Republican vs. Republican-Lite

J of Value Judgment comments on my post where I wondered if members of the Democratic establishment have ever bothered to come to a meetup, adding some valuable insights of his/her own. He/She concludes with this:

Have they become like the Republicans? Afraid to let a few actual facts get in the way of their pre-conceived notions of how the world is? Once again, I will wander through my day wondering wtf is wrong with these people.

I don't think they have become like Republicans. I think they have just become establishment, which means they have lost touch with the rest of the party. There is nothing Republican about that. It's just human.

I think we should avoid the reflex to label anyone who disagrees with us as "Republican". I think Dean went over the line during the primary campaign when he started saying that. We need to adopt our own version of Reagan's 11th commandment. We can criticize each other for the actions we take, but we should avoid getting personal about it.

Note: "Republican-Lite" is not the same thing as Republican. The essence of the "Republican-Lite" charge is that Democrats shoudn't sell out their principles in order to achieve quick victories by simply stealing Republican thunder when there is plenty of Democratic thunder lying around.

The potential is there if only Democrats would use it.