Category: A political memoir

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Youth is Not Wasted on the Young

  By A political memoir, About me

I’ve been organizing my personal files, paper and electronic, and just rediscovered this piece. I wrote June 9, 2006 pretty soon after I started my blog. I didn’t post it because a young friend of mine who knew I was thinking about running for office talked me out of doing so. She was a little worried that it wasn’t serious enough and the Viagra joke bothered her. But having reread it–and being 6 years older and coming off of major surgery– I still like what it says about the importance of cross-generational collaboration and about the pleasures and pains of aging. And while I’ve lost touch with some of the young people I was working with in 2006, many of them are still friends and allies, and others have been replaced, in some cases by younger versions of themselves. Staying engaged with young people is still important to my life as a health appreciation for the knowledge and occasional wisdom that comes with age. Continue reading

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What Do Do-Nothing Legislators Do?

  By A political memoir, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Political Organizing, Politics, Progressive Politics

There is a class of legislators who pundits sometime pick on for not being “effective.” They are politicians who typically stand a little to the left (for Democrats) or right (for Republicans) of their party. Then tend to come from relatively well-off, safe districts. Their constituents are more ideological than most and less in need of the pork barrel projects that are the stock in trade of other legislators. And they often serve in the minority party in the legislature, so they have little impact day to day legislative business. That gives them some freedom to push the envelope on policy by taking stands in advance of public opinion. Sometimes they push the envelope simply by being who they are—a woman, an out gay or lesbian, or the member of some other minority. These politicians are often criticized because they don’t have a lot of legislative achievements. They don’t have… Continue reading

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Having fun while doing good or managing activism fatigue

  By A political memoir, Political Organizing

Introduction Last weekend I appeared on a panel at the PA Progressive Summit called Don’t Stop Believing: Managing Activism Fatigue. The panel was created by three psychologists who thought that it would helpful for activists to get some advice about managing the stress, anxiety, and  exhaustion that often leads to burnout. I was asked to comment on their advice, based on my experience as an organizer. My remarks were well received so I’ve decided to write up my notes. I won’t try to present the ideas of my fellow panelists. They were very good but I don’t think I could do them justice. Instead will present the concrete recommendations I gave activists based on my own experience. I was drafted to be on the panel in part under false pretense. After ten years as an political activist, organizer and sometime candidate—the first six of which I did as a volunteer… Continue reading

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Donna Reed Miller without tears

  By A political memoir, NW Philly, People, Philadelphia, Politics

Councilwoman Donna Reed Miller announced her retirement last week. I though this would be a good time to repost a slightly revised version of this piece, which I originally posted May 22, 2007. I’ve been meaning to write a long piece about Donna Reed Miller’s role in the eighth district for a awhile. It is a fascinating story with all kinds of complications that provides an interesting view from which to explore race and class issues in our city. This is not it. But it is a brief sketch for those who want to know more about the Eighth district. I can sum Councilwoman Miller up with a story. I once met with her to discuss public financing of political campaigns. This was before Councilwomen Tasco and Verna with the encouragement of state representative Dwight Evans, decided to hold hearings on the subject. She was interested enough, but our conversation… Continue reading

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Everyday Heroes

  By A political memoir, Health Care

I’m not getting as much time on Melanie’s March, our march from Philadelphia to Washington, DC for health care as I would like. I’m driving back to Philadelphia in the evening so that I can spend late nights and early mornings with a fast computer and internet connection that enables me to edit video, update this website and stay in contact with all the wonderful people who are organizing events down the line for us. I’m getting back to the March mid-day or sometimes later and only getting a few miles in. But I’m there enough to know how hard the march is physically both because of the mileage and, especially on the first three days, because sidewalks were so often snow covered. So, last night, as I had dinner with the marchers I kept thinking about how important they are to the health care campaign and how heroic they… Continue reading

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I was a liberal tea bagger

  By A political memoir, Health Care

Tonight we turned out a bunch of people for a Health Care Town Hall sponsored by Damian Dachowski, who used the event to announce that he would be running for Congress against Allyson Schwartz next year. Normally, HCAN in PA ignore most these events. Given that the press in Southeast PA pretty much doesn’t cover events held by issue activists unless there is controversy, it doesn’t make sense to show up and give the right wingers more publicity. And, given that we are a non-partisan campaign, we especially make a point of avoiding partisan events. But this was a special case. Allyson Schwartz has been a great champion of health care reform. Her districts is important in that a lot of people who live in it have influence far beyond it. It is a district that is becoming more progressive. And we expected a lot of press anyway given that… Continue reading

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Quotes from the illustrious dead

  By A political memoir

There are three approaches to life, that of anger, gratitude and laughter. Those who take the path of anger become bad people, who bring destruction on themselves and others. Those who take the path of gratitude become good people, who bring happiness to themselves and others. And those who take the path of laughter become teachers, who teach us about the choices before us. —dead white Greek guy, I think. It’s not enough to follow the Oracle’s injunction to “know thyself.” We must also have the courage to act on that knowledge—another dead Greek guy Continue reading

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Escaping gravity: some reflections on organizing

  By A political memoir, Political Organizing

To see a world in a grain of sand…And eternity in an hour. Blake Caress the details. Nabokov Organizing is hard, often frustrating work. It takes an enormous amount of energy to get people to fit their personal vision into a collective effort and even more to help them focus on what matters as opposed to what doesn’t. In doing this work you have to deal with every sort of personal quirk and idiosyncrasy found in a, hopefully, large group of people. Of course, as an organizer you are also part of an broad effort to make life better for people. And if you are organizing in a democratic fashion, your goal is to empower people, to lift them and their ideals up, and give them a vision of a better world that they themselves have created. Doing that kind of work is inspiring. But sometimes the disconnect between our… Continue reading