Many of us here on Kos and in progressive communities all over the country are afraid, stalked by the shadow of the close, lost elections in 2000 and 2004. It seems unbelievable to us that the McCain blitzkrieg of lies and the absurdist nomination of Sarah Palin as McCain's running mate could have turned the polls around, but it is happening before our eyes. Many of us, including me, are feeling despair.
What I want to ask all of you who read this, and what I am asking myself, is this: What choice do we have but to fight this election to the end, hard? And to fight after that whether we win or lose? It becomes clearer by the day that we are fighting a real monster. It is dangerous to use the word "evil," but there is some deeper psychological significance to the Devil's moniker: "the father of lies." The McCain campaign and movement conservatism in the United States have become a purely destructive force, a movement of deluded people who must lie, distort, hate, and destroy to protect their false worldview. It is a moral obligation and an honor to fight against this force before it destroys our democracy, incites more wars, and irreparably damages the planet.
Thinking conservatives are slowly peeling off from the Republican Party, recognizing that it has become literally fascist and imperial (the doctrine of the "unitary executive", the misogyny, the glorification of "Unity," the demonization of dissent, the hatred of women, gays, socialists, and "liberals," the sweetheart deals between huge corporations and a corrupt government, the shifting of the tax burden onto the lower and middle classes, the militarism, the celebration of power for power's sake, the revisionist national history....). Even more dangerous is the absolute contempt demonstrated for the necessity of saving the planet for human habitation, as manifest in the denial of anthropogenic global warming. But the peeling off is not on a mass scale. The vast majority of the conservative movement appears ready to accept any lies, and any policy measures before admitting that their ideas and policies have come to a dead end.
Time is against the Right in its present incarnation. The industries that donate to its candidates - oil, coal, agribusiness, transportation - are based on energy resources that are running out and obsolete patterns of organization. Global warming will be disastrous for agribusiness, as will the rising cost of fossil fuels. These industries must and will have to reorganize themselves dramatically if our society will function in the future. But their owners are resisting. Eventually they will have to adapt or go down.
The culture of white supremacy in America is dying, albeit a long, painful death. The Republican Party since the 1960s has staked its success on that culture, and they are literally terrified of growing tolerance, intermarriage, day-to-day contact and cultural sharing between different "races" in the United States.
The long arc of history is towards progress, as I think Martin Luther King said, quoting Niebuhr. The problem for those of us in the progressive camp here, now, is that we may lose yet another battle. The 2008 election could easily go to McCain, at this point.
But somewhere, somehow, perhaps in the writings of future historians, perhaps also in the spiritual realm, an account is being kept. Do you want to be remembered as standing on the right side when things seemed darkest? Do you want to be remembered as one of those tough and courageous enough to take on the machinery of lies and destruction? I do. Even if we lose this round. Remember that Washington lost most of the battles he fought, but won the war.
If you want to get really corny about this, go and read "The Last Debate" in Tolkien's "Return of the King," the third book in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The chiefs of "the West" gather to consider their "last throw" in the war against Mordor that they seem destined to lose. Gandalf proposes that they send what is left of their army to the very gate of Mordor, to challenge a hopeless battle against "The Dark Lord," in the hopes that Frodo will be able to destroy the Ring while Sauron is distracted. He says: "We must walk open-eyed into that trap, with courage, but small hope for ourselves. For my lords, it may well prove that we ourselves shall perish utterly in a black battle far from living land; so that even if Barad-dur be thrown down, we shall not live to see a new age."
Even if we lose in 2008, we have fought on the right side, and the progressive movement will endure and go on to victory. That is what the long-term trends suggest. So let's get the hell out there and fight! I'm phone-banking, travelling to a swing state to do face-to-face canvassing, and donating. What are you doing?