Remember how hearing that phrase, "You have the power!" made the heart thrill? More than anything else about the Howard Dean surge, that phrase both represented us and spoke to us. All of us. Taking back our flag, taking back responsibility for our political lives, our Party, our government. We have that power. We've ceded it in far too many instances, but it is ours.
In 2004, that message was a little before its time. But let us consider it a prescient message, rather than a pie-in-the-sky one. Because the tools for taking back our power are coming together, under Governor Dean's leadership. One of them will unfold tomorrow, the Neighbor-to-Neighbor organizing day. One conversation happening in a thousand or more neighborhoods, in all 50 states and the U.S. territories. It's a grand vision, of conversations between neighbors all over the country, the beginning of bridge building, of talking about the issues that matter to all of us, of putting a friendly, neighborly face to the Democratic Party.
I'll admit freely that I'm a sentimental idealist when it comes to the best of our democracy--the people-powered democracy, with active civic engagement, and an electorate that is informed and involved. How much more idealistic can you get, huh? My first taste of it came really before I can even remember it clearly. It was 1968 and I was four years old. My parents were campaigning for Cecil Andrus for governor. Mom would load us kids in the station wagon to drive around Idaho's Magic Valley, going door-to-door (ranch-to-ranch, farm-to-farm) to talk about the campaign and the vision Cece Andrus had for Idaho, a vision that he was able to see come to realization when he won that campaign and several subsequent ones.
Since then, I've been involved in a handful of other campaigns, sometimes as a volunteer, sometimes as paid staff and once as campaign manager/scheduler/press secretary (we were pretty poor). But every time, I've taken the opportunity at least once to get out my clipboard and walking shoes and canvass. Because, oddly enough, it's fun. It's fun to walk around the neighborhoods meeting people. It can be great fun to talk politics with a neighbor, to find out that you have something in common with the people living around you. Of course, you also get plenty of threatening dogs and doors slammed in your face, but you can't win them all. Every person you connect with makes up for the unfriendly ones ten times over.
So some of my idealism comes from experience, and seeing with my own eyes what you can achieve by knocking on your neighbor's door, and starting the conversation. The thing is, it works. I've seen several campaigns, some local, some Congressional, run on little more than extensive door-to-door and local contact efforts and win. I've made lasting and valuable friendships with the other volunteers I walked with. I listened, I learned, and maybe I even educated.
One of the critical elements lacking in our country is a substantive conversation about real issues. We have it here on the blog, among our friends and family. But we aren't having the conversation in the larger community. Few of us belong to any group other than this one where these conversations can happen. Membership in groups these days generally consists of little more than sending in dues and every now and then firing off an e-mail about some issue. Here's a chance to start expanding the conversation, to talk to people other than those in your immediate circle about the things that really matter.
I can't walk in my neighborhood tomorrow because family obligations have me in another city, which is bumming me out. I've read that a lot of you are planning, organizing, or just volunteering, and have done so facing some really annoying obstacles. Let's hear your stories after tomorrow: good, bad, indifferent. Remember this is just the beginning of a grand and important experiment. It might not go too smoothly the first time around. But it's worth the effort.
For those who are facing a Saturday with nothing exciting to do, consider finding an event in your neighborhood and joining up. If you can't, and some nice person knocks on your door to talk to you about the Democratic Party, give them a drink of water or some lemonade. You might just be helping save the country.