Who Thinks The Democrats Here Have Contributed To A Change In...

[ChiciB1]

Politics as we knew it on Election Day 2004???

Are we making a difference or spinning our wheels?? Are our leaders getting our message or not??

[ClassWarrior]

1. Trust me, they're hearing us. DNC's Howard Dean, for example.

NGU.

[ChiciB1]

2. WONDERFUL... Waiting For More Replies... n/t

[racaulk]

3. I definitely think they're getting it.

I think Reid and Pelosi are doing a great job heading up the minorities in the legislature. And I certainly think Dean will help us turn things around. :applause:

[FreedomAngel82]

13. Me too

Things are doing well. I agree that Dean is doing a great job on the grassroots level and Reid and Pelosi are doing well on keeping up with all the attacks.

[Double T]

4. The Collective Force Of The Liberals And Democrats Is Being Heard.....

...... Now We Gotta Turn It Up A Notch, And Keep Turning It Up

[cprise]

5. Spinning wheels, sadly

"Our" leaders get the message, and they think we're stupid... that going through the motions of democracy and putting on a show for policies they don't really like will win our favor and ensure their careers.

Remember Clinton's first term? He gave Universal Healthcare to his WIFE for her to handle... Instant policy death. You think he would have done the same with NAFTA? Not a snowball's chance in hell. Little has changed since then.

Democratic voters have become the idiots who think they are boycotting Exxon by filling up at the Mobil station. The rest of the world calls our candidates neo-liberals and we don't even understand what they are talking about. Of course, we care far more about the insults we'll hear from Bill O'Reilly and the shallow comraderie we'll feel in the outrage.

[ChiciB1]

7. Well, I Was Just Trying Get A Feel Of The Member.s..

I personally think we HAVE made some progress, maybe not nearly enough, but a few inches here and there.

I watched Chuck Hagel on C-Span today and he said that he's waiting to see what information comes up regarding Bolton and then decide if he wants to vote him out of committee. He thinks Idiot SHOULD get his men, but didn't actually come out and say he's voting him out. Then he said that even if he got voted out he wasn't sure he would vote for him with the full Senate.

Another statement he made was that he didn't feel the filibuster needed to be vanquished and that it would be reckless to some extent. I know Hagel is more moderate, but he did seem much more eager about Bolton before.

Anyway, I think we have been working hard here and hope we are making a difference. This just can't be "just for us"! I want MORE!!!

[cprise]

8. Sending a brittle asshole like Bolton to the UN is

...a sign of the Bush admin's weakness in global affairs.

The UN is the closest thing the world has to a conscience. Kofi Annan intends to reforn the UN to broaden the base of that conscience. That naturally results in diluting America's power over the "glorified debating society".

Suddenly we hear stories that attempt to paint Annan as a criminal in managing the Oil For Food program... that he's the "real" source of Iraqi hardship.

In light of those facts, the highly unusual choice of Bolton makes sense... if Bush wants to send a sabotuer to damage the reform process. They can't get moderates like Powell to go through with that (at least not anymore). Bolton is not a careful or savvy choice, but rather a reaction to a power-shift the neocons haven't planned for. I say send him to the UN and let him bang his shoe on the podium.

Listen to one of our celebrity Liberal Democrats, Thomas Friedman:

"My biggest problem with nominating John Bolton as UN ambassador boils down to one simple fact: He’s not the best person for the job — not even close. If President Bush wants a die-hard Republican at the UN, one who has a conservative pedigree he can trust, who is close to the president, who can really build coalitions, who knows the UN building and bureaucracy inside out, who can work well with the State Department and who has the respect of America’s friends and foes alike, the choice is obvious, and it’s not John Bolton."

Yeah, we're being heard alright and the message is based on the same predictable reflex to gain brownie points with the boss while helping conservatives advance their shocking YET comforting cause for your white "Judeo-Christian" *ss. The rest of that article reads like an ultra-nationalist screed and it is not even sarcastic.

Let's get a person who can build conservative coalitions at the UN! Idiot. I wonder if Democratic Party leaders ought to respect the message of people like that... like 'us'.

[ChiciB1]

10. I Think Maureen Dowd Said It Best On Bill Maher...

Bolton should have been nominated for the head of Homeland Security, so he could really screech!

I have a feeling he's NOT going to make it. Hagel on C-Span today was a bit wishy-washy.

