Minne2020 (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Ken Martin speaking at a Minneapolis campaign event in late 2020.
Grassroots Democrats Pulling Party Back to the Grassroots
Early in the Civil War, General George McClellan’s Union Army was poised for a decisive victory over Confederate forces. But, inexplicably, McClellan wouldn’t attack! For days, President Abraham Lincoln ordered and even begged the general to move—but nothing. So the Confederates slipped away.
Before firing McClellan, Lincoln proclaimed: “If General McClellan does not want to use the Army, I would like to borrow it for a time, provided I could see how it could be made to do something.”
That’s what today’s grassroots Democratic Party activists are saying to their aloof campaign generals, who remain ensconced in Washington, D.C., refusing to deploy their ground troops in the field of battle.
The great strength of the Democratic Party is its army of volunteer door knockers across the country who have the local knowledge, connections, and lingo to relate to local voters. Yet, in the past thirty years, fat-cat donors and high-dollar consultants have taken over the “People’s Party” and abandoned high-touch organizing for high-tech “digital outreach.”
Thus, the Democrats’ passionate army of local campaigners is unused, only called upon in emails to send more donations to fund Beltway consultants and negative political ads. As a friend of mine recently said in exasperation, “I wish the Democratic Party would stop asking for money and start asking me for ACTION.”
Well, change is coming, because the grassroots Democratic army has been taking charge in many areas and mobilizing itself! In a huge advance, the party’s new national chair—Ken Martin, chair of the Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party—and its new chair of state Democratic committees—Jane Kleeb, chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party—were both elected in early February on a bold program to move the party’s focus back to year-round, grassroots activism. After all, voters aren’t mere consumers of politics; they should be valued as the whole purpose of politics and its primary producers.
Hurricanes and Wildfires Don’t Have Political Preferences
May I just say that the stupidest, most despicable, and most self-defeating political “tactic” in our present hyperpartisan climate is the accusation that victims of today’s horrific wildfires, floods, and the like are getting what they deserve because of their political views.
Start with February’s catastrophic floods in Appalachia. If you’ve never had a river gushing into your home or town, you can’t imagine the destruction, muck, stench, injuries, death, and despair. Yet, various numbskulls who profess to be progressive have posted taunts online, chortling that these devastated victims are red-state, small-government Trump voters who don’t deserve the government’s helping hand in their time of dire need.
Likewise, rightwing MAGA squads, including some GOP Congress critters, routinely jeer at wildfire victims in blue states and cities, gloating that hellfire is righteous punishment for “ungodly” people who oppose Trump’s “divine mission.”
Hello! This is not politics; it’s disgraceful inhumanity. And those who engage in it are skuzz and insult America’s democratic ideals of the common good.
Happily, though—even as divisive and violent political rhetoric is being spewed by some of our highest officials—the ingrained ethic in practically every community is to rush to the aid of anyone and everyone in times of disaster.
I saw this up close when Hurricane Harvey slammed Houston, Texas, in 2017. Officials in Washington played politics for weeks as the city was drowning. But hundreds of working people showed up, even from far-away states, bringing their small boats and power tools to organize ad hoc rescue teams, not asking anyone their party affiliation.
That’s our truest selves—and why it’s essential to swat down the malignant ethic of anyone who tries to pervert fundamental humanity into their red-blue morass.