This is crossposted at dailykos and MLW
It’s been a long week for most of us. The Alito confirmation hearings were exhausting and telling. It says a lot that the spat between Specter and Kennedy, that the crying jag of Martha Alito, were what made the headlines, it speaks not just to our media but also to the job the Democratic senators did or rather did not do.
When we hear on the Sunday talk shows that half of the senators didn’t know what `unitary executive power’ was it’s like a slap in the face. When executive powers became as hot a button issues as abortion has been since Alito was nominated, I felt a rush of hope. If the Democratic and Republican senators didn’t have what it takes to protect a woman’s right to choose surely they would care about the place Congress has in governing this great nation of ours.
For those that think many of us are having a knee jerk reaction to the Alito hearings, for those of you who think we’ll get over ourselves, for those of you who think we haven’t thought this through, I’d like to offer evidence that that is simply not true.
At least for me, even thinking of leaving this party has left me crestfallen for months. It’s not something I take lightly. It’s finally realizing that at some point it’s no longer about short term results, it’s about what we leave to our children and their children.
There is no miracle fix, there is no magic bullet, there is a time when time is up, there’s a time when what comes next has to be looked at because none of it happens overnight. A political party doesn’t dissolve overnight and the answer to a party that has left us behind isn’t built overnight. When I look into the eyes of my grandsons I see the hope that is America. When I look into their hearts I see a longing and I see dreams of what they aspire to. When I hear what their souls say to me it is of an America they were born knowing, an America that speaks of justice, liberty and of freedom. When I look into those eyes I know it is their future that matters most, that I am on the other side of looking out at the world, I am on the side that is looking in at their world that is to be. I cannot entrust that world to the Democratic Party any longer.
The following is a comment I made on a diary written by Eugene after Harriet Miers was nominated to the Supreme Court. It was written on October 4th. Since the lost election of 2004 I’ve thought a lot about my history with the Democratic Party. What it has meant to me, what a touchstone it has been for me for four decades. What a savior it became for me in 1966 when I was a pregnant teen in high school without a choice. This party was my best hope, it was the best hope for women, it made me so proud to say, “I’m a Democrat” even though I would have to wait until 1972 to vote in a presidential election. Not being of age didn’t stop me from joining Democratic clubs, didn’t stop me from becoming a feminist who protested the war and fought for Roe v. Wade and for the ERA. I was a seasoned Democrat before I ever entered my first mark on a ballot.
‘A tip of the hat and a so long to what once was’
I wrote this comment, sorry for the length, in response to Eugene’s diary late last night. All of this has been brewing inside my head and, most especially, in my heart. It came into sharper focus after watching the non-leadership Democratic Party decide they needed to come out and show their mugs on camera saying Harriet Miers is a ‘nice lady.’ With leadership like that we really don’t need a Republican Party.
I’ve said it ad nauseum I know but after 40 years of being a Democrat it’s really hard and heartbreaking to even imagine quitting this party. It’s hard to even type it through the tears. Through all the ups and downs we, as Democrats, have been through during those decades we’ve always soldiered on because we had our principles to hold onto, we still had that deep down inner knowing that we stood for the truth of who we are as Americans. That truth is only in sight for me when I’m on threads like this one in response to diaries like this where the true liberals congregate.
For 35 years I truly believed I was fighting for equality for women, I was fighting for abortion rights, I was fighting against the death penalty, I was fighting for voters rights, I was fighting for better schools for the generation I was born into and the generation that were our children. For the past 5 years I started to question if that was so. I didn’t let go of the dream though, I still thought it was a possibility I would see myself as an equal. I still had such high hopes I would see an amendment in my Constitution that told me women have equality at long last. I still envisioned a day when I would stand up with such pride because we had finally won, we would have those chills that come when you have fought so hard for so long and finally prevailed. I thought there would be dancing in the streets with trumpets blaring as we danced and sang knowing they could never take it away, the feeling when you know, inside your very soul, that you are equal to all men.
What I know now, after November, 2004 is that it won’t be so. I will die without knowing what it’s like to be an equal, not because I have an illness but because I don’t have a party that supports me. I don’t have a party that protects me. I don’t have a party that will stand up for me. I don’t have a party that believes in the ERA enough to fight for the basic rights women should have had 250 years ago. I don’t have a party that, even when they were the majority, saw fit to vote in the affirmative to send the ERA out to the states. When asked, “should women be equal?” I have a party that said no, they cannot.