[Tigress DEM]

15. DU demands for the truth and support for DEMs who Speak Truth

to Power are the light that illuminates the roaches in the neo-con race for most abuse of power unseen by the public eye. We make them scurry away and show their deeds for what they are.

RE: **If President Bush wants a die-hard Republican at the UN, one who has a conservative pedigree he can trust.... **

Realistically, if *ush were a normal Republican president, then what Friedmen said would be true...** any prez appoints someone who is in line with their agenda. It's just a really sick agenda and so un-American that everyone is rightfully up in arms.

If *ush were serious about a UN appointment he might appoint someone like Colin Powell who actually has a world view not conscripted by totalitarian fundie beliefs and who had the skills to bridge gaps and at least listen respectfully to people.

But he doesn't want someone who will actually represent the USA fairly and with dignity. He wants someone to go in and trash the place then he'll fire him and ask for forgiveness later.

[cprise]

19. People don't want their inner thoughts so nakedly displayed at the UN.

Americans (US public) demand a nice self-image, and for that reason I say the desire to stop the Bolton appointment is petty narcissism. We badly want that sugar-coating on our imperialism, to be liked by ourselves and the world while we suck it dry... we want the sugar so much that instead of just registering our objection and letting he loudmouth go to the UN, we are willing to press the issue hard enough to stop the appointment and cost us a massive amount of political clout at home.

How many additional far-right judges will we suffer with for the next 40 years because we had to look pretty at the debate society???

Isn't that the essence of the 'truth' we are speaking? The perky, consumerism-addled, liberal-cheerleading 'truth'?

Or is it true that people arrive here at DU and the Meetups as political refugees, still wounded and largely brainwashed without even realizing it?

We still think and act as if we lead the world's pogressive left. But the global left has demonstrated it knows how to deal with neocons, and their job is even easier with one as inept as Bolton. We here in the US (despite our huge collective ego) do NOT know how to deal with neocons no matter whether they are subtle or rash.

You make some good points in this thread about raising awareness and supporting each other emotionally. Those things are important. However the internet fundraising was a one-time advantage we had; it is too plutocratic to work for us in the long run. Even if we can keep raising tons of cash (which I doubt) we are blocked by a commercial media cartel and corporate-run voting systems. With those two barriers to accountability in place, whatever real truth we have to offer will be laughed at.

As for career Democrats, being favored by 50+ percent of the nation is rather profitable in terms of corporate consulting opportinities and the lecture circuit -- even if the majority no longer can get them elected. These politicians have no real incentive to change.

[Tigress DEM]

24. Cprise, you really sound jaded and ready to give up.

Either that or it sounds like you believe that the only real progressive movement crushes all opposition in its wake. I'll have to re-read your posts and think about it for awhile.

All I can say is I get my hope from the revolutions that have worked before. When I felt like this whole resistance was getting futile, I picked up the book, "The Impossible Will Take A Little While" by Paul Rogat Loeb.

I did not do justice to Rev Desmond Tutu's analogy of Christ turning the other cheek being a statement of power, so I will go into more detail in another post. It took me awhile to absorb it the first time and then I started seeing the truth to it in actions that work around the world.

Loeb puts forth the stories of key revolutionists and their followers and a common thread is that the peaceful resistance finally breaks down the walls. I believe that is because a majority of people in this country really want the America we were taught to believe exists when we learned about it in school. Sure, when the going gets tough many scramble back from the responsibility of making the nation what it needs to be, but I think most people want to get along here and abroad.

I have a husband with strep I have to take to the doctor now, but I will be back.

[LittleClarkie]

11. I think it's a combination of grassroots

Folks paying more attention than they ever have before, and the power that was shown in fundraising over the internet. Also, I don't want to discount that some of the Democrats are getting good and pissed off in their own right.

[Tigress DEM]

30. Someone besides me should nominate this for greatest thread.

[CWebster]

22. It's true.

sad commentary.

[AndyTiedye]

6. Unless We Can Stop the Nuclear Option, It's All...

[Tigress DEM]

26. We will stop it.

There may be a bit of a price to pay and we may have to go back when we are stronger and evict some awful judicial appointees, but the nuclear option will be removed from the table.

If it isn't, then an alternative plan is to do is get the Vote issue fixed, stomp them into the ground in 2006 and 2008 and use our majority to get the country back on line.

