It was probably a bit too much to ask the 435-member Democratic National Committee to admit to their role (as the party apparatus) in the colossal failure to get the candidate the majority of Americans (by 3 million votes) said they wanted as their President. How hard can it be to get the actual winner of the vote inaugurated? I guess if you're the Democratic Party, just because you win the Super Bowl, it doesn't mean you get to wear the Super Bowl ring. That makes sense, right? 435 honchos of the party and none of them had a pencil or a map or the ability to do electoral college math? No one had a plane ticket to give the candidate to visit Wisconsin for seven long months during the campaign? Too busy polishing their "SUPER DELEGATE" plaques on their desks?
So, I get it -- this was not the group that was going to install a Bernie-loving, Detroit-bred, Muslim-American and hardcore successful grassroots organizer who had helped orchestrate turning a Midwestern red state blue a few years ago. They wanted to play it safe and so they picked a decent guy. The good news is that Tom Perez is not a step backward to the old conservative Democratic DLC days. He is not Al Frum. He is a progressive and shares most of Keith Ellison's agenda, just as Hillary had adopted 80% of Bernie's plans. So, not the end of the world, and maybe a surprise to boot down the road. We will hope and pray for this.
Of course, it was not helpful yesterday, before the election of the new chair, that the 435 leaders of the Democratic Party voted against President Obama's ban on the Party taking corporate PAC money. Corporate lobbyists can now write big checks so they can get their pipelines, their TPP trade deals (that cost them the election in the rust belt), and so they can keep the for-profit health insurance industry intact. Not a good sign. The Party still doesn't get it and they clearly don't see the millions in the streets, the thousands packing the town hall meetings or the Capitol Hill switchboards that are still jammed, 37 days in a row now (202-225-3121).
Ok, fine. We'll work with the hand we're dealt. And here's how -- with a very clear message to the old guard of the Democratic leadership: We're not "uniting" with you - you're uniting with US. We, the people, the majority, the Resistance, will LEAD and we enthusiastically welcome you to follow. We will be the ones stopping Trump and we welcome you to watch and learn how a pissed-off majority - who have twice in 16 years seen the winner we elected not being inaugurated - operates. We are fierce, we are relentless and we are right. We have the moral and patriotic wind at our backs because the majority Americans agree with us. We will not "compromise" or find "common ground" with misogynists, racists and haters. We won't give an inch and we will show you how to do that. Nonviolent mass protest. In-person visits and daily calls to our elected representatives. Running for office and throwing some of you who are appeasers and collaborators out. Writing checks to Planned Parenthood and ACLU. Pushing for true universal health care in Blue States where we can get it passed. And convincing the 100 million members of America's largest political party -- The Non-Voters Party -- to join us at the polls in 2018 for a raucous and legally riotous overthrow of the Republican Congress.
So, DNC, watch, listen, and join. Follow our lead. You essentially work for us (although none of us know how it is in this democracy you get picked to be on the DNC, but we have a feeling it has something to do with each of us running for precinct delegate in our neighborhoods, so we'll do that, too!).
Thank you for making Keith Ellison the deputy chair of the party and thank you Keith for also deciding to stay in Congress. Let's help Tom Perez and the executive committee follow the Resistance and use all the means available to them to stop Trump and do good for the country.
Meanwhile, many in the Resistance will become active in their local Democratic Parties, run for local leadership and field candidates for next year's elections. Eventually, that 435-member committee will more closely resemble what the people want. I'll say it again -- how a party like the Democrats could WIN the popular vote in SIX OF THE LAST SEVEN Presidential elections but end up holding ZERO power in ANY branch of government in 2017 is a humiliation of gargantuan proportions. Who's with me in saying "NO MORE!" Let's take the loser "L" off the "D".
~ MICHAEL MOORE
