any sense. Love the part of one book where he talks about convincing your Republican uncle that voting liberal is in his personal self-interests.

I think that Kerry is a tiny step in the correct direction since he is left of Lieberbush, Clinton and the way the DLC ran Gore. I say that understanding that he is to the right of Kuicinch and Nader. Maybe I am too pragmatic but I see it as a tiny step in a good direction.

I guess that is frustrating to see that liberals can be just as reactionary as the conservatives on some things.

_

[mike_c]

24. one of the problems is that the left has been asked to...

..."just work with us this year" for as long as I can remember, and I've voted solidly dem for 30 years. Unfortunately, every election gets the same treatment. Every election is the one election that's too important for voting one's conscience. That argument gets old and tired after a few decades.

Personally, I think John Kerry is going to win by a landslide. One of the things that disappoints me the most about the party is that this year, virtually anyone with a beating heart and decent advisors could win big as long as the neo-cons don't rig the election. This year the dems REALLY could have moved to the left if the party had the heart for it. Increasingly, I fear that it doesn't, that Wellstone and Kucinich liberals are marginal voices within a centrist party who's primary vision is limited to the current election cycle.

That's criticism of my party and its candidate. I'm sorry if this offends the cheerleaders here, but lockstep marching with the program never effects change. Dissent does, if it's loud enough and sustained.

[ACK]

35. Then work for the party to move the platform more solidly left

Some just want to insult him for having money or being boring or elitist.

They sound more like the right than the left.

_

[mstrsplinter326]

45. Working to make the party more left has

left many with bitter tastes in their mouths, and I don't blame them. No body responds to calls for a reinvigorated EPA and the legalization of hemp growing might as well be calling for the Anti-christ to be displayed in the white house. I would love to ask kerry why, while jobs are being lost, he doesn't introduce a plan to start a new american industry! But I wont be able to nor will anyone else.

[ACK]

52. Get with Kuicinch and let the party know...

Otherwise, we are all in a world of shit.

If the left splinters what is left of what passes for politics in this country will continue to be completely co-opted by the radical freak Repukes and their evangelistic anti-christ extremist fundie agendas.

It is not about reforming the party. It is about taking the party back. This has to be a move to understand the few things that the DLC made sense on like moderating on the tough guy issues so you don't get painted as a wuss and picking charasmatic candidates. We can't forget the good stuff but we have to dump the rest.

I understand that mushy middle does not cut it. With a country idealogically split there is no mushy middle to stand on. You have to embrace your base and reach out to the undecideds. Sure, you can't stand on the far left ledge of politics and win on a national scale but there is not enough ground in the middle to plant a fence to sit on. We have to start with the convictions to convince people we are the ones that are right.

If you moderate on gun control, the death penalty and military spending (just lip service Clinton cut military and still won elections), then you can go very, very liberal on most other issues and still find yourself firmly in the mainstream of popular thought.

You just have to find the populist voice and the charasmatic candidate to pull it off.

Remember Mondale running against Raygun once stated that according to polls the American people believed in 95% of all Democratic positions even in those days when the Dems were arguably more liberal than today. So why did Mondale get his ass stomped?

Because he had no populist voice to his positions and the party as a whole seems to have very little understanding of how to effectively use mass media to its maximum impact.

We have to find our voice and understand how to get that to the American people.

_

[mstrsplinter326]

29. I agree, but agree to disagree on voting, I am voting more liberal

Than I am: Dave Matthews for President.

[emulatorloo]

36. Kerry is not the President

there will be plenty of time for prodding when he is.

Item One: Elect him and Kick Bush Out
Item Two: Work on Kerry

[Beacho]

8. Has anyone realised...

That it's only June?

Bush is getting hammered, the press is just looking for an excuse to give him an out by bashing Kerry. Why not keep your powder dry?

[I thought so.]

21. And smart you are.

So many here have no understanding of politics. They want to grow cranberries in Alaska.

[MadHound]

10. Perhaps this whining is a sign for Kerry

A sign that people aren't satisfied with what he is wanting to do. Perhaps he should adjust his message and agenda accordingly and then the whining will stop.

And perhaps people should stop using the loaded term whining. Most of us prefer the term constructive criticism. After all, that is such criticism is supposed to do, help the candidate win. Kerry's message and agenda is pissing a lot of people off, and if he would make some, any concession to those on the left, it would go a long way to insuring that the leftist block would vote for him this fall.

[Name removed]

22. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[mike_c]

26. "you're either with us or against us...."

Shrub might as well have been talking about dem politics. It's a shame that we've come to such transparently blind partisanship.

[sangh0]

31. Sounds like Nadirite politics

"Either you follow our demands 100%, or we're not going to vote for you"

"Either you're with us 100%, or your against us 100%"

Unfortunately, in politics you need either votes or money in order to extort. Naderites have neither.

[mike_c]

37. broken record...

...or wrong thread.

