A lot of politics lately, but this is my life. I'm sorry. I'll post about getting drunk, high and laid soon. I'll write about art. I'll write about cities and music and bike riding and about what kinds of new dreams are starting to percolate. But it's less than two weeks to Iowa, and so this shit is all over my mind.
I was volunteering in Burlington in early September. It was a really wonderful week for me, working within an upstart political campaign, meeting new people who shared some of my vision, making in-person connections with those I "knew" via chatrooms and email. It was also the week that Clark entered the race, when he came up and took the lead in the national polls. The week that Kerry and Gep's attack websites (waffle-powered-howard and deanfacts) hit the net.
My own internal state was tense, and I could sense a whiff of worry in the air around campaign HQ. The old hands were rock solid -- they didn't even pause to look at this stuff -- but some of the kids were skittish, you could see it.
These times now remind me of that. Clark coming up in the nationals, passing Kerry in NH. No word from Iowa until Sunday, so we're in the dark about the storm. Are thousands of out of state volunteers making a difference, or are attack ads carrying the day? A little pit of worry sits in me.
With the flier that came out in NH today, I think about how the campaign might have to "go after" General Clark in a serious fashion. I don't like it. Wes Clark doesn't seem like a bad guy. His policies aren't bad. He voted for Regan, sure, but so did a lot of people. Why should I really fight for Dean over him, I wonder?
With all this in mind, I went to my meetup; and it's about par for the course. But it's nice to have that moment of meeting people. Always sense a lot of latent potential in those things, but don't quite know how to tap it just yet.
And then I get home and turn on the TV, PBS late night. Charlie Rose has Dick Perle and David Frum talking about "An End To Evil," their blueprint for how to keep pulling the train on the Middle East (and N. Korea too).
It begins coming together in my mind. We have to win. The Neo-Imperialists may have the most lofty and humanitarian goals in mind, but they're clearly drunk with delusions of power and they're clearly far too comfortable with telling lies to get what they want. We have to win.
And when I say we have to win I don't mean we have to beat Bush. That's the first step, but we have to prevail with a different vision of how the world should be. We have to think as big as these bastards. Bigger, even. We need to change the system because the system isn't working. We need to clean house in this country, and put a lot of things in order. Wes Clark, nice guy that he may be and great resume that he has, is not in a position to do this.
To my ears, Howard Dean is the only candidate who speak to the enormity of the political moment. This is what came though in the beginning with "I want my country back," the idea that we're on a bad roll here, and it has to do with more than just one idiot pResident who was gifted with political capital like manna from heaven. This is what comes through in the debates, with everyone squabbling over petty differences and dragging one another down in a fitful quest for personal power. Dean speaks to me and acknowledges what I see: unless we make some serious progress in the next decade, this country is headed into a serious decline.
The problems are far deeper than Bush. They include to poor voter turnout. They include our reliance on relatively content-free and impersonal television forums -- and even more specious 30-second ad spots -- as a primary means of public discourse. They include a president almost impeached over oral sex, and the fact that he couldn't just own up and admit to the blow job. They include a "war on drugs" that clearly targets minorities and other culturally-designated undesirables and strips them of freedom and civil rights. They include the prison industrial complex, the petro-chemical/auto alliance, the media czars and the impending crisis of digital rights.
That's just a part of the domestic picture. On the other end there's global inequity, terrorism, trade practices, widespread poverty, and a tradition of cultural, economic and military imperialism to break with.
Our problems have deep roots, and they will take years of time and more than one presidential election to set right. I'm optimistic about our chances. We can set something in motion this election that will begin a process. A true American Renaissance is in the offing if we want it. With enough will to participate we can set these problems right. Dean's movement can rescue America from oblivion, but for that to happen enough of us need to believe.
So I think back to September/October, nearly one quarter previous. A belief that we were doing the right thing in the right way sustained our efforts. We did not loose our nerve. We didn't burn out or fly off the handle. We stuck to our guns, kept our eyes on the prize, integrity and whiskey in hand.
As it turns out Clark was just bouncing. He broke out of the pack, but without real grassroots support and in the glare of the frontrunners spot, he and his campaign sputtered, and soon we were back on top, the solid frontrunner.
But now the crunch is back; and the best thing to do is remember to breathe. There's work to do, but the most important thing is to stop struggling. Remember why you are here and learn to ride the storm. If our campaign founders now, we would have no chance against Bush. But if we've charted a course straight and true -- and I still believe that we have -- we have nothing to fear but fear itself.
