Let me get the disclaimer out of the way first: the whole Lieberman vs. Lamont thing is important. It is. I have a calendar on my refrigerator, and August 8th is circled. Ned Lamont has had both my money and my support.
Diebold is important. Just typing the word makes me feel helpless and victimized and scared.
Montana firefighters are important. Holding Conrad Burns accountable for his idiocy is important.
But seriously, folks...I really think we're missing an opportunity to harness the amazing power of this 6-digit-strong community.
We're literally a couple percentage points away from taking the Senate back, but we insist on rehashing "news items" that were buried on page 9 of the 2nd section of the 4th edition of the New York Times, as if all of us weren't reading the fucking paper ourselves.
The House is within our grasp, but we obsess over "The Kiss" and getting Democrats to beat Democrats and who swiped Ned's campaign signs.
All important, but let's regroup, people. We are 100 days away from an historic election. And yet two-thirds of the diaries scrolling through right now were either in yesterday's paper or will be in tomorrow's paper.
Daily Kos may be the "State of the Nation," but it's up to us to take the state of the nation and change it for the better.
Where are the action diaries?
Why aren't 100,000 of us here trying to teach each other how to truly make a difference in November?
Why aren't we obsessed with an extremely tight marriage amendment in Wisconsin, or the handful of Democratic House candidates who are this fucking close to taking back our country?
Why do we report Mason Dixon and SUSA and Rasmussen polls without also laying out the grassroots strategy for winning those races?
When I first came here, I didn't view Daily Kos a news site. I don't want that. I have a zillion sources for news.
We need to be the rallying point. We need to teach each other how to get involved in ways that don't include diaries. We need to make a difference.
If the Lieberman/Lamont thing has taught us one thing, it's that the sheer power of this community is awesome and amazing. What a shame if we use that to just bitch and ridicule and gripe and kvetch.
Misery loves company. Good. Kos serves that purpose for me, too. This is where I go when I need the company of people who think like me. Someday, we'll know what it's like to be on the other side -- where happiness loves company -- but not if we insist on rehashing the MSM and being the first to include "Breaking!" in a diary title and racking up a little mojo and a spot on the rec list.
Opportunity is knocking, but we're too busy blogging to answer.
Here we are -- all of us smart, motivated people. And I know that many of us are involved politically in one way or another. But preaching to the converted is not our calling. That only begets a more passionate, but equally sized, converted.
Let's teach other, not read the news to each other.
Let's rally, not commiserate.
Let's bring Kos back to the way I found in '04 -- full of action diaries and ideas and strategies.
Let's make a little history, shall we?