Problems

by digby

“Democratic strategist” and uber-villager Michael Feldman appeared with Andrea Mitchell earlier and said this:

Mitchell: Let’s talk about the State department and foreign policy. John Kerry, widely anticipated to be at least one of the people considered, really wants the job, although with joe Biden leaving the foreign relations committee,if he doesn’t get the job, he would be the foreign relations chairman because he has the seniority.What about John Kerry as Secretary of State? How hard is it to be Secretary of State with Joe Biden as Vice President?

Feldman: What I saw the other day is the domino effect of Kerry as Secretary of State might put the Democratic caucus in a position where Senator Feingold would be the next up to chair the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and of course that poses a whole series of problems so…

Mitchell: Why does it pose a series of problems?

Feldman: Well, because of Senator Feingold’s opposition to the war and I think that would immediately, his vocal opposition to the war, I think that would immediately then raise some issues for the caucus and for leader Reid..

Mitchell: But the president [elect] of the United States is opposed to the war…

Feldman: This is true, but I think they’ll want in foreign relations is maybe a more even handed person. Ben (sic) Nelson’s name has been floated there as a potential consensus pick…

Is Feldman saying that Democrats still believe that it’s a liability to have voted against the war? (Nelson voted for it.) If so, somebody needs to tell the country because I think they just voted, in huge numbers, for a guy who won largely on the basis of his opposition to the invasion of Iraq.

The Villagers want to muzzle Feingold because they are petrified that the dirty hippies are about to trash the place. But using opposition to the war as some sort of litmus test is ridiculous. They are going to need to find a better excuse to deny him the chairmanship than that or risk one of the major rationales for Obama’s presidency.

The Republicans allowed a global warming denying, knuckle dragging neanderthal to be the head of the Environmental and Public Works Committee and nobody said a word. Russ Feingold is not his doppleganger. (He’s sane, for one thing.) And he has voted many times with the other side for a variety of reasons. The idea that he is going to cause “problems” because he is a war opponent only makes sense if you think withdrawing from Iraq is a problem.

These Democratic villagers are victims of Stockholm Syndrome and they need to be reprogrammed. It is not automatically a “problem” for Democrats to allow liberals to have a voice in politics when they just won a big election with a man at the top of ticket who the other side named the most liberal candidate in history. The public clearly didn’t find that a disqualifier and they need to accept that.

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