This is what I know now. I know that the fight we fight today and tomorrow will be for the generation of Maryscotts, Eugenes, and Sassy Texans and for your children. That what we choose to do today you will see in your lifetimes. That your children and their children will know equality because you will keep fighting until they do. I know that the party we create is not for my generation or even for yours but it is the party that your children and their children will prosper in.
This all started for me when Reid became minority leader, when Pelosi said Tim Roemer should be chair of the DNC, when Schumer said Casey was ‘the candidate’, when Kos couldn’t let go of Langevin, when Hillary stood beside Democrats for Life. It takes time to let go, it takes walking away with babysteps, it takes picking the pieces of your heart up as you go, it takes wiping a million tears away, it takes remembering the pride you felt just saying the word, Democrat and accepting that pride is a thing of the past, it takes believing there is something else, something better, something brighter, something healthier, something more vital and robust. It takes knowing we are worth so much more, we are worth everything, we are the best there is, in our hearts and in our souls there lives majesty and goodness.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m very close to my swansong. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t take the heartache. Forty years is enough, they’ve had my very best years so far and I’ve had the best of their years but it’s over. I’ve loved being a Democrat more than I can say. I wish all the Reids and the Schumers and the Leahys and the Clintons and the Pelosis and the Obamas knew how much this hurts. I wish they could appreciate what it costs us to hang on, I wish they had an inkling how hard it is to leave.
Count me in on what comes next. The next new thing, whether it’s a party or the next best thing in the progressive movement. Eugene has some excellent ideas. Just give me a minute to wash my face, put on a dash of lipstick and a tip of my hat to the past.
For me, it isn’t just the leadership in the Democratic Party, it’s also what the party itself has become. I’m not sure what came first, the chicken or the egg, but the two elements in this instance are the leadership and the members of the party. Whichever came first, the party started to shift to the right and I don’t think it’s going to go back to what was once known as the center. Because it’s not just the leadership, it feels to me like I’ve stayed too long at the fair. It’s no longer a fit, I’ve outgrown it or perhaps it has outgrown me but when I let the sadness rest I can see clearly that I no longer belong.
At first I did think that it might be my age but I really don’t think that is it. For months on Kos there has been fighting that is vicious. That is not to say we didn’t fight before in this party, of course we did but there were some things that were tried and true. A healthy respect was one of those things. Another one is that once women had rights those rights were respected. It’s not that we didn’t have to prod the members to remember us, we did, but the foundation of the party made a place for us, be it smaller and quieter, there was still a place at the table.
Granted, it was a time of Feminism come to life once again and we weren’t shy about saying our piece. Issues like sex discrimination, sexual harassment, equal pay were all issues that came out of the closet so to speak. We fought mightily, we were called names, we were put in our place often but with steely determination we got our leadership to listen. That isn’t happening any longer, it’s as if they gave us a voice for awhile and now they want that voice muted. Women’s issues clearly scare them. Abortion, reproductive rights, Title IX, equal pay, violence against women are all issues that threaten elections somehow. It’s ridiculous and it’s true, this party is running scared away from the very word abortion, they don’t want to talk about a medical procedure that women deserve to have access to. They don’t want to talk about our reproductive rights because then they might have to utter the word, abortion. They don’t want to protect us period. How often is Title IX or the Violence Against Women Act in the headlines? Never because our leadership and many in this party don’t want to touch us with a 10 foot pole.
That attitude permeates the leadership and the members. I’m only willing to expend energy fighting one or the other, not both. We will be fighting the Republican Party for many, many years so clearly that’s where I think our best work should go. Maybe others are better at fighting the center and the right of the Democratic Party, it’s clearly not my strong suit. At the end of the day I’m not sure what has done me in more, the leadership, the center, or the right of either or both of the parties. The telling thing is that I can’t differentiate, I don’t have an answer. I think that’s a statement in itself.
