Here is a short list of things I now regularly do that I didn't even dream of doing in 1994, the year pundits seem to be comparing to 2010 an awful lot. Remember, also, that all of these things are completely independent of the passage of HCR, war, terrorism, and the economy.
- I ACTIVELY SUPPORT candidates in both my own voting districts and in other parts of the country, both with letters, legwork (virtual and physical), and also with money. I lost my job last year but still spent money on various races to the tune of several thousand dollars.
- I PAY ATTENTION on a daily basis, and often an hourly basis. I did this even when I was fully employed, as do many of you. There is no substitute for information--it doesn't negate apathy, but I do believe it makes it so much harder to ignore egregious conduct.
- I THINK STRATEGICALLY when I spend my money or conclude on a way forward. I have learned a great deal about public policy, electioneering and simple citizenship in the last nine years. I know what a conference committee is, I know what cloture is, I know how recalls, recounts and reconciliations work, within reason. I know how to spot an ally working to get a bill to the floor that he or she might have to then vote against (not well, but I get it to some degree).
- I have a solid BASIS OF TRUST in certain information gatherers and pundits out in the world, many of them right here. I don't take everything they say as gospel, and I often disagree, but my general rounds of checking out DK, FDL, TPM, DD and a few others give me some solid footing when I try to do that strategic thinking in 3.
I am just about to turn 50, and I'm an infant at this, I think. Or perhaps a 4th-grader (solid on some principles but not ready for Algebra), but I was in utero in 1994, politically speaking. Where were you? How many of us are there like this?
The reason this will be such a big change over 1994 is that the other side does not have this, I am fairly certain, or they would not be losing their shit so badly, nor would they be losing independents. They fire wildly in all directions in the same way we tend to fire inwardly. The difference is that they are hitting innocent targets now with impunity, and the general populace is noticing. We're steaming, true, about a stalled vision, but even if things don't improve, we are working, informed, willing to sacrifice and, most importantly, active participants. I'm not sure the country has ever seen anything like this before; certainly not in 1994.
If we stay the course as active, participatory citizens, 1994 simply cannot recur.
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