Tonight was the first post-election meeting of my local Democratic organization. So many new people showed up that the building had to bring in a cop, and breakout sessions weren’t possible because the entire cavernous room was jam-packed.
During the comments portion of the meeting, one guy stood up and said he’s been a Democrat for 40+ years, but tonight was his first party meeting. A couple of people said they’d been independents until tonight but were getting off the fence to join the only party that still acts like Americans.
It was a diverse group: women and men, old and young, gay and straight, black, white and brown. They were fired up and energized by the women’s marches, the immigration support rallies and pro-ACA public meetings.
A lot of organizing happened. We worked out ways to coordinate responses to ongoing issues and expected outrages to come.
More anecdata to support the Trump radicalization effect discussed earlier here and here. Just thought I’d share. Open thread!
SiubhanDuinne
This is great and so encouraging! Thank you, Betty!
Major Major Major Major
Awesome! Encouraging indeed, thanks for sharing!
ETA: in before “hurr hurr you’re assuming they’ll hold elections again” wankery
NR
Good to hear.
TaMara (HFG)
Amazing news. So good to hear.
mdblanche
More anecdata reposted from below, the DNC is getting awfully shrill:
Gelfling 545
Similar experience at our meeting here last week. They hoped to get about 100 people. They got +/- 400. The q&a session was spirited and fascinating.
Smiling Mortician
Today my small purple town in a blue state held a protest downtown against anti-women legislation from the right-wing of our state legislature. This is actually a Big Thing around here. People are waking up.
Betty Cracker
@mdblanche: The leaders are following the people! I hope anyone who pissed on the women’s marches as useless posturing sees how wrong they were. People getting their asses out on the street is making a huge difference.
FlipYrWhig
Uh oh, Betty, I think this makes you “establishment” now… :/
jl
thanks for sharing that news.
I think a group devoted to fighting voter suppression should be very high priority.
And that is one issue that people should talk about with their family friends and neighbors.
Reminding them that Trump said ‘Look at what’s registering’ to justify his voter suppression policy might be good. Note he said ‘what’ not ‘who’
I do hope Trujmp’s complete incompetence really shines through for that policy initiative.
Mortal Coyle
So is this just a slow-motion coup already under way? Agree or disagree?
http://mortalcoyle.blogspot.com/2017/01/slow-motion-coup-detat-this-post-from.html
trollhattan
Took one year for Tea Party to charge up the Hooveround and protest against Obama. It took America one day to rev up and protest against Trump.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
It’s just an ever-growing clusterTrump.
hitchhiker
I was at an Indivisible meeting about 15 miles north of Seattle last night. Big crowd, seemed mostly to be former Occupy organizers and Bernie folk. One guy made a (cough) forceful comment about how we can’t ever let the DNC railroad us again and pick a candidate who isn’t the person “we” want. Big majority gave him twinkle fingers, or whatever you call that sign. Looked around and saw a single black person, out of maybe 200.
I realized then, probably not my natural home. They’ll do good work, I’m sure, but oof … I need to be among friends right now.
trollhattan
@Mortal Coyle:
By my understanding of coup, no. Popular uprising and overthrow? Too soon to tell. Whether any of this pushback has legs or if we settle down and accept our new, perverse normal will play out over the next few months. Republicans have no intrinsic need to give up their newly gained powers, no matter how bizarre Trump acts.
MobiusKlein
@Betty Cracker: one resolution I have is to not tell people they are “Protesting Wrong”.
Unless they start burning shit, they are on the right team.
Jay Noble
Not that I miss them, but I haven’t heard or seen anything from Rush, Palin or Glenn Beck in oh maybe a month. Should we initiate a wellness check? ;-)
? Martin
@trollhattan:
That’s only true if they feel they can control the voting/election process down the road.
jl
@Jay Noble: Last I heard Glenn Beck is the concerned moderate phase of his fugue state. He emitted something about how he learned to appreciate Obama. I didn’t bother to look at it or find out what it said.
Ocotillo
@Jay Noble: Rush was on the fainting couch because of all the “vulgarity” at the women’s march last week when I heard him.
BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: In fairness, those Hoverrounds don’t instantly charge and it takes time to get those tri-corner hats.
Mnemosyne
@hitchhiker:
Yeah, you may need to seek out your local Democratic group. Some people have been saying that their local group is useless, so the first step may need to be to infiltrate, identify other people who seem to be frustrated, and then start a new group by peeling off those people.
Zelma
I think we should all read David Frum’s article in the Atlantic. It’s frightening and all too plausible. I’m in a red county in a blue state and we had more people at our recent party meeting than I’ve ever seen before. But it’s going to be very hard to stop these people.
WesternPALurker
@Mortal Coyle:
Not necessarily related but
The “Judicial” link is back on whitehouse.gov. I had never looked at it before. Anyone know if this paragraph noting congressional power over the judiciary has always been there?
“Article III of the Constitution, which establishes the Judicial Branch, leaves Congress significant discretion to determine the shape and structure of the federal judiciary. Even the number of Supreme Court Justices is left to Congress — at times there have been as few as six, while the current number (nine, with one Chief Justice and eight Associate Justices) has only been in place since 1869…”
Mortal Coyle
@trollhattan: But it is a rapid consolidation of power by a very small group. I find the the circumventing of established channels very disturbing, as it avoids all the typical checks on rash actions and not-obvious mistakes. Add in the inexperienced, hot-headed bent of the inner circle and you have an unstable crisis brewing. If it runs out of control like a nuclear melt-down, even the R’s may loose. We know all these clowns are drunk on power.
mdblanche
@Betty Cracker: “It’s the peoples’ will. I am their leader; I must follow them.”
Mortal Coyle
@Ocotillo: Poor snowflake!
Mortal Coyle
@WesternPALurker: I’m no expert on this, but seems to me congress may have some say on court make-up, funding, staffing, etc. but when it comes to court decisions how can they gainsay that? That is the function of the courts, to be the designated referee. You know once the ref’s have been gamed, the game is over!
mdblanche
@WesternPALurker: From the Wayback Machine, it looks like that paragraph was always there.
MobiusKlein
@WesternPALurker: only 148 years. A tissle of time, if I ever saw it.
WesternPALurker
@Mortal Coyle: [email protected]MobiusKlein: @mdblanche:
Thanks. Good to know it was always there. I knew it was correct constitution-wise, but given the current power grab, I was a bit paranoid about the emphasis on it.
Yeah, the “only since 1869” got me too!
Kryptik
I was part of the rally pulled in Jersey City (at least for what time I could stay there before my feet literally started to numb over from the cold). Makes me feel good about JC’s place in the whole mess vs. Trump.
More than 1K gather in Jersey City to protest Trump actions
Crowd estimates ranged from around 1k at minimum to 3k (which I personally doubt, simply because of the size of the area the rally was in). #JerseyCityStands has a lot more pics from attendees, and the organizers have promised to push more resources for those wanting to get involved, since they really pushed hard the idea that the marches need to mobilize into concrete action.
O. Felix Culpa
@Mnemosyne: I’m super-late to the thread, but that’s exactly what we’re doing. Had an organizing meeting last night to prepare for upcoming Ward elections. We’re doing our best to re-energize the county party. I’m running for Ward Chair (first time ever running for anything since junior high school). If I win, I’ll be able to vote for the County Chair (an activist and former labor organizer) as well as work with my Ward team to engage in local activism.