Reply #132: Wyldwolf, you want to drive people like me from the Dem Party? --just [View All]

keep it up. 40 years a loyal Dem Party voter, with only one anti-Dem vote--only one in that entire time--against Humphrey (wrote in a vote for Pope John XXIII, a wasted vote). Couldn't vote for Humphrey with upwards of TWO MILLION PEOPLE being slaughtered in Southeast Asia. Just couldn't do it. Bloodbath. Horrible.

I've walked precincts. I've phone banked. I've sent money. I've raised money. I've written I don't know how many countless letters. I've lobbied for my beliefs. I've organized. I've talked on the radio. I went down to Alabama in 1965 and joined the voting rights campaign of MLK. I fundraised and phone banked for Bobby Kennedy. I've voted for Dems for 40 years, and gotten many others to vote. And I am a socialist (with qualifications)/Green hearted/and a "fringe" Democrat (whatever that means). And I WILL NOT BE TOLD what to think, how to strategize, or whom to support by some whippersnapper.

This assault on people like me is unconscionable, and divisive. In 2004, who was out there in the trenches, registering people to vote and getting people to the polls, and phoning all over the country, and raising millions of dollars on the internet to MATCH Bush's money chest--but all the grassroots antiwar, environmental and human rights groups in the country, and individuals like me? Also, in 2004, former Nader voters from 2000 voted overwhelming for Kerry! So stop dissing the Nader voters. Just stop. What is the USE of doing that, except to inspire them never to vote for a Democrat again?

And who was it, in 2004, who defended peoples' right to vote in Ohio, and other states? Who was out there counting votes and fighting Kenneth Blackwell? Who was it? It wasn't the Democratic Party. It was the Greens! God love them. They backed off in 2004, so Kerry could win. You know they did. And then they tried to save his win! They tried to save DEMOCRATIC votes!

This is the most destructive OP I have seen here at DU in a long time. And I hope every one of you who have commented here in favor of this kind of machine gunning of very good people, most of whom ALWAYS support the Democrats, will think hard about this matter.

Are WE the enemy, we who want peace and justice and a healthy planet for all, we who may not march in lockstep with every Democrat who comes along, regardless of what they say or do, because sometimes we just can't stomach it any more; we who do the hard work of the party, and often get screwed by the party and the corporate/military interests who control the top of the party, but generally get out there and get out the vote anyway?

And I'll tell you, my loyalty to this party has been sorely tested since the 2004 election, because I believe--and I'll give you the facts if you want them--that the leaders of our party, in Washington DC, and at the state/local level have utterly betrayed us on the matter of electronic voting, and have sold away our right to vote and our right to transparent elections for reasons of venal corruption, in some cases, and because they don't care, in others--they'd just as soon see Bush slaughter and torture some more Arabs in the Middle East, and take the rap for it, so they can come in like "saviors" and promise to slaughter and torture a few less.

That's the truth of it, in my opinion. So I'm hanging by a thin thread here, for several reason:

1. Germany 1932, and the splintering of the center/left, which paved the way for Hitler.

2. I regret my wasted vote in the Nixon/Humphrey election--I think we should have tried to work with Humphrey (a good Minnesota labor liberal), and persisted in an antiwar, and an anti-military/industrial complex program, rather than give up.

3. I think we have one opportunity--one very narrow window of opportunity--to put this country right again, quickly and on national basis, with election reform by Congress under a new Democratic administration (otherwise it's going to be a long slog at the state/local level, with a serious barrier of local corruption). We cannot turn things around with Bushite corporations counting our votes with "trade secret," proprietary programming code, and virtually no audit/recount controls. We MUST change this.

But you don't have time for my historical perspective, my age, my wisdom, my experience or my loyalty, do you? You've got your own shtick, that all your troubles, and all the Democratic Party's troubles, are caused by us socialists, and leftists, and Greens and "fringe Democrats."

My first vote for president was in 1964. I voted for the "peace candidate," LBJ. (I kid you not. That's how they sold him to us.) Result: The most horrendous war crime this country has ever committed.

So I happen to believe, from long experience, that we will not be permitted to HAVE any true populist antiwar candidate, who represents the majority opinion in this country, ever. I've seen THREE populist antiwar figures in this country gunned down--JFK, RFK and MLK. And probably a fourth taken out with a plane crash--Paul Wellstone. I've seen the most recent populist antiwar figure run out of the campaign for a trumped up reason--Howard Dean. There is simply no way--especially with these corporate-controlled voting machines, and with the war profiteering corporate news monopolies--that any such person can survive and make it to the White House.

That is reality. I think we NEED to face reality. And I think we have to angle for election reform, however we can get it. There is nothing else we can do, until we have made the election system transparent again. And how we get it is by playing along, by fully supporting whatever Democrat is selected by the corporate-military rulers, and work on their commitment to the progressive value of honest elections, and get it changed. I do think we have a chance, with an overwhelming turnout, to overcome the fraud. I also think that a pro-war Democrat may actually be installed, in order to get a military Draft (which Bush and the Repubs can't do), and for other purposes (so they can start placing the blame tfor Bush's financial and foreign policy disasters on the Democrats).

But this doesn't mean I don't get to raise holy hell in the primaries, and before the primaries, about who I think represents me and most Americans, and who I think doesn't, and to vet them on the issues, and promote what I think is important. Are we a Democratic discussion board here, or not? Do we get to hash these things out here, or are we all supposed to just shut up and bend over for whatever "our leaders" do or say? And if someone despairs and naively cries out, "I will NEVER vote for Hillary Clinton!", so what? We all know they won't have a choice in the end. And what we'll have to do is hearten people, and help them understand the reality of our situation, and hang together on election reform, and I will be telling people this, from the bottom of my heart...

....never, never, never, never, never give up on your right to vote! NEVER!