A letter in the Wednesday Post-Dispatch deserves comment.

For whom does Sen. Blunt work?

Shame on U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., for choosing to stand on the side of powerful corporations instead of working for the people who elected him (“Blunt blasts EPA for Ameren lawsuit,” Jan. 14).

Members of Congress have the moral responsibility to protect the health and safety of all Americans, and this includes keeping cancer-causing pollutants out of our air.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, despite attacks on it from people like Mr. Blunt, works to keep our air and water clean enough to sustain life. Scientists at the EPA know that in an average year a typical coal plant emits almost 4 million tons of carbon dioxide, not to mention doses of arsenic, mercury, lead and other heavy metals.

So when Ameren chooses its own wealth over our well being, our elected official should be outraged. Instead, the relationship between many of our elected representatives and corporate lobbyists has become almost incestuous.

We should ask Mr. Blunt if he works for us or for Ameren Missouri.

[italics mine]

Note that the letter writer has been listening to the advice dished out on this site by sarah jo, who summarized the Core Progressive Message, including this:

Progressives believe that the benefits of economic production should be shared by those who actually do the work and produce the wealth, not just by shareholders and top executives.

Progressives believe that the moral mission of government includes the protection and empowerment of citizens.  Protection includes education of all of its citizens,  defense against inhumane working conditions, medical care when needed,  access to safe food, air and water,  and a national defense and intelligence infrastructure commensurate with changing world conditions.

Sarah jo, a student of George Lakoff, recommends that whenever we criticize the right we should ALWAYS BEGIN BY STATING THE UNDERLYING MORALITY OF OUR POSITION. If you look at the italicized passages, you’ll see that the letter writer has done that. When it comes to effective communication with those who aren’t already in one’s own camp, Republicans have spent billions to give themselves a Ph.D. in mass psychology and linguistics. We’re in the second grade. But you get to skip a grade if you develop the presence of mind to always state the underlying morality of your position whenever you are presenting the lefty point of view. I’m going to do that–and bask in being a fourth grader.

Of course, most of the readers on this site implicitly understand that morality already, so I won’t be informing you of something you didn’t know. But, and here’s the thing, I suspect that we need to see this linguistic paradigm practiced. That’s the only way that the need for making our morality explicit to others will sink in. Otherwise, if you just read about it once, the admonition will strike you as “Yeah, yeah, she’s probably right.” And the idea will go no further.

This is an experiment. I don’t know whether I’ll find it too klunky to do it faithfully on this site. But I’ll try it, and I invite you to let me know how well you think it works–or doesn’t. (My sensibilities aren’t delicate. Speak up.)  

Last week, sarah jo posted a diary that I think needs more attention than it got.  Mr. Temporiti, members of the state committee: Is anybody listening?

Let’s Keep it Going

by: sarah jo

Mon Nov 24, 2008 at 15:33:37 PM CST    

From what I’m hearing and reading, there are a lot of Obama supporters eager and willing to charge into the next phase of party building in Missouri.  Now that we’ve been trained to ID voters, discuss their issues and persuade them to vote for Obama, why let the fire go out?  Why not set up permanent Democratic offices around the state with the goal of continuing to build party support, recruiting and grooming candidates for 2010, and pitching in to support President Obama and Governor Nixon when their policies and ideas are attacked by the other side?

There must be a way to coordinate with the party’s state-level apparatus other than just access to the VAN (although that IS a really neat system.)  What if we could talk the state committee into budgeting some funds for basic things like rent, utilities, internet connection, etc.  Groups with at least some track record and decent organizational skills could apply for grants, e.g., $12,000 per year, spelling out their goals and timetables.  E.g., Identifying a set number of Democrats in a specific geographical area.  OR sponsoring monthly or quarterly political events/fundraisers.  Or setting up committees like those proposed by former Chair of the Mo Party, Roger Wilson.  That was a good idea, but nothing came of it.  If there are new volunteers joining local clubs and central committees who have great ideas, why not nurture them by providing a physical space for them to meet and work?  AND a permanent, year-round local phone number easily accessed by phone book or online.  

If we’ve learned nothing else from Howard Dean and Barack Obama, we’ve learned that “top of the ticket” candidates getting all the resources doesn’t work.  Building the party from the bottom up does.  Does anyone else think it’s worth approaching the state committee about this?

Here are three comments from the original diary:

Half the battle is showing up  

Contact your local party committee (the officers, by county, are on the MDP web site), roll up your sleeves, and get started. In some places there already is a year around presence.

There are also some web sites for local groups on the MDP web site.

543,895 votes

by: Michael Bersin @ Mon Nov 24, 2008 at 15:47:48 PM CST

local dem groups

Michael,

Thank you for the information, but I am already “showing up.”  I am a central committee woman in Franklin County and served as office manager at our campaign hdqs in Union from July to November.

What I’m asking is how the state and national party officials will support keeping the local groups going. We have many creative, passionate new volunteers now but central committee officers who don’t know how to get them involved. These officers were just re-elected in August for another two-year term.  Their intentions are good, but they just are not good at getting people organized into work groups.  So the committee members themselves are forming new sub-committees to do things like fill the vacancies on the central committee, brainstorm ways of recruting and supporting viable candidates for 2010, etc.  If there were some help from the state level to fund a physical space for us to do this work, we’d have a much better shot at keeping these wonderful new activists.  Obviously this is being discussed nationally – see below.

