Democratic Leadership Council Will Fold

[SkyDaddy7]

Source: Politico

The Democratic Leadership Council, the iconic centrist organization of the Clinton years, is out of money and could close its doors as soon as next week, a person familiar with the plans said Monday.

The DLC, a network of Democratic elected officials and policy intellectuals had long been fading from its mid-'90s political relevance, tarred by the left as a symbol of "triangulation" at a moment when there's little appetite for intra-party warfare on the center-right. The group tried -- but has failed -- to remake itself in the summer of 2009, when its founder, Al From, stepped down as president. Its new leader, former Clinton aide Bruce Reed, sought to remake the group as a think tank, and the DLC split from its associated think tank, the Progressive Policy Institute


Read more: http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0211/Democratic_Leadership_Council_will_fold.html

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Hmm?

[elocs]

1. I heard that from cali:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x368638

[brooklynite]

2. Before people here break out the champagne...

...keep in mind that there are moderates in the Party, and running them out in the name of ideological purity will not bode well for the future. A successful big tent can and should encourage ideas from all party elements.

[groovedaddy]

9. Doesn't seem like that's what is happening here. The lobbyists and campaign contributions have done

more to pull the Democratic party to the "center" (the old right). I think the DLC is going away because it's no longer needed.

[DeSwiss]

12. Exactly.

- No point in having two DLC's when the one will do quite nicely.....

[karynnj]

10. No one is running the centrist Democrats out

This is just one organization - once important in the party - a decade age, that will disappear. The fact is that it too changed over time. In the early days, there were people like Gary Hart as founding members. By 2008, no one here would have called Hart a member of the DLC. (Yet had he stayed in the Senate, he would have been on the infamous list posted often here - that its creators admitted was a list of (I think 2005 Senators) who were on the last list published - pre 2000 as DLC. )

What was telling was that by 2005, maybe earlier, the DLC stopped posting who their "members" were - listing only the leadership. This was a super contrast with the 1990s, when they proudly listed everyone who had allied with them. To me, this signaled that they did not want to appear to have been losing support.

Though there were many new conservative Democrats, they really were not on the same page as the DLC.

[EFerrari]

15. A self-appointed leadership council folding because

it had nothing but watered down Republican policies and could not lead is not the same as running moderates out of the party.

[Major Hogwash]

17. Yeah, but there's elephants in that thar big tent that you're talking about, though.

And they've turned the Democratic party into a 3-ring circus.

I got an elephant gun for Christmas, and I intend to use it to shoot them right in their big fat trunks!!

[pmorlan1]

23. They weren't moderates..

they were corporatists.

[progressoid]

25. They haven't been run out. They are entrenched in the party.

The President even see fit to appoint them to high offices.

[PassingFair]

37. Clinton as SOS, Bruce Reed as Assistant to the President and COS for Joe Biden...

they ARE the democratic party at this time.

:puke:

[Le Taz Hot]

35. Funny that "big tent"

never seems to include the progressives. "Ideological purity" indeed. :eyes:

[lob1]

3. Hooray!

[FiveGoodMen]

4. !

:bounce: :toast: :party: :applause: :woohoo:

[KamaAina]

5. I thought it was just changing its name to "The Democratic Party"

:eyes:

[Hell Hath No Fury]

21. Yup.

Their job is finished. Mission Accomplished, indeed.

[Botany]

6. now where will all the people in wing tips and dolce gabbana shoes work?

n/t

[Kolesar]

34. At the prisons that they got financed

DLC pushed all that conservative "law and order" fear mongering on us.

[Disintermedia8]

7. Actually they just changed the middle letter from L to N n/t

[LoisB]

8. DLC

Good. Anything I can do to help them fold faster?

[PassingFair]

11. As long as there is a Clinton drawing breath, the DLC shall not perish! nt/

[bluestateguy]

13. Cause of death: no populist appeal

Just a collection of politicians, ex-politicians, think tankers, pundits and academics.

They don't have too many, you know, actual people in their little group.

[LiberalEsto]

14. They were too radical

for the current centrist crowd

:hide:

[Gregorian]

16. Maybe they felt like they succeeded. Mission accomplished!

[jwirr]

18. My God, two good news stories in a row? KO is coming back and the

DLC is going away. What is happening?

[Fuddnik]

19. I think they're just changing their name and re-branding.

"No Labels"

"New Democrat Coalition"

[Citizen Worker]

20. The DLC has morphed into the No Labels party. They are not going away.

[pmorlan1]

22. Great News!

Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

[MilesColtrane]

24. When almost everyone in power thinks like you, why do you need to exist...

as a separate entity?


The army is dissolving because they won the war.

[Lorien]

26. They have become redundant now that the GOP/ DLC/DNC is one big happy

corporate ass kissing family. Their goal from the beginning was to destroy the Democratic party from the inside out. Mission accomplished!

[Shining Jack]

28. +1

:(

[somone]

27. It's Bill Daley and his Third Way now

DLC is so yesterday

[on point]

29. Bad news - Moderate republicans now moving even further right

The DLC was always a moderate republican party that happened to call itself Democratic.

While I am happy this wolf in sheep's clothes is going away so we have clarity on what is really Democratic, it is a bad sign because the moderate republicans are disappearing to be replaced by the wacko, ever more extremist and delusional fascist right wing.

This is not a case of purity purge. I am simply tired of the 'center' moving ever further to the right, so that now the center occupies an extreme right position. The DLC was always 'right' of the real center. They are in fact one of the reasons I no longer contribute to the dem party, but only to worthy 'real' (eg Grayson, Feingold) dem candidates. I do not want my money supporting right wing repukes, even if they call themselves dems.

[swilton]

30. I don't consider them moderate and I don't consider them gone

Now that they've emasculated the progressives, mission accomplished, they have just moved to the place where moderate Republicans used to be.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

31. not feeling the least bit blue about it

[Joanne98]

32. SEE YA!

[unkachuck]

33. "Democratic Leadership Council Will Fold"....Mission Accomplished!....n/t

[UnrepentantLiberal]

36. Good riddance.