Congrats to Donna Edwards for her primary victory in Maryland. An important win, indeed. Here's a good run down from The Nation. Yglesias has some good thoughts too. Last, the tree of progressive politics must be watered with the metaphorical blood of sellouts ever now and again. Some people seem to me to walk around in their head with a model in which politicians are very principled ideologues who then divert from their default status due to electoral fears. In a more plausible schematic, they have a natural tendency to drift in the direction of utter corruption and only electoral fear keeps them doing their jobs in a somewhat responsible manner. I'd add that in the long run, primary challenges could increase party discipline and save progressive activists time and resources by cutting down the need to lobby conservative Democrats. And more democracy, where elected officials are held accountable to voters and activists, is never a bad thing.
Adam Doster, a contributing editor at In These Times, is a Chicago-based freelance writer and former reporter-blogger for Progress Illinois.
