Today's mail included a thick envelope from the Democratic Party's Senate Campaign Committee and Committee Chair Senator Charles (Chuck) Schumer of NY. It had all the usual direct mail gimmicks.
A four-page large type appeal from the Senator asking me to help create a "firewall" against the GOP right wing.
A flier advising that if I give $35 or more I will receive an "Official 2012 Firewall Tote Bag."
A form to return with my contribution including a code reading: A810586HALBA F207776723 7 and boy with a code that long it MUST be something official and important. And to make it extra special personal, there is the usual "hastily crafted note" at the end, printed in a typeface designed to look like a handwritten note and highlighted in yellow.
Well I am sorry to tell you Chuck that all of that crap is now in the waste basket, except for the postage paid return envelope which I used to send back the following message:
Dear Senator Schumer:
I am in receipt of your mailing urging me to help be a “firewall” against the right wing by contributing to a Democratic Senate Re-Election campaign.
Let me put this in very simple terms: I will not contribute a single penny of my money to “party wide” efforts like this. If I do, too much of it will be used to support DINO Democrats whose weak-kneed failure to stand for core party values runs the current risk of turning over control of our country to some of the most radical political ideologues in history.
In 2008, I gave more money to President Obama’s campaign than I have given in my life. I volunteered to make phone calls, I wrote to friends, I wrote letters to the editor. Today, I am asking myself, “What has happened to this party and this President? When are they going to stand for something? Why do they keep seeking compromise when the GOP filibustered virtually every initiative and has made it clear they have no interest in compromise and in fact no problem with destroying our nation’s economy if it will help win them control.
What I am seeing over and over now is a Democratic party that concedes, buckles and caves to the most outrageous demands of the GOP with hardly a struggle. At some point, the President and the Party have GOT to stand up and say, “These are our core values and this is where the line is drawn. We will absolutely NOT gut Medicare, health care reform or Social Security. We absolutely will stand for greater parity in tax levels, reducing the growing advantages we have given away to the rich. We absolutely will assure sound regulation of the environment and of Wall Street.”
Instead, we buckled on the national debt limit fraud, agreed to the idiocy of a special “Super Committee,” allowed further ozone pollution, and very soon, no doubt, will be agreeing with GOP contentions, paid for by the military industrial complex, that it would be irresponsible for the Super Committee to make any cuts in defense spending and all cuts have to come out of social programs with no increases in revenues.
I will continue to contribute to Democratic causes, but my dollars will go to individuals and causes I know stand for core party principles. I gave to Kathy Hochshul’s successful Congress election and I gave to the Wisconsin recall effort and I will give to Senate candidates who are willing to fight for what this party supposedly stands for. The party as a whole? Not a chance, until the party stands for what it supposedly believes in.
I know these are not easy times in which to be a member of Congress, but damnit, stand up and FIGHT. Yes, you may lose because of the GOP’s continual use of the filibuster, delay and stall, but until the nation’s voters believe you are actually trying to help them with jobs and the economy, what reason do they have to vote for you/ Make the GOP take ownership of their greed and corruption.
If the Democratic party’s stance is that the answer to our current problems is still more spending cuts and more tax cuts at the same time (despite 10 years of evidence that system doesn’t work) then why the hell shouldn’t they vote for the Republicans instead. It’s their program and we’re apparently about to tell everyone let’s not cut a trillion….let’s make it $1.5 trillion.
I am trying to figure out who in the party thinks this is going to be a successful strategy for November, 2012.
It might be good if party leadership got out of Washington and got a close look at the millions of mini-disasters now taking place nationwide.
Want an example?…..my 66-year old brother….out of work for nearly three years now after losing his job as a newspaper plate pressman to technology, and absolutely unable to find even the most menial job, despite having a college degree and service in the military.
And our way of saying thanks to him? Push back the Social Security retirement date and if all goes as planned, reduce his benefits while forcing him and millions of others back to the old health care system that has been bankrupting the country while gutting veterans spending, unemployment benefits and employment subsidies. Brilliant thinking!
One of the best quips of all time comes from an episode of Cheers when Norm enters the bar and is asked how things are going. He replies: "It's a dog-eat-dog world out there and I'm wearing Milk bone underwear."
Well Charlie, when you ask me to be a "firewall" against the right wing, why do I feel like you and the Party are preparing me for that battle by dressing me up in Pampers soaked in lighter fluid?