Sunday, August 28, 2005
Grandstanding Beltway Dems, stay away from Crawford
I keep seeing comments here and elsewhere that Dem elected officials should somehow "show support" for Cindy Sheehan by showing up in Crawford.
Doesn't anyone see that's the worst thing that could possibly happen?
It would change a grassroots, citizen-activist form of direct action into yet another photo-op, and take all the focus off the campsite and put it on the politician. The press knows the scripts for that story very well.
If the Beltway Dems—who, let us never forget, represent half the country by population though not in seats, due to Republican gerrymandering and election fraud—truly want to help Cindy Sheehan, these elected officials can do it by doing the job we elected them to do, and they don't need to travel to Crawford to do it. Right there on Capitol Hill, they can introduce bills, investigate, break stories, call for votes, amend bad bills, throw sand in the gears, and in general do what an opposition party should do: Oppose!
NOTE Now if a Republican were to go to Crawford, that would be entirely different. And that will happen when Crawford freezes over....
UPDATE Morans, via Atrios.
Doesn't anyone see that's the worst thing that could possibly happen?
It would change a grassroots, citizen-activist form of direct action into yet another photo-op, and take all the focus off the campsite and put it on the politician. The press knows the scripts for that story very well.
If the Beltway Dems—who, let us never forget, represent half the country by population though not in seats, due to Republican gerrymandering and election fraud—truly want to help Cindy Sheehan, these elected officials can do it by doing the job we elected them to do, and they don't need to travel to Crawford to do it. Right there on Capitol Hill, they can introduce bills, investigate, break stories, call for votes, amend bad bills, throw sand in the gears, and in general do what an opposition party should do: Oppose!
NOTE Now if a Republican were to go to Crawford, that would be entirely different. And that will happen when Crawford freezes over....
UPDATE Morans, via Atrios.
