Rahm Emanuel Runs to the Front of the Parade

... and pretends to lead it, as all marginal pols do.

(Photo, left: Rahm Emanuel, head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, tries to thumb a ride on the VichyDems Express.)

Check out this hilarious nugget from an email the DCCC leader just sent out, referencing Lamont's victory over Lieberman:

Dear Thersites,

The recent Connecticut primary election illustrated how incumbents are bearing the brunt of the public's frustration and anger with the status quo. Change is what November is about.

We have the political atmosphere that is ripe for change. Energized Democrats around the nation can capitalize on our shared frustration with the government and build the movement needed to win.

Last week, Senator Barack Obama introduced a few of our candidates that are going help us get this country back on the right track. In November we not only have an opportunity to claim a Democratic majority in the House, we have an opportunity to do it on the strength of a new generation of progressive leaders....

Now, understand, Emanuel is a poster child for the protection of incumbent Vichys. He's a fave of Hillary and the rest of the DLC crowd; he couldn't even manage to oust incumbent Vichy Henry Cuellar in Texas, even though Cuellar's the worst conservative Bush-kissing Democrat in the House and faced a formidable opponent in Ciro Rodrigues. And Obama CAMPAIGNED FOR LIEBERMAN AGAINST LAMONT!

So I call bullshit, and laugh my ass off. If Emanuel had been in the Senate instead of the House, he would have been on his knees doing intimate favors for Connecticut voters to keep Lieberman in office.

But the good news is: OUR MESSAGE IS FINALLY BEING HEARD. The 2008 Dem primaries are shaping up to be a lot like the 1968 Republican primaries, with the centrist Old Guard finally catching on that there's a new, less accommodationist crowd in charge and scrambling to stay ahead. (Except that progressive Democrats, currently represented best by Russ Feingold, want to actually govern the country well, whereas the regressive Republicans of '64 and '68, such as the pre-reformation Barry Goldwater and a young, energetic Ronald Reagan, wanted to gut the government. So: similar dynamic, opposite effect.)


BACK TO VICHYDEMS HOME