In some of the conversations I have had this week as well as some of the blog posts I have read, one explanation for the inexcusable actions of Congress in approving the terrorism detainee bill is that the American people get what they deserve. This has been a thread throughout the Bush years, especially among the limousine liberals who read the right books, go to the right movies, wear the right clothes and send their children to the right colleges. According to their line of reasoning, we have had to suffer Bush, Cheney and Rummy because unlike more enlightened types, the American people are too stupid to see what idiots are running the administration. Actually the reason America got the vote it did is not because of some failing in the American people. Democrats got the vote they earned. They couldn’t even get a significant number of their own people to vote against the bill!
Whenever I hear about the ignorance of the American people my first impulse is to ask those who proclaim that if, in fact, a majority of the citizens in their community are misguided because they watch Fox News or hang around the wrong people, what have the enlightened done to change things? The Wine and Cheese Democrats like to spend all their time with like-minded people, drinking the best pinot and eating Brie while they together bemoan the sad state of the average American’s intelligence.
These people earned that vote because how many were out there doing something? Writing a check is the easy answer; soothing one’s conscience with a contribution has always been popular among those who have money. What if for every dollar contributed to progressive causes people also contributed ten minutes of their time to go door knocking for their candidate or cause? What if insteading of sipping wine and complaining they manned a phone bank for an evening? Or licked envelopes instead of Brie?
Two weeks ago I attended a gathering sponsored by America Votes and Wellstone Action for people in my county who wanted to make a difference for progressive candidates. In an evening we were trained, for free, in using analytical tools like the message square and practiced door knocking with each other. By the end of the evening all of us felt energized and better prepared to go out and campaign for our candidates. What was interesting about the evening was that I would say at least a third of those present wore union jackets or shirts.
Democrats earned this week’s vote because of the disinterest the Party seems to have in reaching out to all Americans. Last week in two different posts I wrote about one blogger who said the poor would vote Democratic anyway and in another post castigated the Lamont campaign for not doing a better job of connecting with blue collar voters and people of color.
In fact what has happened is that as Winona LaDuke and Ruy Texeira have pointed out, a majority of Americans don’t vote at all. They see nothing in either party. The 2004 CNN exit poll showed that one third of those who voted had a household income of over $75,000! Perhaps the most fascinating finding is that in 2004 the suburbs accounted for almost half the total presidential vote–45%! Those with a post graduate education made up 16% of all voters while only a quarter had a high school education or less.
Add to this some of the Counterrevolution’s tilting of Liberal America’s cornerstones and it becomes easier to see why Congress voted the way it did. The GOP has waged an aggressive campaign to make it more difficult for the poor, the elderly and people of color to vote. At the same time they have pushed electronic voting machines manufactured by GOP-leaning companies. The GOP has encouraged the media to become more politicized and manipulative with Swift Boating becoming commonplace. They have cut back education so much that some inner city schools lack even the most basic learning supplies. As for social and economic justice we all know about the infamous tax cuts, but looming in the background is a possible housing crisis signified by an increasing number of mortgage foreclosures. That some Democrats and a fair number of left-leaning blogs have done little to publicize these conditions or worked to change them, helps to explain why the majority no longer votes.
So in the end that vote over detainees was made because most Americans did not have a say in it, just as they have not had a say in Iraq or other administration actions. When those people do find their voice, it should prove interesting. Meanwhile we need to remember that if we lose faith in the American people then we lose faith in our nation and ourselves.
Technorati Tags: limousine liberals, 2004 CNN Poll, Republican, Detainee Bill, Wellstone Action, Lamont, nonvoters, four cornerstones, voting rights, housing crisis, Amercan People, education
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