Forget the Partisans, Organize the People
October 24, 2007
There’s something sickening happening with politics these days. And, unfortunately, we’re all to blame. While it’s easy to get up on our hind legs and wax poetic or even rage at our elected officials for this transgression or that, the sad truth is that those politicians and their more than lethargic leadership skills are merely mirroring the lethargy of the population. Sadly, we’ve become a nation of political sleepwalkers.
Consider the war, for example. Yes, we are a nation at war. And tens of thousands of people are dying because the nation we call our own is waging that war in a place thousands of miles away. Yet the American public largely yawns with indifference over the actions of our government that are not only resulting in unfathomable death and suffering but are also undermining future hopes for peace and prosperity.
Worse, the discussion on the war has been hijacked by a kindergarten-like partisanship that only serves to fuel the hopelessness, inaction and, worse, disconnection between the people of this democracy and our leaders. You know the discussion I’m talking about, the one splashed across the front pages, yelled by the radio talkers and oh-so-well articulated by the hierarchies of the two parties. Yep, the one where the Republicans tell us to wave the flag, “support the troops” and otherwise shop ourselves to sleep, while the Democrats respond by telling us to wave the flag, support the troops and go to sleep until the next election. And then they all wonder why the public isn’t engaged.
The wet blanket of partisan bickering masquerading as “democracy” has trickled down to the street level, where the grassroots partisans try to clumsily get into the game. You know the type, they start blogs and scream about the “other guys” and refuse to see that “their guy” is neck-deep in the game of nothingness as well. Ah, the bliss of well-fitting blinders – especially when you still get your phone calls returned!
But where did the dreamers go? Where did the risk-takers go? And when the hell did we decide that the “art” in politics had to be replaced by this drab and wholly uncreative blob of bickering nonsense? Oh dreamers and risk-takers and – dare I say it – revolutionaries, we need you. Please come home and shock the system again. Because, as Mother Jones said, “we must wake the sleepers.” Because people are dying for crying out loud and I’m tired of everyone in power blaming someone else in power while those of us with no power just become dizzy from the nonsense of it all.
As readers know, earlier this week I was part of a group of dreamers who decided to pay a visit to Congressman Peter Welch’s office to express our displeasure with his recent votes to provide more money for the Iraq war and his condemnation of antiwar activism. As activism goes, it was about as low-key and civil as it comes – the nuns amongst us wouldn’t have tolerated it any other way. But we were rebuffed completely in our efforts to gain an audience with our elected official and, instead, arrested for trespassing at a taxpayer-funded office.
While Welch’s response to us was, indeed, appalling if not completely bizarre, the reaction from the public has been more interesting. Not surprisingly, the hardcore Dem partisans ran to the defense of their anointed one, Peter Welch, ignoring the facts as we presented them and, instead, deciding to cast personal aspersions about the dreamers (“hippies,” “radicals,” “un-credible,” etc. ho-hum). How very Rove-like of them, huh?
But, remember, the issue here is the war, not the personalities or fashion styles of the protesters. And these partisans love to talk about how much they hate this war, but apparently not enough to see through their partisan blindness to realize that their elected Democratic leaders keep voting to fund the war. And hell hath no fury hot enough for those who take the “risk” to point that out. But that’s okay, we’ll never be invited to the cocktail parties anyway. It’s a risk we take to truly believe in the power of democracy.
But there’s been another reaction to our little visit to Welch’s office that has been truly inspiring: The reaction from the vast majority of non-partisans. Yeah, the everyday folk who don’t dither with navel-gazing blogs, get invited to high-priced political fundraisers and who only get recognized by the Peter Welch’s of the world when he dons his bottle of hand-sanitizer every two years to get close enough to them to ask for their votes.
These folks have been excited about our action. They see, hear and recognize the bullshit being spewed by the partisans and they’re cheering us for calling it what it is. They’re the ones who saw the Dems wave the flag and vote for the war until it got unpopular and then continue to wave the flag but merely talk about hating the war. But votes? Forgetaboutit.
