I saw the trumpeting of They Work For US by Markos and Matt about Steve Rosenthal's group, but the second shoe dropping wasn't near as loud (the group launched with three incumbents being challenged on their website and quickly erased the offenders). I'm not surprised by the capitulation as it's damn near impossible to have a mega-organization insurgency group in agreement, and definitely impossible without ideological grounding. And this week, the capitulation is being used by local papers around Tauscher to show the failing of the PAC as implying the netroots (here and here) in being a viable force against Tauscher.

I would agree with Marchmoon at Calitics, who sees the failure (and maybe its not a complete failure yet, but they are not even updating their website content of having pulled the three offenders-- and to me the whole thing looks DOA) as a good thing though--to keep it at the populist level. And that's probably the most realistic response-- there's nothing people-powered about Steve Rosenthal going out and raising millions to be in a figurehead position of the netroots.

The underlying reason why TWFUS had to yank their three offenders is because it was an attempt to make insurgency an establishment-level voice without having an ideological foothold. The Club for Growth is an ideological litmus vehicle (no taxes - starve the beast) that cares more about making a no-corporate-taxes statement than they do about winning or governing. The progressive movement (none of us can even agree on what the term 'progressive' means which points towards pragmatism is its basis) has no such ideological pinning to nationalize. I don't view that as a loss though, because it makes us rely upon the local area activists to create insurgency.

The building and supporting of progressive blog communities and individuals is much needed. It's not as sexy as primary challenges, and it won't generate headlines, but its got a bigger payoff under the current model of our progressive movement. We can make noise nationally but its locally that movement is made.

It's great to see that Matt and Chris are fully embracing the local blogosphere with BlogPAC. The local blogosphere should be encouraged to the point that it supplants the national blogs in importance. When I originally started BlogPAC with Markos, I envisioned that we could get 1,000 'seeders' of the PAC for monthly recurring contributions of $10 or more. 84 is a good beginning, but it needs much deeper support from the MyDD community.

Yet, if BlogPAC tried to become a sort of national PAC that goes in and tries to impose primary litmus tests on behalf of the netroots, it would fail just as miserably as TWFUS in holding a consensus. I'll say it again-- our progressive movement doesn't hold the sort of ideological rigidity needed to succeed that way. We could point to individual failings of representatives, over legislative matters such at the bankruptcy bill, the bill authorizing Bush to invade Iraq, the pro-torture bill, that we might all get aboard. But how likely are those types of bills under a Democratic controlled Congress? Now, just maybe there will be bills introduced that are odious enough that such PAC's becomes a viable vehicle to protest it, but if its that odious, we wouldn't need a national PAC (TWFUS activating from its webcobs) to kick-start a local rebellion (which is the only way it'd succeed) against the candidate, and we've already seen that funding by the netroots and organizations happens in such cases. We don't need establishment-like leadership to make that continue. Now, if big funders (or those big organizations that comprised TWFUS) are looking for ways to make the Democratic congress more liberal, their starting to help build and fund the local blogosphere is waiting to happen.

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I am a Democrat.  I'm proud to be a Democrat.  I couldn't be happier that the Democrats control the House and Senate.   But, I want a strong, progressive Democratic majority ruling the Congress, not a timid one that caves to corporate interests and avoids making real change.   That's one reason I am serving on the board of They Work For Us.  

They Work for Us is a new organization comprised of progressive activists who are tired of being sold out by Democrats.   Its board and supporters include some of the key players in the progressive movement, including leaders associated with the netroots, MoveOn.org, the American Association for Justice, several unions (Steelworkers, Painters, Teamsters and SEIU) and others with deep roots in the progressive community.    

We all agree that if progressives don't hold Democrats accountable for passing a progressive agenda, we're not helping.  In fact, we're hurting our cause.  Now, instead of just complaining when Democrats abandon basic principles, we can take action to keep them true to our shared goals.

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-- cross-posted from mnblue.com

I got a call yesterday from Eric from the Democratic Action ... something or other (Network?  Coalition?).  He was fundraising for them.  He started off by asking "aren't you tired of Democrats caving in to the Republicans?" which I thought was strange, because wasn't that what this last election was all about?  Then he got to name dropping who was behind this organization.  He mentioned James Carville, Tom Vilsack, Dick Durbin and a few others whose names I don't remember.

I wasn't going to let this pass.  So this poor guy got to listen to me rant.

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You may have seen on Kos an announcement about the new group They Work for Us.  TWFU is going to run primary challenges and put pressure on lawmakers to better represent their districts.  TWFU is going to be much more powerful than groups like the Club for Growth on the right for a number of reasons.

It's People-Powered:  The Club for Growth is entirely money-driven, which means that they can put commercials and pay for GOTV in races, but they cannot deliver actual votes.  TWFU has a base of labor support and blogger support, and while it's not going to eschew money, it has a real base of voters that it can communicate with right off the bat.  In low turnout primaries, this can be very powerful.

It's Mainstream:  The Club for Growth is pushing fundamentally unpopular policies.  Perhaps at one time there was a strong anti-tax sentiment, when marginal tax rates were in the 70s, but that day has long passed.  The public has seen that the low tax scam from the right is just another way of screwing the middle class.  TWFU is part of a new progressive ecosystem that is pushing mainstream policies supported by large segments of the public.  Primary targets are going to choose themselves.

It's Faster:  Unlike the Club for Growth, TWFU has the blogosphere as a communications network built into its DNA.  The Club does a lot of blogging, but the netroots on the right haven't broken out yet.  On the left, we're seeing a rapid 50 state communications and organizing network emerge, which can put huge amounts of pressure on lawmakers without direct involvement of TWFU.  Just knowing it's there, and that bloggers have a seat at the table, is going to create huge progressive leverage.

It's Low-hanging Fruit:  I love trash-talking the Club as much as the next progressive, but the reality is that the Club already has a well-developed right-wing infrastructure on its side and has been effective within that infrastructure.  Aside from the blogs in 2004, though, there had been very little work done on the left to hold lawmakers to the standards they set for themselves.  With TWFU in the game, there's a lot of low-hanging fruit out there simply because no one's tried this on the progressive side before.

Ah, good times.

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