Why are you a Democrat?

I am a democrat for voting purposes. I am a progressive in my heart. My head is a realist. I’m 61 in 16 days. I grew up in union family. I went to a (Northern) Methodist church. I only specify Northern, because I don’t know what Southern Methodists are like. I am no longer a Methodist, or anything for that matter. In my church, we collected clothes for neighbors who had a fire in their house. We worked meals on wheels to assist the elderly. we would have evangelists come around once in a while, but I only remember hearing stories about love, and helping each other. This was the early 60’s. I cannot comment on the state of the Methodist church today. In my day, there was no ‘Fire and brimstone” In my church. There was love, empathy, and tenderness. If you asked, you would be forgiven.

At my grade school, there were about 20 white kids, and about 6 black kids. But they were just kids we grew up with. 55 years later, if I run into LJ, I squeal and hug her, because she was one of my friends.

I grew up in a union household. I guess, I have never wanted much, except for fairness for everyone. Love for everyone. Peace for everyone

I am not a Democrat, because I am not an American citizen 😁

I support the nearly-defunct British Labour party.

I'm a Socialist because I believe that human evolution was enabled by co-operation and mutuality.

The Right seem to work on the principle of "survival of the fittest". Social Darwinism. Raw, unmitigated, competition. Well, we are animals, but we are distinct in our "intelligence".

At the moment, that intelligence seems insufficient, because our embrace of competition is leading our species into destruction.

One thing our state party did after Jane Kleeb became the state Democratic Party chair from her successful campaign against the Keystone XL Pipeline, was to launch a programme sending cards to every voter to let them know who their Democratic candidates were in their area for every office from President to cemetery board.

Since Nebraska elections are by law non-partisan (no party affiliation is allowed on ballots or candidate campaign materials, except for federal office), that helped Democratic voters sort out the crypto-conservatives, particularly in areas where political coverage is very thin. (Amongst other things, that helped us flip our school board to Democratic control.)

One side note about Nebraska state senator Megan Hunt. When she announced her first candidacy for Legislative District 8, she filled in a "get to know your candidates" survey form for the Omaha World-Herald. In that, she outed herself as an atheist.

That came to the attention of Hemant Mehta (The Friendly Atheist), who invited her on a podcast to ask her why she would do such a thing. Being an open atheist (or being outed as one) is usually the kiss-of-death in American politics.

She noted in the podcast she wasn't concerned about Republican reaction: She expected attacks on her for being a single mother and bi. She brought out the atheism in the survey to head off Democratic Party attacks for being an atheist. By putting it out front, she hoped to prevent our own party from attacking her over religion, and she was right.

She got that by observing the election of Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) in his first primary. He took out attack adverts against then-sitting Rep. Pete Stark for being an atheist, and blared them all over California television. Stark was sunk in the primary by Swalwell for being an atheist.

For all the praise Swalwell gets for going after Republicans in the House, if he ever ran for President I could not support him. As a minority "religious" faith, he attacked my community (Pete Stark) for how he worships, not on policy. Swalwell would not get support from me unless he was the last Democrat standing (and only because any Republican would be exponentially worse).

The reason democrats aren’t seemingly able to get things done is republicans are blocking everything they can. As McConnell said when Obama was sworn in, he was going to block everything Obama tried to do so he would look bad and ineffective.

The reality is democrats are getting things done but are slowed by all the other crap republicans throw into our way.

We just have to double down. I will always vote straight tickets now with the finer choices made in the primaries.

It really sucks we have such a large segment of the population so fucked up they vote for Trumps, Ozes, Desantises, Jordans, MTGs, Boeberts, Gaetzes, or Greenes, but that’s what we are stuck with.

We can only do what we can. No matter how hopeless or discouraging anything feels, we still have to vote. Otherwise the bastards win for sure.