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PITTSBURGH — There is a battle going on here within the Allegheny County Democratic Committee, a formidable force of centrist, conservative, and liberal Democrats whose backgrounds range from union halls in the city to the businessmen and women who have spread out into the leafy suburbs that hug the city limits.
A key figure in the battle is committeewoman Heather Kass, who is running for the state House. Several years ago, Kass's social media posts criticized Obamacare and the distribution of free Narcan for addicts — and insinuated support for President Trump.
Fortunately for Kass, she received 49 votes from the committee to secure its endorsement. Her opponent, liberal activist Jess Benham, received just 19.
That’s when things got interesting. Darrin Kelly, an influential local labor leader, issued a statement blasting Kass’s previous statements. The party hierarchy followed that up by saying her social media history was disqualifying.
The fight soon unraveled in many different directions and tested a party that has comfortably come together and built a force that helped keep a Democrat as the chief executive officer for five consecutive terms and the majority of the county council seats.
Now, accusations of disloyalty and closet Trumpism are being tossed around by the liberal wing of the party. The factions that once worked together well enough to enjoy a healthy coalition are splintering.
Party Chairwoman Eileen Kelly held a press conference defending the endorsement process and encouraging forgiveness of Kass’s past social media posts. But in response, local elected Democrats demanded her resignation, including two of the county’s congressmen, Rep. Mike Doyle and Rep. Conor Lamb.
There's a reason why people listen when @Darrinkellypgh speaks. He tells it like it is.
I agree. It's time for the Chairwoman to step aside. https://t.co/v1Dr9z730f
— Conor Lamb (@ConorLambPA) February 21, 2020Two things are worth watching: The chairwoman is probably going nowhere, and the April 28 Democratic primaries in Pennsylvania are going to be a spectacle. This county isn’t the only one in the commonwealth with fractures within the party. Roughly 250 miles due east along the Lincoln Highway, Lancaster County is also experiencing some serious turmoil within its party ranks.
Unlike Allegheny, Lancaster is considered a red county. Yet despite giving Trump a majority of its votes in 2016, Democrats (under Chairwoman JoAnn Hertz) fought and flipped traditionally Republican-held suburbs in the 2017 and 2019 local elections.
As thanks, Hertz was given the choice of either facing public criticisms from within the party ranks or resigning.
Forced out, Hertz was replaced in a committee election by Diane Topakian, a retired Service Employees International Union political organizer who is from the most liberal side of the party.
Places such as Allegheny and Lancaster counties have made strides in elections with Democratic candidates who ran and won as centrists. Once they are elected, however, local party apparatuses start to demand more fidelity to liberalism, and the national party stresses it in messaging. But these are the kinds of places where any gains that were made since Trump was elected may start to fall apart.
The ideological balance in this country remains firmly center-right. Yearlong 2019 Gallup poll numbers based on combined data from 21 of its telephone surveys show 37% of the country, on average, identifies as conservative, 35% as moderate, and 24% as liberal.
It also found that Republicans tend to be less fractured. They have their differences, but in the end, they conform around conservatism.
Democrats are more fractured. Survey results strikingly reflected what happened in Allegheny and Lancaster counties. As Gallup said, "Even though liberalism has been on the rise among Democrats, it is not yet the clear majority position, perhaps leading to the strong intraparty clashes." This has been seen at the local level in Allegheny and Lancaster counties, as well as the national level, in Democratic Party presidential debates.
A Democratic presidential candidate is not going to win or lose based on how fractured his or her party is. That will depend on how well the candidate can coalesce the party and motivate people to show up for him or her.
What is happening in Allegheny and Lancaster counties and countless other counties across the country shouldn’t surprise anyone. It has been reflected in every single Democratic debate of this presidential cycle.
This didn’t start yesterday, last week, or in reaction to Trump or Hillary Clinton. This party has been trying to shed its centrist members since the presidential campaign of Al Gore, and it tipped the scales with President Barack Obama — who waited until his second term to dismantle the New Deal coalition in favor of the ascendant coalition of young people, minorities, women, and just enough white, working-class voters.
