What I want from my political party

 

It’s a lovely dark and dreary, rainy morning in North Texas. My garden is soaking up steady rainfall. A perfect day for curling up with a book and taking a nap. But, alas, I have politics on my mind.

Anyone who’s read more than two words I’ve written knows that I am a proud lifelong Democrat, prone to speaking out often and loudly. My brother compares me to a dog with a bone, and he’s probably right. This morning, I’m thinking of Michelle Obama’s classic statement, “When they go low, we go high.” She was spot on with her advice. Let me count the ways they go low—I probably can think of a thousand, but that’s not where my mind is this morning.

I get at least 200 emails a day, especially now that election day is a mere two weeks away. Most of them are whining that we’re losing, begging for money, declaring disaster if I don’t send $5 or $25, reminding me that their election is the one the nation’s entire future hinges on. This morning, one screamed in boldface that President Biden had just smashed Mitch McConnell. Now personally I think McConnell is a pretty nasty man and has done a lot of smashing of others. He probably deserves whatever he got. But that’s not what I want from my party. Yes, in some ways the goal is to beat the Republicans. But there is, and should be, a far nobler goal—and that is to govern our country for the betterment of all people. Beto talks about what he will accomplish for Texas—what a refreshing change of tone.

There is so much today that Democratic candidates should be shouting from the rooftops. Did you know that President Biden has reduced the national deficit by more than any president—in just two years. Did you realize that crime, especially murder, s uniformly higher in red states than blue? (Ask the governor of Oklahoma, who just learned that lesson the hard way in a debate with his opponent; she has statistics to prove it.) Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock you know that employment is way up, unemployment down. Democrats have had lots of other victories in Biden’s two years in office, yet campaign after campaign goes on the defensive against Republican’s outrageous and untrue accusations. No, Biden didn’t cause inflation; no, Democrats didn’t open the border and say, “Ya’ll come on, now.” No, Democrats are not baby killers. No, the Democratic Party is not the party of extravagant spending, running up the national deficit (a hint: that’s Republicans with ginormous tax cuts to the rich).

The list is endless, but If you keep up with the real news you know these things. Unfortunately a lot of knee-jerk voters believe what they hear on TV and see on Facebook. I love the comment by one observer that he couldn’t believe Americans would accept a dictatorship if they could save a quarter on a gallon of gas.

I wish my party would take the high road. Stop bashing Republicans, stop accusing them (that’s their despicable game). But perhaps wiser heads know more than I do. Whereas I desperately want civility, the collegiality of Congress before Reagan, in the days of Tip O’Neil, perhaps political consultants know that chaos and drama draw attention. Democrats tend to be lower key than Republicans. Trump is of course outrageous in his flair for drama and many of hs colleagues follow. The media loves drama, so the story is too often about the Republicans. Maybe our blue candidates believe they have to compete on the turf that’s given them. If so, God Bless. But I long for a party that will go high, and an electorate who will appreciate that.

Or maybe we should go back to the days of Lincoln when it was considered unseemly for a candidate to speak publicly on his own behalf. The Lincoln/Douglas debates broke the mold, and maybe we should blame it all on them.

I just heard a touch of thunder. Time to curl up with that book.

Iowa and politics

 I didn’t sleep well last night. I was in the midst of the Iowa caucus all night, though I have no idea what I was doing. But I have been fascinated by the rhetoric and conflict leading up to this evening’s vote…and just now I saw on TV that Hillary is ahead of Bernie by a close one point, too close to call, but Cruz, with much lower numbers, leads Trump by three points and is the projected Republican winner. Marco Rubio is in a close third. Those are the “big name” candidates, the competitions that matter. And while I’m scared to death of Ted Cruz, I’m not displeased with the Democratic numbers. I was prepared to support either one of the two leading candidates. And I really like Martin O’Malley, who only got 1% of the vote. He’s made a lot of sense in the debates. He is expected to end his campaign tonight.

I read posts on Facebook today from people who were sick to death of hearing about Iowa and some who said, boastfully, that they hadn’t watched a single debate or caucus. I find that sad, because I think it’s the duty of every responsible citizen to keep informed and vote. The person who hadn’t watched a single caucus obviously doesn’t understand that Iowa is the only state that caucuses and it’s not something you watch, like a debate. An uninformed, uninterested citizenry is why we have most of the inept people in government that we do—no names mentioned, but I have strong personal opinions. I don’t care however how you vote—please just vote. (Okay, I care, but that’s not the point here.)

I went to college in a small (read really small) town in Iowa for two years and went back to the University of Chicago and home because insularity and 3.2 beer were too much for me. The only good thing I took away from Iowa was the notion of turkey sandwiches and blue cheese. It strikes me as strange, after fifty years or so, that Iowa, with its rural culture, looms so large on the political scene. But maybe that’s the reason—Iowans still tend to be close to the earth people with simple needs. I like the farmer I heard saying on TV that Hillary’s emails didn’t matter one bit to him—he was interested in what she would do for the ordinary citizen like himself.

So here we go, folks, into a campaign that’s liable to be as bitter and vitriolic as any in memory. Keep your hats on and your judgment clear. And, please vote! In the last presidential election, almost two-thirds of the eligible population didn’t vote because “my vote doesn’t matter.” It does.