Electability

I was appalled when, on Wednesday morning, I read this headline in the Post & Courier:

Democrat Archie Parnell, who once beat his ex-wife, easily wins SC primary

No, it wasn't glaring red, but it might as well have been.

Sadly, it doesn't take much to get to this point when our own Democrats are so willing to jump in and push good candidates -- and elected officials -- off the ship.  Bakari Sellers, who has turned from a decent and caring public servant to a famous celebrity, was among the first to try to shame Parnell into stepping down.  Either no skeletons in his closet, or no plans to run for office.

Apparently, republicans have realized that all they need to do is to dig up (or invent) some dirt on a candidate who threatens their feifdom, and then step back and let us Dems pummel that candidate into the ground.  Lordy, the best they could come up with was college party videos of Jon Ossoff, who scared the crap out of republicans in Georgia last year.  They couldn't have done it without us.  While most Dems continued to stand by Ossoff, enough backed away to give his republican opponent the win.  That's all it takes.  Remember Hillary?  Thirty years of republicans flinging mud, with James Comey putting the icing on the cake and leaving him, and us, with feelings of nausea -- and with Donald Trump.

Focus, Democrats!  Focus on the issues here, because we stand to lose good candidates who MIGHT JUST WIN unless we get distracted by rumor, innuendo and the occasional irrelevant fact.

We are the party where we stand by people who have had tough times in their lives, made horrible mistakes, and come out better for it.  We don't need to support people who live bigotry and misogyny; we can leave that to the republicans.  We have enough good Democrats who will fight for us.  But we have to accept that they may be flawed.

We need to stop looking for the perfect candidate, because that is our Achilles heel:  the strength that becomes our vulnerability.

In fact, we don't even have the ability to look a gift horse in the mouth and say, "Aw, thanks."  As when our own Dimitri Cherny made the outrageous decision to run against Mark Sanford in the republican primary.  It was hilarious to watch the republicans (who have used the open primary system against us a number of times) squeal about how unfair it was.  What wasn't as much fun was watching our own party have conniptions over what they saw as Dimitri jumping ship.

Because in the cold light of day, there was absolutely nothing for us to lose in Dimitri's candidacy.  At best he might topple the horrible Mark Sanford, who has been like a piece of chewing gum stuck to the feet of South Carolina for decades.  At worse, he would... what?  lose?  In fact, he did lose, but the three percent of votes that he got just might have been what lost Sanford his cushy job.  To that I say, "Thanks, Dimitri."  Of course, now we need to garner some enthusiasm for Joe Cunningham instead of cowering over the fact that he will be running against a right-wing wacko Trump supporter.

Meanwhile, the DCCC, in an effort to prove their irrelevance once again, is currently sniffing around, looking to put the money they suck from us whenever they can into candidates that are "electable."  It saddens me to say that Nancy Pelosi, once my hero, is now so desperate to win in November that she is leading the charge against candidates that may be too progressive to be electable.  Pelosi: once a progressive firebrand herself, the woman who held the damn bag of cats that was the Democratic House together to pass Obamacare.  I have until this recent news defended Nancy with every breath I had, and continue to believe that it is ageism and misogyny that has been behind the push to push her from her position of party leader in the House.  And yet this picture of Pelosi seeking to support Democrats who appear safe -- electable -- and pass on those who aren't afraid to talk about significant change, that is the real threat to the Democratic Party and our success in taking back Congress.

We had Bernie "the socialist" shake things up in 2016.  In 2017, among other headline wins, Danica Roem became the first transgender elected official.  People are electing Muslims and gays without fear these days.  And yet we continue to have a party afraid to support "progressive" candidates.

On the other side, we had a child molester in Alabama who nearly beat an amazing Democratic candidate.  Thankfully, Doug Jones didn't have any scandals that could have been dug up.  And don't forget the current "president" of the United States, who ran happily on being capable of every possible crime that could be committed (including shooting someone on Fifth Avenue). While good Democrats stayed away from Hillary, muttering about "emails," "Benghazi," and never proven financial crimes.

I don't know how much more proof we need that voters want radical change.  They want to hear about their own lives and needs.  Donald Trump didn't win (he really didn't) on grabbing pussy.  He won because he lied about giving everyone health insurance and good jobs.  And now we have solid proof that the republican party has not only failed in those goals, they have actively legislated killing health care and job creation.  They convinced some of us that a $14.00 a week increase in our paychecks was a win, but psychotic economic policies have caused the price of gas to go up over $1 a gallon since the maniac-in-chief took office.  Social services are being cut to fatten the pockets of Trump, Ryan and McConnell, and all their rich buddies.  Trade wars with our once-friends will eat up more of our miserable incomes while Jeff Sessions and the cabinet of deplorables works to make sure that, from education to employment, we won't have a chance at a level playing field.