Mon Nov 24, 2008 6:15 pm (PST)

Huffington Post

How Dems Can Keep Party Going

November 24, 2008

The sweeping victories enjoyed by the Democratic Party this November have been credited to three major catalysts: Barack Obama, for his campaign and fundraising efforts; the campaign committees, for their influential fifty-state-strategy; and President Bush, for producing the most opposition-friendly political climate since Richard Nixon.

These post-election acknowledgments ignore one crucial factor. In the past two years the progressive movement has built an infrastructure that, while still in its relatively nascent stages, can be tremendously influential.

Groups like Progressive Accountability, CAP Action Fund, National Security Network, Women’s Voices Women’s Vote, Brave New Films and others (many of them unions), went largely unheralded during the election cycle. But behind the scenes, they put in place a system that churned up opposition research, helped influence the media, charted out the electoral landscape, and was often seamless in delivering a message. In short, they beat the GOP at its own game.

And yet, weeks after their work is finished, there is uncertainty about what’s next.

The Obama team has the resources to maintain its strategic advantages. The DNC is committed to continuing the 50-state-strategy even after Howard Dean’s departure. But Democratic officials are still exploring ways to ensure that an infrastructure that took more than a decade to assemble remains intact.

“The Democratic Party now has, for the first time in a generation, superior infrastructure and really good research,” Paul Begala, a famed strategist who often worked with these groups, told me a few weeks ago. “As a Democrat I want the party to continue to do that. And I feel very confident that they will. If you believe, as I do, that politics is about ideas, how you argue and channel those ideas matters most. It is more important than knocking on doors, because once you knock on a door and someone answers what do you tell them?”

The benefits of a stable infrastructure — which includes outside groups, shared data, coordinated communications, and systems that harness young talent — are painfully clear. Beyond keeping voters active, it can give the party tremendous leverage over both lawmakers and the press. A veteran of the Clinton years recalled how each day during that administration, Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robertson “were echoing the RNC’s talking points and we were beaten to the punch.”

“We didn’t have a capacity to get out there on a moment’s notice,” he added. “We didn’t have our ‘own’ media.”

——————————————————————————–

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. WE are the ones we’ve been waiting for. WE are the change that we seek.” Barack Obama

by: sarah jo @ Tue Nov 25, 2008 at 07:25:36 AM CST

The new state Democratic committee…

…was elected on November 22nd. Contact the MDP to get their contact information (the folks from the 2006-2008 term are listed on-line now). Write or call those folks to let them know what you’d like them to do. Missouri DNC members were elected to four year terms at the state Democratic Convention earlier this year. Let them know what you’ve got on your mind.

543,895 votes

by: Michael Bersin @ Tue Nov 25, 2008 at 10:09:52 AM CST

Sarah jo has an excellent diary, “A Hug from Barack”, about her encounter with Barack Obama at the bbq in Union, MO on Wednesday. I read it right after reading this letter that a Democratic friend of mine had received online and forwarded to me:

Hello everyone,

As you know I am not a very political person. I just wanted to pass along that Senator Obama came to Bagram Afghanistan for about an hour on his visit to ‘The War Zone’. I wanted to share with you what happened.

He got off the plane and got into a bullet proof vehicle, got to the area to meet with the Major General (2 Star) who is the commander here at Bagram.

As the Soldiers where lined up to shake his hand he blew them off and didn’t say a word as he went into the conference room to meet the General. As he finished, the vehicles took him to the ClamShell (pretty much a big top tent that military personnel can play basketball or work out in with weights) so he could take his publicity pictures playing b asketball. He again shunned the opportunity to talk to Soldiers to thank them for their service.

         

So really he was just here to make a showing for the American’s back home that he is their candidate for President. I think that if you are going to make an effort to come all the way over here you would thank those that are providing the freedom that they are providing for you.

I swear we got more thanks from the NBA Basketball Players or the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders than from one of the Senators, who wants to be the President of the United States. I just don’t understand how anyone would want him to be our Commander-and-Chief. It was almost that he was scared to be around those that provide the freedom for him and our great country.    

If this is blunt and to the point I am sorry but I wanted you all to know what kind of caliber of person he really is. What you see in the news is all fake.

In service,

CPT Jeffrey S. Porter

Battle Captain

TF Wasatch

American Soldier

When I read this “letter”, I thought, this screams fake to me. Sure it’s signed, but checking out whether such a soldier exists would be so difficult that it might as well be anonymous. And the negative picture he paints of Obama sounds like just the sort of scummy lie McCain supporters would love to promulgate.

Then I read the account of Barack in Union. Readers, I know sarah jo. If she says this happened, then it did, and it happened the way she described it. I figured if her account was accurate, then the one from the “soldier” was bogus. And sure enough, our editor, Clark, found it debunked on Snopes.com.

Republicans always fight dirty, but expect this campaign to be worse than usual. In fact, Obama just put up a site called Low Road Express that will keep people updated on the latest lies, as they are reported in the mainstream media.

Keep your antennae aquiver because we’re going to have more than a modicum of Republican dirty tricks.