RE Greenwald v. O'Donnell on Morning Joe

where all posts are front-paged by default.

We stand by what we write here.

I don't want to listen to the whole thing, and in any case, quotes and transcripts can be googled for and cited to....

Didn't see the exchange. The natural counter-argument to O'Donnell is that if the Democrats had enacted a progressive agenda, there would be jobs, the banksters would be in jail, the wars would be done, and people would be feeling safe in their homes (that they wouldn't be foreclosed on). In other words, the Blue Dogs would have had a record of successes to run on instead of a record of failures they did so much to create. And they would have had a much better chance winning in their conservative and swing districts, because success has no ideology.

I agree that Greenwald's argument is weak but remember that Ted Kennedy's seat in the "bluest" state in the country went to a Republican precisely because liberals and independents stayed home.

I see LO'D losing his cool not GG. Nice to see LO'D defend his "socialistic" beliefs (which apparently he finds needing to be hidden 99.9% of the time as he does his job as a political analyst and commentator -- wow, put your own morality on the shelf, LO'D, be sure to enable the status quo unless like on this you draw it up to emotionally defend your ego-hurt) since he is clearly on a corporate leash and certainly opposite of GG who is true to his morality and defender of the constitution and consistent unlike LO'D except LO'D is consistent in his Beltway superciliousness. Easier job for him to suddenly play moving target with GG cuz he is. And so nice to see the supercilious O'Donnell lose his temper on the air that GG DARED to criticize him and call him out. I wish more of our talking heads were called out!!!!! I saw this from an entirely different way! Reminded me of Stewart when he was on Crossfire.

LO'D has disdain for the great unwashed, GG doesn't. That is something I take away from this. GG poked his ego and he got pissed off. Great that GG went on MJ which has always given me a headache within minutes of watching and takes so much patience to endure. So much nervous ego-chatter going down. For once they shut up and listened. It was great tv. Priming the pump of their cliquey group think is what usually happens. Great to see LO'D's tricks not shut up GG!!!

What got me was the creeeeeeeepy contempt LO'D feels toward those "progressives who are so scared they won't embrace the name liberal", which was NOT where GG is coming from. But it flashed out of LO'D ... a real dislike for "cowardly progressives." I am better than progressives and even liberals I am a SOCIALIST ... so have you looked at what you are doing as a living, LO'D???? Hello????

Wow. It is personal with LO'D ... and again "I am a socialist not a cowardly progressive" creeped me out. So as a socialist you let those progressives you disdain "twist in the wind" from your bully pulpit as you chameleon yourself to power brokers? Are you another media pundit overcompensating to the right and cheating with it (like Mike's cartoon of donkey and elephant in bed). And you, LO'D, get so bent out of shape when someone smart and consistent and moral (MORAL!!!!) challenges the VOICE OF THE PUNDITRY. Hypocrisy thy name is LO'D!!! Duh, I am in the idiot-box so I get to be a hypocrit cuz everyone else is. And along comes GG who is so not an idiot and so not a hypocrit!!!! Illuminates all the rest of them. (Though GG is naive re Rachel and Jane H. imho but that is for another blog)

I watched the full video and waited for GG to lose his point and get upset. I didn't see it. He won the debate imho!!!! But maybe cuz I agree with him? LO'D shaking polling info and having GG talk about challenging the polling and its exploitation by talking heads and polling nuancing is valid cuz GG always does his homework.

LO'D punts depending on the show, the story, the guest. Maybe with Michael Moore he shows some liberal colors. But not with the committee group think he so often travels with. The closet socialist LO'D is a good little enabler of the ruling money/war class. GG is one of its greatest challengers. Wow, LO'D can play it out of both sides of his mouth. Wow, glad to know about this socialism. Maybe he's like an undercover cop who loses himself in the culture he has infiltrated.

I will say this, though, O'Donnell is totally right about universal health care (his PERSONAL not public assertion) and GG did crony up with Jane Hamsher on public option and betrayed that movement, no small betrayal imho. It was a hard disappointment with Greenwald and I did see progressive cronyism there with FDL et al. But in a New York minute I would say GG has done more for consciousness raising, one we desperately need in this country, a person of conscience, than LO'D with his ever-increasing "I'm okay and you are not ... everyone is not so I don't have to be courageous" media presence. I know there is a line for journalists not to share their full out perspective, but to enable wrong-headed and dangerous perspectives by nationally enabling them ... silence and cowardism does indicate consent. But, ya work on corporate tv, there is a leash. What are you gonna do???? Invasion of the soul snatchers.

I am so glad I saw this. Thank you.

ps. Many blue dogs lost! GG posts the list. Many. 29 million ex-2008-Obama voters stayed home. Many talking heads ignore that reality. Most people wanted more "liberalism" from their government though that label has been vilified to an Orwellian degree enuf to sabotage intelligent discussions for so long now and hereafter. One reason I have a personal affection for the name "liberal". "Progressive", again LO'D was right, a sell out, but that didn't have to do with GG or his argument.

