This diatribe is currently a comment on Dana Houle's diary, but I've been encouraged to post it as a diary, so I will. Just because:
Well, I’m one of those people who couldn’t take the Obama hagiography that punctuated the primary cycle this year—and I’m a survivor of the Howard Dean/Wesley Clark stuff of what feels like a bazillion years ago. (Check user ID now.) I lived through the pie wars and the NARAL shit-storm and the Fraudsters, etc., ad nauseam. I will say, too, that I have little in common now with most of the people posting on this site. I’ll say this, though: I respect Dana immensely. His gut instincts will point you true north each time and he’s a doer not a poseur, and that counts for a lot.
As background, I was fine with either candidate, Clinton or Obama. I’m a tried-and-true, elected party official Democrat. I believe in what the Democratic party stands for and I believe that those values can and will prevail in this nation. What bothers me about this site, however, is the fact, I guess, that there are people posting here who are invested in seeing the Democratic party fail. Purity, purity, purity. I hate purity. I fucking hate it with a passion because it’s masturbatory, self-indulgent, and childish. Human beings are not pure; they are not now and never have been. The Purity Left are like the religious cranks who value virginity. Gaaaah! But they are out there on the left in large numbers, drifting to the site and finding something resembling a home. Well, I’m not interested in their home. I’m interested in a home that elects more and better Democrats. I’m interested in a home that studies and appreciates the true nature of human beings. I’m interested in a site that is, in reality, reality based because a site like that has rational, reasoned people who are willing to actually leave their houses, run for office, and do fucking something except pound their keyboards in the spirit of 60s-style revolution.
Barack Obama has the hardest job in the world, probably, right now, and maybe even in the history of this nation. The Bad Guys are organized, pathologic, and determined. They are the Unimind from Buzz Lightyear. They are why Diaper Dave Vitter is still commanding something that looks like credible attention and Eliot Spitzer is out. They are why Michelle Bachman is raving like a feral rodent and Gates can’t get convey the fact that his budget is 4% higher and hasn’t been cut. They’re why Rush Limbaugh is the default head of the Republican Party and not one of them will say he’s really not.
There is no place for purity in this world. The shut-in factor aside, the people like me, I suppose, who used to have this site as their homepage but no longer do should speak up, take part, and stop whining. It’ll be okay as long as the doers continue to do right. Let the cranks rave, but speak up and say stop, you’re not helping. Shoveling shit against the tide, I know, is hard when so many other options are vying for your attention, like ThinkProgress and TPM. Hey, I rarely come here anymore.
Bottom Line: Barack Obama has a 66% approval rating. He is navigating unbelievably treacherous waters. Let’s give him three years before we judge instead of three freakin’ months.