Before, during and after the pie fights on Kos and then after the election in 2004 all of this has been made very clear. We’re a fractured party and I don’t think it will be different for a very long time. To stay political, which is in my blood, I have to make a choice and that choice to me is to align myself with people who believe as I believe. United we stand is absolutely true and I don’t believe the Democratic Party with us in it can accomplish that. Just as Kos has suffered greatly from the exodus of strong women’s voices the Democrats will suffer when a proportionate number of us, liberal men and women, leave but they won’t know what the cost will be unless and until we do. I truly believe that. It’s not out of revenge or bitterness that I say that, it’s because we want more, we want different things, we have different values and principles. It doesn’t make them wrong but it does make us right because then, and only then, can we stop doing what we scream and yell at them for doing, we will stop compromising.
Now Alito stands before us as a threat to the country we have known and the country we have all loved. There is no disagreement in what direction this country will likely take if he is confirmed. There is disagreement on what actions should follow. There is disagreement on who will stay and who will leave this party. I’m sure all will agree, no matter where we are in this debate, we are all filled with fear.
I wrote the following letter in response to Senator Feingold’s request for our views on the prospect of Alito as a Justice on the Supreme Court. I have since emailed it to all of our senators on the Judiciary Committee because what they decide affects not just their constituents, it affects every generation of Americans living now and those who will be born in the not too distant future.
‘Alito is extraordinary, you must filibuster, our fate is in your hands.’
As a lifelong Democrat I’ve had ups and downs with this party. Every time my party compromises any of my rights as a woman to have an abortion under Roe v. Wade, I am livid. Every presidential election cycle that comes and goes without women’s issues being a top priority, I am incensed. Every year that goes by without the passage of the ERA I say to myself, through clenched teeth, “maybe next year.”
I always brush myself off and pick up the mantle of the Democratic Party because I’ve been a member of this party for almost 40 years. 40 years of support, 40 years of phonebanking, walking precincts, hosting coffees in my home, fundraising, GOTV, the list goes on and on.
I’m loyal to this party but I’m having an increasingly hard time believing this party is loyal and/or committed to me. I am beyond angry or livid or incensed today though. I’m frightened by where the Republican Congress and administration are taking us and I’m scared that the only thing that stands between Americans and the evil and corrupt government we have under the Republican leadership is the party I’ve believed in for almost four decades.
It isn’t always about losing in and of itself, it is often in the way we lost that counts. Alito’s beliefs on where this country should go is a snapshot for every other Republican in roles of leadership. It’s abortion rights, unitary executive status, the environment, worker’s rights, civil rights, the rights of the hungry and unsheltered, women’s reproductive rights, equal pay, Medicare and so much more.
I’ve drawn my line in the sand Senator. That line is what you do as a congressional body to stop the confirmation of Alito. We will most likely lose but what I know for sure is this; if the Democratic senators can’t make me feel safe in my home from my government essentially spying on me with wiretaps and surveillance, then you surely can’t make me feel safe from terrorists. If the Democratic senators can’t address violence against women overall but also against Alito’s view that women should notify their husbands about terminating their pregnancies, then you cannot protect me from terrorists. If you can’t protect our children from law enforcement that will shoot them in the back because they may have stolen $10., then you can’t shield us from the terror that lurks from fundamentalist extremists outside of the court that calls itself Supreme. If the Democratic senators cannot stop the strip searches of our ten-year-old daughters without a court order, then you can’t even begin to tell us we’re safe from those who wish us harm.
Samuel Alito will set back the advances we have made in the lives of women for decades to come. He will stifle our children’s rights to an education that will surely speak to the quality of their lives and their children’s lives. Samuel Alito will have a say in the air they breathe, in the water they drink and in the availability of national parks we have come to take for granted.
Samuel Alito will be the defining moment for many of us, for the bloc of women voters this party has come to rely on, it will spell the future for us in many ways. You have a say in what that future will be for us and for you as leaders of our party. I will stay home for the first time since 1972 if you don’t stand up for me. I have placed my vote for the D candidate for 34 years. I have proudly done so, it will break my heart not to ever again, but stay home I will unless you give me reason not to.
That history for me will come to an end if my party refuses to protect my rights and the rights of my daughter and her daughter. I will stay home before I vote for one more Democrat if you fail to listen this time.
