Democrats Everywhere

How many of you, oh dear kossacks, have had some variant of this conversation with people you love, like, respect, or otherwise have positive feelings towards:

Buddy: I could never vote for a Democrat
You: Really?  Why?
Buddy: They're all immoral peacenik hippies who drive Volvos.
You: Ok, let's step back.  What's the most important issue to you?
Buddy: Health care.  I don't have any.
You: Both Democratic candidates have great health care programs.  
Buddy: Yeah, but it's Hillary.  And Obama.  
You: So?  If they've got plans that will make your world better, what's the problem?  
Buddy: Democrats are all immoral peacenik hippies!  Starbucks!  Turtlenecks!
You: sigh

Isn't that frustrating?  If you've caught a live one, they'll throw in a "Democrat Party" quip just to ruffle your feathers.  (For the purposes of this conversation, you have feathers.  Get over it.)

While Democrats are doing much better this cycle, with turnout in primary after primary trouncing the Republicans and party identification numbers swinging our way, there's a vocal core of Republican agitators who are uniquely gifted at making us look like, well, immoral peacenik hippies.  You and I may not have a problem with being peacenik hippies, but apparently Middle America, Main Street, Real Americans, or whatever Republican label-of-the-week thinks there's something wrong with that.  I'll leave it to the reader to determine whether one can be substantially moral while evidencing some behavior that Middle America might consider out of bounds (like gratuitous blogging and recumbent bike riding).

Anyway, through some state of the art polling I have been able to determine that Democrats are, in fact, everywhere.  

Take this poll question: "Do you care about keeping America safe and secure?"  An overwhelming number of Americans said "Yes".  The results of the poll are below:

Look at all that blue!  Let's try another poll question: "Do you care about having health care?"  Once again, overwhelming numbers in favor of us Democrats:

Hat trick?  Unlike my beloved Georgetown Hoyas, let's see if we can close the deal here.  Question 3: "Do you want ethics and responsibility in your government?" Stop the presses!  Another big win for Democrats:

I can hear your skepticism.  "Oh, socratic," you say, "those are issues all Americans care about."  Not so fast, gentle reader!  Let's look at some responses to questions about uniquely Republican issues.

First up, "Do you believe in invading countries based on lies, misunderstandings, and incompetence if the countries have done nothing to attack us?"  An overwhelming number of Americans said "No":

Next, "Do you support fiscal policy that leaves the United States unable to pay its bills while rewarding tiny numbers of campaign contributors with giant tax breaks?"  Again, most everyone said "No":

It keeps going: "Do you support intrusive government measures that rely on secrecy and the elimination of individual privacy?"  The "No" results were overwhelming:

Finally, "Do you believe that the American people have no say in the running of our government?"  Again, a blowout, with almost everyone sorting out the resulting double negative and saying "No":

Now, a few of the questions didn't look so good for us.  Support for recumbent bikes seemed to be localized to the Pacific Northwest.  And those who answered "Yes" to "Do you believe in participating in advocacy communities at the expense of friends, family, personal hygiene, and diet?" was strangely localized right around my house.  Strange result, that.  And you might just object that I used Google Image Search to find a picture of the US with a blue background and repeated that without any real statistics to back them up.  Well, I reject and denounce the haters!  My results are ironclad.  Submit them to "Mythbusters" and you'll see.  Oh yes you will.  Adam Savage and his exploding pants won't make a dent in my numbers!

Anyway, things are looking good for us.  Folks believe in many of the core principles of the Democratic Party all over this great country.  But they cling to ... well, I'd say "outdated", but they were never really "dated" to begin with (sort of like a biglaw associate, but I digress).  So they cling to false ideas about Democrats because ... well, truth be told, I don't know why.  

But there's an easy way out of this.  Show people these absolutely true poll results.  Then remind them that Democrats are everywhere and everyone.  They are hemp wearing anti-war activists in San Francisco.  They are gun-owning lawyers in Atlanta.  They are grandmothers, granddaughters, soldiers, doctors, firefighters, whites, blacks, and every other race, Mac users, Windows users, and a few Linux users (most of them, sadly, are R0n P4/l supporters).  They are people who think that DailyKos is the pinnacle of online activism and they are people who think that DailyKos is a cesspool of Bad Things™.  They are poverty-line retail workers, middle class middle managers, partners at law firms, professors, line workers, corporate bigwigs, investment bankers, bank tellers, magicians, clowns, actors, and short order cooks.  They can trace their family histories in America to a time before history, and they can trace their family histories in America to the time they passed through Customs yesterday afternoon looking for opportunity and hope in our country.  

They are, in other words, us.  Americans.  People.

Sure, America may not agree with all of our policy proposals, but we can have a genuine debate about those.  But I've read the Democratic Party platform and talked to some prominent Democrats, and I didn't see anything about handing America over to militant terrorists, taking away Bibles, or stealing all your money and mortgaging your children's futures to pay for boondoggles like the Department of Homeland Security, No Child Left Behind, the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act, and the Iraq War.  As near as I can tell, the Democratic Party stands for policies that will leave the country and the world better off for later generations rather than milking the present for dollars at the expense of the future.  I think folks can get behind that.

Anyway, here's one more absolutely true poll result, just to cap things off: "Do you love America?"