There's a lot of hand wringing and second guessing and GOTV 20-20 hindsight going on in these parts. There's a lot of "get off you asses", "get more enthusiastic" talk. It's all important. The thing is...this isn't about us.
The DKos community, and progressive activism in general, is plenty active and plenty enthusiastic. The apathy is among the "independent" voters and those generally inclined to sit on the sidelines until the big show comes to town.
More after the jump...
I read diaries here every day. I head over to TPM and Media Matters and HuffPost. I watch the video podcasts of DemocracyNow!, Countdown, and The Rachel Maddow show. When time permits, I sprinkle in any number of other sources of progressive and independent information to keep me up to speed. I hash over the issues, discuss them with friends, family, and co-workers. I Digg and Facebook important stories and offer my opinion whenever possible. I'm active in a number of progressive and Democratic organizations from abroad. Can I do more? Certainly. Am I (or anyone of similar profile) among the biggest issues in our electoral misfortunes and the Congressional failings of recent weeks and months? No.
There are plenty of us organizing, phone banking, spreading the word about progressive issues and points of view. All of it is still in place. What's not in place is the enthusiasm for politics and governance among the people who tend to make the difference in these pesky little things called elections. People who are fed up with Washington, and who refuse to align themselves with either of our sorry excuses for political parties, voted for Obama on the strength of sweeping out the Bushies and their legacy. People hate the war(s) and the lobbyists and the Katrinas and the cronyism. Obama did a good job of selling them on his ability to clean up and change the tone. Guess what?
The Republicans have ramped up the ugliness and so has Fox, Rush, and the rest. The conservative think tanks understand that they don't have to have a single legislative victory on an issue important to them if they can muddy the tone, sour the independents on Washington further, and generally swell the shit storm that had people standing in line for hours to cast their ballots in 2008. You know who's enabling them? The Democratic Party. Joe Lieberman and his ilk are happy to participate. Moderate Republicans are in on it too. Grassley and Snowe and the rest are excellent pawns in this game because they provide the illusory cover of bi-partisan cooperation and Senate collegiality for the delays and stonewalling. They help to slow our agenda long enough to really whip up the teabaggers via Fox, the internet, and the Dick Armey bus tours. In the meantime, MSNBC heads and Fox heads bash away at each other and the insipid cable news networks babble on about the dramatic events of the day, as if they were political soap operas.
The independents are watching all of this and frowning. They're thinking to themselves, "The Democrats are ineffective morons. The Republicans are obstructionist hypocrites. Neither of them can deal with Wall Street. The teabaggers are insane. Fuck 'em all." Some of them will vote for whoever's running against the incumbent. Some of them will stay home. Many of them will stay home. That leaves the enthusiasm issue in our laps and I think it's tough to match the teabagger enthusiasm when you have the WH and the Congress and they both suck.
I don't blame the independents either. People are hurting. We have solutions and a vision for government that will really make a difference in people's lives. Good for us. We got a lot of Dems elected via the 50 State Strategy and the excellent leadership of Howard Dean. Good for us. We started a landslide for Democrats in the 2006 mid-terms, largely on the strength of MoveOn.com and the anti-war sentiment sweeping the nation. Good for us. We rallied Democratic caucuses to go Obama and tilt the odds in his favor against the heavily favored Hillary Clinton. Good for us. We helped revolutionize online fundraising for Obama and set records to push him over the top. Good for us. We have kept the pressure on a lousy Congress to pass quality health reform. Good for us. You know what it amounts to? Beans.
It's not about us. It's about the system, which is so hopelessly broken and tilted in favor of the think tanks, corporations, Wall Street, the Business Roundtable, the Chamber of Commerce, and all the other well-funded and well-connected organizations in the world. We used to have unions on our side, and they still promise to bring their bad selves to the fight for health reform if they don't see what they like. You know what? It hardly matters. The Reagan Revolution led to a decimated union presence in America. They still matter, but now they stand diminished against a vastly superior set of organized foes. The inequality of our economic system has only expanded over the last several generations and that's swelled the power and influence of all the entities I listed above.
To be sure, there are plenty of people that think like us, and want the same things we do. There are a lot of people who would love to see progressive government take charge. The media tends to frame us out though. We're not part of the consumer culture foundation that fuels their vision of the world. In their eyes, we're the margins. Thankfully, the force of outlets like DKos has kicked in their doors and given us entrance into the national conversation. That's how we're doing our part most effectively. The conversation about what our society should look like, the priorities that we should be setting and following, and the very nature of "us" as a people includes progressives. That's a major breakthrough. In that way, WE continue to be a big part of the solution.
If Massachussets is disheartening, as it should be, it should fuel our efforts even further. It shouldn't, however, be mistaken for something it's not. It's not about enthusiasm. It's about reaching a larger audience with our message. It's about getting to those independents sitting at home flipping off their televisions at Harry Reid, Joe Lieberman, John Boehner, Dick Cheney, Keith Olbermann, Sean Hannity, Sarah Palin and the rest of the high profile people talking and creating political drama. The cast of characters is huge and ranges from the far Left to the far Right. People want solutions. Obama had a vision that turned people on and some solutions to go with it. It turns out that the solutions aren't feasible in large measure thanks to the way shit is stacked against us.
Final thought on this...what gets those independents back and what reclaims the enthusiasm for progressive politics? One idea is the Move Your Money campaign started over at HuffPost. You know who that appeals to? The people who want to strike back at the powers that be. The teabaggers, in all their insane glory, like it. The progressives like it. The independents and libertarians like it. Everyone who is fed up with the power structure likes it. It gets people back involved by kicking the system in the teeth and putting power back in the hands of the little guy. Harry Reid can't even fuck it up (fingers crossed).
We need more innovation on that front. That's what the Obama campaign was about. It's what he meant when he said that it was never about him. It's not. The enthusiasm that America felt was part Obama, but it was also about the ownership we all had in kicking the system in the teeth. Bush was the easy symbol of that system at the time and boy did it feel good to see people dancing in the streets in front of his White House when Obama won. The easy symbol now is Wall Street. Obama is getting that and just maybe the Congress will do something to rein them in. The thing is, they are part of the failed system too. We witnessed it with health reform. We'll never get what we want unless WE create it, control it, and put it in action. Yes, we elected OUR president. Many of us still like him, but what does it mean in the end? It means we have a friend in high places. The problem is that those high places haven't changed all that much. WE have to be the change and then push him to have our backs.
Any other way and we're doing things backwards. That's the lesson we're missing from the election. Give people a reason to get up and be with us and they will. Then kick DCs ass. That part is all about us.