The Democratic establishment is not composed of democrats, it’s made up of elites who, not unlike our “Founders” were, are opposed to an excess of democracy (which the so-called Founders considered to be as big a threat as monarchy). And U.S. political history has been a never-ending contest between the forces of reform who have sought to democratize our republic — the anti-slavery movement, the women;s rights movement, the labor movement, the civil rights movement, etc., — vs. those who defended the status quo or, worse, sought to roll back progress whenever it was made.

The Democratic Party was once the party of those democratizing impulses, but that hasn’t been true for a good forty years or more now. Trump must be defeated, but our problems didn’t begin with Trump’s ascension to power and they won’t end with his defeat. The removal from power of the not-particularly-democratic Democratic establishment is also a necessary condition for progress, if not for survival of the species itself, every bit as much as the defeat of even greater evils farther to the right are, and that’s why we have to remember that even when we share a common goal, like defeating Trump, with the Democratic establishment and it’s enablers, the enemy of our enemy is not necessarily our friend, and the path we take in hopes of reaching that common destination, the strategic and tactical choices we make that frustrte and anger establishment Dems and their loyal followers, will necessarily differ from that of our intraparty rivals.

cross-posted from Facebook