Retirees in east King County kicking some serious butt

Sunday evening I went to an impressive meeting of a MoveOn-affiliated activist group at the community room of the Providence Point retirement community in Issaquah. It's a beautiful, gated retirement community up on a hill north of Lake Sammamish.

There were 26 people attending the meeting, including me and Craig Salins (who spoke about Washington Public Campaigns and the efforts to overturn Citizens United).

The Providence Point activists were impressively progressive and fired up with anger about our broken political system.

At the start of the meeting, the convener said, "In case you forgot, this is not the Alzheimer's Support Group meeting." Everyone laughed.

They said that they're in the 41st LD, having recently been redistricted from the 5th LD. I thought it would be great to get them more involved in the 41st Dems somehow. We need more progressives in the Democratic Party!

They said that turnout at their local precinct caucus was high, but turnout for the 45th LD was low. They asked about the LD caucus meeting on the 28th but seemed uninformed about its nature.

They said they have 88 people on their mailing list.

They'd recently participated in a rally in support of Planned Parenthood. Some of them stood up holding signs they'd held at the rally.

A group of them had participated in the Working Washington demonstration against Wells Fargo in Seattle. They gave a report.

One woman volunteers four times a month at Monroe Prison.

Others spoke with much passion about their efforts and concerns.

They wondered when the Obama campaign will start in earnest.

Several of them attended the 99% MoveOn training with Jennie Petersen.

This coming Thursday they'll be holding a protest in Bellevue, near Microsoft's campus on 148th St. They practiced the rousing chants they plan to shout, such as "No ifs, no buts, no education cuts" and "The people united will never be defeated" and "Are you fired up? (the call) We can't take it no more. (the response)."

Don Smith
Webmaster, Washington Liberals
thinkerfeeler {at} yahoo.com


My comment--

Old age should rave and burn at close of day.
Do not go gentle into that good night
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.