DNC Survey
Yesterday I got some mail from the Democratic National Committee At first I was glad to hear from them. I had been wanting to exchange some thoughts with them, though I knew that anything I had to say would be sadly inadequate, compared to what has already been delivered to them by Left Leaning Lady.
The Committee had sent me and I assume everyone else on the Democratic rolls what they called a "survey," along with a cover letter. I read both as thoroughly as I could, but that was hard, because of my increasing dismay. Instead of sending me the picture as things appear to me, they had sent a document much like a photographic negative, with all the colors and gradations reversed.
The letter and the survey were generously sprinkled with mentions of J. McCain and the dangers he presents, and I concede that that is very true. But at the moment McCain is doing everyone a great favor by being out of the country and therefore temporarily out of mind. The idea probably is that he is piling up "foreign policy experience" while the Democrats are temporarily unable to do the same, though actually he and his boy Lieberman are only engaging in an extended tourist trip, in which the media reports amount to fancy postcards in which they can tell the cat and the canaries back home that they got to talk with various leaders, and through those important consultations they learned that the boats do indeed go through the Suez Canal in both directions.
At this particular time, the situation with the unseated Michigan and Florida delegates is, in my opinion, the more pressing problem, and, just as this crisis was brought on in large part by the DNC inflicing punishment on those states, now things have worked out that, thanks partly to Republican legislators in both states who are more than happy to sit on their hands and so block Democratic efforts to hold revotes, only the DNC appears to have the means to end the impasse, by seating the delegates on the basis of the primaries that were held in both states in January. Yet there wasn't one mention of Michigan or Florida anywhere in the DNC's literature. Instead, at the end of survey they had tacked on what you might have expected, a modest request for money. It's easy to suspect that this pitch was the main point of the DNC's mailing, and the survey was just a dress-up for it. That's consistent with the negative reversal aspect.
Actually maybe the survey could be seen as reassuring. The DNC could be telling us that there is really no reason to worry about those delegates, whether or not they are ever seated. The Democratic nominee has already been chosen, all rancor and the August convention are history, and what remains is only to face head-on the apparition of John McCain and his blood-thirsty cohorts.
Nevertheless I've been thinking about returning the survey with all the questions left unanswered, and instead with the sheet covered only with words in huge, black letters, reading something like, "First, what about Florida and Michigan, dummies!"
But that would be rude, and these days more than ever I place huge store on not being rude.
Speaking of rudeness, I know all too well that the late General George Patton and I would not see eye to eye at all. But I have always taken great delight in the speech delivered by the also late, great George C. Scott in the first minutes of "Patton." That movie is worth seeing just for those lines, and also for Jerry Goldsmith's music. In his instructions to his troops, Scott/Patton says something like: "One more thing. I don't want to get any reports that we are holding something. We're not holding anything. Let the enemy do that. We are always advancing!"
That's how I feel about being rude. Let the enemy do that.
Besides, it's Easter, the season of brightly colored eggs and chocolate bunnies. Till yesterday I didn't know that today is Easter. Happy Easter.
.
The Committee had sent me and I assume everyone else on the Democratic rolls what they called a "survey," along with a cover letter. I read both as thoroughly as I could, but that was hard, because of my increasing dismay. Instead of sending me the picture as things appear to me, they had sent a document much like a photographic negative, with all the colors and gradations reversed.
The letter and the survey were generously sprinkled with mentions of J. McCain and the dangers he presents, and I concede that that is very true. But at the moment McCain is doing everyone a great favor by being out of the country and therefore temporarily out of mind. The idea probably is that he is piling up "foreign policy experience" while the Democrats are temporarily unable to do the same, though actually he and his boy Lieberman are only engaging in an extended tourist trip, in which the media reports amount to fancy postcards in which they can tell the cat and the canaries back home that they got to talk with various leaders, and through those important consultations they learned that the boats do indeed go through the Suez Canal in both directions.
At this particular time, the situation with the unseated Michigan and Florida delegates is, in my opinion, the more pressing problem, and, just as this crisis was brought on in large part by the DNC inflicing punishment on those states, now things have worked out that, thanks partly to Republican legislators in both states who are more than happy to sit on their hands and so block Democratic efforts to hold revotes, only the DNC appears to have the means to end the impasse, by seating the delegates on the basis of the primaries that were held in both states in January. Yet there wasn't one mention of Michigan or Florida anywhere in the DNC's literature. Instead, at the end of survey they had tacked on what you might have expected, a modest request for money. It's easy to suspect that this pitch was the main point of the DNC's mailing, and the survey was just a dress-up for it. That's consistent with the negative reversal aspect.
Actually maybe the survey could be seen as reassuring. The DNC could be telling us that there is really no reason to worry about those delegates, whether or not they are ever seated. The Democratic nominee has already been chosen, all rancor and the August convention are history, and what remains is only to face head-on the apparition of John McCain and his blood-thirsty cohorts.
Nevertheless I've been thinking about returning the survey with all the questions left unanswered, and instead with the sheet covered only with words in huge, black letters, reading something like, "First, what about Florida and Michigan, dummies!"
But that would be rude, and these days more than ever I place huge store on not being rude.
Speaking of rudeness, I know all too well that the late General George Patton and I would not see eye to eye at all. But I have always taken great delight in the speech delivered by the also late, great George C. Scott in the first minutes of "Patton." That movie is worth seeing just for those lines, and also for Jerry Goldsmith's music. In his instructions to his troops, Scott/Patton says something like: "One more thing. I don't want to get any reports that we are holding something. We're not holding anything. Let the enemy do that. We are always advancing!"
That's how I feel about being rude. Let the enemy do that.
Besides, it's Easter, the season of brightly colored eggs and chocolate bunnies. Till yesterday I didn't know that today is Easter. Happy Easter.
.
posted by Carl (aka Sofarsogoo) | 9:35 AM
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