While working on that there is another option (and I don't know the exact name) I think it's a Convention of some sort that the people themselves can get together and frame certain demands. I want to say Constitutional Convention, like the founders formed and it may have been what was used to push prohibition through, I can't remember.

Maybe we should have one to demand action against those we consider war criminals and traitors to the American public - through means of mass deception about 9/11, unconscionable appointments to high government posts, conspiracy with intent to defraud Americans by allowing secret meetings about Energy policy to take place with Enron and Nuclear lobbyists and participation in vote fraud?

[sandnsea]

9. Yes, slow but sure

SS, religious extremist, power grab, economy, deficits. We've got to do a better job on extremism that leads to terrorism and that the Republicans have no answer on that, neither here or abroad.

[Tigress DEM]

12. DEMs here who build up our own and pull no punches help, I think.

We have been educating each other, we have been inspiring each other to action, we have been keeping each other from diving into pits of despair and letting the cheaters win by forfeit.

Many of us have written to more Senators and House Reps and Media sources than ever before in our life.

Many of us have developed a great hunger for the truth and a sense of responsibility to be the generation that keeps this country from falling right into the toilet, whatever it takes.

I've gone in and read what Kennedy, Conyers, McCullom have to say about life, and been impressed, moved to tears sometimes. I have cheered when the DEMS showed the first spark of life and I see more and more to be proud of every day.

I've written to reps I don't even know in other states because I read something her in DU that says whether they are DEM or Repub there may be a chance they will do the right thing. More and more bi-partisan activities are taking place because the truth is coming out like a whisper campaign from the blogs and the INDYs.

Those of us who REALLY want our Country back and are willing to meet the opposition an hammer things out instead of throwing knives, yeah, I think we make a difference.

Those who scream and rant and rave. They make a difference too. In the beginning, they woke us up.

NOW - can those who screamed and screamed and screamed to get us all to pay attention realize that maybe they can notch it back just a bit? I think it's a bit needed when we deal with each other, when we try to find a path to unite this country and start working on healing - which means giving up this persecution complex and stick to the facts.

EX: Shit stinks. Shit needs to be removed. Yeah, it's been dumped in my yard, killing my grass for all these years and I'm affected and I want it taken care of. But do I need to get all martyr about it?

No, what I'd like to see here is people finding the best in themselves and looking to the repukes and saying, "See? See? We do not need you to tell us we are right or wrong or left. We've taken our own inventories, studied our own flaws and done what WE need to do to improve and will continue to do so."

When we walk into the fray on an issue, it would be great to keep it about the issue and not get all cluttered up with name calling and hating. We need ALL DEMS, ALL Progressives, ALL willing Independents and ALL Republicans who can put the needs of America before the dictates of their party line - we need everyone to pull in the same direction to keep this country from falling down into the crapper.

I am oh so hopeful that we can do this because the DU exists, because I've been able to learn to stifle my anger long enough to listen to opposing views and really try to find common ground.

We still need our radicals to keep the balance of the country - to make it a place that offers opportunity and demands accountability - NOT just of the elected officials - but of the voting public. We gotta fix the vote issue and then we have to keep on it. Most of us will probably never be the same and we will instill in our children a value of vigilance that will make the depression era pack rat syndrome seem like a mild case of nerves.

The job has only just begun, but have DEMS here made a difference? Hell yeah, and we should be damm proud of ourselves.


:kick:

[AmBlue]

14. Awesome post, Tigress!

:applause:
I feel it, too. Best of all, our side's stance has the smell and the taste and the ring of truth to it. It gives me real hope that in the end truth will prevail.

[Tigress DEM]

16. You are TRUE BLUE!!

I feel the ground swell of a commitment to peace happening within people. There used to be such arrogance and nastiness everywhere I went and disrespect for the truth as "conspiracy theory".

I think one of the biggest things that happened early on was when Ken Blackwell over reached himself and tried to sanction the Legal Four back in Feb 05. It resulted in the court having to enter over a thousand pages of evidence about the vote fraud in Ohio. This was the first time I saw Republican's backing away from a party man like he was a leper or something and I knew their free ride days were over.

DEMs tend to want the best from their leaders, but we don't conscript what that is. We think it makes us weak sometimes, but I gotta tell you I am really beginning to think more and more it is our strength.

