Saturday, July 26, 2008

Single Issue Politics

Way back in the 1960’s I first joined the National Rifle Association. At the time, this was an association that promoted firearms and the sport of using them, and it filled a valuable role in sponsoring shooting matches throughout the country. After a few years I became a lifetime member.

Then the NRA shifted to a more political focus, and its political activity became more and more radical. It became enamored of it its own sense of political power, bragging to its membership and to the public of its role in defeating at the polls various candidates based on their positions on gun legislation. They began mounting rabid and outrageously slanderous attacks on candidates who dared to favor even the most benign gun laws, no matter how good a law maker that candidate might otherwise be.

They bragged that any person running for national office had to hew the line on the single issue of gun control and meet with their approval on that issue in order to be elected. It was not quite true, but it was dangerously close to the truth.

The NRA became an organization radicalized by its narrow viewpoint and corrupted by its own power. I resigned my lifetime membership and demanded that they remove my name from their rolls. Others have done the same and their new enrollment has diminished; their power has dimmed, but they remain a dangerous force, imposing their narrow view by a form of political terrorism.

Howard Dean raised an Internet task force in his campaign which morphed into a valuable ongoing presence promoting the liberal cause in politics. The movement is centered around Internet bloggers, headed by the Daily Kos, is known as Netroots Nation, and is so well formed that it now has an annual convention.

I’m not sure that it can be said that the resurgence of the Democratic Party is due to Netroots Nation but they have certainly played a role, and by no means an insignificant one. Many of the blogs that I read on a daily basis are part of the Netroots Nation and I admire the hard work these people put into what they do. They are well informed, they care deeply about their nation, and they spend valuable time researching and writing their articles.

There are signs that, parts at least, of the Netroots Nation might be steering toward the same form of political terrorism that the NRA has favored lo these many years, excoriating Obama because he has lately begun taking positions that disagree with those espoused by the blogger and, in one case, merely because he did not attend the Netroots Nation convention.

From Ian Welch at The Agonist a few days ago.
He doesn't need us and he thinks were wrong about the most important things. K? Thanks. Bye.

It’s a lengthy post, blasting Obama on quite a few fronts, and there are a number of supportive comments. It very much displays an “all or nothing” brand of support for Obama. I’ll support you until you disagree with me one time and then I will turn on you.

It would be a terrible shame if a valuable group like these people began to take themselves so seriously that they turned into political terrorists; that no candidate could ever be sufficiently politically “pure” to satisfy them and, as such, they were relegated to an NRA-like posture of opposing everyone and supporting nobody.

Sure there are positions that Obama takes that I don’t like, but as a candidate he is the one I want to see become president. His positions that I support far outnumber and outweigh those I disfavor, and even without considering his opponent I have no hesitancy in supporting him.

“K? Thanks. Bye.”   Don’t go there; I’m not going with you.

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