Conventional wisdom is that you "dance with the one who brung you." Since at least President Clinton's administration, the Democrats' bringers have been the extreme left of the party - Hollyweirders and those of similar mind. In politics the conventional wisdom breaks down when the "one who brung you" becomes a serious liability. For the Democrat party, that has become reality.
The Democrat party is facing a tough choice: stay with and be defined by their extreme left wing or break with the extreme left and redefine the party and its policies. Staying with the extreme left may seem easy - doing nothing - in the short term, but this is likely to doom the Democrat party to being a long-term minority. Breaking with the extreme left will be hard and unpleasant; redefining the party "under fire" from the extreme left will be hard work. Doing so will hurt the party in the short term, but has a reasonable possibility of the party having a meaningful future.
