More on the revolution

Everyone in the 'sphere has been pointing to the article in the NYT by Matt Bai about the undercurrent of change in the Democratic Party. It's a long article, but a good read. It goes in-depth about what I was trying (not very well) to say in my previous post about the revolution coming to the party. Not just blogging, which was the focus of my post, but the general populist upheaval that's just barely stirring the surface now, but, if the various movements and factions can come together and reach a critical mass, will erupt into not just a tidal wave, but a super tsunami of change. (What? It's a real thing. I saw it on the Discovery Channel once.)

Our party's traditional bastions have been slowly receding in strength/numbers/influence, buckling under a dual assault of relentless right-wing criticism and the ceding of the battle by the Democrats. Republicans have successfully dictated not just the message and terms of the debate, but the definition of our party. And we've let them. Rather than nodding our heads when they label us "liberal" and saying, "Uh, yeah. And your point would be...?", we run away from it like it's a bad word. It's not. But we never get our message out, we let the Republicans shout over us every time we try say what we stand for and instead of telling them to shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down, we get into an argument about semantics and how unfair they're playing. And guess what? Mission accomplished. They've baited and switched. It works every time.

The party's long, loooong overdue for a complete overhaul. We set the message. We set the terms. And goddammit, we define ourselves. And while we're at it, we'll define them, too. Not by turning conservative into a dirty word, but by calling them out on their shit.

More than that, though, it means pushing a progressive agenda -- our agenda -- and putting the Party out front, ahead of the rest, an innovative leader that caters to its constituents. We're the party of the little guy and it's about time we got the word out.