Tuesday, August 04, 2009

Discontent at the Grassroots

The big story of the past day or so has been the vocal attendence at Congressional town hall meetings in which the Obama Health Care Plan is being discussed and Democratic members are getting taken to the woodshed for their support or perceived support for socialized medicine. When you think of hte growing citizen activism, from Tea Parties to townhall take-overs and take downs (like this one), it is hard to not feel a little good about the future of our country. After all, citizen action has changed the course of American history on more than one occaision.

But, the big worry I have always had about citizen activism is translating that civic action and discontent into action at the polling places. Of course, it is too soon to call it a "bellweather" but Brett McCrae talks about a GOP upset in a Delaware state senate special election in which the Democratic candidate in an overwhelmingly Democratic district and the daughter of the deceased officeholder got spanked with over 60% of the vote going for Republican Joe Booth.

McCrae notes that the Republican turnout was huge.

With over a year to the mid-terms, if the GOP can harness the rage at current policies, it could be a very, very ugly year for Congressional Democrats next year.

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