I've been doing a lot of reading and thinking lately.
On one hand I am extremely irritated that the GOP has gotten so much traction out of their obstructionist platform and that they can still manage to use the same old play book that they have been using for the last few decades with success, despite the greatest financial collapse since the Great Depression.
The other thing that has really got me thinking and is driving me crazy is the Tea Party and how they are getting tons of attention, holding conventions, and overall being heard. While on the left, we seem to still be active in the blogosphere, but outside of that, we haven't been able to generate any sustained movement or anything that equals the Tea Party's conventions at a time when populist anger is appropriate and should be aimed at improving the lives of most Americans and not just advancing the agenda of a few crazy pundits, pols, racists, and an ill informed minority.
Reading List
Obama Is No FDR, We're No Mass Movement
Seth Godin's Linchpin
Good Cause Presentation
How To Get Our Democracy Back
Thank You Wall Street, May I Have Another
Officials Are Not Buying Rosa Bracero's Reason For Missing the Regents' Exam
All of these things led me down a path. I think it is a path that I may have come across or may not have come across if I had just kept following along passively and doing the things I do in my everyday life.
The first step in this path was seeing Seth Godin at a book launch presentation in Manhattan in mid-January. Sure, he is a business writer and speaker, primarily, but anyone that has doubted that politics is anything less than marketing and message, has by now seen the light.
The second thing was finding out the story of Rosa Bracero and how at this particularly vulnerable point in her life, the entire system really seemed to fail her and her family when she was so close to losing everything but at the same time being able to push off in a new direction.
Finally, I did some reading and combining the other two things came to the conclusion that while the progressive movement provided a huge investment in time, energy, and money to getting Obama elected in 2008, that the movement he began has begun to fall apart due to a number of factors, some his fault and others a fault of the system that he found himself thrust into in DC and, finally, because no movement or person has moved into the void that having Obama move into the White House has caused.
The reasons for our disillusionment with the process of participating in our government are many. That goes without a doubt. It is still strange to me after all this time to see a media, any media for that fact, that still focuses on someone like Sarah Palin and calls her 'newsworthy,' 'qualified,' and/or 'a politician.'
I've seen her speech to the Tea Party Convention and I noticed that the thing that stood out to me the most wasn't her writing her notes on her hand. To me that showed that she at least did a little preparation, which doesn't seem to be one of her strong points. But the thing that stood out to me the most was her anger and venom towards people that are obviously hurting. The "How's That Hopey-Changey Thing Working Out For You?" line is obviously so mean and angry that it is surprising that the focus wasn't on how can someone be considered a viable Presidential candidate if they are willing to slam the hopes and dreams of so many people.
We have been burdened by a continued indifference by our political leaders in respect to the lack of jobs being created, in reforming the financial industry, in making meaningful change to our broken health care system, in stopping the ready flow of corporate dollars into our political system, and reform reform of our financial system. Here in New York it is especially galling that someone like Jonathan Tasini can't get a word in edgewise when he is talking about the real problems facing real people because the media is focused on which person is raising more money from Wall Street: Harold Ford Jr or Kirsten Gillibrand. The 10+% of workers in New York State that are out of work because the financial system broke and nothing has been done to fix this, be damned.
The Lessig article does more to lay out the issue of money corrupting politics than I could. The movement to get some kind of grasp on how our elections are financed has been talked about over and over and over and over, you get the point, for a long time now. That doesn't change the importance of the need for some kind of campaign finance reform.
I could stay on what is wrong with this world track all day, but that wouldn't be useful, helpful or productive.
More, I want to throw out some thoughts, ideas and hopefully stimulate a path where we can begin the work of building a cohesive movement that counterbalances the Tea Party and allows us to take some of our rage and anger away from the computer and to get out into the streets and to get into action with it.
One thing that Obama did was build an incredible infrastructure of volunteers and workers that helped build a campaign out of thin air and propel an unlikely candidate to the Presidency. But, since Obama has been elected the OFA has fallen into the hands of the DNC and really is, at most, a spam operation that has little, if any, usefulness to the average person.
That's a huge missed opportunity for the Democrats.
I know, big news there.
The other thing is that there are countless organizations, disjointed or separate due to cause or purpose that all have great missions and lots of great people that would be willing to pitch in, volunteer, rally or almost anything else to help move the country in the right direction if they thought it would do any good or if they thought their actions would be heard.
As someone that was the MoveOn Council Coordinator for Manhattan for a time, I feel that frustration and I completely understand it because it is a too often real and unrecognized problem from the organizations' leadership teams.
Les Leopold writes about the progressive movement that forced FDR to create many of the New Deal programs.
In that same vein, it was a progressive movement that has elected Barack Obama, Sherrod Brown, and others to their positions now.
On more than one occasion, President Obama has said that he can't do this alone. He has also said the work of change is never easy.
We have also, as a group of people, or a movement, seen over and over how our opinions or beliefs are discounted by the main stream media because it doesn't move their story line or doesn't sell their papers and magazines. But, that can't be enough to make us stop the fight.
Which leads me to Seth Godin and his new book, "Linchpin."
In our communities and in our sphere of influence, we are all linchpins. Most of us are the people that our friends and families come to try and get an explanation for something that they see that is wrong in the community or something that doesn't quite make sense. There's magic in that.
In Manhattan and New York City, I continue to organize events, rallies, provide useful seminars, whatever the case may be to help my community come a little closer, become a little more educated and a little more active.
I also realize a few things:
- There are so many talented, motivated, and compassionate people out there that want to do some good in their communities and that care so passionately about the future of our communities and our country that it is an awesome site to see.
- I also realize that while phone calls, Internet campaigns, and things that you can do remotely have a great impact and are also vital, there is still room for mass gatherings...not only to show strength, but also to show community so that you don't feel so alone or so separate from all the other activists in the community.
- Finally, I realize that it is extremely disheartening to see all of the work that we have put in get us no closer to any of the solutions that we have been fighting for.
That doesn't mean that we quit. That means that we organize again. That we fight harder. That we continue to battle every day for what is important to us.
I'm challenging everyone to suck it up, realize that maybe our eyes have been dotted a little bit, but also to realize that if we didn't get our teeth rattled a little bit, something must be wrong.
In Les Leopold's words, I challenge each of us to make ourselves a vocal, mobile, and substantial progressive community. One that equals the Tea Party in its anger at the status quo but one that surpasses them in passion and knowledge. One that doesn't look to false prophets like Sarah Palin or Tom Tancredo but looks to real heroes like you and me that are doing the hard and heavy lifting of democracy by organizing and fighting.
I open myself up to your suggestions, thoughts and ideas.