I am in need of some encouragement. Help!

Historically, has there been anything for which dems have fought so much with such little result? Are we not doing enough? What more can we do? Before you answer these questions, I want to give props to all the activists who are putting forth the effort to get results. While I'm at it, I'll give myself some props, too... I have been doing my part in LTTE's, signing petitions, etc., however, I'm quite discouraged.

At least in my lifetime (I'm 30), I have not seen anything so clear-cut as what is going on in our country. It angers me everyday to see what I consider little progress in this fight against something so sinister.

I think that there is a lot of rotting away under the facade of Republican power and influence - they look strong, but we will be surpised at how quickly the come crumbling down.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

i like that theory. thanks

Please call your Senators and Representative today and tell them to vote no on the energy bill. Please?

And then call your Representative again and tell him to vote no on CAFTA.

Sinister bills both of them.

You are not alone in your thoughts. I'm a senior and have seen much in my 62 years but nothing like the current situation. I feel we are being laughed at by the Republicans. We have no voice and they are trying to keep us from getting one. Like many of us, I have e-mailed, written, stood vigil, protested and done all kings of things to be heard. Todays situation is worse than Vietnam. That was an unjust war, today we have an unjust government. A lot worse. Keep up pestering anyone you can find, starting with your state rep and work your way up. Letters to the editor are fine too but rarely get to print because the papers get so many. If you find things confusing, take comfort, we all do but somewhere someone is listening.

BushCo seems to me to be really, really struggling, on the verge of desperation. I think they have been making it up as they go along and are shocked at how badly it's all going.

RE: the SCOTUS and all that, I cried those tears with the last election. We knew that would happen; the damage of BushCo will be monstrous and take years if not decades to turn around, but it's all blowing up in their evil little faces.

In a way I'm almost glad Kerry didn't "win" (although I think OH was a fix) because they would all be blaming the current horrors in Iraq on him.

My personal feeling is that the task of bailing us out of Iraq would be so daunting that the Dem's decided to let George and co. fall on their own faces as they tried to bail us out of their war and their other misadventures. Now they will go down in disgrace for all of the lies, misdeeds and smirks they have put upon the American people.

I agree, yy. Kerry had a lousy setup, and knew that the Republicans
would only find a way to blame all the problems on him. So we let
W stew in his own juice.

Start eroding their base.

Ask minimum wage earners why they cannot organize and get stronger like the big companies are doing to them?

etc.

Ask conservative women's groups if they are proud of our list of women presidents and heads of major corporations. If they think only one or two female SC justices constitutes majority rule. Why women haven't been the power they need to be if they are, in fact, the majority. Ask them about the first woman on the moon, since women pay a great deal of taxes, it should have already happened by now!

All kinds of ways to stir the pot. Most people will start to agree if you keep it at their level of understanding.

Hell, I used to live an an extremely right wing area and we got almost 98% of all consumers to sign petitions asking grocery stores and manufacturers to start making and selling more recyclable products. This really ticks off only the extreme right wingers for some bizarre reason.

Lots of stuff to do. Just put your noodle to good use.

The damage they do is impacting lives everywhere...
More and more people are beginning to wake up...
It's taken forever, I agree... but I DO see signs of progress...
The web they've been weaving is beginning to ensnare them in embarassing and telling ways; their tentacles are showing, almost daily...
The cracks in this grim facade are widening every day...
And keep in mind, despite all the rhetoric of Rove's 'genius' and Reep 'discipline and unity': Our enemies are actually some of the biggest idiots who ever lived... that's what fascists are; and that is why they will lose, in the end...
Hope I've been helpful...
d

I think you've started a good thread here; so many of us are exhausted on so many levels, I sense this very deeply and profoundly... but the very fact that we've made it this far, and are spreading our message to others every day, is VERY encouraging...
I hope others will see and nominate this thread; we NEED to think about the progress already made...
It's a house of cards. It CAN'T STAND FOREVER.
d

And, moreover,
it's a house of cards built by a pack of greedy idiots
who never learned the BASICS of "card-house building"...

The B*shCabal WAS (past tense) running amok
because they think they were above the law; untouchable.
They AREN'T

You want to cheer up?
Just watch the next Scotty McClellen press conference.
Watching Scotty squirm and sweat makes ONE thing very clear:
They were NOT prepared for this.

It never even OCCURRED to them that they might be QUESTIONED,
let alone "held accountable".
They had NO alibis, NO "back-up plan" ready...
and now they are STEWING.

The "Administration that Never Admits Mistakes"
was forced to sneak out and buy a copy of
"Damage Control for Dummies"...

And, so far, their efforts to "spin" and "distract"
have been conducted with the same SKILL and PRECISION TIMING as
a dozen monkeys trying to fuck a football.

It's an INTERESTING time to be alive, so cheer up and take notes!
People are gonna ASK about this someday!

"If not for yourself, won't you do it for the CHILDREN?"

And I'm laughing my ass off here on a number of your lines, esp. the one about the dozen monkeys...
:rofl:
You are one funny writer!...
Thanks for the props, bro; much appreciated.
d
ps: anyone reading here, read the last two posts AGAIN!
DAMMIT!

And it took over another 100 years to get anything close to equality for African Americans. It took nearly 150 years for women to get the right to vote and we STILL don't have equal rights under the Constitution.

