This is a comment I made on Open Left discussing the Kos poll. I do not want to be bitter. That is not my nature nor is it the nature of most progressive, in my opinion. But I mean every word of it and I will keep my promise, unlike the President, who seems to be making a habit of breaking his. I don't know if he is getting bad advice or if he is just a manipulative person who would say and do anything to be elected President. At one point I thought that I knew this man. Now I am just puzzled. The Open Left article is entitled Death Wish Politics
Why should I bother? You don't know me any more than President Obama knows me or Rahm Emmanuel knows me. But I am one of those little people, the grassroots progressive Democrats in a very red state who scrimped and scraped, went without my medications, cut back on food and turned the thermostats down until I was wearing heavy wool indoors so that I could send $10, $20, $30 donations to the Obama campaign out of my disability check. I knocked on doors, even though I my feet felt like they were sitting in hot candle wax. I called people until my ears were sore; I got called a commie, a n****r-lover, a terrorist, etc. I stood in line at the polling station for 6 hours in crippling pain to make sure that my vote was cast for Mr. Obama.
And what did it get me? It got me Bush Lite. If I had wanted Bush Lite, I would have just stayed home and not scrimped to send money to a campaign that I believed but discovered was just lying to me to get my money, my time, and my vote.
Do I sound bitter? You bet! The first thing that comes out of the new administration is that the Chief of Staff tells Democratic Progressives to STFU. Anonymously, of course. I wouldn't be Village Chic to be on the record when you are stabbing your party in the heart. Then we get Bush holdovers in ;a HUGE number of jobs that are critical and Republicans who helped make the mess in other jobs. And then there was the Goldman Sachs fraternity organized by the Chief of Staff as a pool for appointments. The very people who caused the economic depression that we are in are now rewarded with being given an open door to the US Treasury. Nice work, if you can get it.
Go out and vote next year? Not until some people begin to deliver on their promises and the Congressional leadership begins to show some backbone and gets legislation that my life depends on passed.