It’s no less than women’s lives that are at stake here. There has never been as compelling a reason in the 30+ years I’ve voted as there is now. Don’t take lightly when I say it’s women’s lives. I was a pregnant teen in high school in 1966 without a choice. One Monday morning the news of Charlotte’s death rang through the halls of my high school, she bled to death after she tried to self abort. A boy named Bobby brutally beat his girlfriend until he was sure she had lost the baby she was carrying. There were abortion wards in those years, all the girls my age knew of them, those wards were our choice.
If you send us back to that world we will not forget for a very long time. When our daughters, sisters, granddaughters and nieces ask us why we lost Roe v. Wade we will tell them we fought hard to protect our rights of choice but we had a party that didn’t think it was `extraordinary’ enough to do so. I hope you do what’s right, what’s right for us and what’s right for you, so we never have to have that conversation.
Make no mistake, we are deadly serious.
Sincerely,
XXX
I was watching the figure skaters who will go to the Olympics this year and those who fell just short of their dreams. The ice dancing team of Tanitha Belbin and Benjamin Agosto skated to Born in The USA, An American Woman and America the Beautiful. They did so as she carried an American flag across the ice. It was a breathtaking moment for those who know their story. Tanitha is a Canadian who, with her partner, Benjamin, have won the silver medal at the World’s Championship. This is their third straight U.S. Championship gold medal. For a country who savors those who win and banishes those who don’t, their struggles to gain citizenship for Belbin has been like a metaphor for ice dancing. It doesn’t stop there however. The reigning U.S. silver medalists, Melissa Gregory and Russian native, Denis Petukhov will be going to the Olympics for the first time as representatives for the U.S. He won his citizenship in February. They placed second. The couple who placed fourth, and out of contention, in this year’s U.S. Championship, Morgan Matthews and Maxim Zavozin, would have also been in the Olympics as he was sworn in as a U.S. citizen on December 30th.
This reminds us all who and what we are. We are a country of immigrants, a people who longed for and dreamed of a better life, a republic built on the principles of a democracy. As Tanitha and Benjamin spun and glided their way into our hearts, they held our flag up as a symbol to us and to the world, we are America, sometimes we skate on the thinnest of blades but we persevere because we live in the land of the free. We know it, our hope is our leaders will find their skating legs and glide with us into a future where we are free from the powers that be.
If you lose your will to fight actively, as I will once I confirm the loss of the Court, there’s a middle ground.
Support Dean’s in-party grassroots movement, look for genunine liberal candidates for local and regional office. Give them everything you withhold from the national party and candidate. With the Court lost for a generation at minimum, we can afford to spend the generation it’ll take to replace the leadership.
If the Republicans can run as Democrats and Greens, surely liberals can run as Democrats.
I’m no longer convinced of what you say. I wish I was but I’m not.
I’ve worked for local politics my whole life. My father was a career local politician. I was born and raised on local politics. I’ve understood since I was still in my one digits that everything starts with local politics.
In the early 80s when Reagan won the presidency I had a non-profit that recruited and ran women’s campaigns for school board seats throughout the state. It was a great way to launch political careers for women, to start at the local level. Plus, we had stealth candidates that needed to be exposed and beaten.
Maybe I’m just tired but I think, more so for me, that I find hope in true liberal values and this party has gone so far away from the left I don’t feel like it’s my party any longer.
I will take your words to heart though. Like I said, it’s gut wrenching to leave the longest relationship I’ve had in my lifetime, my relationship with the Democratic Party.
I understand your burnout, I walked away from the National Organization of Women sometime in the mid-70s because, well, then it looked like the women’s rights were stalled.
But now I look back and I see all was accomplished by increments. (And at the same time, the reactionaries were furious at what we had accomplished and were building behind the scenes.)
Abortion rights aren’t over, the reactionaries are in the ascendency, but the swing back is coming, the fight behind the scenes is ours, the younger generation is furious and anti-reactionary, and they will be the majority as the dinosaurs die.
It’s a dark day — but you can still let them know where you stand: if Repug, tell them “No” to Alito; if Democrat: FILIBUSTER!
CONTACT YOUR TWO SENATORS
John Edwards has endorsed this petition for FILIBUSTER!
