I've been an active Democrat since Carter and while many of you have been active longer I was only eleven when I first went door to door for Jimmy Carter & Lynn Cutler. But that part of my life is over for now and it will take a lot to bring me back into the fold.
I started with the Democratic Party in Iowa, my father was a local college dean and as such I was lucky enough to meet every presidential candidate from 1976-1988. I had my hand almost crushed by Ted Kennedy, I shared a bag of potato chips with Al Gore, I remember chatting about Chicago with Jesse Jackson and I remember my dad calling Regan a real "so-in-so". I also participated in the caucuses and it was great lesson to learn how the party created the planks of our platform, it was truly democracy in action.
Fast forward to 2004, I have moved from Iowa and had been living in Chicago for 15 years. I had been following politics very closely since the 2000 election and I was very excited about our senatorial candidate Barack Obama. Obama was not some anonymous person to me, we had worked for the same law firm and I would see him around Hyde Park and the U of C. To seal the deal he came to my door and asked for my vote. I saw in 2004 what I think a lot of people did not see until a few years later. I had great hope in him as a senator and he was a great disappointment. He was never bold, he seemed to play the numbers and always side with the safe path. Further, he didn't seem to care, he seemed too busy getting ready to run or running for president. A quick example, when BP wanted to pour more toxic chemicals in Lake Michigan I wrote both my senators and my congressman. Luckily Sen. Durbin stepped in and stopped that mess but no one heard a peep out of Obama, I guess he must drink imported water. I received a response from my congressman and Sen. Durbin but nothing from Obama. That was not the only instance, out of twenty of so letters/faxes/e-mails I sent to my Senator Obama I received one response from his office. But I did not give up hope. I believed that he was something special and that a lot of what he was doing was so he could get in office and once in he could effect real change. I even had hope after his vote on the FISA bill. To backup my feelings with deeds, I raised money, donated and worked on the campaign. I even got on TV standing behind him at a rally in Indiana.
Well, that hope is over. I know a lot of people say he has only been in office a few months and he is really busy with the economy, frankly I don't care. He promised transparency, bullshit, he is embracing the tight lipped classify everything spy on Americans policies of the Bush administration. His Administration has embraced the constitutional power grab made by the Bush administration and are hiding under the cloak of "State Secrets" to maintain those powers. He could end DADT in one stroke of the pen but he doesn't have the balls to do it. He could pursue the people who broke the law and tortured innocent people but he'd rather look forward. I will use the same defense if I am ever arrested, "Yes your honor I did that crime but lets just look forward and everything will be okay". For a constitutional scholar he doesn't seem too fond of restoring it. He is disappointing now; I cannot imagine what he will be like during re-election and as a lame duck.
But my anger doesn't end there; it extends to the spineless Democrats in the Senate and Congress. With rare exception (Feingold & Kucinich) I have never seen a bigger bunch of defeatists in my life. The Republican didn't seem to have any problem ramming legislation through the senate with only 50 votes. The Democrats couldn't seem to stop Bush even though they controlled both houses. Now, the milquetoast Democrats can't get anything through congress without kissing Republican ass and watering down every bill so it can be bi-partisan. How many Dems do we need to put in the congress and the senate before we don't have to ask the republicans permission to pass a bill? The Dems know the right thing to do regarding the health care bill but they certainly don't have the balls to pass it. I really wonder what they will do when Franken is seated and they don't have the 60 senator excuse to hide behind. Pelosi and Reed are failures and their lack of backbone seems to have set the standard who the whole congress.
So, I am done. I will give no more money and I will give no more of my time. I will not waste either on the Democratic Party.
One last thing, as I said before Obama was really bad at responding to letters/faxes/e-mail and I only received one response to the many letters I sent him during his tenure as my Senator but like clock work I receive at least one e-mail a week asking me for money. I will respond to these e-mails just like he responded to mine.