TW: Milbank makes a fair if un-original point: party activists have much more fun in opposition than in power. The progressives held their version of the CPAC conference where Rush made his infamous and very heavily covered speech a couple of months ago. The lefty activists have lost their bogeyman in Bush and no where near ready to go after Obama yet. Give them time and he will do something sufficiently moderate to raise their ire. In the mean time they meander around with little or no media coverage (no conflict to cover=no media coverage, covering more or less happy folks is booooring).
This is part of the great levelling process which occurs, the conservative complainers will get the coverage which will eventually ding Obama and the Dems which will some day help them re-gain some power. Bitching is funner after all than actually doing something, progressives have had their "fun" for eight long years (really about forty) now it is the conservative's turn.
From Dana Milbank at WaPo:
"For the past few years, liberal activists have gathered in Washington each spring for the Take Back America conference, where speaker after speaker -- Obama sometimes among them -- would give rollicking denunciations of the Bush administration before packed rooms of partisans.
But now that Obama has actually taken back America, the activists at this year's gathering feel a bit like the dog that finally caught up with the car. Organizers changed the name from Take Back America to America's Future Now, but that didn't prevent a sharp decline in participation.
...And Leo Gerard, head of the United Steelworkers, warned that if his fellow activists don't "seize the opportunity to lead with our progressive ideas," then "Rahm Emanuel will lead." And while "Rahm has the president's back," the union leader said of Obama's chief of staff, "I don't think he has our back."
But many in the audience had warmer feelings toward the Obama administration. A straw poll taken by pollster Stan Greenberg found that 90 percent of those in attendance approve of the job the president is doing, and that they have no consensus about whether to help Obama or fight him.
That ambivalence could account for the lethargy at this year's conference; as Fox News and Rush Limbaugh know, it's more fun to be an opposition bomb-thrower than a palace guard. "This place was more high-energy last year," said Roger Hickey, who co-directs the Campaign for America's Future with Borosage. "Last year people were jazzed up. . . . Now we're getting into the sausage making of legislation."
..."Radio row" was quiet, the "TV Terrace" was empty, and two people sat typing on "Blogger Boulevard."
...But defending the state isn't very exciting, and in the big ballroom for the luncheon, no television news cameras were on the risers..."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/03/AR2009060303173.html?nav=rss_opinion/columns
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