[sangh0]

42. Yes, the Nadirites are repetitive

.

[MadHound]

28. Please move on?!

Who are you to judge who is or isn't a Democrat? Quite frankly friend, I would stack my Dem credentials up against yours any day, hour for hour worked, dollar for dollar donated, drop for drop of blood, sweat and tears shed. Don't get up on your high horse trying to tell people who is or isn't a "true Dem", you're only setting yourself up for a painful fall.

In fact it is attitudes just exactly like your that are driving away people by the hundreds. Demands for lockstep thinking and no questions allowed. Hell, if we wanted to be in the Facist USA party, we would go over to the Republicans, where that kind of mentality belongs. Expecting, nigh, demanding that the constituents of the Democratic party be locked into such a facist embrace and mindset is a big part of why the Dems are in such dire straits now. Demanding that people adhere even tighter to this misguided mindset could be deemed among some circles as insanity. You know the definition, doing the same thing over and over again, yet expecting a different result every time.

If you can't handle constructive criticism, hell any kind of criticism, perhaps politics shouldn't be your thing. For the heart, root and essence of any open, free and fair political process is the right to criticize. Demanding that people be silent and march in lockstep is heart, root and essence of facism. Which side of that fence to you fall in?

[JayS]

11. I believe that Kerry should be made to work for our vote, not...

...simply take it as given that we will vote for him. He has some positions that could not possibly be made more pitiful and he should be called on that. Hopefully, he is smart enough to have staff out patrolling the web looking for hot topics and digging deep into them when they are found.

[trogdor]

18. There is a time and a place for everything.

This is not the time, nor is the public media the place for this. I do not need to agree with JK 100% of the time. All I need to know, and this should be more than sufficient for you as well, is that I agree with JK about 50 times as often and 1000 times as strongly as I agree with George W. Bush.


While I am sure JK has a team of nerds scouring the Internet for the kind of stuff you describe, it would be FAR more productive, not to mention appropriate, if you were to list these objections, along with links to discussion threads, blog articles, etc., directly to the Kerry campaign. Believe me, the Bush campaign has an even larger army of nerds doing the same research; does making Kerry work his ass off for your vote mean having him defend half-baked allegations from the Bushies that YOU so helpfully provided them?

PLEASE engage brain before hitting "Post Message." That means EVERYBODY. Whether you know it or not, you are a member of the Democratic campaign team, from President all the way down to dogcatcher. Keep that in mind when you post.

End rant.

[JayS]

32. Now is the time, and the public media is the place for it. Sorry...

...but emails to campaigns do not have the same effect on the candidate as information circulating in public. Also, politicians have the tendency to forget all about the people that put him/her in office until voting time comes around again.

And yes, I know, on the state level, just how valuable the Republicans view information extraction, control, and management. I assume this is the case on the national level.

I did not say anything about Kerry having to defend himself from half-baked allegations from any right-wing group, although it would be a good idea to do so. It would also be much better for him to listen to allegations from within his own party as they have his best interests at heart. As he is still running in a national race with a New England campaign strategy I don't think he is listening. So far his campaign seems to be doing okay so hopefully he will make it.

[LittleApple81]

12. Whining... how predictable. Whine and question are not equivalent

terms. You should have not titled your poll like you did. The wording seems to imply EVERY question on Kerry is whining...
Most of DUers support Kerry because he is whom we have as our democratic candidate. But I think discussion on essential issues should not be avoided.

[trogdor]

20. If you don't recognize that a lot of whining goes on here...

...I suggest you make a visit to your friendly neighborhood LensCrafters. Pointing out that certain people piss and moan on a fairly regular basis that JK isn't 100% orthodox (who is?) doesn't marginalize jack shit. If the shoe fits, you know what to do with it; otherwise, there isn't any reason to be offended when people point out the obvious.

[LittleApple81]

39. Look, for someone who, I assume, minds badly structured polls,

not recognizing that this is one is more than blind!!! And exactly what you are implying "if the shoe fits..." I have asked questions, I have not WHINED. That is what this is: it is a forum. If you don't want to get into pissy arguments with "whiners" do not participate in the "whine" "response" fests.
WHINING is a charged word if I ever saw one. It sounds like a Faux news poll.

[Beloved Citizen]

56. Yr wrong. Say anything you want...

..just don't believe that the world owes it to you to automatically respect your opinions, especially if they deviate from the most important priority of all, removing George W. Bush from office.

Patient: Doctor! They're out to get me!

Doctor: No, they're just trying to ignore you.

[carolinayellowdog]

14. "Whine" marginalizes legitimate complaints as infantile

I don't criticize Kerry here but have found that anyone who criticizes anyone but Republicans is subject to being labeled a "whiner." That's bullying, plain and simple. Calling people crybabies should be left to those on the other side, accusing us of "whining" over a stolen election that we should just "get over." It's a rhetorical strategy that avoids dealing with the content of complaints by personally attacking the complainer. Hence, unworthy of liberal discourse.

