Arguing for Good is Easier when the Dem’s aren’t being Bad

Let’s just get something straight right off the bat. The following criticism in no way changes how I feel about the state and actions of the current Republican party. It would take many, many hours over many, many days to convince me that Republicans:

• want to make sure people won’t starve
• want to make sure people won’t die of treatable health conditions
• will ever understand why taking $100 away from someone who makes $30,000/year is a much bigger deal than taking $10,000 away from someone who makes $1 million/ year.

I mean, I may be convinced after many hours, but chances are, it would require some of those tactics I saw in Zero Dark Thirty.

Anyway, all that aside, I need to bitch about the Dems. My people. My folk.

I get about a million emails a day, asking for me for money, to sign a petition, or to call/email/tweet someone of “importance.” Sometimes I do it, sometimes I don’t. I’ll admit that I’ve watched hours of my day spin out of control due to stories about animal abuse, women’s rights, or gay marriage (I know — I’m just a screaming liberal…).

But today, I got an email — multiple emails — from a group that shall remain nameless (so’s I won’t shame the party even more) that attempted to get me mobilized with this bullshit:

Friends — This is our worst case scenario:

Paul Ryan raised a record-breaking $14.4 million over glasses of champagne last night – and his radical budget just passed on the House floor.

So, I won’t mince words: If Ryan can bury us under a wave of corporate special interest cash, then his Medicare-destroying budget really has a chance to become law and seniors are in real trouble.

We need you right now.

Now, I don’t doubt that they raised butt-loads of cash last night (they’re politicians — that’s what they do). I don’t doubt that the super PAC’s are going to pour down tons money to mess with the budget negotiations. I don’t doubt that the Republican endgame is to shield their wealthy friends with every ounce of their beings, even if it means cutting twenty bucks a month from the social security check of an elderly person who’s already eating mac and cheese every night (generic, not even the expensive Kraft stuff).

What I take issue with is insulting my intelligence with the scare tactic that the Ryan budget has a snowball’s chance in John Boehner’s tanning booth of passing. Because we all know it ain’t gonna happen. Ryan knows it. Everybody on the Hill knows it. The guy who wrote this email knows it.

So why does he think the rest of us are this stupid?

Back in 2006, I was volunteering for Jill Derby’s congressional campaign, and now-Senator Dean Heller* was sending out these positively sleazy robo-calls that were making everyone nuts. Someone asked, “Why aren’t we doing that,” and one of my friends responded, “Because we’re Democrats — that’s not how we operate.”

I understand that politics sucks. It’s ugly and mean and more disgusting than making sausage. But it’s so much easier to argue for the side of good when our side is acting “good.”

And as the story goes, you only get two chances to cry wolf. After that, no one shows up to help you anymore.

Personally, I’d rather have people coming to hang out with me because they think I have the best sheep and not because I scared the crap out of them in the middle of the night.

 

*Incidentally, yes, I realize that for all of our “nice play,” Dean Heller is now a Senator. But that’s due to multiple factors, one of which is that Nevadans have a long history of electing good-looking, slightly dim men. Jill came closer than any other Democrat to winning Congressional District 2. She ran an amazing campaign, had a fantastic staff, and in the end, all of us can sleep at night.