Mystery of the Democrats' New Spine

http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/21878/

This author gives the credit for the Dems' sudden discovery of backbone (over Social Security, Terry Shiavo, and even some of Bush's particularly over-the-edge nominations) to independent media, and particularly liberal AM talk radio, e.g., Al Franken.

Well, I listened to Air America, and read Alternet and Truthout and Greg Palast and a lot of others, all the way through GWB's first term (well, OK, Air America was a late arrival--but well before the election, during which the Dems continued to show a complete lack of spine). The stuff was out there all along.

My feeling is that it may actually have more to do with a lot of the mainstream news bigwigs, including the New York Times and Washington Post, admitting that they were hornswaggled in the run-up to the war, and finally beginning to *function again as a proper press does*: questioning everything and investigating until the truth can be discovered.

But I'd like to know your thoughts: Readers--why have the Democrats finally begun to turn into an actual opposition party? And why did they give GWB a free ride in his first term, despite his radical-right actions that are far out of the social mainstream? And why did the media so seldom question any of it until recently?

And why, for heaven's sake, is there not a mass movement in the streets to protest both the stolen elections and the imposition of this very undemocratic government?