Phone, fax, and email addresses for the Judiciary Committee.
People for the American Way has collected over 60,000 signatures to send to the Senate, please add yours:Save the Court Petition
Move On.org’s Stop Alito petition
Democratic Party’s Reject Alito Petition
Stop the NRA’s Oppose Alito Petiton
And while you’re at it, please sign: Planned Parenthood Petition
Naral Anti-Alito Petition
Urge Congress to support Plan B
UPDATE:
MORE NEW ACTIONS AND PETITIONS:
National Coalition for Disability Rights
Brady Campaign
Human Rights Campaign
National Abortion Federation
National Council of Jewish Women
National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association
National Organization for Women
National Partnership for Women and Families
National Women’s Law Center
Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
US Action
First let me say to you Judy, you have been resolute in fighting against Alito’s confirmation. You have been tenacious even when you were being lambasted by so many in this party just for merely showing up. My hat’s off to you and your fortitude. BRAVA.
Second, listening to Al Gore speak today was like a lightning rod. I will say I’m very confused now, I wrote a 3400 word diary about why I am so disenchanted and weary to be a member of the Democratic Party. I had one foot and all the toes of the other foot on the way out the door. Then I saw Al Gore and realized we’re perhaps always just a stone throw away from having a leader so inspiring and passionate, so willing to tell the TRUTH, that he can lift us up out of despair.
It isn’t so far removed from how I felt when I saw Bobby Kennedy. It’s that same fire in the belly, the same devotion to the rights of all Americans, the same commitment to what this country was built on and a loyalty to our Constitution that isn’t seen in our current leadership.
You have given me links I hadn’t participated in yet. You have, once again, given me a way to be proactive and for that I thank you. I’m hoping some of your resolve is rubbing off on me as we speak. Bless you.
Gore, Gary Hart, Bradley and so many others are all-but ignored by the current leadership. I find myself wishing they would recruit Bernie Saunders, Feingold, Conyers and others to form a center/left coalition. Gore barely mentioned the institutional party other than to shame them.
Perhaps its time to walk away, even longstanding members of the party such as these.
doing cut and paste of links to petitions and actions.
Just another increment.
And I almost stopped doing that yesterday after I’d read a “give up on the filibuster” diary at Kos.
Then I read another asking “Why the hell should we give up on the filibuster?”
What the hell, maybe we can’t sway even our own Democratic Senators — but we sure as hell can tell them where we stand.
And as long as we still have the right to do that, maybe we should exercise it.
Sorry for the length of the diary, a lot has been brewing for months. This week brought it all home.
It was the perfect length — it took just as long as it needed to say what had to be said. It was a brilliant diary.
I have consistently voted for Democrats throughout my voting career (which parallels yours), although I could never bring myself to register as one because, with few exceptions, they have never been much to good at the art of political compromise.
The way to save the Democrats is to push them to the left. We need to find and support truly progressive candidates, regardless of their party and particularly at the state and local level. Electing these candidates will not only make the Dems realize that they cannot continue to ignore lefties because we have nowhere else to go but also prove to them that holding progressive views is not some sort of electoral death wish.
Caliberal, I cried when I read this last night. I was also falling asleep in my chair so I couldn’t post to tell you that then, but I wanted to make sure you knew how profoundly touched I was by all that you wrote. I am younger than you (I’m about Maryscott’s age) but so much of what you wrote resonated so strongly for me. Thank you so much for this very moving diary.
Thank you for your heart filled diary. So many things have been addressed here. Where does one even start??!! I am with you in your stance, even tho I am not a democrat, I with you 100%.
My heart knows you are right. I am so glad you wrote this up. It is what many of us out here have been thinkng of for a very long time. I can only say, I applaud you. I am with you in this stance, evn tho my path was different, I think we want the same thing. Actually I am hoping thre are many republican women and perhapes men out there that wat this too. This is not just about abortion. It is about life for us all, not just the fetus. Seems they just cant get a handle on this in their heads. Anyhow, just know I am in this march with you and I do so applaud what you have said.
“One day, an army of gray-haired women may quietly take over the earth.”
