what would barack do?
so, last year we had a hard fought, nasty municipal election. my very progressive alderman was mercilessly (and thruthlessly) slimed on a couple of neighborhood blogs. it was ugly, and it was close. he missed being re-elected outright in the primary by 52 votes. he won the run-off by 253 votes. the loser filed suit. so, the nastiness continued.
to be honest, i hated these people. i was throughly slimed on the blogs. i thought their candidate was a nutjob, and they used some very right wing tactics on election day. they had pollwatchers up the wazoo, and challenged like crazy. a religious crazy group came in and helped them develop the challenge lists. there was some outside interest, including a hatchet job on penn and tellers bullshit, even. the blog wars were intense, and amazing. i took it personally, as i was an election judge, and my precinct was on the list.
the lawsuit was thrown out. they insisted that they would release their evidence, but they never have. the remnants of that campaign has morphed into an election reform group. it is really only a handful of people. they did put on a well attended campaign forum earlier this year. but i still thought of them as a bunch of bitter deadenders.

yesterday i got an email from the president of the ward organization that there was a public meeting of this group. he said he had seen a couple of flyers, and someone had forwarded him an email. among the items on the agenda was the release of said evidence. the question was- should any of us attend the meeting? we knew that if the alderman showed, or too many of us showed, the chances were good that the blogs would spin it that we had invaded.
i could not help looking at the situation this way- what would barack do? all these people are hard core obamanaughts. i asked them- what would barack do? that was about the end of the email go round. the alderman and committeeman could see no good coming from their appearance.
but, i just couldn't help it. i had to go, not as a spy, but to see what these people were about. and ya know what? i was really welcomed. ok, i got the hairy eyeball for a while. (and the bloggers were left out of the loop. they were not there, and the meeting was not touted on the blogs.) but as they started talking about securing clean elections, and found out that i knew a lot about the movement for election reform, and that i agreed with some of their goals, they asked me to join them. i agreed to help with recruiting and training election judges and pollwatchers, something very near and dear to me.
common ground, people. you find it in the strangest places, if you are willing to listen. i think change is already here.