The Netroots Nation conclave held in Detroit over the
weekend failed to produce much news, though the true-blue liberal left made it
clear that they love Sen. Elizabeth Warren and they pity President Obama.
According to Politico’s 
account of the gathering at Cobo
Center, Warren, the populist Massachusetts Democrat, created all the buzz as
the focus was largely on domestic issues and 2016, not the 2014 mid-term
elections or any of the overseas turmoil that has U.S. foreign policy tied up
in knots.
This is the crowd that thinks Hillary Clinton is too
conservative, and they want an alternative for the next presidential run – if not
Warren, some other worthy standardbearer of the left.
Here’s some of Politico’s other observations:
“… Interviews with several attendees suggest it’s not
a lost cause for Clinton. If she distances herself from big business,
highlights her support for labor — a point that came up several times here,
given the big union representation at the conference — and demonstrates she
cares about the struggles of ordinary Americans, she could go a long way with
this group. What it really comes down to, activists say, is a shift in what
Clinton emphasizes.”

“… As one national Democrat with close ties to the grassroots put it,
activists are ‘venting’ while they can, even if they ultimately rally behind
Clinton. ‘No one, especially Democrats, no one likes a frontrunner’ — at least
not at this stage.”
The Netroots loved Obama “during his nomination fight ahead of the
2008 election, but many of these activists have grown disillusioned at seeing
the White House fail to produce much of the change they felt they’d been
promised.
“Nonetheless, many said Obama has done what he could given the
gridlock in Washington. ‘He’s doing all right, he could be doing better,’ summed
up Antonio Leonard, 26. ‘But with this Congress, you can’t get anything done.’”
It’s important to note that Netroots Nation goes a long way toward
demolishing the right’s insistence that the media has a distinct liberal bias.
For hardcore liberals, this conference is the biggest event of the year. Yet,
it annually attracts relatively little media coverage. That was the case this
year, beyond Joe Biden’s speech to the group.
In fact, key conservative conferences, such as CPAC, tend to
attract far more attention from that Main Stream Media than Netroots could ever
hope for.
While the skewed view of right-wingers makes them say strange
things, such as the tea party represents the mainstream American electorate or
that the GOP has not moved to the right, the Democrats seem to have a more
realistic view of the political landscape.
At the same time that Republican officials pander to the tea
party, elected Democrats, particularly presidential candidates, rarely attend
the Netroots confab because they don’t want to be tagged as a left-winger. Even
if their heart tugs them in that direction, they know the fringe when they see
it.
In an interview over the weekend, retired congressman Barney
Frank, a loyal liberal Democrat from Massachusetts, expressed his affinity with
the Netroots crowd. But, he added, the Netroots Nation is not representative of
America – or even the Democratic Party.
“If they were, I would have run for president 20 years ago,” he
said with a laugh.

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