Archie Parnell is serious about winning this thing.  And he is damn close.  All it takes for him to lose is friends like Bakari Sellers, and us.

I did not support Parnell in his special election primary last year.  Rather I supported a young, smart, African American woman.  Big name Democrats came out in droves for Parnell, because he was "electable."  It is a shame that we do that to ourselves, keep women and minorities from representing us because we are afraid they won't win.  Talk about your vicious circle.  But when he was chosen, he became by far the best candidate, and I continue to wholeheartedly support him.  I'm glad he has the guts to stay with it, rather than hand this victory to the republicans.

On June 13, BuzzFeed published this friggin' headline:

National And State Democrats Won’t Support Archie Parnell In South Carolina

“What Archie Parnell did is inexcusable and deeply disturbing, and he should drop out of this race immediately.”

Well, there's a surprise.

Farther down in the article was a video posted on Facebook by Parnell.  The same video was published by the Post & Courier before the primary, and before their egregious post-primary headline.  I would like to post the video here, but can't do it from Facebook.  I urge you to listen to Archie talk about his decision to continue to run, in its entirety.  This is the kind of candidate we should throw our support behind, enthusiastically.

You know what, we might get hoodwinked.  But at some point we need to trust what we see with our own eyes.  And if we don't, for sure we will be the ones to lose.

With Friends Like These...

It has been tough enough fighting the forces of evil lately.  But just in the past couple of days we have been hit upside the head by our own Democratic Party.  Multiple times.  Let me just regale you with three items in the news.  Hang on to your hats, friends.

Shock #1

My hero, John Lewis, just last year led a sit-in in the House of Representatives, to protest the refusal of republican leadership to allow a vote on gun control legislation.

You may recall that, during the Memorial after the horrific shooting in Charleston, a call for gun control received a standing ovation -- except for Tim Scott and Nikki Haley, notably sitting front and center.  Scott receives the complete support of the NRA, with an "A" rating.

I haven't lived in South Carolina long (in southern time:  only 18 years).  But Tim Scott and I go back to when I was working at my beloved Charleston County Public Library and he was on County Council.  In the economic destruction of the Bush years, here in Charleston, Tim Scott voted to drastically cut funding for our award-winning library.  The library that teachers in a perennially exhausted school system used to provide the best books to their students, the library that provided an amazing collection to those of us who would never have had that kind of access to literature and science -- Tim Scott voted to slash the budget.

And last week, Tim Scott sat smiling broadly next to Donald Trump as he bloviated about how he was going to get the Senate to pass the health care bill.  And then Scott voted to do Trump's bidding and take health care away from millions of Americans.

That Tim Scott, that is the person who John Lewis has just awarded the John Lewis--Amo Houghton Leadership Award for Faith and Leadership.  Okay, I understand that this is an award given by a group that is committed to non-partisanship.  And I know it is hard these days to find a republican that hasn't compromised himself to hell to follow the leaders of his party.  But Tim Scott???  Yes, he will go on about his faith at the drop of a hat.  But there isn't a damn way you can call him a leader.

Shock #2

And then yesterday I learned that the DCCC had formalized its desperate need to seek the support of the Trump voter by stating that they would support candidates who were anti-abortion.

I imagine that wimpy Tom Perez is hiding behind Bernie Sanders on that one.  Bernie, you may recall, failed us big time when he threw his support behind anti-abortion mayoral candidate Heath Mello in April.  Let me clarify my take on this.  Bernie Sanders had the clout to offer to support Mello if he changed his position on reproductive rights.  Mello didn't have to say he "believed" in abortion; it would have been enough to say that he supported a woman's right to make her own choice.  But he did not.  Despite appeals from women and women's groups, Bernie stood firm in throwing women under the bus to support an otherwise progressive candidate.

So, with Bernie's transgression as inspiration, the Democrats went on a highly suspect Democratic "listening tour." Suspect because it doesn't appear the Democrats are listening to anybody but their own fearful conservative leaders.  Hillary may have won the popular vote by three million, obscenely gerrymandered voting districts and horrendous voter suppression laws may have resulted in Dems winning the vote and losing Congress, but to our Democratic leaders, what we need to do is compromise our values in order to win.  The Democratic Party is like an abused spouse, promising ever more vehemently to behave each time they are struck.

Compare and contrast this to the republican party, which has maintained their leadership by promising to derail the programs that best serve their constituents.  The difference?  They really, really believe in what they stand for.  Tom Perez and the DCCC, not so much.  It has been nice to see the recent squabbles among republicans when faced with the psychotic behavior of the head of their party, but don't forget, only three republicans voted against the despicable Senate health care bill.

