Screw the intro, I'm going straight into the diary. I'm sharing a lot of what a lot of of other Progressives are feeling today. It's like the stages of death - shock, denial, anger, bargaining, acceptance. That's me except the final stage puts me in the mode of taking a major dose of f-it-all and screw politics once and for all.
I did all the things I was asked. Candidates asked for more money and I gave. Party leaders wanted more support and I did. They wanted me to help GOTV and I helped. The polls made it look like maybe, just maybe, this might not be the blood bath it turned out to be.
And then the election happened and it it was all B.S.
The polling was wrong. Dead wrong. Unbelievably wrong. Mary Burke in a tie with Walker? Not close. Bruce Braley vs Joni pigtesticle Earnst? Nope. Udall in Colorado? Ha. This was a beatdown, one by one. Even Staten Island would prefer a twenty felony congressman than vote Democratic.
I'm not going to mince words. EPIC FAIL. Bottom line is when it comes to elections, facts don't matter. Policies don't matter. And for that matter, the American electorate just doesn't give a flying rat's ass. If they did, they'd get out and do something. Anything. You know, like VOTE. And they just shrugged their collective shoulders and said Bqhatevwr. Well as the saying goes, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. I don't know why I should knock myself out every damn election cycle and donate money to candidates who don't seem to energize people. I know the counter-argument, "but if you don't, you're just conceding to the Koch brothers and the 1%". Well here's a newsflash for ya: It's over. Elizabeth Warren is right when she says the game is rigged. If you want me to get all jazzed up about a HRC run, good luck with that. If you want me to think that the next election starts now and start work on it because the bad guys will be playing defense, well whoopie-doo. They should have been on defense THIS election. We had the facts on our side, but when push came to shove, Democrats ran away.
The way everything's going, everything we try to do winds up meaning absolutely jack squat. The public voted for the government they wanted, for worse or for worser. Life is short and I don't have time for this.