1978 essay, “Why Young Women Are More Conservative,” Gloria Steinem
Sounds like you may be ready, caliberal, and I know there are lots of strong, wise women here. How massive a demonstration could we put on at the next Dem covention? Would some strong women in congress join us?
Ah, damn! There I go holding out hope again. I’ve been doing it for decades, too, and I am sick of living under the boots of the rich white men who run this country.
Hi neighbor. Go to the south and see what is developing there…btw, I so agree with you….
Better we should go find the Green Party convention and get them to start running more candidates at the state and local level instead of wasting resources on presidential campaigns so we’ll have people to vote for.
As I didn’t make very clear above, I have basically given up on the Dems because their idea of compromise is to bluster for a bit and then cave.
I totally agree with you about the Greens. They need to take over local politics to show people that progressive policies are effective. This is what the religious right did and it took them 30 years. I know that 30 years is a long time, but it’s the only way to have true victory. Plus, with so many people disgusted with both major political parties, it might not take that long.
So many of us on these lefty blogs are smart, well-read, and principled that it must start here.
Oh dear, a post from the heart-I too,feel betrayed and bereft.
Although I know in my heart that politics is an ugly business– As Boston Joe says- ‘Have they NO SHAME?’
Are we going to put up with these cowards?
I do applaud the ‘fighting dems’ meme over at Big Orange-but why do we have to play the ‘I was in the Army/Marines/Navy’ game to get any traction?
Let me say that I am married to a Navy veteran,and I know many vets who are DISGUSTED with this betrayal of everything that this administration has done to undermine our basic freedoms.
When will somebody just STEP UP and tell the effing TRUTH?
Many of my friends – who are not of the ‘liberal’ bent -are looking with fear and consternation at this latest violation of our civil liberties. This is not the America they were brought up to believe in and respect.
Of course,that was all a lie in the first place,as anyone who has read Howard Zinn knows.
Illusions die hard.
They will only change if an independent bloc of liberal/progressive voters MAKE them change.
Withhold your money, withhold your vote. Support only those who support your values.
It has come to this for me as well. Alito is the last goddamned straw for an awful lot of people. And you know for every person who’s saying it, there are at least 10 more who are quietly thinking it.
My relationship with the Democratic Party has felt much like my relationship with my abusive ex for some time now — and it only took me 2.5 years to tell her to pack her stuff and go, whereas I’ve been taking crap off of Democrats since the 80s. Well, no more. They want my vote, my money, my time? They can send me progressive pols, or they can go straight to hell.
And you said it with sincere, heart-felt intent. I couldn’t agree with you more. I left the pretend Democrats quite a few months ago and they still continue to disappoint me greatly. I have been saying since 2004, when are these people going to stand for somethin? Even if it is something I disagree with. So far, I can’t see that they stand for anything but re-election.
I’m with you as I know many, many others are. There has never been a time with greater potential and opportunity for a real opposition party, or at the very least opposition candidates. . .where the F are they? So busy apologizing for any and all of the things that matter most to this country, any stand that is too far away from neocon thinking that they are falling all over themselves trying to sound like democrats but having no spine or heart for real values.
They are too disgusting to spend my time on any longer.
Thank you to all who have made comments here. I think it’s a good way to see how much we are not alone in this courageous fight to take our country back.
When I came online to see Gore’s amazingly passionate, articulate and eloquent plea to understand what is at stake in this country and how America has got to wake up and do OUR part, it reminded me of how big an equation we are in what and who governs us.
For all that Mr. Gore said, it illustrates what we don’t hear any longer in the Democratic Party. For the passion and conviction he spoke with, it only illuminates how sickly our leaders sound as they trumpet a big load of ‘nothingness’ every time they open their mouths.
Perhaps Mr. Gore will be the saving grace for this party. Perhaps if he would run again it would light a fire under the feet of those who pretend they are currently leaders of Congress. Perhaps if Mr. Gore got disgusted enough he would be the Pied Piper to us all and give us the courage and fortitude to create something we all want, a party that speaks truth to power, a party that lives and breathes it’s progressive, liberal values and principles.
Perhaps Gore’s words can embolden us to build a party we can truly be proud of, a party where we never, ever utter the words, “it was the best hope for us” when what we really truly have wanted all along is to say, “it IS our hope.” We owe it to our children to give them better than we have got.
