Antonio Villaraigosa who won a landslide victory on Tuesday is launching his transition team. He takes office on July 1. He's already showing his willingness to lead: on Wednesday he was scheduled to speak at Taft High School in Woodland Hills. Despite a major gang fight breaking out(possible a racial one), he didn't cancel his appearance, he spoke anyway. Now as most of Los Angeles Kossacks celebrate his victory, I am begginging to ponder a question. What do we Kossacks do now? We're liberals, we're intellectuals, and as a result we're usually in the minority. The Republicans hold the governorships of the four largest states (California, Texas, New York, Florida), a Republican is the mayor of New York City, the Republicans control the Supreme Courts and just about every lower court on the federal circuit (except for the 9th circuit). I don't need to remind you that they control the house, senate, and presidency. The LA Mayor's office is all we have for now.
We Los Angeles Kossacks are in a very rare situation, the people we like (for the most part) are in charge. So now what do we do as Kossacks? We like to criticize, share personal stories, ponder questions about life. What about helping politicians we support? Could we do this? Is it possible? Is it against what a Kossack is? I don't know.
The point of this diary is to ask the question, when we take power, what do we do with it. Let's say in 2008, we got the Senate, the House, and the Presidency. How would we continue on? How would we make this country a better place? A place more like the one we want to live in? And I look at LA right now and I think about this. We just elected a liberal in dramatic fashion...do we now just say "okay, he's won, let's move on to the next race"...I think that's fine for Democratic operatives but what about us? Is it possible to support the people in power? And how do we do this without becoming mindless neocons? Antonio is coming in with high expectations and a lot on his plate, he's ordered the 30 ounce prime rib. I don't want to see him fail as an Angeleno and as a liberal. I'd like to know how you guys, especially fellow Los Angeles and Southern Californian Kossacks feel.