These Are The Times

[NanceGreggs]

I have rarely posted here over the past four months – not due to lack of interest, but due to a desire to step back and analyze what is being posted here, and why.

I am known as a “cheerleader” for this Administration (and don’t taze me, Mod bros, for having invoked a term considered taboo). The truth is that I have chosen to opine on the positives of this president and his administration – a personal choice that in no way denotes the sense of “worship” that I, along with others, have been accused of.

I do not opine on this Administration’s position on education – because there are teachers here who are vastly more knowledgeable than I on the subject. And I defer to their better judgment on how such policies impact not only on their ability to teach, but the students they hope to educate.

I do not opine on the need for electoral reform, environmental issues, GBLT rights – and a myriad of other topics – because we have among us experts in the fields; i.e. people who have made such subjects a cause celebre, and know (far better than I) whereof they speak.

I believe we have often confused support for this Presidency as blind acquiescence – just as often as we’ve confused valid criticism of its policies as unsupported bashing. The sincere among us (on both “sides”, if you will) often raise our voices out of hot-headed passion rather than cooler heads being allowed to prevail. And vice-versa.

I have raised two children, and have supported them throughout. Although I may have disagreed (vehemently at times) with their choice of career, companions, lifestyle, education, career opportunities, etc., my support has been unwavering. Support does not always equal agreement with every choice – just as criticism does not always equal a complete withdrawal of support. It is a distinction with a difference – and I believe a lot of us (myself included) have failed miserably in discerning the difference between the two. Supporting the current Administration does not equate to agreement with its every decision; criticism of this Administration does not equate to bashing. We would all be wise to note the difference.

There are those among us (and I’m not naming names, but I think the vast majority of us know who they are) who have consistently posted only the most negative of comments, article excerpts, op-eds they can find on the internetz and the MSM, in order to quash optimism and dissuade voters from thinking that their vote matters.

There are those among us who have labelled themselves as representative of “true progressives’, “true leftists”, “true Democrats”, and have, in the doing, labelled all of those who disagree with their every agenda item as somehow being less worthy, less valid, less sincere in our efforts to see this country move forward rather than backward, as though such labels – self-proclaimed and self-affixed – are to be accepted without question, or factual support.

We are – and always have been, forever and ever, amen – the party of the Big Tent. Our strength has always been not our sameness, but our diversity; our sweeping inclusion of the centrists, the moderately-left, the extreme left, and everyone who falls within the scope of those who desire change for the better, immediate or painstakingly gradual, as the case may be.

“You’re either with us or against us.” It’s a phrase that, once uttered by one G.W. Bush, immediately fell into disrepute. Accepted as a RW talking point and nothing more, it lost its true meaning as a rallying cry for those of us who, on the left, pose it as a valid question. You are either with us or against us – you are either with the Democrats who, with all of their failings and flaws, are for progress – or you are with those who would see our nation move backwards in opposition to every step forward the Democrats have made, no matter how slight you might perceive such steps to be.

There are times when we must choose our battles – not only against the “other side”, but amongst ourselves. There are times when we must, as a widely diverse group, speak up as individuals – and there are times when we must speak with one voice.

The time to speak as one is now.

Speak up in November. Or forever hold your piece – for what it’s worth after-the-fact.

“I told you so” may warrant kudos on certain websites, populated by those who deem themselves to be (despite all numbers to the contrary), the “real voice” of the Party – as though there is some victory to be found in the defeat of those who purport to be the “base” thereof.

You’re either with the Democratic Party, or you’re against it.

Pick. A. Fuckin'. Side.