When I checked on Kos for comments to my diary there I read one that a young man had left. Essentially it is everything rolled up into one, it speaks of the desperation of the Democratic Party, everything that is wrong with it either top down or bottom up. It has NOTHING to do about how the Democratic Party can be great, it has EVERYTHING to do with why I am choosing to leave.
“If this was 1933 in Germany and you had two big parties – the Nazis and the Democratic Party – would you abandon the second one to vote for the Third Party even if there was no prospect of the Third Party to ever get more than 5% of the total vote. And if you did – wouldn’t you be guilty of helping Hitler to win?”
If I don’t vote for the Democrats even though that vote will be against the Republican Party and not for the ideals set forth by the Democrats, then I am gulty of helping Hitler win. That says it all in a nutshell for me.
I’ve tipped my hat and thrown it away. I’m shopping for a new one.
Gee- guess my bitterness was showing there!
I don’t think it was bitterness at all, I think it speaks to how fearful we are not just because of what the Republican Party has become but also because of what the Democratic Party has become.
How hard is it to watch our country falling into evil hands and, at the same time, knowing our voices are not just not heard but what we are saying lands on deaf ears? It’s utterly discouraging and leaves us with a sense of hopelessness.
Democrats have always been a hopeful lot, we’re the eternal optimists, we’re the ones who always look for the positive. Not any longer, and for those of us who simply can’t abide watching those qualities being thrown out with the bath water, it’s time to look for our place in the field once more.
One of my favorite books is Norman Maclean’s “A River Runs Through It.” My addiction has become the prose of others far more eloquent than myself. I find Norman’s words throughout the book to be soul searching and answers many of the questions I have in these turbulent times. Norman says this,
“Not far downstream was a dry channel where the river had run once, and part of the way to come to know a thing is through its death. But years ago I had known the river when it flowed through this now dry channel, so I could enliven its stony remains with the waters of memory.”
That so perfectly says what the Democratic Party has been in my lifetime and how I see it now. I can’t say it any better than that.
cutting and pasting links to petitions and actions.
Just another increment.
You have said everything I’ve been thinking. We’ve been traveling the same road for 40 years.
I’ve watched my party whisper “SHHH, we want to win back the Republican moderates”, whenever we demand that Democrats act like Democrats. I thought I’d found a place at DKOS to make sure that progressive values had a strong foothold in the party, but the pie wars made it clear that too many “liberal” men see wanking off to an endless supply of exploitive images FAR more important than women’s equality, and more are much too willing to barter other people’s rights in order to “win”. (I recall seeing a spot on tag line about defeating the Republicans by electing our own…Republicans.)
Now fascism comes “..wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross”, as Sinclair Lewis predicted, and what are my elected representatives doing about it? We’ve already rounded up Arab Americans and held them without due process. The new provisions of the Patriot Act will make inappropriate (read effective) protest a felony.
As one atrocity after another has been revealed, I think, “This is it; they’ll impeach him now, people will rise up and say ‘ENOUGH !'” but it seems that a groundless war isn’t enough, bullying and deliberately lying to manufacture excuses for war is not enough, bombing innocent civilians is not enough, torturing and degrading them is not enough, flouting the law is not enough, presidental speeches for “vetted audiences only” are not enough, marginalizing the poor to pay Haliburton to rebuild the damage caused by our million dollar bombs is not enough, dubious elections are not enough, the back door draft is not enough, domestic spying is not enough, a record surplus tranmuted into staggering debt is not enough, contempt for the legislative branch is not enough, packing the court is not enough, and a sitting president calling the Constitution “..just a goddamn piece of paper.” is still not enough.
Is this what it was like when the Nazis tightened their grip on the German people ? A rabid minority cheering them on, and everybody else too frightened or apathetic to speak out before it was too late ?
I am sick, sick with grief for my country.
Maybe Al’s speech will cheer me up.
I know many die-hard, long term democrats here in ND who agree with what you are saying.
I will be extremely unhappy if either one of my senators votes for Alito.
I think I will call them both a second time, just to be sure they understand all the ramifications.
imho, if the D’s fail to gain one of either the Senate or the House in ’06, I think they’re finished as a national party.