This is a hell of an essay. I tend to think Kos has calmed over the past year or two and his voice is positive these days, but the larger points of this critique, particularly about the false sublimation of ideological battles into partisan unity, really ring true. A sample:
I am always struck by references to this “movement” of which the fresh-scrubbed collegiate youngsters of the Democratic Party seem so enamored, despite its apparent invisibility and lack of actual social incarnation. Maybe by “movement” he is referring to the progressive wing of the Democratic party (and those many progressives who found themselves outside of the party when she picked up her skirts and hoofed it on over to the center-right). Anyway, to say that disagreements that are, in fact, manifestly and obviously ideological in nature are in fact not ideological is to claim some sort of gnostic insight into the hidden nature of things.
The piece goes on to skewer New Democrat buzzwords that explicitly condescend to values and attitudes that largely don't exist, but are nevertheless ascribed to fair number of innocent Democratic bystanders. As the kids say,
read the whole thing
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