Pacific Views

Backyard Realpolitik

Four people get together for lunch at the food court of a hopped up strip mall, figure out what should go on a flier, and make plans for organizing a training on Saturday. The training will only be about half an hour, and after that, maybe a dozen volunteers will knock on around 100 doors. Repeat as necessary until the state caucus.

This, apparently, is how politics happens.

The people who show up, volunteer, knock on doors, and make phone calls, decide whose message gets out. Decide which neighborhoods get canvassed, and who gets reminded to register to vote.

I've long been of the opinion that if you don't vote, you kind of give up the right to register a complaint about government that will be taken seriously. I'd now consider taking that a step further. If you want to complain seriously about the choice of candidates, then you need to work to make sure that the good ones get local visibility.

Posted by natasha at September 4, 2003 07:31 PM | TrackBack