With Friends Like These...

I can't help but find it interesting that the knee-jerk reaction from a political party which just got their clocks cleaned in the latest election is to entrench towards the most radical elements and fire their guns at the President who is not only the leader of their party but also their most important ally. I lean towards to the right politically, but I'm not sure how this makes any sense if you're a progressive who wants to advance your agenda.

The latest example of this is rumblings from the left wing is that they'll mount a primary challenge to an Obama presidential reelection campaign in 2012. How is this going to help a President who is desperately trying to hold a fragile coalition together of moderates from both parties to accomplish as much as he possibly can to address current economic and diplomatic crises? Weakening their own candidate will do nothing but increase the chances that a Republican candidate (which they'd despise far more than Obama) would win. Do they seriously think that somebody like Russ Feingold or Howard Dean would even be competitive in a national election? Or is it more likely that this is posturing to force Obama to put the priority back on progressive pet issues ("Get us a single payer system goshdarnit!") which decimated their party in the past election in the first place? How is this helping your cause at all?

I suppose it cuts to the hearts of the political inner-conflict. Is it better to compromise on your principles and win or to stand firmly on your principles and lose? Of course, the question comes down to determining which parts of your platform are non-negotiable and which are nice to have. The farther you go out to the ends of the pole, the more non-negotiables there tend to be, and in conjunction with the plethora of non-negotiables on the other side of the political fence, you inevitably have gridlock in the government.

Despite my conservative leanings, there's actually a lot that I like about President Obama. I may disagree with him on a number of positions, but I respect that he's making an effort to govern from the center. If progressives are correct that the Republicans are evil nihilists who are hell bent on stalling the government while holding the country hostage as part of a singularly focused conspiracy to make sure that Obama loses in 2012, how does essentially doing the same thing to him on the left solve the problem? Take the tax deal brokered by the President and Republican leaders, for example. If the Democrats undercut the President and drive the country towards an impasse leading to tax hikes for everybody, it further adds fuel to the fire that President Obama is an ineffective leader and should be replaced ("Heck, he can't even govern his own party!" the pundits will crow.)

There's plenty of guilt on both sides of the aisle here. Even if basic game theory doesn't convince the Democrats to get behind their President, I hope that the desire to do what's best to the country will. Yes, they might be frustrated by the perception or reality of Republican intransigence - but their own intransigence will do nothing to advance their cause.