Hillary goes another round and comes up with the win.
Yes, I mean you (and me) on Team Hillary.
It’s getting harder and harder for those of us who support Hillary to spend time at dailykos, and it’s no secret why. Most of us are too busy making phone calls for our candidate to spend a lot of time defending her against thousands upon thousands of ridiculous attacks on a political blog. Hillary supporters, after all, include many who have been slogging it out in the trenches with the Democratic Party for many years, even decades. We’re workers. Many of us have watched Hillary for a very long time, and we know how committed she is to the issues we care about. We know that the character attacks she is subjected to now from Bernie followers are the same one’s she’s been getting since she first attempted to bring single payer health care to America, when she was first lady. The insurance companies had no choice but to demonize her vociferously, aided by their Republican puppets — Oh, the outrage!! — and it’s been going on ever since. We remember.
Hillary’s efforts way back then failed, due not only to the horrid attacks from Republicans and corporate America, but also due in part to misogyny in both parties. And yet she found a way to have an impact in spite of it. Thanks in large part to both her groundwork and her on-the-ground efforts, SCHIP was passed, with funding. All children got access to health care. (See factcheck.org for confirmation of her role.) Of course, Hillary suffered a lot of attacks from some Democrats back then, too: she was too pushy, she was too aggressive, she went too far, she should not have tried to do so much, she created a backlash, blah blah blah…. And now they say she hasn’t done enough. We’ve heard it all. And Hillary still keeps on working with whatever tools are at hand, for the causes that matter to us, both at home and around the world. We celebrate the fact that she’s done enough over the years to have made a few mistakes. She’s been working in the trenches all her adult life, getting her hands very dirty, and we love her for it.
My point is this: we have seen Hillary unfairly attacked like this forever - by the right, by misogynists of all stripes, by Republicans, and yes, by the left. She’s still here, and she’s beating the pants off her squeaky-clean-hands opponent in this primary. So, let’s buck up people! The verbal diarrhea on dkos doesn’t matter; what matters is the win. And we will get it, if we all work hard, together.
Now – how can we make dailykos a little more bearable in the meantime? Well, I have a few suggestions to share.
1 – Stop going into anti-Hillary and pro-Bernie diaries. Waste. Of. Time. And it gets us riled up, bothered. Just stay away from them. Collapse the reek list (my current favorite – thanks to whomever) and collapse the most shared list too, and focus elsewhere for the next few weeks.
2 – Ignore all negative comments from Bernie supporters. Even the cute puppy responses sometimes encourage more verbal abuse, although I do enjoy them.
3 – Check the Hillary Writers Circle frequently. New diaries show up there and deserve to be rec’d. Also, follow some of our most prolific diarists, like First Amendment, Lysis, and brntbewld to name a few.
4 – Check the recent diaries list for pro-Hillary diaries, and rec them up. They don’t all appear in Hillary Writers Circle. These days even a fair and balanced diary from a Bernie supporter seems worthy of a happy dance and will always get a rec from me. In short, look for things you’d like to put on the rec list.
5 – and these are not in order of importance – pay A LOT more attention to the diaries that have nothing to do with the primary. There are lots of good diaries not making the reek list because of all the sh*t clogging it up right now. Give those worthy writers a shout-out. If there is something worthy in the diary, give it a rec. Make a positive comment. Get interested.
6 – Pay more attention to Community Spotlight. Aside from the front page, that is the best part of dailykos. Most diaries that appear there are definitely rec-worthy, and would make the reek list if it weren’t for all the sh*t….
7 – Rec every anti-Trump diary that is true and readable. And every anti-Republican diary. We know who the real enemy is, let’s put our recs where our heads are. We’re fighting the Republicans, not each other.
This is just a start – add your own ideas in the comments for how to clean up the reek list without having to go into it, and for how to survive the next few months. I’m not holding out any hope that kos will be cleaning up the mess any time soon. Even after Hillary has the delegates for the win, attacks will still be allowed, and the rules covering those are vague to say the least.
So buck up, we can take it. Like our candidate, we’re tough.
In other words, think BRING IT. We’re tough, and we’re winning.
