So are we gonna let the bastards win or are we gonna fight back?

During my recent blogging semi-retirement, I spent a lot of time avoiding the news.  I just couldn't bear to look at, listen to or read it anymore.  The current political climate had become so toxic, the divide in this country so great, that I lost faith in the ability of the political process to get our country's collective act together.

In the words of George Bush, "Mission Accomplished".  If you were a G.O.P. strategist who woke up on November 5, 2008 in the aftermath of an unprecedented groundswell of support for the Democratic Party from minority and young voters, things probably looked just as hopeless.  The Republican Party had experienced their own metaphorical Katrina.  The levees had burst.  The political landscape was awash in a revived Democratic coalition that, demographically-speaking, seemed overpowering.

So what would you do if you were in our hypothetical strategist's shoes that morning?  For starters, you would want to undercut the enthusiasm of this expanded coalition that had just carried the Democrats to control of both the White House and Congress.  Maybe, slow the approval process of Presidential appointments to a crawl, handcuffing the governments ability to implement the Administration's political agenda. 

How about attacking organizations dedicated to poor/minority voter registration and human rights/public education advocacy?  Or maybe, ramp up the crazy at right-wing media outlets?   Perhaps create a political movement as a cover for abject racism.

Heck, why not multi-task and have that movement funded by the rich to provide cover for the yawning income gap between the haves and have-nots?  I mean why should the rich fight to maintain the lowest tax burden they've ever had in this country when you can get the folks on fixed incomes or poor/middle class American's to do the dirty work for you?

More importantly, you might want to dumb down our entire culture.  

You know, turn your back on scientific evidence.  Get control of school boards so you can force-feed your political agenda down the throats of the next generation of voters.  Eliminate or greatly reduce stimulus and other government spending during an economic downturn.  Just like the good old days after the Stock Market crashed in 1929.

One could go as far as to use our judicial system to undermine the unprecedented influx of small donors into the political process by allowing untold millions of anonymous donations to fund foreign and corporate interests on Capitol Hill.

I could go on.  The past two years has been an eye-opening experience.  I had completely underestimated the cravenness of the conservative movement in this country.  I would never have thought that a political movement would willfully flush the people of this country down the drain in an attempt to regain power.  But this is exactly what we are witnessing.

The plan worked, on me at least, for a little while.  I have woken up from my right-wing induced coma.  I am as pumped for November 2nd 2010 as I was when I woke up on Election Day back in '08.  I'm gonna spend the next few weeks knocking on doors and working the phones for great candidates like Joe Sestak and Patrick Murphy.  I know I'm a little late to the game, but I'll be there nonetheless.  Where are you gonna be?