Clinton failed to include the working class in her coalition and lost. If these smaller county parties mimic that in 2020, and if the Democratic National Committee and its presidential nominee follow suit, Democrats will struggle locally and nationally. The result will be fewer locally elected Democrats, a slim-to-none congressional majority, and four more years of Trump.
What I find interesting is, how this echoes the 2016 election. Democrats around the country told the party that "We want this" or "We want that". But, the party rejected all of that, and tried to ramrod Hillary into office.
Same thing here - toe the party line, or you're out.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/centrists-flirt-with-democrats-and-the-party-rebuffs-them
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:43PM (12 children)
The DNC wants a centrist "liberal" who won't push actual liberal policies. Any article crying about Democrats not supporting their conservative members is possibly a real opinion piece by a journalist, but more likely "inspired" by the oligarchs who own all the media companies. I imagine you understood my meaning quite well, thus the attempt to derail it into something specific about the W.E. that of course no one could prove.
"Or does one need a copy of Mein Kampf and have sucked off Rush Limbaugh to be a Republican these days?"
Umm, well Trump sucked him off good and hard, and he said Mein Kampf supporters were very fine people.... soooo yeah that seems to be the way the Republican party is going these days. Don't like it? Stop supporting that shit and support the real independent who wants to actually help the average American. Sanders 2020, since you'd probably "guess" someone else if I didn't.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:16PM (11 children)
You're making my point for me other AC.
You apparently haven't been paying much attention to the folks running for President in the Democratic primaries. With the exception of Bloomberg (undemocratic --small and big 'd'-- scumbag that he is), the policy differences of *every* single candidate are ones of degree and not ones of substance.
The biggest questions for Democrats (of which I happen to be a registered one) are:
1. Which candidate can unite the party and drive turnout;
2. Which candidate has the ability to communicate the *values* that motivate us to support a more equal society;
3. Which candidate can muster, organize and manage the grassroots efforts to reach those that the Clinton campaign *ignored* in 2016;
4. Which candidate will have the longest coat-tails to maintain the majority in the House and flip the Senate.
My state's presidential primary isn't until the end of April. Which almost certainly means that I won't have nearly as much variety as those who vote on Tuesday. Which annoys me personally.
I did, in fact, vote for Sanders in the 2016 Democratic primary, not because I wanted him to win in my state (he didn't and I knew he wouldn't), but to push the Democratic Party to be more focused on the needs of the vast majority and to help try to convince them that filthy lucre continues to distort our political system.
Regardless, I and pretty much every other Democrat I've discussed this with, agrees that regardless of who the eventual Democratic presidential candidate might be, they will be superior to the lying, amoral, self-dealing, contrary to the interests of the American people words and behavior of the Trump Administration.
As such, I (and many, many others) don't really care too much who the candidate might be. Rather, we're interested in positive change to help the vast majority of Americans who have been screwed over by the kind of workaday corruption, lack of principle, flat-out lying and corporate handouts of which the Trump Administration is (at least for now) the apotheosis.
If Sanders is the nominee, I will support him. If someone else is the nominee, I will support them.
To use hyperbole to put an extremely fine point on it, a poorly-trained chimpanzee would make a better president than the one we have now. That chimpanzee would, at least, fling less shit than he does.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @11:06PM
I know quite a few people who do not like Trump. They do not like Trump so much they'll vote for the first Dem candidate that can demonstrate to them they aren't just a poorly-trained circus elephant (donkey? gotta be careful with the c word around here or it'll trigger people). They are still waiting for one.
Personally I thought Gabbard was really cool.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 02 2020, @03:26AM (9 children)
Bearing in mind that I think Trump is a clown, a fool, and a buffoon, just as you seem to:
I think the US probably does need four more years of Trump.
That's a problem. You allowed the last election to be stolen from you by the DNC. And, as near as I can tell, the DNC is stealing this one from you, as well. D's around the country showed some balls in 2016, when they supported anyone who was Not Hillary. You need to show a lot more balls to win your party back from the Ruling Class like Hillary.
If Bloomberg gets it, you're fucked, and so are all the rest of us.
That is why I thought TFA was important. We, American citizens, need to control the two parties, and stop them controlling us. Bernie should have had the nomination last time around. He should probably get it this time - no one else is really outperforming him. It would have thrilled me to see Gabbard get it. The rest of the pack? Mehhh.
