Why I am voting Dem and working to build the Dem party
The work I do requires study of history, so I see things in current events that remind me of things that have happened before. I'm older than some people too, so I've seen things with my own eyes. I can see, for instance, the ways Obama seems something like Carter. It would be pleasant, from my point of view, to have a robust and articulate left constituency in this country but we don't. The left is factionalized almost down to isolated individuals here these days, arguing about how to move the masses for what purpose. What we have is a weak and inarticulate center and an insurgent right wing.
In my opinion the goal of the right wing everywhere is to allow people to take advantage of other people for economic gain without limit. It wants to create a society in which people can treat other people however they want if they can afford to, the done to have to put up with it, that is their right wing fate. The left wants everyone to be fair & wants to set up a system that forces people to be good to each other. But there is no known method of getting people to be "good" that works all the time, is there?
Historically, almost of all of human history everywhere has been right wing, only very rarely did some kind of broad power sharing culture develop. In those erstwhile egalitarian cultures right wing tendencies, being in a sense "primitive" or "natural," emerged naturally as capital accumulated to certain people & not others & the holders of the capital tried to hold on to it for themselves, neighbors can fend for themselves. Rich don't want to take the poor into their families, certainly not all of them. They'd prefer to employ them for somewhat less than they're worth.
Here in USA we have Dems & Reps, the Libs & Greens just don't count. I look at the Reps & I see people who front for people who want to take things without limit. They call that privatization. Their goal is to allow people with money to do whatever they want. Their policies are designed to keep people who aren't them from getting in their way. The more poor people the better from their point of view, they'll work for less.
Me being egalitarian there is no way I could vote Rep now.
But the Dems are such undisciplined petty wooses what am I going to do?
I remember school getting to be 50 years ago. The jocks - bullies among them, using most of the yard, on the edge the nerds, geeks, misfits, geniuses among them, united by their non-jockness, can't we all be friends. Well, no, said some of the jocks, you're not good enough.
Faced with that kind of desire to exclude I eventually found myself compelled to do political work, which for me is about getting people to think about things & to decide that they will try to do something about what they care about, I eventually ended up with the Dems because realistically they are all that stands between me & my kind of people & right wingers who want to take my stuff away from me. If there was a lefter party that amounted to anything I would be there but there isn't. None of them have the organizing principles required. Get a good organization eventually an electable candidate will come along. Dem organization isn't really great by and large, though they sure did the job in 2008, but this is what there is to work with.
For me disappointment with the way things are going is irrelevant. I expect to fail, am happy when anything good happens. I want to keep trying for fairness. I know from experience that the people I want to win will probably disappoint me, but I know that the alternative is worse so I am involved and do things.
I have something in common with the right wingers: I think I know what's correct, I share with all activists a tendency to act. It makes me feel good when I do something. But I have moved beyond any consideration of success or failure of any goal I might have. I do these things because I think they are good things to do. It doesn't bother me that history is going wrong (=not the way I want it to go) but it always goes wrong. I want to do the right thing so that's what I do. What's the right thing? What I think it is of course.
Politics is the alternative to rule of force. It is a lot of boring meetings, bad compromises, disappointment, half-measures, cronyism, nepotism, good tasting bad food, mistakes, fixed deals, money money money. If we don't participate in that stuff it happens without us & eventually the henhouse gets taken over by the foxes. I hate meetings but I go to a few of them. If we all went to a few of them things would be different. Few people always run those meetings. Why? No one else wants to. That is actual political power.
I plan and schedule my political work. I don't take on more than I can do. Political work like doing dishes - must be done. Doing laundry. An amount of volunteer work, a donation budget, a committment to send some emails to some elected officials. Demos and parties & rallies are fun but the other things are what makes stuff happen. I started small, kept doing it. Doesn't matter if we win or lose cause I know what's the right thing to do and that's more important than who wins. All candidates are defective, everything is. But there is always the right thing to do.
