Ex-DNC Chair Howard Dean: ‘Whiny’ Left Doesn’t Want to Win, They Just Want to Be ‘Pure’

[Frank Underwood]

Former DNC chair Howard Dean went off on the “whiny” left this morning on AM Joy, as MSNBC’s Joy Reid and her panel took on the backlash in some corners to Kamala Harris.

Pieces this week titled “Democratic rising star Kamala Harris has a ‘Bernieland’ problem” and “Why leftists don’t trust Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, and Deval Patrick” have given way to another ongoing debate about friction in the Democratic party.

Zerlina Maxwell told Reid the “ideological purity” some Bernie Sanders supporters are pushing for is a “manifestation of privilege,” arguing that “people of color and women who are running for office can’t abide by purity tests because of the structural difficulties in running for office.”

Jason Johnson added that right now, the Democrats should be “embracing anyone who elicits that level of excitement,” like Harris or Sanders himself.

Reid then asked Dean, “Is there any pleasing a certain set of progressives who essentially think anyone who isn’t Bernie Sanders is not progressive enough?”

Dean responded thusly:

“There has always been a section of the left, which I call the whiny party––the party that doesn’t really wanna win, they just wanna be pure, and if they go down swinging purely, then that’s fine. Well, the problem with that is it leaves behind the people who really need their help. If we’re gonna have a single-payer or Medicare for all or whatever we’re gonna have in health care… then we all have to pull together. And people who sit out or crank on some candidate because they did this or that that wasn’t to their purity test are basically turning their back on the very people they pretend to represent. So I don’t have a lot of patience with this wing of the progressive party.”

He went on to say a lot of this friction on the left is just a “media creation.”

Source: https://www.mediaite.com/tv/ex-dnc-...doesnt-want-to-win-they-just-want-to-be-pure/

 

[Frank Underwood]

When the most popular politician in the country is a progressive and a majority of Americans support his positions, can you really say it's progressives who don't want to win? It reminds me of a Bernie Sanders quote. He said "Certainly there are some people in the Democratic Party who want to maintain the status quo. They would rather go down with the Titanic so long as they have first-class seats.”

And that's just it. As long as that corporate cash is rolling in, they would rather lose to a Republican than win with a progressive.

Why else is fighting for a living wage, single payer, free college, and getting money out of politics considered "whiny?" When people wag their finger at people for being pure, it only shows what soulless hacks they are. Dean also neglected to mention his work for a healthcare lobbying firm. When a politician gives lip service to single payer without actually supporting it, you can usually find big pharma somewhere in their back pocket.

I love how the purity of Bernie supporters supposedly comes from a place of privilege, yet his entire platform is based on helping the underprivileged. Corporate Democrats, on the other hand, have supported NAFTA, TPP, stagnant wages, no public option, and a right wing healthcare plan that left 29 million people uninsured. Not to mention bailing out Wall Street on the tax payers dime. Yet they're manipulating people into taking their anger out on the disenfranchised who have been screwed over by those policies. Republicans may be extremist douche bags, but an embrace of neoliberalism by Democrats is what's pushed Republicans so far to the right.

Now they're using identity politics to woo SJWs. Criticisms of black or female corporate Democrats gets you labeled "racist" and "sexist," even though progressives criticize all corporate Democrats. They're so transparent in their bullshit, but there are people who will eat it up. Between all of their projection, hypocrisy, corruption, corporatism, and militarism, the Democratic Party has become a socially liberal extension of the Republican Party.

Of course, with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairman saying there is "no litmus test" on issues such as abortion, they're willing to sell out those social liberal values as well.

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

Well, I think Dean's reference to "privilege" was the privilege of being a purist.

Most of what he said was true. That doesn't take anything away from Bernie's sincerity, or the reasons for his popularity.

The 2016 election, especially for those on the political right, was about cultural identity, not policy -- not even about policy which could and would hurt themselves. That's why so many Republican voters kept sneering that Democrats' "tears are delicious" after the electoral college handed Trump the presidency, while the political left was more perplexed, wondering why working class had fallen for and elected a guy who obviously didn't give a crap about him.

Trump's people were voting Us versus You. The Democrats weren't really doing that so much.

It was "Ha! We won! Suck it!" and "Huh? We both lost -- that sucks!"

Afterwards, the Democrats have been tossing "too pure"/"not pure enough" accusation backs and forth amongst each other. Which doesn't really help, although both arguments seem to be fairly sound and their anger towards each other pretty much valid.

But if Sanders had not had the Democratic nomination "stolen" from him, he isn't much more likely to have taken the White House from the orange ball of flatulence who inhabits it now.

Unless Putin liked Bernie.

 

[Frank Underwood]

Well, I think Dean's reference to "privilege" was the privilege of being a purist.

Most of what he said was true. That doesn't take anything away from Bernie's sincerity, or the reasons for his popularity.

The 2016 election, especially for those on the political right, was about cultural identity, not policy -- not even about policy which could and would hurt themselves. That's why so many Republican voters kept sneering that Democrats' "tears are delicious" after the electoral college handed Trump the presidency, while the political left was more perplexed, wondering why working class had fallen for and elected a guy who obviously didn't give a crap about him.

Trump's people were voting Us versus You. The Democrats weren't really doing that so much.

It was "Ha! We won! Suck it!" and "Huh? We both lost -- that sucks!"

Afterwards, the Democrats have been tossing "too pure"/"not pure enough" accusation backs and forth amongst each other. Which doesn't really help, although both arguments seem to be fairly sound and their anger towards each other pretty much valid.

But if Sanders had not had the Democratic nomination "stolen" from him, he isn't much more likely to have taken the White House from the orange ball of flatulence who inhabits it now.

Unless Putin liked Bernie.

I agree with what you said about cultural identity on the right. There's a large number of conservatives who think Clinton and Sanders are one and the same, but the left wouldn't be divided if that were the case.

In the months leading up to the election, people on the ground were worried that the working class would go for Trump because Democrats weren't campaigning hard enough for their vote. This is a voting block that traditionally votes Democrat, so I'm not as convinced that they fall into the cultural identity camp. Democrats seemed to get the message, as evidenced by their "Better Deal" economic agenda.

It's a step in the right direction at least, although they're still mum on other issues such as single payer.

We'll never know if Sanders would have beat Trump, but he polled considerably better against him than Clinton did. As for Putin's influence, the leaked DNC and Podesta emails weren't really damaging to Sanders.

The "too pure"/"not pure enough" accusations show the fight that exists for the soul of the Democratic Party. The centrists have won several battles, but I'm still hoping progressives win the war.

 

[Frank Underwood]

How Howard Dean went from a member of the "whiny left" to corporate shill:

Isn't it funny how a party of losers accuses progressives of not wanting to win, while continuing to shit on them and demanding they fall in line. I swear, the Democratic Party has become an abusive spouse.