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You’ve been gone for not quite a year now, but some days it seems like forever. You know there was a time, years ago, when I was content to be pissed off and discouraged about this country. But a little over a decade ago, your work motivated me to start writing myself, first in a weekly column for the dearly-departed Everybody’s News in Cincinnati and then on the internet.
After the 2000 Election, your righteous indignation caused me to take the next step. I started writing less and agitating more. I got involved with the Democratic Party, I ran for office, I raised a little hell. When I moved away from Cincinnati, the members of the local Republican Party literally applauded when they got the news of my departure. You would have been proud of me, Molly.
I just want you to know that now, every phone call I make, every door I knock on, every meeting I attend, every fund-raiser I help organize, all of that is done because of what I learned from you and if I’m blessed with a hundred more years on this earth I’ll never be able to express my gratitude. Or maybe I can. By making one more phone call, knocking on one more door.
I miss you terribly sometimes.
The Democrats are sitting pretty right now in the primaries. We’ve got the choice between nominating the first female president or the first black president. But just to be culturally diverse, we’ve also got a middle-aged white guy who’s worth a fortune; but the kicker is he’s the one who just might be an actual progressive populist. The genuine article. Think of Jim Hightower, but with a real haircut.
Here’s the problem, Molly. The Democrats are going at each other something fierce. Maybe it’s because the country is so screwed up right now and the Republicans are melting down just a little more every day, but everybody knows that whoever gets the Democratic nomination is almost certain to be the next President. So the Obama folks are dredging up right-wing talking points from the 1990’s to tarnish the Clintons, and the Clintons are responding by suggesting that Obama is Ronald Reagan’s love child.
And the Edwards people? It doesn’t matter what they say because nobody’s listening to them anyway.
It’s getting brutal out there. I know, I know. Politics is a full contact sport and before you get into the arena, you’d best make sure you strapped it on. But I’m worried, Molly. Worried that at the end of the day the two sides will be so lathered up from the heat of battle that they can’t come together after Labor Day. Even when we were united against Bush in 2004, those scalawags figured out a way to stay in power. What happens if half the Democratic Party leaves in a snit?
Everybody has to remember that only one person has the authority to send troops into combat. The thousands of flag-draped caskets being shipped home to big cities and small towns in America are the result of a decision made by one man (two, if you include Bush and not just Cheney). No vote cast by any Democrat caused the tragedy to unfold in Iraq the way it did. In the heat and passion of the moment, Molly, they’ve become too focused on what divides us.
Democrats need to remember that we’re the people who make sure working families earn a decent wage and have access to decent schools. We’re the people who make sure that women can control their own bodies. We’re the people who make sure that the air is clean and the water pure. We believe that health care isn’t a luxury and that justice is not for sale to the highest bidder. We’re Democrats.
"So keep fightin' for freedom and justice, beloved....Be outrageous, ridicule the 'fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin' ass and celebratin' the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after you how much fun it was."
Consider it done.
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