How will we make our voices heard on the Issues after the GE? Ideas anyone?

Please don't tell me: the Vote, LTTEs, phone banking, door knocking, demonstrations, MoveOn, etc. etc. These are things to which pResidents, Senators, and Representatives have become habituated, because the consequences of their behaviors become diluted by time and distance. I'm tired of calling and writing and being just "yes'd along". Sometimes, I feel like these actions are just public pacifiers that we perform for party powers who do nothing but give big money.

Also, lobbyists are out of favor somewhat, but they will NOT be going away; their influence will return and they WILL call the shots.

The role of People in general, ir-respective of party, is at stake, more so than at any time in recent history. It's Life or Death. NEW times require new actions. Everything is in a very fluid state; HOW? HOW? HOW? do we get those we elect to do what we want done in the legislative process AFTER THE GE?

DUers in the D.C. area should make a few appointments with Senators and Congress people to talk about them.

You'll see some staffer, not the representative him- or herself. You'll be nodded at and smiled at and given words of encouragement and any documents you brought along will be gratefully accepted and then you'll be given a very proper and polite goodbye.

And that's how it works.

If you want to get involved and make changes, why not go to work for a group that's already established and working towards those changes? My personal favorite, where I always donated time and money, is the ACLU. But, it's the personal involvement, the investment of your time, your body, your own self actually doing something that makes a difference. Talk is cheap.

She had to put her daughter in rehab up there (it has worked wonders BTW) so she has been getting more familiar with how they do things there.

We've GOT to start thinking about new ways to create PRESSURE.

and we adopted the Town Hall form for our student government.

Decades later, everyone remembers everything about our Town Halls. It was brilliant.

Define a decision making process; get together; pose a question; make a decision; communicate.

But you have to want to participate, just like in a democracy. If you can get people to talk and to be present, you can work wonders.

We were an experimental division of an old, established liberal arts college. They gave us autonomy, which was great, but they balked when we chose the name for our dorm (the first co-ed dorm in the US).

We wanted to call it "Fred." They said no. It never got named.

At reunions, we still talk about Fred.

We won.

very specific issue areas, and what this country needs is a freaking' overhaul in just about every way possible.

I guess we'll just have to hope enough people are spread out working for enough different groups that everything will somehow be covered then.

You have to find your most important area, and focus on it. That's why I said to chose your area of concern and then find someone who shares that concern. if you try to address everything, you'll end up addressing nothing.

It's about focus, something the Democrats sometimes lose.

change anything much?

just a thought.

Find a group that's had some success in the past, who knows how the game is played, and who is focused on an issue that resonates for you. They're out there.

Just because I'm a bad writer and indulge in the occasional cliche doesn't mean you didn't understand what I wrote.

So you're interested in more direct action? I see. There are a lot of volunteer organizations that always need help.

I wish you luck.

You don't vote for incumbants in the primaries. Period.

So, what do you do? Start illustrating in a non-partisan way how every incumbant in Washington is corrupt to the marrow and must be replaced. If your incumbant is a Dem, get you Republican friends to re-register as Democrats and vote against your incumbant. Do it today.

he will feel.

Are you willing to use it?

Can I actually talk to, investigate, consider his opponent??? That's a hard thing for this old Democrat to do.

What we really need is a good Progressive to run against him in the next primary.

is find out who can run against him in the primary, and work for that candidate - assuming, of course, that said candidate shares your beliefs.

Never, and I really mean this, NEVER VOTE REPUBLICAN.

:::: panting, drooling ::::::::

there's no candidate to run against our Blue Dog : - ((((((((((((((((

P.S. I know that means that I'm supposed to consider it, but my life is enough of a mess as it is, maybe someday when I get a few things straightened out.

And that's when you'll get involved.

And your life will be in fine shape when you choose to get busy with political candidates. I promise you.

Pretty much a can of gasoline over the head and a match? Oh wait--that would fall under "demonstrations"--never mind.

candidates, all will be well. It won't. The candidates are selected by a process linked to the existing power structure, & unless you have enough power to challenge that, your voice is a fart in the wind.

There's no challenging that power structure on the basis of money. People need to start organizing locally, & linking with similar others in the next town, & the next, & though the internet. Numbers is the only basis of power ordinary people have.

The existing structure of power controls:

1. Money.
2. Information.
3. Law.
4. Physical force.


The "usual methods" (strikes, protests, letters, etc.) are fine - but they need to be tied to organization which doesn't back down, get bought off, & isn't in the service of elites for bargaining chips in the elite power game.

There were tons of protests in the run-up to the iraq war. But they all died down. What happened? What WOULD have happened if, instead of dying down, they'd escated? Why aren't they happening so much NOW, when more than half the electorate is SICK of the war?

Look to the forces behind the organization & their motives. Most people will GO to a protest if someone else organizes it, but they'd never think of trying to do so themselves. Why not?

The first clue is in your thread title: "after the GE."

If you want the people's voice to be heard on issues, issues can't be put on the back burner for this, or any, election.

Issues have to come first, and have to DRIVE every election.

It's too late for that in '08. The majority of Democrats have already set issues aside.

If you can convince them to pressure Obama NOW, you'll have something to hold him accountable to after November.

If you give him a free pass on the issues now, you have nothing to hold him accountable to.

You can hold Congress accountable for not doing a good job by replacing the complicit dems in November. It's a little late for that, now, too, as too many of them won their primaries.

a strong local coalition. It's pretty hard to ignore whole communities.

Progressives are notoriously fickle.

The first time our candidate disappoints us or compromises, we scream TRAITOR! WHORE! DINO!

The traditional honeymoon period is a year. We'll give Obama two years, mainly because we want everyone to think that we're down with the homies. Then someone will break the ice, and it won't be race, it will be ideological conformity.

"Obama sold us out! Traitor! Whore!" A hundred critical books will bloom, a thousand snarky editorials will contend.

... OR ...

This time, we can do things differently. We can realize that Obama will be stretched to compromise a hundred times, and it is up to US to make it as easy for him to pull the compromise as far back to OUR side as he can.

And no tantrums when we suffer a setback. Setbacks will come to mean: work harder.

We really can't do the same old same-old. The rhetoric sounds swell, but we really have to be about it this time. There is too much work to do, too much at stake, and an entire era of history that demands to be birthed.

Opening Night is 1/21/09 -- tickets have been sold. There will be fannies in those seats. It's showtime!

--p!

It's also not fickle if someone misrepresents themselves and then those who were lied to are pissed. That's not fickle; it's rightfully angry.

....with the concept of clobbering the disappointing incumbent pricks next primary....if we put you in office because you lead us to believe you were progressive, and you won't vote accordingly, you're out! I don't care how sweet and lovable you are, hit the fuckin' road!

....with mcSame needing public financing and Obama refusing, the most important thing we should take from this election cycle is that grassroots internet financing is equal to or greater than that of corporate America....a new day has dawned and we're in charge....

....we must organized around this new financing power and take no prisoners....repugs set this ball in motion years ago; you're either with us or against us....and if you're against us, we will shower your opposition with all the gold necessary to whip your ass....