The Vote -- Continued

The CW is that the Dems' losses are due to their "leftward" direction.

Wrong.

The Dems are losing, even such prominent Dems as Russ Feingold (although there are a number of issues with him) because they have pretty much ignored the interests of the People in order to fulfill their obligations to their Owners.

With Feingold, it was a matter of his talking real purty, but when it came time for action, he couldn't get it up. I'm sorry, anybody who insists that as a matter of principle, he has to vote to approve George Bush's appointees no matter how awful they are and anyone who refuses to use his prerogatives and powers as a Senator to stop the worst abuses of a White House out of control is an empty suit. Sorry Russ, you lost me a long time ago. Apparently, you lost a lot of Wisconsinites, too.

The fact that the Democrats have been languidly indifferent to the horrendous unemployment situation, except to demagogue it, is the deal killer for so many Americans. You can expect the Rs to try to repeal minimum wage and health and safety protections for workers, but they also say they're going to do something to get people back to work. The Dems have never, ever made that kind of promise for the short term, all they've done is work to extend unemployment benefit payments (that over half the unemployed don't -- and never did -- qualify for.)

They have done nothing about foreclosures but make the situation worse for tens or hundreds of thousands. They have lavished so much money on the upper crust, the rich are seeing their incomes skyrocket while everyone else's declines -- sometimes well less than zero.

The Dems' economic policies are Hooverite; their international policies have been Bushevik with a somewhat less hostile face.

One can go on and on listing the abundance of reasons for the Democrats' losses.

But it's not because they've been too leftist. It's because they have ignored the plight of the People, kept the wars and Empire going, and have lavished money on the already well-heeled.

The Republicans have said they will pay attention. Of course they lie, but at least they have said the right things.

The results are utterly predictable.