Beacon Street Journal

After hearing from liberal pundits about how conservative Republican backing of  Doug Hoffman in the NY 23rd Congressional race was indicative of a civil war inside the party, it’s nice to see some strong evidence that it is actually the Democrats who are engaging in fratricide.

Byron York reports that MoveOn.org has raised $3.6 million to support primary challenges against those Democratic Senators up for reelection who don’t toe the party line on health care. Additional heat is being felt from left wing bloggers. Daily Kos founder, Markos Moulitsas, recently urged party activists to ignore the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s strategy of protecting incumbents:

“So here’s the bottom line — skip any donations to the DCCC. Their first priority is incumbent retention, and they’re (necessarily) issue agnostic. They’ll be dumping millions into defending these seats. Instead, give to those elected officials who best reflect your values,” wrote Moulitsas.

If the health care bill actually makes it out of the Senate, it will be most interesting to see the posture of House liberals in terms of voting on any measure from the Conference Committee that contains a prohibition against any federal funding for abortions. Many House members have already stated that they will not vote for any bill that contains such a provision. Does this mean that there isn’t much room in the Democratic Party for “moderates?” This doesn’t seem to fit the template of a unified Democratic Party foregoing any differences to pass health care legislation.

In addition, there are rumblings of discontent from the Hispanic Caucus, who have indicated that they will oppose any measure that seeks to deny illegal immigrants from participation in the health bills public insurance exchanges. As reported in The Hill:

The Congressional Hispanic Caucus was also weighing its options on what to do about a push by some vulnerable centrist members to block illegal immigrants from being able to buy insurance on the bill’s “exchanges,” even with no subsidy.Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) said he “would have a hard time voting for” a bill or procedural measure that did that.

“I’m tired of feeding hatred and bigotry,” Gutierrez said.

After spending a considerable amount of air time falsely postulating that liberal Democrat Dede Scozzafava was somehow a “moderate” Republican, far less prominence is given by these same pundits to the internecine conflict brewing within the Democratic Party over the health care bill.