Along the same lines as the last post...Allies?

I have to report the harm in several groups to our cause of bringing about a strong Democratic county in Miami-Dade. While we gather steam and begin to fight the good fight, it seems that several 'pro-democrat' groups would want nothing more then to sink our efforts just as they begin to look successful.

Some groups that can be helpful to the cause of progressive democrats everywhere are easy spotte, such as Democracy For America and New Democratic Network.

Others warrant strong attention to influence and involvement. The DLC is one such group that could meddle when the time comes Florida to return to a Blue state status and continue our personal challenge within Dade county to the federal representatives.

Tabbi is a political reporter for Rolling Stone magazine. In recent article; a top level spokesman said some very disturbing things about the nature of the democratic party and the ability of everyday people to 'dare' influence political candidates.

This is a portion of the recent article found here .

Marshall is the president of the DLC's Progressive Policy Institute and owns the distinction of being the first public figure to use the term "body count" in a positive sense with regard to the Iraq war ("Coalition forces still face daily attacks but the body count tilts massively in their favor"). He wasted no time in giving me the party line: "What we're seeing is an ideological purge," he said cheerily. "It's national effort by the left to get rid of somebody they've decided to demonize . . . we have concerns about narrow dogmatism. . ."

We went back and forth for a while. I noted that his conception of "narrow dogmatists" included the readers of Daily Kos, a website with something like 440,000 visitors a day; I also noted that recent Gallup polls showed that fully 91 percent of Democrats supported a withdrawal of some kind from Iraq.

"So these hundreds of thousands of Democrats who are against the war are narrow dogmatists," I said, "and. . . how many people are there in your office? Ten? Twenty? Thirty?"

"Well, it'd probably be in the thirty zone," sighed Marshall.

I asked Marshall if there was a publicly available list of donors to the DLC.

"Uh, I don't know," he said. "I'd have to refer you to the press office for that. They can help you there . . ." (Note: a DLC spokeswoman would later tell me the DLC has a policy of "no public disclosure," although she did say the group is funded in half by corporate donations, in half by individuals).

"So let me get this straight," I said. "We have thirty corporate-funded spokesmen telling hundreds of thousands of actual voters that they're narrow dogmatists?"

He paused and sighed, clearly exasperated. "Look," he said. "Everybody in politics draws money from the same basic sources. It's the same pool of companies and wealthy individuals . . ."

"Okay," I said. "So basically in this dispute over Lieberman, we have people on one side, and companies on the other? Would it be correct to say that?" I asked.

"Well, I guess if you live in a cartoon world you could say that," he said.

I feel its important to discuss who helps our efforts as a party for the county and what do they gain from it. We have the oil rigs set to go to work off our precious and vital coast soon for large corporate interests. Do they live here or do we?

And whose party is this?

It is our party. Its far past time to take by horns and steer it clear of these sorts of forces.