What we need is for about 180 million Americans to all stand up, and start chanting "Fuck the Party!" D's and R's alike. That's why I usually vote third party. It's the only way in which I can say "Fuck the Party" and make anyone care in the least. The fuckwits at party headquarters - both party headquarters - notice when Libertarians make gains in the percentage of the vote they win. If/when they get the magic 1% of the vote, then the two parties will have to give up some of that federal campaign money.
I want to see three or four third parties all getting more than 1% of the vote. Stop obeying the dictates of the party like good little puppies, or sheeple, or whatever.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @03:42AM (8 children)
No. the DNC and many Democrats *warned* the Clinton campaign that they weren't paying enough attention to, you guessed it, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. The Clinton campaign ignored those warnings and Trump *squeaked by* (a total of 77,000 votes out of more than 20,000,000 cast) in those states. Had the Clinton campaign paid attention and brought out the vote in places like Milwaukee, Detroit and Philadelphia (in each of which more voters *didn't vote* than the margin by which Trump won those states), she would have won the presidency by a comfortable margin.
The fault was incompetence and laziness in the Clinton campaign. Clinton won clear majorities of delegates and the popular vote in the Democratic primaries. Anyone who says differently is ignoring the actual vote counts and is actively trying to deceive.
As such, you're just parroting a bunch of conspiracy bullshit.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 02 2020, @04:27AM (7 children)
You're making a somewhat obvious presumption. You presume that all of those non-voters would have voted for Hillary. You don't consider that by not voting, they effectively cast their votes for Trump. Nor do you consider that those voters may very well have voted third party, as I did, because they couldn't stomach either Hillary or Trump.
Bottom line is, voters in those states didn't want Hillary any more than they wanted Trump. I will fault those voters for not voting, because they could have voted third party, or voted "NONE OF THE ABOVE".
Your "incompetence and laziness" comment almost suggests that the voters are livestock, and that Hillary's people just didn't get out there with the cattle prods to move them along.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @05:03AM (6 children)
Given that the hundreds of thousands who didn't vote in the big cities were *overwhelmingly* African-American and they vote 'D' more than 80% of the time, you're talking out of your ass as usual Runaway.
Clinton's arrogance and her campaign ignoring the warnings of folks in the very states she expected to win cost her the election. Full stop.
Go and read some of the news reports about it
https://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/michigan-hillary-clinton-trump-232547 [politico.com]
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/11/why-hillary-clinton-lost/507704/ [theatlantic.com]
https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2016-11-09/clinton-made-her-case-to-black-voters-why-didnt-they-hear-her [usnews.com]
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/clintons-ground-game-didnt-cost-her-the-election/ [fivethirtyeight.com]
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 02 2020, @05:08AM (5 children)
Ahhhhhhh, you got Darkie on the plantation - I get it. And, this time around, Darkie didn't do as you expected. Obviously, that is the fault of Master and/or his crackers. If you had just hired a couple more whip crackers to drive the darkies to the polling booths, Hillary would have won. Got it, you racist bastid.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @05:12AM (4 children)
That's right. Now get back to work, boy. And I do emphasize the word 'boy'.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 02 2020, @05:15AM (3 children)
I haven't been disarmed yet - so fuck off and die, bitch.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @05:37AM
You're such a sweet talker!
Kissy, kissy baby!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @07:35AM
We're coming for your guns, Runaway! Red-flag report already filed. Do not resist the nice officers when they show up, they are only there for your, and our, protection.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2020, @06:29AM
Not disarmed, but dis-brained. You have been sorely used, Runaway1955! I know you had the Hots for your First Lady of Arkansas, back when you were both both younger and able. But your unrequited love for Hilary is no reason to subject the rest of us to your insane rantings about how you will always love her! Just "Let It Go", Runaway! The Clintons were the High Point of Arkansas Liberalism, they rose to the Precedency, and you are just upset you were left behind. But she told you, Runaway, that she would never leave Bill, unless you got elected precedent, and we all know what the odds of that were, and are. So go blow Trump supporters, Runaway! It is, after all, the one thing you are good at. You do not seem to be able to "own the Libs" to any significant degree.