Democratic Underground and where it is heading after Obama's first 100 days [View All]

Never in my life have the fortunes of the two major political parties in America hung in the balance as precariously as they do now.

I'm old enough to remember watching a moon landing by Americans with my mom on television, but still too young to have taken in the gravity of Watergate, My Lai, and the same-year assassinations of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. at the time these events happened.

But I remember my own tumultuous political evolution, where weariness with what I perceived as arrogance among Democrats in DC drove me to vote for Republicans in 1994, and my disgust with Republicans over the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal drove me to vote for Al Gore and Democrats in 2000, and how it took grassroots organizers like Howard Dean to turn me into a full-fledged Democrat.

The Republican Party, thanks to the abuses of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, is teetering on the edge of schism and collapse.

But I see the same thing happening in the Democratic Party. At a time when our party is in position to readjust America's moral bearings and repair our standing in the world community, too many Democrats are starting to embrace the destructive policies of the Bush administration. Sadly, this includes some Democrats in the White House.

The Republican Party is an endangered species. But so are we. The difference between us and the GOP, however, is that our party stands at a crossroads. Our party is capable of making a conscious decision to avert its own demise.

That's where I see Democratic Underground coming in. I think we are going to remain the "underground" of the Democratic Party for at least the next four years, constantly challenging the Obama administration to stay true to Democratic principles and rebuild the social, political, financial, and medical infrastructures of our nation while still honoring its duty to the Constitution to defend our country against all enemies - foreign and domestic.

And that is why we cry out against Obama's refusal to prosecute Bush administration officials over torture. That is why we are alarmed with Obama's plans for "prolonged detention" of Gitmo detainees without charges, let alone a trial. That is why so many of us continue insist that single-payer healthcare options not be pushed off the table.

There are forces within the Democratic Party hierarchy that are trying to shut us out of the political debate. And DU is one of those places where we can build the strength needed to force the door open and march into the center of the arena, where we will be impossible to ignore.