The last few weeks (months, even) of observing the despair which the netroots seem to have with the Obama Administration and Democratic Congress has been painful, even from across a border. I'm having the same problem in Canada, where I'm just not motivated at all to do anything with the Liberal Party because I just don't sense any direction or grand vision coming from them. But the thing is, I loathe Conservatives more. So I will vote Liberal, and I might even donate some money when the time comes, and it will be with no sense of enthusiasm.
I guess the issue I struggle with when I see so much criticism of Democratic politicians here and elsewhere is this: look at the alternative. Yes, Baucus sucks, Nelson sucks, Landrieu sucks, and the Blue Dogs are more like Blue Wolves sometimes. But to fold up tent and stay home will just unleash a new kind of hell.
Back in the 90s, an Ontario NDP (socialist-light) government, in trying to rein in a deficit, imposed unpaid furloughs on civil servants. They were naturally upset and stayed home on election day in 1995, or worse, some decided to vote on other issues like crime, taxes, etc. They woke up with a Conservative government that took a hatchet to labour laws, welfare, education, public transit, you name it. This appears to be what voters in Virginia and New Jersey have decided to do. And yes, maybe the Democratic candidates didn't deserve full throated support. As Kos says on the main page, this isn't a referendum on Obama in the voters minds, but you know the Wurlitzer will spin that fact into fiction in the time it takes Limbaugh to refill a prescription.
I guess I'm a fairly establishment kind of guy. I don't like to rock the boat. Never really been involved in issue-based activism. Maybe that's because a lot of the fights I'd be interested in seem to already be won here. And (as I put on my asbestos suit), if I can paraphrase one Mr. Rumsfeld, "you go to the election with the candidates you have, not the ones you wish you had". So in between elections, I think constructive criticism, carrot-and-stick fundraising, and even primaries for wayward candidates is all fair game, especially when you have the kind of tools at your disposal that I envy (we don't get open primaries and we have strict spending limits, usually less than $100,000 per riding during federal elections). But on Election Day, you've got two options. One option might move you several steps ahead to your goal, or just one step, or maybe you'll just sit still. The other option will almost always ensure you get knocked back to a place you'd hope you had seen the last of. But the worst thing you can do is say "pass" and hand your future to someone else to decide.
Maybe that's the fatal flaw in "hope and change" based elections, on the left or the right. Disappointment will always settle in when the dreams aren't met, whether they be the dreams of the candidate or the dreams their supporters pin on them. We all want the next FDR, or Trudeau, or Kennedy, but even when we look at their legacies in the clear light of day, they leave us wanting. Maybe we shouldn't look at voting as an expression of pent-up emotion and desire. Maybe we all need to look at it as just another choice between two outcomes. The outcomes can be good vs. bad, or crappy vs. crappier. But there will be an outcome, and short of moving you can't remove yourself from experiencing it. Am I being too cynical, or throwing in too much with the status quo? I don't know, maybe. I remember being in love with politics as a child and a teenager, but the last few years, something has changed. Are others feeling the same way as me? What do you say, folks?