Last night, for example, I stopped at a general store for a snack. The second I walked in the couple that runs the place exclaimed that they saw me on television protesting. I didn’t know where it was going to go because I have no idea about their politics and – perhaps stereotypically – assumed they were conservative. And the gentleman came across the counter and shook my hand and said this: “I switched parties to vote for Welch because I believed that he was going to stop this war. I’ve been waiting for people to hold him accountable.” He then thanked me and told me to remember to tell the judge that I was “trespassing in an office paid for by the public.” Indeed.
And therein lies the lesson for me. Forget the partisans. They’ve lost the ability to dream, to be creative and, worse, to even be honest most of the time. In their thirst to get the cocktail invitations to the next great Welch or Obama or Clinton “spectacle,” they’re apparently all-too willing to silence themselves and, worse, attack those who of us who still hold onto that quaint notion that it is our responsibility to speak up – especially when people are dying.
If they don’t want to dream, so be it. But we can no longer let them kill our dreams. Forget the partisans, organize the people.
I’m hopeful again. And so it goes.
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10 Responses to “Forget the Partisans, Organize the People”
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So where do we sign up?
I can’t believe you expected something different from Welch. He’s simply climbing the ladder and following the orders of Pelosi. He used to chase ambulances, now he chases Pelosi.
Yes, ignore the partisans. But we’ve also got to have someone ready to run against Welch if he keeps this up.
I thought Dan DeWalt was going to run? Does anyone have an update on that?
I’m more interested in holding the fire in a strategically placed position in respect to Welch, and less interested in a political ouster. That fight should be directed toward Jim Douglas, IMO.
The real battle, it seems, is in respect to the seeming turn toward a “managed democracy” as versus a representative democracy. If this seems to be the case, it really doesn’t matter who our Congressman is; more to the point is how they may be unwittingly playing into a Putin-esqe model of government.
Maybe the real question is, how do we manage our managers?
It warms peoples’ hearts to see someone from the hometown getting arrested for civil disobedience on the evening news. And very often people you wouldn’t expect.
Also got a call from someone who wants to know, was it the staff’s decision to freeze out the protesters, or was it a directive from Peter? If it wasn’t, doesn’t he have some explaining to do?
If Welch continues to say one thing and do another, an ouster is fine with me. But I really like your last question. And I think the answer is to organize, organize and organize without falling into the trap of playing electoral footsie — especially a year before the election. We always seem to forget that major political and cultural change has come as a result of the elected officials responding to an organized, creative and relentless public. And when we fall into the trap of trying to do things in the opposite way — expecting politicians to energize the masses or even truly lead — we end up with the kind of mess we’re in now. Change takes far more work than getting on some party/candidate bandwagon and then pretending we’re headed to the promised land by just donning our cheerleader outfits and sending in checks.
Hey A.I. — I guess we were posting at the same time. My previous response was directed to Nate. Now I’ll respond to you: When the police took our offer to the staff members in his Burlington office, they took the time to make calls before telling the police that they were rejecting our offer and that we should be arrested. We no longer had any contact with the staff so we weren’t able to ask them about who specifically made the decision. All we can really assume is that it was someone higher up in the DC office. Was it Peter? We don’t know. And, unfortunately, the media isn’t asking this question. Yet.
Where was the Free Press during this sit-in? I haven’t read a word about it in the state’s largest daily. I’ll bet if they knew Welch was going to fumble it like he did they would have sent someone.
The Free Press didn’t cover it because they, like Peter are trying to say that because this happened once before (occupation of office and request for civil conversation with the congressman,) it is old news. Hell, the same people were even arrested.
And of course the protesters were polite. Had they thrown rocks, peed in the plants, thrown blood on the walls and on the cute little staffers, that would have gotten coverage. But just protesting the same old war and harping on about people dying? Why give up news space for that? Heck, wasn’t that the day they had to cover the hot story of new gas pumps at Costco???
Geez. You guys are never satisfied.