And with Democrats supporting anti-choice candidates, who will they compromise next?  Look around folks, because all of us have our vulnerabilities.  LGBTQ, affirmative action, gun control, unions....  basically, all the groups that the Democratic Party is supposed to protect and represent.  The sad thing about this, other than leaving us all hanging out to dry, is that it won't work.  Bigotry-lite will never have the appeal of outright right-wing bigotry.  And the thing about the Democratic Party is that they are just aware enough of what they are doing to be embarrassed by it.  They will never stand strong no matter what they say they stand for, and then they will still be attacked for being Harvard/Goldman Sachs elites.  And when that happens, they will blush and deny it.

With the "listening tour" party sorely in need of a hearing aid, I have taken to firing back at fund-raising emails, saying that there is no way on this still-green earth that I will throw money down that toilet.  I do try to say it in a more civilized manner.  The other thing I do, and I encourage y'all to do both, is tweet @WhicheverDemIsBeingAWuss to let them know you won't support them unless they shape up.  And then send your money and your support to all those great candidates who stand up for all of us.  The DCCC may have forgotten what the Women's March and Indivisible are all about, but we remember, and we will continue to stand together.

Shock #3

And speaking of standing together, I glanced at Twitter today and saw one from Bakari Sellers that wasn't really shocking as much as saddening.  So I replied.

Here in Bakari's state of South Carolina, the Democratic Party just passed over a highly qualified, politically active and successful woman (white) to go out of state to choose a white man to lead the party, which was at the time being led by a black man.

But you don't have to be a white woman to be passed over by Democrats.  In 2014, Joyce Dickerson ran in a primary for US Senator against newly appointed Tim Scott.  She was told by our own Jim Clyburn that she should step aside and let the two men fight out the primary.  Well, with her powerful voice and message, she won the primary, but you wouldn't know it by the help and support she got from her party.

And just this year our state party put their thumb on the scale of the special election for US House seat for District 5.  They unabashedly backed a rich white guy over a young black woman.  And they had help from a bunch of big-name out-of-state Democrats.  Wasn't a day I could check my email or visit Facebook without seeing that white guy's face or a fund-raising email from Robby Mook or Daniel Barash -- again, before the primary.  And yet, that woman who ran without national or state support had a strong message and strong community support; in a three-way race, she got some 22 percent of the vote.

So let's not inject a white woman bias into this debate, okay? 

Here is the thing.  The republicans have been able to pit us against each other for decades.  We have all been victimized by an unfettered capitalist system run by rich white men.  Republicans in the positions of greatest power don't really give a damn about abortion or even the threat of terrorism -- you only have to look at how blase they have been at Trump regime's national security transgressions to know saving the nation is not what they are all about.  What they care about is power, maintaining and growing that power.  And they do that by making people scared and angry -- at each other.

And boy-o, Dems are an easy target.  We are still fighting over Bernie versus Hillary.  And when we argue over who has been the most victimized, they score an easy win.

So, let me say again, let's not do that.  And let's tell the Democratic Party that they had better stick by ALL of us.  And let's keep supporting our great progressive candidates.  We have proven that we don't need the Democratic Party if we have the community.  And with our social network, our community is the entire country.  And these days, much of the world is behind us.

Women marched together, not for one cause or another, but for all of us who are suffering from the callousness and greed of the wealthy and powerful.  And men marched too.  You could march with us even if you were anti-abortion -- you just couldn't march for that with us, because that would have gone against the whole reason for the march.  This is about all the individual rights and freedoms that are being systematically taken away.  Jefferson Sessions might don his white hood and come after Muslims today, but tomorrow he will find time to go after sick people who use marijuana to ease the pain, and the day after that he will get to interment camps for Mexicans, and then young women using birth control, and yes, Bakari, affirmative action.

The Democratic Party needs to be reminded what they say they stand for:  individual rights and freedom for all.  We don't need a party to get behind a great candidate, but we can get their attention and refocus them on who they claim to be.

Some Last Thoughts (Before I Vote)

Unsurprisingly, in the last day before the midterm money leads by, well, a lot.

Take Lindsey Graham, for example.  Graham has proven that he is slick and, I have to say, pretty creepy.  He can sit back and sound like your kindly uncle who knows what is best and well, he's just going to do it, because it's good for you.  Like increasing the social security retirement age.  But don't forget that he has also taken some unpopular stands and went up against a slew of opponents in the primaries and, well, he slew them all.  Why?  Because he's willing to work with those on the other side.  Huh.  Of course, like that wise old uncle, he tells you that you're going to have to give something up as well.

