"We're losing our damn minds": James Carville unloads on the Democratic Party

[2naSalit]

21. Empty states?

You know, if a little attention were focused on some of the smaller populous states like Montana, we wouldn't be trapped in red state status when in reality we are sort of purple. But does anyone come here, other than the failed MF45 invasion to oust Sen. Tester a couple years ago?

No.

We have to travel very long distances to another state to attend campaign events for 99% of presidential candidates. Yet there are complaints when I won't decide which candidate to back until I know who will be on the ballot by the time I get one.

I see people on DU and elsewhere bitching about how low population states have more "power" because we have two Senators like all other states. Well if you look at it, we get ONE representative in the House against most other states that have ten or more. WE ALL HAVE TWO SENATORS and ONE House Rep/district so it almost evens out there except when it comes to campaigns to choose our president. We don't count because we have only a small handful, if that many, of delegates in the electoral college so we are at a great disadvantage and we really don't have much of a say in that process so once you consider that element of "who gets more political power" in this whole process, we are at a great disadvantage compared to the rest of the larger populous states.

When will all these candidates come to our state and show us what they have to offer us?

We western states - especially in the Rocky Mountains - have most of the public lands in the lower 48 where many of you like to come to get away from your congested states. Most of the fresh water in the US comes from this region, we have most of the forests and wildlife and National Parks upon which much of the US ecosystem relies... but since there aren't a lot of people here, we don't matter. I guess that's why so many show up here with no respect for the environment or those of us who live here because we must be uneducated and unable to live like all those fine cityfolk who come here to show us how to fuck up our environment so they can have more conveniences. Many of us are treated as though visitors are doing us a favor by coming here so we should treat them like royalty because they are on vacation or some shit... but I digress.

So when a campaign that is designed to help change the political landscape in this way, I see that we don't matter at all because, why spend $$ to oust a senator from a state that could turn a lot bluer for the effort? Though we don't have a whole lot of delegates to offer, we have a lot that matters to everyone on the ground and should be given some serious consideration. The natural resources* that matter are here, and there aren't many humans, which is why we still have natural resources* that are important to the rest of you whether you are here or not. If we had some help turning ONE of our Senate seats blue, it would make more difference on serious matters regarding climate issues and other key VOTES needed in the Senate.

It would take all the Congress and the executive to sign off on changing our system, so if you want that kind of change, your gonna have to have a majority of all states to vote for and ratify the change to make it so. Helping us flip our red seats would be the first order of business in accomplishing your desired goal.


Until then, next time you come to my state to fly fish, ski, go to the NPs, watch wildlife, enjoy water in all the rivers provided by the snow in the mountains in our state(s)... you might recall that these things matter too and part of why we have so few people here is because of the natural environment that most of you enjoy on vacation. So if you think we're all idiots, if those of us who spend our lives fighting to protect these things for everyone's sake are that stupid, please proceed with your narrow arguments on how we are represented in DC.

Such arguments only serve to further isolate us from your objectives -all of our objectives for equality - by claiming we shouldn't have the representation we do have... even we Democrats out here. So please proceed with the insults, you're only serving our opponents with them.

Personally, I will proceed in voting and working to turn this state blue which is a very futile effort without support from the rest of the party.



*I am loathe to call the natural elements here "resources" because to me that means measuring the forests out in board feet for possible harvest and sale without regard to the importance of these thing when left in their natural state of being. It sets these things up for wanton exploitation in exchange for extremely short term monetary gain.