It's not very useful to proclaim one's socialist cred while simultaneously reproducing every talking point that reinforces one's own powerlessness.

On policy, it's a shame to see GG still pushing the neo-liberal "public option" sparkle pony. L'OD's got it right on the policy, but if he was in the midst of the fight for single payer, I missed it. Links, anyone?

On the politics, the blue dogs got shitcanned. There would have been no way to save them for the Ds without simply turning into Rs and (a) you could argue that Obama's done as good as job at that as he possibly could have, already, and (b) people are going to vote for a real R not a fake one anyhow, if only out of tribalism.

I'd bet that the south was a write-off no matter what. I don't believe that the midwest was, or is. That's where the Ds lost the election, and they lost it on "It's the economy, stupid."

I just watched the video, and -- to these eyes -- the dynamics didn't resemble much at all what you described.

O'Donnell kept talking over GG at the outset, and that was the "ugly, just ugly" part.

I will give LO'D points for arguing for Medicare for All instead of the fake and meaningless "public option" (Glenn's persisting the myth that "PO" wasn't a scam is a rare and frustrating FAIL on his part).

That said, GG is absolutely correct that LO'D is wholly contradicting himself by saying the Democrats would have been better served to promote real leftist policy, since that's the antithesis of his trite and erroneous premise that they're too far left for the American mood.

It's all subjective anyways, but in my view, GG walloped LO'D.

Best GG line: When reconciling the 20% self-identified liberal label vs opinions on actual issues: "that's the kind of cable news sloganeering that Lawrence O'Donnell specialize in." That was fucking brilliant and you heard LO'D start grumbling immediately.

The best LO'D line was about how he doesn't abandon the liberal label in favor of "progressive." I myself always choose the word liberal, because I'll be damned if I let a bunch of fuck head Republicans trash the brand. Nonetheless, I don't actually think LO'D is particularly liberal at all, but I did like that line of his.

By the way, I also think that LO'D got his ass handed to him about the self-identified label statistics by Adam Green in that show where he had Adam Green and Tom Daschle on.

I understand LO'D to be saying that Dems should not have governed more to the left because the polls indicate that a) only 20% of voters self-identified as liberal and nearly twice as many as conservatives, and 2) 56% of voters thinks the Federal Government is doing too much.

I understand GG to be saying that they should have governed more to the left because 1) results show that the loss rate among blue dogs was almost 10 times greater than the loss rate among progressives, and 2) voters may not self-identify as liberal and may also think that Government is doing too much, but, in addition when polled on specific issues like whether the Government should implement job programs to end unemployment, implement Medicare for All, and prevent big bank investment and foreclosure fraud polling shows that heavy majorities favor the Government doing these things.

In my view, GG has the better of the argument. I don't think GG point 1 above is decisive, because clearly progressives tend to run in progressive districts where the national polling results don't hold, while blue dogs tend to run in districts with more conservatives in them. So, the difference in loss rates doesn't prove anything on its face. However, I think GG's points about polling on specific issues is decisive. For most Americans, abstract labels like "liberal", "progressive," and "conservative" aren't as important as where a candidate stands on specific issues. If you satisfy people on specific issues, if what you do "works" then you win. FDR knew that, today's Dems either don't or don't care about winning, but only about serving their corporate masters.

From where I sit the Ds didn't have the will to win. By the Fall of 2009, they were in trouble. If they cared about winning, they would have told Obama to go fly a kite, would have rammed through HR 676, Medicare for All, and in the process ended the filibuster, then they would have gotten back to the recession and ended unemployment with a program like Warren Mosler's. They then would have moved to a fin reg bill that would have established a Consumer protection Czar with substantial authority to protect consumers, and a banking Czar outside of the Federal Reserve with power to regulate all financial instruments, and they also would have raised marginal tax rates substantially while creating many new tax brackets. When the Supreme Court decided Citizens United the way it did they would have immediately responded by 1) immediately packing the Court with 6 more justices, and 2) passing national legislation defining the status of legal persons to make clear that they do not share the first amendment protections the Constitution affords to natural persons.

If the Ds had done that the so-called "conservative" voters would have viewed the Ds as legislating in their interest and against the Corps and there would have been no 2010 comeback for the Rs.

... it's nice to hear somebody say "I'm a socialist." I mean, the wingers believe that Obama is a socialist, which certainly would come as a surprise to poor old Karl Marx (though Obama did help socialize the losses for the big banks, no question).

So why not a real socialist, instead of a delusional one?

... I'm not sure where the knowledge of Geenwald's discomfort comes from. Telepathy? If we're going to attribute feelings to others, the subjunctive is still not dead in English....