[MoonRiver]

15. Guess some people just can't get enough of *.

That's the only explanation I've been able to come up with. :shrug:

[I thought so.]

23. Democrats don't whine about Kerry.

Soreheads and defeatists do.

[union_maid]

25. Oh, God yes

DU is becoming as depressing as the rest of the world. Just in a different way. We have a chance to defeat the most evil AND incompetent administration EVER. That's all that really matters to the country and to most of the world right now.

[Forkboy]

30. What about the whiners whining about the whining?

[JayS]

33. I whined about that yesterday.

:)

[mike_c]

34. I'm sick of the character assassination that the Kerry kamp...

...resorts to whenever dems question the appropriateness of their anointed one. Questioning and criticizing presidential candidates' positions on issues, prior records, and haircuts is the political process in representative democracies, or at least those that still function as such. Lockstep conformance is the province of political systems that routinely re-elect their great leader by unanimous affirmation. That's not the America I want.

[emulatorloo]

38. Kerry is not the President

Item ONe; Elect Kerry and Get BUSH OUT
Item two: knock yourself out criticizing Kerry and pressuring him; I know I will

Basic Facts:
1 GWB will never listen to you, Kerry is more likely to
2 Pres Candidates Run To The Center (Look at GWB)
3 Ralph Nader is not going to be elected president, and a message vote will only help GWB

[sangh0]

43. he hates "character assasination" unless he does it

then he has no problem describing other peoples' opinions as "Lockstep conformance"

[mike_c]

44. well if the shoe fits, 'bro...

...then it'll help keep your feet comfortably in lockstep! Otherwise don't take it so personally.

[sangh0]

48. "I'm sick of the character assassination that the Kerry kamp..."

Well, someone's definitely taking it personally

[AP]

40. Yes. Cooperation does not require comprehension. People who have a

problem should think about cooperating for the common good until November, and after Kerry wins we can try to comprehend each other's arguments.

[Jacobin]

41. Have you signed up yet?

Are you also sick of Democrats complaining about the invasion of Iraq?


Which branch to you plan to enlist in?

Just curious

[Solidarity]

51. The Democratic Platform Is A Meaningless Document

The national Democratic Party platform adopted at conventions is a meaningless document. There is really very little discussion or debate among Democratic party activists on that document before and at the convention.

And after the convention the nominated candidates pretty much campaign as they wish no matter what platform is adopted.

The party platform is not used or widely circulated after the convention. Few people outside of convention delegates and guests see it. Can anyone recall any mass distributions of past convention platforms during a presidential or other election? Why, you can't even find the last Democratic Party platform adopted at the Democratic Party National Committee website!

[senseandsensibility]

46. I'm atleast as sick of it

as you are. And I have an idea. As a teacher,I'm somewhat of an expert at behavior management. By ignoring unwanted behavior displayed by students, I can frequently eliminate it. I'm sure you're getting the picture....How many of these Kerry bashers post just to get a large number of responses? If we just ignored them (yawn), they'd go away IMHO.;)

[Solidarity]

53. Will Convention Delegates Be Told To "Shut Up"?

And any progressive convention delegates who want to include in the Democratic Platform strong statements in support of national single payer health insurance coverage for everyone, abolishing the Patriot Act, opposing the continued occupation of Iraq, etc., will also be told to "shut up". They will be marginalized.

Does anyone really believe that any debate and discussion on such platform proposals will be tolerated at the convention much less included in the platform at the convention?

[hiphopnation]

54. It's true

that not every single progressive issue can be addressed in this particular election. But, IMHO, what we've got here is:

a) Apocalypse

b) Senator John Kerry

:shrug:

[hiphopnation]

47. Shut up

and Vote Kerry or stock up on water and canned food and restart your stalled plans to build that fallout shelter. You decide, ninnies!

:thumbsup:

[PATRICK]

55. Voted yes

It is not the simple study and questioning of his political positions which may produce actual policies we may later be dismayed with. That is because false hopes in recent leadership have been cruelly disappointed, signs of progressive wisdom or being in touch with reality all too few or effective.

But fear is wrong. Kerry's record and character are superior to most presidents, most candidates, forget the abomination he is running against. Continuing contest grudge matches and issue gripes to the point of ignoring that is suicidal to put it mildly. Nor is he to be king anyway. We have other candidates to get elected to the other branches.

You can strongly disagree or criticize a campaign position(Venezuela or Iraq come to mind) or lack of one or tactics or progressive platforms, but it takes more discipline than we can universally muster not to get down into the mud and foster anger and despair.

A people majority with strong feedback can influence the direction of a new administration, though not 100% to anyone's satisfaction unless like Bush you appeal to nutso minorities or auction off the government to looters. We should settle in for a work in progress and not wait for a "next time" that appears more and more unlikely. We must build faster than the other side tears down. That is a challenge. THE challenge.