The repukes got so far in their planned vision of dominating the DEMs, but they are like villains in an Austin Powers movie. They always have to gloat and they don't dare get caught in their evil ways under public scrutiny because many Republican's really are in that party because they can't stand the idea of abortion or have an intolerance for homosexuality or poverty, but truly can't abide with their leaders' unethical actions.

They had to hide the torture shops in Cuba, Saudi Arabia and such... to have done what they did on American soil would have been too much. Even so, *ush's demand for Gonzales was another huge fracture in the party.

Every time *ush steps up and slaps the DEMs in the face and we respond with the integrity of Christ and turn the other cheek, we win. To slap us again is to acknowledge our power to protest without violence and to win because his behavior shows him to be the scumbag he is and converts even Republicans to our side.

This turning the other cheek isn't just passive either. It's a statement of, "Is that all you got?" It's the spirit of slaves generations away from freedom who still would not be dominated. It's Martin Luther King's ghost smiling, "God made me a human being and YOU cannot take that away from me, no matter what you do."

It's every child who has been beaten, starved, raped or ignored, but has climbed out of the ghetto and worked to make the world a better place.

It's people who just DON'T give up.

How can they match simple power and talking points against real humanity?

Like a Tigress stalking a big old Yak. I've no need to rush things, the neo-cons are so stupid they will find a pail of oil to drown themselves in sooner or later. All I have to do is be patient and let evolution unfold. Survival of the fittest and all that.

[cprise]

20. Yeah

Dems magnanimously accept a slap in the face, but refuse to connect that acceptance with the bombs dropped on others' heads. It especially shows when Dems come to power and press the "bombs away" button while their cheek is still smarting.

[Tigress DEM]

29. I refuse to be bullied into violence or senseless retaliation.

Either by the behavior of the opposition or by my supposed allies who seem to believe the ends justify the means when it's a good enough agenda.

I'm not sure what exactly you consider enough effort specifically to defeat the Republican machine and where you draw the line? I'm talking non-violent resistance, not passivity. And I don't take every apparent "defeat" to heart because there are many, many laws still functioning and many fronts where the political war is still being waged.

Still - to clarify - turning the other cheek as taught by most King James theologians ISN'T my interpretation. They took the Hebrew "antistenai" as "resist not evil" but that was to serve the monarchy at the time so they could imply docility.

Literally "antistenai" means to resist violently.

I'm paraphrasing some of what Walter Wink* writes "Jesus did not tell his oppressed hearers not to resist evil... He is, rather, warning against responding to evil in kind by LETTING the OPPRESSOR set the TERMS of our opposition."

Wink also says, "A proper translation of Jesus' teaching would then be 'Do not retaliate against violence with violence.'"

At the time of Christ this was still a world where the primary "fight or flight" responses were all that was known to respond to oppression. Wink says that what Jesus proposed was a third alternative, "militant nonviolence" which is clarified by the examples Christ gives IN THE CONTEXT of the TIME Christ lived and the LAWS of that time.

1) "If someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also."

Why the right cheek? Because a strike to the right cheek is made with the back of the left hand - considered unclean at the time and a deep insult to the person you strike. In that time to strike a peer with your left hand carried a fine of 400zuz, but to an underling no consequence.

This defines the example as of a slave or inferior responding to someone to whom retaliation would be suicidal.

To turn the other cheek requires the oppressor to choose - if he strikes the left cheek with his right hand it takes away the label of "inferior" and brings the person struck up to the level of peer.

2) "If anyone would sue you and take your coat, give him your cloak as well."

Only the poorest of the poor would have nothing but an outer garment to give as collateral for a loan. Jewish law strictly required its return every evening at sunset, for that was all the poor had in which to sleep.

The situation Jesus alludes to is of someone so far in debt that they are dragged into court to wring out repayment. Literally if the person handed over their cloak as well they would have to walk naked from the court.

Since VIEWING or CAUSING nakedness was taboo in Jerusalem, by handing over your clothes to the one who brought you to court, it takes that person into shame - revealing him as an "unrespectable" moneylender bringing people into landlessness and destitution. "Who would want to deal with someone like that?" people would say and the lender would be hit right in the pocket book, where someone like that will feel pain.

3) "If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two."

