In a (gated) article at the Washington Post today Paul Kane writes that it is complacency among rank and file donors that has led to a 25% drop in donations to the Democratic party’s three major fund raising arms. He also notes that third party groups don’t appear to be preparing to put the same effort into electing Democrats this time around. For much of the article, he also tries to put that on equal par with a drop in large donor donations as well. However, the Ds are still bringing in three times the money from large donors that the Rs are.

It’s not complacency that’s causing us to close our check books. The surge in Democratic fund raising in 2006 and 2008 came from progressive, grass roots democrats who were desperate for a change. We got our change and we’re not that happy with it. The House is certainly better than the Senate where we’re being told that it takes 60 votes to do anything. The fact of the matter, though, is that progressive groups are finding themselves having to run ads against Democratic congressmen and senators to get them to do progressive things that are supported by solid majorities in their districts and super majorities of Democrats. There is some talk among grass roots groups and labor of finding and supporting progressive primary challengers. It’s a sure way to turn some of these seats back over the Republicans, but it’s also a way of showing that you can’t take our money and votes and then ignore us anymore–like you’ve done since the 80s.

We’re not complacent. We’re pissed. Not giving the bastards money is the hardest hitting outlet we’ve got for now.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 25th, 2009 at 11:50 am and is filed under blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.