The Politics of Purity is the hobgoblin of the Democratic party...
it is as strong a reason as any why the Democrats currently fail to hold the Congress or the Presidency despite the fact that the majority of Americans agree with us...
it keeps many of the best of us outside the process, and holds those within it to the unreasonable standards and cynical judgements of the few...
worst of all, it creates a barrier between the everyday Americans who are the backbone of the Democratic Party and the liberal elites who aspire to lead it....
Two quick stories....
#1. I was sitting chatting amiably with a Green friend of mine the other day when he told me...
"I'm sick of holding my nose when I vote. If I could find a Democrat who was just 80% honest..."
#2: I was listening to the radio tour of Artists United to Win Without War one morning before the war began when I heard Janeane Garafolo rip into this moderate caller...who had sounded a bit befuddled...and said..."You sir have got to wake up and say...not in my name!"
If you're thinking...what's so wrong with these points of view...lemme say this...alot.
The liberal elite in this country are fixated on politics as "moral stance." We don't like to hold our nose when we vote...we don't like to feel complicit in the doings of our nation, ecnomically or politically or militarily...we tend to think that if the country as a whole would just wake up and see things our way....
wrong!!!!
Maybe we need to wake up.
Maybe we need to begin to understand that most people do not see "voting" or "politics" as the expression of their ethical selves.
In fact, most people, whether they vote or not, see politics as a struggle for power where those who participate...elected or not, are in it for what they can get out of it...
and those who seem to be in it strictly for "good" reasons are eventually corrupted and made ineffectual by the whole tainted pigpen...
most people see politics through the lens of the unequal, unfair world they live in every day...
and they're right, for the most part.
If we want to win this election as Democrats, and plot a course to take back our government as Democrats...we need to stop holding our noses and start listening to these people....paying close attention to what they think and what they need...and working with them side by side.
The majority in this country supports Democratic values and issues...but they vote in their self interest.....if they vote at all.
Coming at people and trying to "wake them up"...is more than likely to "piss them off"...
we need to take people where they are at...and convince them to vote Democrat. It's as simple as that.
It is a process of give and take...of listening and educating...and purity ain't got sh** to do with it.