I hate it when I wonder if I'm part of the problem and not the solution. But the fact is, given the nation's many pressing issues, I'm ambivalent about whether Democrats should waste their time trying to get Republicans to censure gun-toting, racist, lying extremists in their own party. And yet I kind of wish they'd ignore my doubts and do so anyway.
I'm confused because I truly believe there are bigger and more important political challenges for the country and the Democratic Party. But I also remember the horrified, finger-wagging MSM coverage of MoveOn that followed GOP agitation over the group's ad labeling Gen. David Petraeus "Betray-us," and the enthusiastic reaction (including, unbelievably, 22 Senate Democrats) that met Rep. John Boehner and Sen. John Cornyn's sponsorship of House and Senate resolutions condemning it.
I wish the media would do its job consistently calling out these hate-spewing liars on the right, and the Republicans -- hello, Wally Herger! Lynn Jenkins! Chuck Grassley! -- who support them, given that so many mainstream pundits went into fainting spells over MoveOn's regrettable (and I regretted it at the time) attack on Gen. Petraeus. I really wish there was a way to catalyze that reaction without any congressional Democrats stooping to the GOP's level.
But I'm just not sure there is.
What do you think: Should some of our liberal Congressfolk ask the GOP to go on record opposing gun-toting at town halls? Death threats against Obama? Lies about "death panels?"
Am I expressing my inner wimp by cringing at such a fight? Or am I being a pragmatist, wanting Dems to spend political capital on what matters?
And am I being Pollyanna either way, believing pundits might step up and definitively debunk and repudiate GOP lies and threats because of a congressional resolution? I'm pretty sure on that last question, the answer is yes.
Tell me what you think.
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