Do you take politics personally?

[jpgray]

Poll question: Do you take politics personally?

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

1. I give it a qualified YES

While I can disagree and maintain friendships with Republicans, if their approach to policy is so meanspirited as to be bigoted, and they show no signs of honestly approaching the issues then I have no use for that person in my life and they will be gone.

[mdmc]

2. yes

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=382730

[jpgray]

5. DU displays the humility and tact of a pissed off two year-old at times

And each of the "train-wreck" threads (I think they went after every candidate's supporters) is perfect evidence. Tit-for-tat crap that shows an ignorance of such kindergarten principles as the Golden Rule reveals this board to be full of a rare creature--the liberal who is bereft of empathy. :(

[mdmc]

8. I hear you

I sometimes forget how young some of us are.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

16. what's your point?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=382730#382813

Where's the problem?
nothingshocksmeanymore (1000+ posts) Sun Feb-22-04 03:10 PM
Response to Original message

7. Not really. I was kind of sad to see Dean go in a sense


and mostly I just get sick of hearing how he is the only one that can save us so I get a bit bitchy.

"There is no reason why good cannot triumph as

[FloridaPat]

3. I got fired by Reagan in 1981 and now I have to look for another

career because Bush is letting all the programming jobs go overseas. I take it personally because it is personal.

[kurtyboy]

30. Were you part of the ATC strike?

If so, I owe you an apology. I passed picketing controllers on the way to Basic Training in 1981. As I went, I told them, "You're not on strike, you're fired!"

I was an asshole, and I realize, now, how that strike was the start of a long decline in the power of labor unions in The US. I wish I'd known more, and fought more for the workers.

I'm sorry. I was an asshole. Please forgive me.

Now, I will fight for unions' rights, decline to buy in non-union shops, and talk the talk about the importance of collective bargaining.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

4. Yes...

I'm not directly hurt by *'s policies but I am personally offended by what his policies are doing to the republic...


I could have R friends but my girlfriend could never be an R... That's too close....

[mvd]

9. I agree

I could never be married to a neo-con type Republican, or married to a Republican who supports Bush. I take politics personally because it's my country that's affected. Things like music and movies won't make bad policy like Bush and his misadministration do. And people as extreme as Bush can have a negative effect on the lives of most, including me. His policies have hurt the job market, and also it's harder to get started in business. His policies on the enviornment could have easily hurt me by now. Plus, he's acting like a little dictator, trying to restrict the power my views have. His being in power casts a constant dark cloud over me.

[A J]

6. I didn't used to....

but I have had enough. I have made a personal vow not to back down to the misinformed. I think it is honorable to make people less ignorant.

If someone insults my politics, they insult me.

[truthbetold]

7. I definitely do!

To the point where my parents are getting REALLY tired of hearing me yammer on and on...
My mom is awful proud that I'm so into politics though. She thinks I should become a lobbyist.

[mmonk]

10. yep

I take all that the repubs do that does harm personally.

[adadem]

11. I do because

I have a handicapped child and when family or friends vote against candidates who would form policy that could affect my child I take it very, very personally.

[mmonk]

21. me too

my son has a disability.

[RichardRay]

12. Nope, not since Nixon

I was very unhappy with Richard Nixon. Unhappy at a deep, visceral, personal level. Since then I just want to beat the opposition, I no longer need to humiliate them.

[mvd]

13. I understand your point, but..

the neo-cons want to humiliate us. They don't want people like us to exist anymore. They declared war on liberals a long time ago.

[Jai4WKC08]

14. I almost voted no

Almost, because I'm so disgusted with the process and so discouraged with the choices left.

But then I remembered...

"What I did is I answered a call to duty... And I did because every soldier that died in Iraq, I would have felt guilty about the rest of my life had I not come into this race. I've done everything I can to make a difference for the men and women in uniform and for working people around this country." -- Wesley Clark

So yeah, I guess I do still take it personally.

[ulysses]

15. of course.

Politics isn't about some abstraction. It's about our lives and what we want.

[Eloriel]

22. Yes, and I'd go even further

Many of the problems we see in washington, in politics everywhere is precisely due to the fact that the people involved DO NOT take politics "personally." Politics isn't tied up with their value system, like the guy upthread who said he couldn't have a girlfriend who was a Repug. Or the one who talked about changing careers, or the child with a disability, or those of us for whom our political beliefs come out of who we are as human beings, our deepest core values.

The professionals who can change campaigns at a whim, engage in dirty tricks instead of honoring and upholding an already imperfect system, manipulate the process to rig the outcomes, etc. These are where the problems come from -- not from those of us who take politics personally. THEY don't take it personally enough. It's a career, a game, a way to accrue power and influence and little more to these people.

