You can't always get what you want.

[Jakes Progress]

If you are a progressive, make that you always can’t get what you want.

Our recent city election made something clear to me. There were several running for mayor and some council seats. For the most part each race broke down to two candidates that were actually capable of winning. On one hand we had the incumbent mayor, loyal to big business, big oil, big gas, big money. On the other hand we had a windy old curmudgeon who was against everything, plus just over the borderline racist. Both had rabid followers, and no one else was going to get even close.

I couldn’t bring myself to vote for either. Damned either way.

Before I get all the responses about getting out and organizing the community and building grassroots support, let me tell you that I live in Texas. Our progressive grassroots are colorful, but not deep. The two mayoral candidates represented the will and beliefs of the people of the city. People who think they are progressive here think Drudge is a valid news source and are sometimes willing to allow that Rush sometimes is a little, just a little, over the top.

The best we could try for is a stealth candidate. One who walked the middle line and played the populist, skirting immigration and gun issues. Then, we could hope that he/she got into office and brought about change. For about a month. That would be before the local paper (all incumbents, all the time) and the media halted any chance of progressive change. Of course, they would be right. He/she would have misled the public during the election. Had they not, they would never have been elected. That’s just the way it is here. Those selfish and frightened voters are the majority.

Maybe that is what is bothering so many on DU about what is happening at the national level. Any time someone complains about the apparent direction of the white house, there is bound to be a reply about just how happy would the poster be with Palin. That is the point. We weren’t given the choice between a progressive and a conservative. At best we had a semi-moderate vs a raving lunatic. We were just hoping for the stealth candidate, one who would appeal to everyone for every reason, get elected, and then take the White House away from corporate obeisance.

We didn’t get that. We got moderate. We got a really good guy who pretty much represents the majority of the country, where they trust corporations. are afraid of different, and only want things to change just a little. They were certainly tired of the march of the mad hares that we have had for 8 years. But they aren’t progressive, and for those of us who are, it is a disappointment. We were hoping. We were audaciously hoping.

So we will keep posting our hopes. We will keep defending our president from the truly insane right. And we will keep arguing with our sane, but slightly right-of-center brothers and sisters about how things could be better.

But inside I fear that in four years, many will feel the way I felt for the mayoral election, that there wasn’t that big a difference. This time there was. My god, how could this election have even been close. If we won with Obama against the crazy old coot and his backwoods mama, how will we do if we have an election between a semi-moderate and a quasi-moderate.

My hail-Mary suggestion is to try progressivism. Let’s have good insurance and an end to war and equality. Maybe people will come to like it and going back will be the change they don’t want.