Who convenes in Denver

In TalkLeft, Jeralyn repeatedly expresses discomfort with the Democratic ticket. Recently, the selection of Biden for VP flew in the face of her long standing objection to the harsh and mindless crime policy of the country. In particular she saw in Biden a strong supporter of crime bills that contributed to the country's befitting label: American - a prison nation.

Still She intends to vote for the Democratic ticket and encourages other to follow her. The fact that Obama is an inferior candidate and starts to seem inept compared to Hillary Clinton and Biden's awful selection does not sway her from continued support of the ticket.

In some sense this behavior is justified. After all, the only meaningful alternative is to vote for McCain. A McCain choice is a silent consent to the continued destruction of the country, continue mindless killing in foeign lands, staying with the past as in the 19th century and continued strong support of the rich and the dismisal of every other group in society. In reality, that is a rather muted description of the plague the Republican party has inflicted on the country.

Yet, the question I want to address is whether we still have a Democratic party or is the Democratic party just the slightly more liberal wing of the Republican party.

Wikipedia uses the following statement to describe the Democrats' policy: "Historically, the party has favored farmers, laborers, labor unions, and religious and ethnic minorities; it has opposed unregulated business and finance, and favored progressive income taxes."

Obama's TV ads repeatetly say that he will work for the middle class. Middle class doesn't appear in the statement above. On the contrary, the statement lists, farmer, laborers and labor union. This group is not identical to the middle class and in reality most of the group is poor and distictly blue collar. The Whole Food Nation, as Anglachel calls the core of Obama voters and the group he seems to identify as middle class, is a rather well off group with income that most labor unions now adays would die to achieve for their member but are not even close to.

We should note that Obama's support for the middle class as the pillar of his campaign snubs African American who are on the average poorer than the white population. In others words, the Democratic party in 2008 ignore AA very much like the Republicans are doing since LBJ.

The Democratic convention in Denver is financed by well established and profitable large companies. The huge extravagance and the stadium acceptance speach, why?, are at least partially paid for by non-Democrats.

In the last several years, whether in minority or majority, the Democrats in congress voted for funding the war in Iraq, the new FISA, increase jail sentences, added new crimes to the millions we have, supported tax breaks for the rich, etc. How Democratic is that record?

Evaluating step by step Obama's policy vs Hillary's show starkly that Hillary is way to the left of Obama. She support full universal health care, represents the blue collar workers and Hispanics and women. Obama's health care plan is not universal, he ignores blue collar workers and his primaries behavior was somewhat sexist. This means that Obama is even closer to heart of the Republican party than the Democrats as a whole.

Since so many so called leftists support Obama, one wonders why? After all, he is not very progressive. One potential, but scary, possibility is that our left has also moved way to the right. The Institute for America's Future, headed by Robert Borosage - one the leaders of the country's left, has 12 words that describe their ideology: "Fair wages, fair markets, health security, retirement security, equal justice…for all."

Interestingly enough, this wording deviates drastically from the typical language used by progressives in the rest of the world. Progressive want the government to be responsive to the popolation, insist on soccial justice (as in prison sentences, for instance) and regulation of coorporations and monopolies. In other words, even our left has left us.

Anglachel points to a history starting from the 1970's of the Democrats sitting on their hands when it comes to affirmative action. The same was true about well fare until its reform in 1996. The Democrats were content with a system that was not lifting people from abject poverty and only Republican pressure stemming from narrow mindlessness has reformed the system, not without causing undue damage.

I don't believe that the convention in Denver reflects what most of us believe to be the Democratic Party. We will have to create a new one.