My father taught me that respect is not something that people deserve by the virtue of their existence or their attributes or where they are from or what family they were born into or any other association. No, he said that respect is something you earn through your actions. He was a blue collar worker and he told me that he never had an expectation of respect from his employers or his coworkers or even his friends without him proving himself and his character through his deeds and his ethic.
It seemed to him that in this new age people expected respect without understanding and evidence as if their mere presence or words warranted unlimited trust and support and esteem.
While he is no longer alive, his words of simple worker's wisdom have always stayed with me.
I am one of your loyal supporters. I've voted Democratic since becoming politically aware. I am a middle class American. I firmly believe in the priorities our Party has down on paper and mouths during the election season. I support strengthening Public Education, improving and extending Health Care to all, a sensible and respectful Foreign Policy, an understanding of our Constitution, individual liberty for all including equal rights for Women, Minorities, and GLBT, a vibrant Labor movement, Fair Trade, Fair Tax policy, and many other issues near and dear to other liberal Americans.
I am not an extremist nor do I play one in the blogosphere. I simply want our country to move in the good direction again. I did not think it was too much to ask from the Party that draws most of its support from people like me. After all in our Representative Democracy, are not the members of the Political Parties supposed to represent the views of the constituents who vote for them? Are they not supposed to be accountable and close to the people who they are representing?
I am not going to recount many of the promises and issues on which the Congressional Democrats were supposed to at the very least stir the hornets nest. War, Constitution, Unitary Executive, Healthcare, Poverty, etc etc there is just too much to enumerate. I fully understand that we do not have a strong majorities in congress and that Bush is apparently anything but a lame duck and instead a vindictive jerk determined to veto any deviation from his "compassionate" conseratism.
However it does seem to me that we have been getting a raw deal from our representatives here. Yes, there have been some actions, but I think there have been a lot more words than actions, and there definitely have been very little follow through on those few actions.
Actions that have not been followed through and fail ultimately seem like half-hearted gestures from people who do not view our goals as having as much importance as their Party's strategy for winning an upcoming election. Emphasis is extremely important and having the wrong emphasis of only focusing on winning in the future, instead of trying to stand up for the good principles of most Americans will not earn America's respect.
I have not been born yesterday and understand that we do need to increase our majorities and have a Democrat in the White House in order to accomplish some of our ambitious goals, but in order to win we need to provide a stark contrast to the other party. Not just words of different priorities but actually standing up for our priorities again and again. Going down to defeat each time, perhaps, but still standing up and doing doing doing so that our actions prove to the American people that we are serious about what we want to accomplish. Democrats have to prove that they are willing to act even if success is far from guaranteed, that they are willing to stand up for the American people.
It is only through such action that they will be able to earn America's respect. Not words, not platitudes, not promises of future action. That is not enough. Americans understand action and respect it. Respect is not free. Please earn our respect.
Sincerely,
An American Voter.