"Republicans fear their base, Dems hate their base…" do we see this here?

[KoKo]

7. I think the article makes a few good points...but is too simplistic given the money

influence in politics which is so overwhelming with Citizens United, Rise of the DC Political Class going through revolving doors from politician (or staffer to politician) to Lobbyist to Wall Street to Think Tank around and around. Democratic Activists who can get money and Influential People in High Places behind them can get legislation passed. Look at the LBGT movement and how far tht has come even against RW Fundamentalist pressure and their own Big Donors. Yet there were enough big backers in Hollywood and Industry who could help apply pressure and had the money to give to supporting lobbying and activism.

Tea Party is mostly funded by Koch Brothers and other Business interests on Wall Street who can apply pressure for legislation and even pay people to participate if they need to for rallies and buses to tour the country stirring things up.

As far as Political Dem Activism..my experience was after the Stolen Election 2000 and Iraq Invasion. There were so many angry folks in my area that we latched onto Howard Dean's Meet Ups and began sharing information and got involved in activist action. We went to our local Town Hall Meetings and asked hard questions of our Dem Reps. They acted like they were glad to see us and have our support. We even found some candidates to run against entrenched politicians locally and managed to hold our "Progressive Democratic Convention" where hundreds showed up and Joe Trippi even came and spoke to us.

Our State Dem Party was completely thrown by all this activity. They didn't seem to know what to do when we had a group who spent time putting all their State Dem Donors and voters on Computer Disks so that the GOTV effort finally had some information to go on. The State Dem Party didn't even have their top consistent voters and donors identified in 2004!

We managed to get the Voting Machines without a verifiable paper trail out of our state (with machines that did) and to get Verified, Countable Paper Ballots in many of the largest counties. We were sailing....and then it all slowly started to disappear. It was if our party abandoned us.
We had Bush's second term and the Housing Bubble..and promises our Dems made to do investigations on Stolen Election, Iraq Invasion and the rest of the Bush/Cheney lies and deceit went nowhere. Even in 2006 when we took back the house and had the Senate...we got little or nothing. That was when the momentum started to fail...until Barack Obama came along. After that it was just focused on Obama...and after his election...the Dem Money and activist enthusiasm dried up. I guess folks thought he'd solve it all and our Democrats would finally support us and listen.

The loss of Howard Dean's "50 State Strategy" which turned into Dem National Party focusing on the Swing States meant the money and momentum left us. And, Obama's great promise of continuing activism was gone when Rahm Emmanuel told us what they really thought of us.

That's my experience in my state which voted for Obama first term and not on Second Term when the RW Republicans took us over. Koch Brothers Money/ALEC and Tea Party. That's what we have. And the First Republican State House and Senate in 200 Years on top of that.

So....I'm thinking things are much more serious than the article touches on. But, thanks for posting it. I hope things are not as bleak in your state. Maybe you could pass on tips if your Progressive Dems have managed to survive and thrive.