"Some of you in the DNC may see us as barbarians at the gate.
Some of us see ourselves as the cavalry.
The truth is, we are fresh horses."
That was me two years ago, speaking to a room packed with DNC members and 450 grassroots activists who came to address them at the DNC's Western Regional Gathering, shortly before an election for a new DNC chair. The activists were there to lobby on behalf of the candidacy of Howard Dean who was facing a crowded field of candidates.
That was a great day... and the rest is history. And so, increasingly, are the Fresh Horses.
The grassroots activists who got engaged in the 2003 presidential primary race and have been working in the trenches ever since... are increasingly exhausted. And the reason why? It's the chickenhawks.
Not the Cheneys and the Limbaughs and the warbloggers... but our very own species of chickenhawk: progressives who think the war on the right wing desperately needs to be fought... but who aren't enlisting.
Two years ago I and hundreds of other "Fresh Horses" become newly minted delegates to the California Party. A group of DFA organizers sponsored training sessions for this crop of new grassroots delegates in both Northern and Southern California. I attended the one in San Francisco and it was fantastic. It prepared me for the state convention so that I could make effective use of my time there, hitting the ground running. It was an example of the grassroots at its best.
This year there was a new crop of CDP delegates, and many new grassroots folks got elected. But suggestions to sponsor a similar training have not panned out. Why? Well, the folks who organized it last time have too many other obligations competing for their time and attention. And no one else is stepping up to do it.
I can't fault the folks who worked so hard two years ago for not making the same effort again... it must have been a massive undertaking (actually, two massive undertakings). But here's the problem: when those few overworked super-activists don't do something, then it simply doesn't get done.
I'm choosing one particular illustration, but I've got many, many others.
The grassroots appear to me to be drying out.
The thing is, I'm in the same boat. I didn't run to be President of my local DFA group this year after holding that office for several years because over time more and more duties and roles and responsibilities have accreted to me from a variety of quarters. I'm working to develop web-based tools to help grassroots organizers (in my copious spare time). I work on web infrastructure for local activists. I'm still VP of my DFA group, though not spearheading it. I'm on my county Central Committee. I'm on my state Central Committee.
And that's all great - it's an example of a grassroots activist becoming more tightly integrated into the Democratic Party's decisionmaking apparatus. It's what we want. But who's coming up through the ranks to be the new grassroots leaders?
I hate to say it, but where I live - one of the strongest enclaves of liberalism in the nation - there are precious few people willing to do much of anything tangible on a sustainable basis. Even with the Bush Administration staring them in the face every day.
When I go to political events I always see the same faces. The same folks at DemocracyFest are at the CDP convention. The same folks at Northern California DFA meetings and PDA meetings and "Take Back Red California meetings". It's like the "Hero with 1,000 Faces" in reverse - different organizations, different venues... but the same faces. Great dedicated people. But far too few of them.
And this isn't some "old boy's network" that you can't break into - we're grassroots, we're public, we're open, we're progressive.
And increasingly lonely.
Our local DFA membership has become miniscule. During the height of the 2003 primary season we had 10 monthly meetups around our county - we started having hundreds of participants come to our first gatherings and we couldn't find large enough venues to accommodate them all. After the election we had just one county meetup... and we thought that was understandable because, of course, election years are galvanizing. And that was pretty well attended. We thought we understood attrition. Nope.
Now we have about 8 members showing up on a regular basis. Maybe its our fault for not doing enough to sustain peoples' interest. Perhaps we have bad attitude, bad breath and B.O. Except that I'm hearing this same tune from enough other grassroot organizers that it sounds eerily familiar. And they can't all be shitty leaders. In fact, I know that a few of them are dynamic, charismatic, and creative leaders.
It seems that people complain endlessly about politics, but don't appear willing to do much about it. Maybe a lot of folks feel that there's not much they can do. So instead of having 50 (or even 100) activists sharing the workload - so that'd be fairly easy for busy people to participate - we have 4 who need to do everything... or it doesn't get done. And these few trade off being in various stages of burnout at any given time.
I think we've got a problem, folks.
Is my experience isolated? I'd love to hear from you guys that you're building your local grassroots membership and doing more and more... instead of less and less.
Please show me that I'm just observing a local ebb in the flow of grassroots activism.
Please tell me I'm wrong.
Please.
I fear that for every hundred people who are activated enough to read and post and rant and analyze and opine on a political blog... there's a fraction of a person who is out there in meatspace going to meetings, sponsoring events, and registering voters.
We can do amazing things. This past election is a taste of that. Thousands of people knocked on doors and made phone calls for Jerry McNerney, for example. But what I want to know is: where do they go in the off-season?
An election year is coming up, so there will probably once again be a flurry of activity from people who want to get involved. Will it melt away again after Nov '08? Will we do something different to make sure that people stay engaged? And what would that be?
All of this begs the question: Are we really building a sustainable grassroots movement? It's an article of faith among many progressives... but I'm lately increasingly concerned about whether that's actually the case.
I understand that people have busy lives. I really do. I'm a busy guy myself, trying to run my own business... and have a semblance of a family life (not to mention a bit of a social life outside politics)... and I'll be going to 3 different political meetings this week. And there'll be less than 7 folks at any of 'em.
Why does it fall to so few of us to gear up for the hard work of fighting in the trenches? And that's not merely a rhetorical question.