Don't get discouraged. Get working.

patience displayed by the African American community over these hundreds of years of struggle and yearned for just a little of it! We are all truely being challenged of late!

First of all, :grouphug: :hug:. There.

Okay. Get a few items to buck yourself up, historically speaking. Sometimes looking at the grim and/or glorious past will help you realize the current misery will pass and that progress will be made. I think the British are taking that kind of view regarding the terrorist attacks in London. They've seen attacks on a much larger scale and had to take cover in air raid shelters.

Examine, if you will, charts of the make-up of Congress by party affiliation over the 20th century. You will see that it swings back and forth and can turn around rapidly. A Republican majority comes and goes, and the same goes for the Democratic majority.

Look at the lengthy effort for women's suffrage. Consider how many years people like Susan B. Anthony had to work for women's rights (and the struggle still continues). The fact that Susan B. Anthony didn't live to see women's suffrage doesn't mean she failed. She laid the groundwork!

And consider the setbacks in the civil rights and labor movements, the assassinations of the mid-20th century, the witch hunts and division. We've survived all that. We will survive this.

impossible for the jews and the good germans and all of europe to defeat Hitler... and bush and his regime have learned from the best. I can't even imagine what it will take to beat the bush regime.. It's so far beyond my comprehension....

I see you are a member of the DU Activist Corps. We are facing a hard battle - don't get discouraged. Know that most of us are passionate as hell about what has been done to this country. Hang in there.

That's OK. I do think that it won't only be the Dems to sink BushCo but that decent GOP & actual conservative conservatives, we will all agree that they have to go.

It's just a shame so much damage had to be done -- to our country and the world, during his tenure.

I appreciate all your responses and ideas...i'm going to get moving on some of this stuff right now!

http://action.citizen.org/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=998

fill in your email info

click and you are done

Don't fall for the spiel coming from Republicans in Democrats' clothing. We all know a progressive when we see one.

Demand to be heard (keep doing what you're doing).

We've made some progress. Hard to see when we're right in the thick of it, but it's there.

Have some fun, do what you like to do with the people you like.

Then bring what you like to do to the fight.

It's a long process.

9/11 is going to sink Bush. His negligence, the coverup, possible
complicity. When the American people learn the truth about 9/11, Bush
will be through.

It took many more years and many more lives to end the debacle of Vietnam. Those of us who took to the streets then often felt the way you do. But we never gave up and it finally ended. Don't focus on all the crimes and lies of this administration, you'll wear yourself out. Pick one or two ideas that mean the most to you and focus on them.


Keith’s Barbeque Central

lol

Bush won the last election because there was a war on. That was probably the deciding factor, yet now the administration is saying “Insurgencies tend to go on five, six, eight, 10, 12 years.” Why weren't they saying this before the election? We need to hold them accountable for this, and for all their failed policies.

"History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce." I think we're in the farce phase, 1929 all over again. Herbert Hoover won the White House in 1928 with 58% of the vote. Four years later, FDR won with 57% of the vote. So far, the Bush administration really has been able to elude responsibility, but eventually the chickens will come home to roost. It is apparent that there are lots of folks who will support the misguided war in Iraq no matter what, though I'm not sure that they would feel that way in 12 more years. Before that time, the Bush administration's economic policies of:

a. exporting all jobs to China and India
b. doing nothing about the federal budget deficit
c. doing nothing about our balance of payments deficit

is pretty much a recipe for national disaster. Sadly, that's what it will take to get a majority of American voters to see how badly Republicans mismanage the country. The situation has gotten so dire, the opportunity for a soft landing so long ago missed that there's not a heck of a lot we can do to stop it, other than to be there to make sure that Bush does get credit for his failures.

The good news is that it will reshape the political landscape in our favor for a generation.

it always seemed clear cut to me, I was active in everything going back to about 88 (I'm 35) but for me, ultimately, I was losing and losing and decided that even if I started winning some of the time, it wouldn't be enough for me and my family. Ultimately I walked away. I still participate when and where I can, but

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4203379&mesg_id=4203379

It's understandable to get down nowadays. Please know that there are LOTS of people who are starting to wake up. Right now we can help speed up the process by engaging them not in debate, but in conversation. It works.

If it's any encouragement, please know there are lots of us who feel the same as you do. This is our country and it's been thru tough times before. We will get thru this too.

Bush's approval is down to 41%! And this is in spite of the barrage of lies and propaganda befouling our airwaves.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=1961363&mesg_id=1961363

more Reality, which is a precursor for wisdom.

Part 2 of Indira Singh Interview of Pacifica (Ptech, 9-11, etc)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x142316#142320
also: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=4182589 (incl. link to the audio: http://www.kpfa.org/archives/archives.php?id=13&limit=N
Part 1 is here: http://www.gunsandbutter.net/archives.php?page=2


This is a difficult time for our nation and the world. IMO we've NEVER been under this much threat, not in my lifetime (I'm 57) and not in any of our history that I'm aware of. If you read the transcript above, it will help point out a little of the nature of the threat we're facing. There are many more such links I could post, different approaches or ways of looking at different facets of the same thing, but that's a recent one that is quite stark.

I wish I could comfort you, but that's not the main reason any of us are here at DU, is it?

Nonetheless, welcome to DU.