Democracy for Vancouver

© by Erin Lynch

Attended the MoveOn meeting in Vancouver moderated by Carolyn Wolin last night. About 25 local activists were in attendance.A motion to approve a name change for the group to MoveOn/Operation Democracy was approved. This will allow the group to work on issues and projects that are not specifically called for by the national organization while maintaining their affiliation with MoveOn.

Cheryl Crist gave a spirited speech about her tiring of all the stuff that has gone haywire in our country since the Bush crime family took over. Even though tired, she is also determined to do everything she can to build a better future. Cheryl is considering a primary challenge against Brian Baird.

An extended discussion then ensued about the importance of attending the February 9 Washington State caucus and being involved in local party politics as a way to accomplish positive political changes. This attendee was rather surprised at how little knowledge the other attendees had of how our local political system works. The whole discussion was rather deja vu for me because I remember the exact same sentiments being expressed in 2003 when I began attending Howard Dean meetups locally. Pretty much the only thing that had changed were many of the faces. I wonder where all the many people are that used to attend the Howard Dean meetings. My guess is they have tuned out politics because here it is over 4 years later and nothing has really changed except for the worse. Oh, to have that political innocense back again and be so motivated to change the world without the knowledge I now have of how undemocratic our system of government has become and how difficult it is to make real, positive changes.

Next Carolyn asked if anyone wanted to head up the Washington Public Campaigns (WPC) organizing effort in Clark County. Again there didn’t seem to be anyone that knew much at all about WPC and the public financing of campaigns movement. So I gave a brief overview of how this method of campaign reform works. Rebecca DeJongh, a person I knew from the Howard Dean days, graciously volunteered to get involved.

Mark McCarron-Fraser gave a speech about opposing Senate Resolution 1959 and a call out to everyone to let Murray-Cantwell know your dislike about the resolution. This is the latest assault on our civil rights and basically allows the government to decide local groups, like say MoveOn, to be labeled a terrorist group if the government so chooses.

One of the attendees came up to me after the meeting and asked, “Do you know what we can do to make more people pay attention to what is happening and actually do something about it?” This for me is the core of the problem we face and my only answer is unfortunately that I think that things will only change when the wrongful actions being committed by our government cause a high enough level of pain that the people rise up and put an end to what is happening. And my crystal ball doesn’t see that occurring anytime soon.

Overall an interesting and informative meeting. I encourage others to attend future ones. The next one is Wednesday, January 9, 2008 (see event listing on left sidebar).