At the time there was a law the allowed a Roman soldier to levy on subject people to carry his pack, but it was limited to one mile only, with possible severe penalties to a soldier who impressed more than one mile upon a person.

So why the second mile? Most of Jesus' listeners would rather have been told to take the soldier aside and knife him in the ribs even knowing it could bring reprisal upon all Jews from the Roman army.

Jesus wasn't recommending aiding and abetting the enemy through cooperation, but again to exploit the law and nonviolent militarism to turn the situation into an impossible conundrum for any soldier who would levy this service upon one of them.

As the soldier reaches for his pack and the Jew will not stop carrying it the soldier is thrown into confusion. What is going on? Will this Jew file a complaint? Get him disciplined? Is the soldier's strength being insulted? Is the Jew being kind?

Can you imagine a soldier trying to get his pack back? If he uses force, he'll be disciplined. If he begs, he'll be humiliated. At the very least it will be a while before he trusts enough to levy his pack on another Jew.





(*Previously I attributed this explanation to the Rev Desmond TuTu who was instrumental in South Africa's fight to be truly free. Both he and Walter Wink contributed to the book "The Impossible Will Take a Little Awhile" and I mixed up my authors.)

[FrenchieCat]

17. We're just getting started.....

I think it's too soon to take an inventory.

Get back to me right after 2006......

[vman13]

18. Just 1 thing...

Democrats need to define who they are. It's just that simple. I think most people on this site are pretty liberal. The question now is, are we the liberal party? I think the problem with the Democratic party is that we haven't really chosen a side in the greater culture war that is going on in America. For so long, Democrats have tried to straddle that line. For what ever reason, Republicans get it. The success of the Republican Party in most part is that they have galvanized an entire segment of the population who identify themselves as soldiers of this culture war (i.e. Fundamentalist Christians,traditionalists, generally social conservatives, and neo-cons) who want to snuff out the progressive voice in America. When looking at American history, it is clear to see that this "culture war" is nothing really new. In all points in American History, there has always been a battle between two opposing political philosophies, usually involving the role of government in people's everyday lives. The success of a party is whether or not they can identify themselves with a one of the philosophies. In the early years of the party, Democrats chose the side of the "common man"(thank you Andrew Jackson). From the 30 years or so during and after FDR, Democrats once again chose the side of the poor and the down-trodden. Both eras were incredibly successful for Dems.

Republicans have drawn the line in the sand and now the ball's in our court.

[cprise]

23. Like it or not

...the cultural basis for the progressive left is Enlightenment and secular humanism. And not just Dems but American liberals as a whole refuse to be explicitly associated with it anymore. Even Christians like Tigress are drawn to the notion of our "real humanity" as the basis for something profound and powerful, but espousing humanism as a world view became a no-no in the 1970s and 80s when televangelists like Billy Graham went on a witch-hunt against atheism and secular humanism (and anything that might put man before God).

That's when America really split culturally from Europe. We believed the fundamentalists when they said that 'secular humanism' and Christianity were two different things, and that humanism was necessarily atheist. The spiritual and intellectual leaders on the Left copped-out by moving to slippery postmodernism ("everyone has their own equally valid truth") and liberals' chose the rhetoric of freedom and multiculturalism over social responsibility. Now only a splintered list of causes that humanism gave rise to remains, along with a vague humanitarian sentiment.

Europeans largely held the (correct) view that humanism was the BASIS for their moderate and inclusive Christianity, and that putting people first was more important than whether you believed in a god. When writing the EU constitution, conservatives wanted a reference to Christianity as the basis of European culture. But they lost and instead humanism was cited as the common heritege; conservatives found this acceptable.

Political culture flows from the wider culture. Humanists assert economic rights as human rights, so in these societies (like Sweden, Japan, France) you find democratically elected socialists wielding significant power.

[Tigress DEM]

25. Please don't purpose to know all that I believe by reading a few posts..

How vulgar.

First of all, I respect anyone else's beliefs, but I only profess my own. I am a Christian/recovering Catholic to be precise. That is my personal reference.

Second, Secular Humanism is all well and good, but I've never heard it was a religion, so please don't ask me to bow and scrape to it. I don't think it is mandatory to have a pissing party over the initial framing of the constitution. Separation of Church and state are clear no matter what was going on in the minds and hearts of our founders and it worked until it got broken, so it needs to be repaired. Period.

