Email from a reader my age in the the Midwest:
Trouble with the base comes and goes for a variety of reasons. Even in the troubled periods, there are people (like me) who will work hard. I stumped hard in 1984 — of all years — and actually ran for the state legislature against an incumbent Republican in 1994 (duh).
Last weekend after the [xxx], I gave up my County Central Committee seat (which was hard because no one wanted it) for the first time in fifteen years. And before that I was on the Central Committee from a different precinct and before that in two different [xxx] counties. And that decision was based on my reaction to the health care nonsense. The spending freeze is actually dumber. Now I’m just one guy, but I’m one of the ones traditionally telling Democrats not to give up. In 1984, I was door knocking before the polls closed to get people out for Mondale. If the party loses a bunch of me’s, it is in trouble. If they have to spend time motivating me the party is in bigger trouble.
But by the time you wrote that you had never been more embarrassed to be a Democrat, I had already said similar things, though less eloquently and using terms that my children should not hear.
This is a very big mess. And I feel like I’ve wasted thirty-two years of political work. We are the majority party for crying out loud. In the prophetic words of Bugs Bunny, “What a bunch of maroons!”
No comment. I’m just sharing.