Here's the thing you need to remember about Lindsey Graham:  he is a manipulative s.o.b.  He actually said, in his moderate voice, that the reason we needed to vote for him is that it will take a republican to work with the crazy republicans that keep blocking progress in Congress.  And in case you thought you had heard him wrong, he said it again.

And then there is the megalomaniac Tim Scott, who sees himself as sent by God (in the guise of Nikki Haley).  He is dumber than dirt, and maybe even dumber than his predecessor, Jim DeMint, but he has been polished to a shine even brighter than his nice suit.  People I actually know think he is smart, and that he sounds good in public.  Maybe I just haven't been around enough to see him preaching to his congregation.  But I listened to the debate, and he may have been rehearsed, but he was wooden, as though even he didn't believe his stock phrases anymore.  And I saw his ad, the one where he brags on pretending to work next to "everyday people," of whom he apparently no longer counts himself.  And I've heard his lies, like about how he voted to reduce the interest on student loans.

And then there is Nikki Haley.  Smarmy and flirty, who has wowed all the big bucks, basically because she will do absolutely anything they want her to do, and even more.  South Carolina under her watch has sold itself to big corporations and refused to feed, insure and educate its poor.  She has worked to deny those who might oppose her right wing plans the right to vote, and she has cost us millions of dollars to fight this battle in court.  She is mean-spirited and vindictive, and she can flash a phony smile better than just about anybody I know.

Then we have idiots like Mike Fair, who wears his stupidity with pride and calls it faith.  He single-handedly stopped our state legislature from moving health and sex education into the 21st century because the old ways are good enough for him.  Of course, he and fellow idiot Kevin Bryant also provided us with better comedy than you can find on cable TV when they argued for putting the Bible in the Columbian mammoth bill.  

But we've also got a few tough choices, but choices nonetheless, and some where we have to hold our noses to give it our best shot, and some where that doesn't even help.  Parenthetically, when someone distasteful is running unopposed, or unhappily you just can't vote for either candidate, don't leave that space blank.  Write-in "None of the Above" so your vote will count.

Do not despair, though, because we do have some good choices, and even some very good choices.

We don't have to let Mark Sanford breeze by without opposition, because Dimitri Cherny is running as a write-in independent candidate.  He's a good man, and I would love to see Sanford's face if Cherny with no financial backing or name recognition made a decent showing.  

Brad Hutto has fought against great odds to unseat Lindsey Graham.  What I like about Hutto is that he is not trying to hide the fact that he is a Democrat, and that he supports the Affordable Care Act, and even President Obama.  It took guts (and I hear some persuasion by the state party) for him to agree to step up.

Bakari Sellers is running for Lieutenant Governor, and he is smart and caring.  He has traveled around the small towns in South Carolina introducing himself to people and talking about what he can do to improve life for South Carolinians.  He has been endorsed by Charleston Mayor Riley, among many others.  I have to say that I watched the debate, and Bakari's comments were a breath of fresh air compared to those of his opponent, you know, the guy who thinks we should all volunteer for service jobs so people like him don't have to pay taxes.

I haven't mentioned Gloria Tinubu here because she is not running in Charleston or for a state-wide office, but she is an amazing woman running for Congress in the 7th district.  She is brilliant and outspoken, and although she lost in 2012, she is determined that she is going to try again so that she can fight for her district, the state and the country in Congress.  If you know anybody from the 7th district, tell them to by all means get out and vote for Gloria.

Last but certainly not least, Joyce Dickerson has had to fight to be heard throughout this race.  She has run on a shoestring, and in spite of the lukewarm support of the Democratic party (famous for failing to support good candidates in past years).  She won the primary against two male candidates in spite of suggestions by male Democratic leaders that maybe she should step aside.  She is not just the underdog in this race against Tim Scott, but she is the underdog that we should all be fighting for.

Joyce Dickerson will not be swayed by power or money.  She knows who her constituents are in South Carolina:  the struggling middle class, seniors, veterans, children.  She knows the issues:  low wages, lack of health insurance, failing schools, unemployment, crumbling roads, student loan debt.  There isn't one of us who would not benefit by having Joyce fighting for us in the Senate.

It was a big step, going from Richland County Council to the U.S. Senate.  But, unlike Tim Scott, she is doing it without the dollars and support of corporations, lobbyists, and of course, Governor Nikki Haley, who gifted the seat to him two years ago.  And unlike Nikki Haley, she is a woman who will fight for women, and her candidacy has made me proud.

So, I'm happy to say, we do have lots of reasons to vote.  It may be that many of these great candidates don't win because they are fighting enormous odds.  But they have fought, and it has cost them a huge chunk of their lives, and people have contributed to their campaigns because they believed in the message, and that we need this change.

Given all that, the very least we can do on November 4 is vote.  And bring some friends and family members.  And if enough of us turn out, well, you never know....