Partisan Politics as Usual

One troubling thing about Obama's candidacy was his choice of Joe Biden as his Vice President. Biden is a very partisan Democrat, almost never, in the senate, voting out of line with the Democratic party platform.

Biden has always received large contributions from big unions and never votes for anything that the unions wouldn't like.

I didn't pay much attention to this, but in light of the choice of Emanuel as Obama's chief of staff, I begin to wonder if there is a pattern.

Since the election, the two biggest things the Democrats have done are:
1) The installation of Emanuel, known more as a political pugilist than a compromiser or for any ideological or intellectual gifts.
2) Attack Lieberman and begin trying to remove him from influential committees in the Senate, presumably because of his support for McCain.

Now, politics goes on all the time, and both sides are equally bad. But, I have to wonder, are the Democrats afraid that the Republicans are planning to simply try to filibuster every bill that goes through, and they are gearing up to combat the Republicans at every turn; now that they have them down, to keep them down?

Or, are the Democrats thinking, "We've been out of favor for 28 years and the country has been ruined, so now we're taking over?" The problem with this is, if that's what they were thinking, they should be focusing on some new ideological promise, not on simply punishing the Republicans. No Senate Republicans tried to cause a recession, so I'm not sure what point punishing them serves.

More generally, if the country needs a significant ideological shift (which I do not think it does), then the Democrats should be trying to provide it. They, the Democrats, have been an ideologically bankrupt party for at least the last 10 years, and really since Reagan gained the White House. If the country doesn't need a significant ideological shift, then the Democrats should be focused on how to pass compromise legislation that everyone can support.