For all of you who were involved, who may feel demoralized, I truly believe that Wisconsin has shown us the way. As the title says, Wisconsin changed my life. Here's how.
Okay, I'll just get down to brass tacks. Here's what I learned. It'll sound obvious, but, like I said, it changed my life: Two-party politics is special interest politics. As an individual in a political party you are nothing. You must be part of an organized special interest group.
This sounds really obvious, but I honestly didn't really understand this before. Not fully. Not like I understand it now.
I am a lifelong Democrat. My grandfather - a die-hard union member - used to say of our family: "We're 49er fans, Democrats and Catholics. In that order." The 49er part was a joke, but the Democrats before Catholics part was dead serious.
I thought Democrats represented the interests of working class and middle class people. I knew the decline of the unions hurt the working and middle class, but I still thought voting Democrat and supporting Democratic candidates was the key. If I ever had any doubt about that - as I occasionally did - my doubts were stamped out by the horrible Nader experience in 2000. To this day, I can get teared up thinking about what might have been if Al Gore had become the 43rd President.
So, any nagging doubts about Democrats or the two-party system were forced to the back of my mind. Sometime back I read something in Mother Jones that has nagged me:
American politicians don't care much about voters with moderate incomes. Princeton political scientist Larry Bartels studied the voting behavior of US senators in the early '90s and discovered that they respond far more to the desires of high-income groups than to anyone else. By itself, that's not a surprise. He also found that Republicans don't respond at all to the desires of voters with modest incomes. Maybe that's not a surprise, either. But this should be: Bartels found that Democratic senators don't respond to the desires of these voters, either. At all.
What? Nothing? Nothing from the Democrats? I think in my heart I knew this was true - I sensed that no one cared (I remember seeing the bankruptcy legislation that huge banks pushed through - it had overwhelming bi-partisan support). But usually I convinced myself that it was the Republicans - Democrats (like Obama) really wanted to help, they just couldn't. Their hands were tied. I don't believe that anymore. Democrats and Republicans alike respond to the special interests that fund them and that elect them. Period. End of story. The rare exception (Bernie Sanders, Russ Feingold) proves the rule.
And I realized that the only reason we have ANYTHING left is because of the few special interest groups that are fighting for them. The AFL-CIO, the Teacher's Union, the AARP - this is the only thing that keeps anything for the bottom 99%.
And then in Wisconsin, I saw what is possible. If the unions and progressive groups could come together, we could do something. Wisconsin was ad hoc - it was a ragtag of several groups thrown together on the fly. But the blueprint is there and I truly believe we could do better. If we could organize nationally - not behind a party, but behind these groups - there's a chance. And I truly, truly believe it is the only chance. It is our only way forward. Our money, our time and our votes must go to the organizations, not to a party or to politicians. We vote as the group tells us to vote. If the group tells us to march, we march. The group can give money to the party and politicians in exchange for something real - not just a hope that they want to do what is right. Supporting organizations and only organizations is the only hope we have, but I could see in Wisconsin that it is a real hope.
The vision I have is for disparate groups - who are each losing individually - coming together. Not necessarily merging, but agreeing to collective action. Like an alliance of labor and progressive groups that can organize and mobilize our money, our manpower and our votes. That could make a difference. But just voting Democrat will never ever do it. It's just not how the two-party system works. And Citizens United ups the ante.
I am not a Democrat any longer. I will give my money, my time and my votes to unions and progressive organizations. And I will continue to convince everyone I can that these groups must come together and make the Democratic Party legislate to our interests and make them pay when they don't.
And that is how Wisconsin changed my life.
Stay strong Wisconsin. Keep fighting and we'll keep fighting with you.