About Jason Scott, by Jason Scott
I have a friend who worked for the National League of Cities. His specialty was urban planning and Mass Transit, so he sat in many meetings aimed at getting municipalities to think creatively about public transportation.
He told me once that every meeting starts in the same depressing way. "Some elected official chairing the meeting welcomes everyone. Then the chair would say something like, 'I think we should start off by agreeing; Nobody is ever going to take public transportation."
They started the meetings by conceding defeat. That is what the Democratic Party has been doing. Our great Democratic party that has been the champion of civil rights, economic justice, firm and fair relations within the international community, and along with organized labor, a check on the rapacious greed of twentieth century capitalism, is conceding defeat.
To use a football metaphor we have been giving the other team the ball on our own 20-yard line. How else can you explain an America where people have come to believe that "taxes" are an unmitigated evil? How else can you explain an America that has come to equate Patriotism with reflexively supporting military adventurism? How else can you explain an America where Donald Rumsfeld is not in jail?
You cannot explain those developments unless you recognize that we as Democrats have failed. So when people ask me why I am so angry I tell them that I'm angry at the Republicans for their empty-headed, and cruel politics, but I'm also angry at the Democratic party for putting up with it.
That is why I am a Progressive Democrat. I am here to stop being angry and start being active. I am here to stop being an armchair liberal. I'm here to banish the soft contentment of knowing that "my heart is in the right place", and replace it with the hard satisfaction of knowing that I've done something for this party and this country that has done so much for me.