I respect the fact that someone doesn't have to believe as I do to have a moral compass, but I can explicitly state the ways Christianity is being used to bludgeon the World isn't in any way a Christian's duty in my interpretation of Christ's life and words.

I am happy that someone who worships Buddha can freely express themselves in our society and I have seen a lot of information on many Eastern philosophies that I've included in my personal belief structure. What Christ said about removing the log in your own eye before dealing with the speck in your neighbor's is very compatible with Eastern ideas about living in harmony with one another and not projecting judgment.

I saw a Tibetan Monk singing recently at a blessing of water in Hopkins Minnesota and his face was that of an angel. I guess I didn't even think of him in one way or another until I saw him singing and then his face was radiant with ??? I don't know, but it was from that part of the universe that is good and kind and helpful.

I've met Wiccans and other Pagans who are wonderful people and whose attitudes of not hurting others as being a way to keep themselves pure I find as great examples of living a righteous life.

One friend who prefers not to be called a Pagan believes in this whole doing little pranks to keep the balance of light and dark and such. Hmmm. Little fishy to me and I give him a bit of ribbing on that, but my dad was a prankster too. He just didn't give it any high fallutin moral agenda. Still, one way or another it isn't anything I'm going to get upset about.

Some people dye their hair blue. So what?

Some are gay. Yeah? Big deal. It's their choice. They aren't hurting anyone by loving who they do. I am able to make the distinction between gay people and pedophiles who prey on same sex children. If being gay made someone more likely to abuse children, as the right wing Boy Scouts seem to claim, then there wouldn't be men abusing little girls and the statistics on that are quite a bit higher. Many of them supposedly Godly married men prior to being outed.

I think the American Indian spirituality is beautiful and it's premises bring me to tears of gratitude. Who is to say we don't worship the same Great Spirit?

What about the Pygmy tribes that worshiped the forest as God and were a real community that's highest law was not to be selfish and do things that hurt the community, but somehow always found a way to bring their errant ones back into the fold?

I think that was a very Godly society and I don't know how to explain that their God and my God can be the same, but I don't feel a conflict about it within my heart. The God I believe in is a God of Love and by that I mean AGAPE - unconditional love. If unconditional love is felt by someone and they respond to that by wanting to be their best self, I don't have to define it for them to appreciate it works for them.

I've done some reading on the Goddess, but most of what I read is too centered in an energy that seems to be a backlash at men. If there were a way to move that out, it seems pretty good. The whole child/woman/crone and the spiderweb of communication resonates with me.

I don't attend Catholic church because the judgment of others and hypocrisy bothers me. I'm not overly impressed with this Pope or the last because of their movement toward conservative Catholicism which was back to the dark ages as far as I was concerned.

Vatican 2 brought the various churches together to the point where it was more important to meet the needs of the people of Christ (to me anyone He loved/so the whole world) than it was to argue about who was doing it right. The things the Pope did to support humanity are the things I am glad he did. In my mind the Pope or Billy Graham are just individuals with an audience, no better in God's eyes than any one else out there.

I have gone to Unity which is probably closest to what I believe, but they strip a little too much of Christ's divinity out of it. I'm still searching for a Chruch home, but I haven't abandoned God. In fact, everyday I feel closer to Him, even in cyberspace.

[CWebster]

21. I don't think it will be because of the Democrats

It will be only because the extremes of the Neo-cons start to make people nervous. People will put up with a lot and they will do their best to buy into groupthink and all the other indoctrinating propaganda as an article of faith. But then they will start to feel uneasy...meanwhile the Democrats may be beneficiaries, but it will be by default and not as a strong mandate. And this is what politicians like Clinton count on.

[MissWaverly]

27. We are making a BIG difference

criticism is now appearing in the news, Look at what has occurred for GWB in the last 60 days, they did not get the
supreme court to intervene in Terri Schiavo, GWB's ssn plan has been stone walled by dems, there was a challenge to the electoral vote, and now Bolton is on the skids, Kerrick did not get approved, Bush
in the past has always got his own way, now look, and it's people
like us, writing, calling etc. that are making a difference.

[blockhead]

28. I hope they can hear us

[proud patriot]

31. I believe we make a difference

From my experience over the 4 years of activism,
and my conversations with people who thank me for
my signs . I think someone like me helps people
get courage to speak their own mind .