I have to say that my enthusiasm for political activism is seriously dampened when I get a e-mail like this.
Dear Jennifer,
I've been keeping an eye on the numbers coming in this month. Here's where you stand on helping us reach our $150,000 November goal:
Name: Jennifer ** (Not Confirmed)
Supporter record: 423434
Support this month: PENDING
Karl Rove and big-money special interests spent more than $719 million to influence elections last year. When they set their sights on Minnesota, and start attacking Al, we need to be ready. And being ready starts when we hit all of our goals.
The end of November is coming up fast. Before you start getting the turkey ready, chip in $5 or more toward our $150,000 goal to help our grassroots network gear up.
Thank you for being such an active member of TeamFranken.
Emily
Emily Mellencamp Smith
Finance Director
Al Franken for Senate 2014
In other words, I've contributed NOTHING to Al Franken's campaign. I love Al. I want him to be elected for a second term. But I will NOT give money to people under duress, and all the e-mails I've gotten from politicians in the last two years have been begging for money. Why do they think I support them? Because I'm very, very poor. I have no money to give. It makes me think my value as a supporter of Al Franken goes way down without cash support.
And this e-mail in particular is using a trick I've seen with other Democratic political organizations. They're framing it like my credit card statement: Your bill is due, pay up or your Texas textbooks will be filled with creationism lies.
And this goes for all the politicians that have sent me e-mails begging for money. They disguise themselves as online petitions to save this, stop that, vote against, support this... But when you sign the petition, the next page that pops up is a DONATE page.
I know it's politics. Politicians are used to drumming up fear to gain donations for their next campaign. Ted Cruz did it. But when I see Nancy Pelosi's name on something like this, or Barbara Boxer, or my president, Barack Obama, I instantly don't give a rat's ass.
Keep in mind, those of you that help organize finances for politicians, that most of us have no money. We would love to contribute our talents to help the politicians we like get elected, but when we're ranked according to how much money we give, it just means this country slips further into oligarchy.