[Leilani]

24. That is really insightful!

I'm amazed at people who change candidates like a pair of socks.
Supporting a candidate is an emotional committment for me, & so
yeah, I really do take it personally.

What truly bothers me are the people who are completely detached;
those who don't know the issues, & don't really care. They know more about the contestants on "Survivor" than they do about the people running our country.

[Piperay]

17. YES...

I live and breath politics and I find it hard to remain friends with repugs, I just can't respect them. x(

[arewethereyet]

18. I take it seriously, not personally

best to keep your wits about you in this area. Getting too personally entrenched in it only leaves you feeling like the more morose Clark and Dean supporters out there. What good has taking it personally done for them ? Or more importantly, their party ?

[Jai4WKC08]

19. What good has it done?

For us or the party?

When I answered the question, I didn't think "taking it personally" had anything to do with the emotional investment in a particular candidate. Oh, there's that too. But the way I interpretted the question is, do I see the end result, who wins in November, as something that affects me personally. And I decided that it does, even if my dog's not still in the fight.

But to consider your remark, well, I can't speak for Dean supporters, but in the case of Clark, the emotional reaction he was able to elicit brought people to the party who might not have previously considered voting for a Democrat. Some of them drifted away, but some are still sticking around.

Both Dean and Clark most certainly got people interested in politics who never had before, or not in a long time. And if the two left standing don't get people particularly fired up, at least some of us are still keeping track, still watching what happens. I know I'll be better prepared to help when there is a nominee, and I know I've gotten more involved in supporting various Congressional races. Heck, I've already sent money to Ben Chandler and Charlie Rangel, and I'll be doing more of the same to others. I'd never given any money to a political campaign before Clark's. How can all that not be better for the party?

As for what it's for done me, I know I'm better off, a better person and a better Democrat, for having gotten involved. "Better to have loved and lost..." as they say.

I do take exception to the implication that "taking it personally" has anything to do with whether one stays rational or not. It's sort of insulting (not that THAT surprises me) for you to imply that someone is less rational simply because he or she comes to really believe in a candidate. My first interest in Clark was coldly logical, and I don't think I ever lost that capacity.

You know, just because people draw different conclusions from your own doesn't mean they haven't "kept their wits" about them. Maybe they just have better information. Or better ability to process it.

[arewethereyet]

20. so then you would not be one of the morose ones

and if you're taking it seriously now when you didn't before thats good. However I would bewilling to gues that you were also more cognizant of the stakes this time out and would have become serious anyway.

Believe me, I saw the same thing with Clinton, with Carter even Reagan.

It gets attributed to a man, a polititian but the fact is its really about the individual seeing things for the first time.

Now talk to your morose pals who keep posting about how Clark 'slipped through our fingers'. Tell them its about more than any single person. Its about the principles, its about the party.

[Jai4WKC08]

26. Naahhh...

I'll agree that it's about more than any single person.

But America did throw away the opportunity to have the greatest president of my considerable lifetime.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

[arewethereyet]

27. no, they are not mutually exclusive

hopefully the others will, in the fullness of time, come to realize that politics is a process that does not end and for which any single election is just one of many steps.

[Eloriel]

23. I can't speak for the Clark supporters

but for many of us Dean supporters, it's NOT about having lost. That would be bad enough.

It was about what forces converged to bring about that loss. Our candidate and his campaign made some mistakes, but those alone would not have, COULD not have brought his downfall. The full weight of the entrenched corporate media, the DNC/DLC and their favorite candidates engaging in dirty tricks all with no time in a shortened primary season for Dean to recover is what we're bitter about. We KNEW the GOP engaged in dirty tricks, we have been surprised, shocked, appalled and outraged to find out that our own party is absolutely not one whit better.

Same for most of us re Gore in 2000 when we were all called Sore Losers by the rightwing. it wasn't that he lost (and actually he didn't lose), it was that the election was stolen.

[arewethereyet]

25. I hear what you're saying regarding the party v Dr Dean

but to be painfully fair, it was Dr Dean who threw down the gauntlet on that. In your heart of hearts do you honestly think that there would be no response from the party ? At the end of the day, its all about producing the nominee of the party.

[Scott Lee]

28. What's that supposed to mean? Huh? HUH???

[flaminbats]

29. Only when it isn't meant personally...

but when politics is meant to be personal, it's not usually a problem! :toast:

[WilliamPitt]

31. No

[Guaranteed]

32. Oddly enough, no. What does make me angry, though,

not in an offended way, but in a frustrated and hopeless way, is that people can be so goddamned stupid as to disagree with me.

[sandnsea]

33. rotfl

How did you get to be so goddamned stupid anyway??? Disagree with me. :eyes: Hmmmph.

:-)