Days of Rage, Rays of Hope
June 4, 2013 - by
Moral Mondays show there is still passion on the Democratic side of North Carolina’s political wars. Away from the headlines, there are more strong signs for a Democratic comeback.
There’s a long, deep bench of future candidates. In no order, and no doubt leaving out many good ones, there are Roy Cooper, Janet Cowell, Josh Stein, Ken Lewis, Cal Cunningham, Deborah Ross, Caroline Sullivan, Grier Martin, Anthony Foxx, Eric Mansfield, Rachel Hunt Nilender.
There are groups filling the leadership vacuum left by the Democratic Party headquarters: Progress NC, Lillians List, the League of Conservation Voters, anti-gun violence groups, Bob Etheridge’s Old North State Caucus, Sam Spencer and the Young Democrats, William Barber and the NAACP, Yevonne Brannon and Great Schools in Wake. Others are bubbling up.
There are nonpartisan groups like Bob Phillips and Jane Pinsky at Common Cause and Bob Hall at Democracy South.
There is an impressive cohort of smart, seasoned operatives and consultants: Thomas Mills, Brad Crone, Reid Overcash, Tori Taylor and many more that I don’t know well enough yet, but will.
There is an army of committed, digitally connected young people that the late Jamie Kirk Hahn and Nation Hahn began organizing in the gay-marriage campaign. That fight could turn out to be to North Carolina Democrats what the 1964 Goldwater campaign was to the Republican Party in the 60s, 70s and 80s.
A party with this kind of talent – in a state with our history and today’s out-of-synch leadership – can mount an electoral revolution. Especially paired with the passion and commitment that thousands of people are showing on Mondays.
Posted in General, North Carolina - Democrats
Days of Rage, Rays of Hope
June 4, 2013/
Moral Mondays show there is still passion on the Democratic side of North Carolina’s political wars. Away from the headlines, there are more strong signs for a Democratic comeback.
There’s a long, deep bench of future candidates. In no order, and no doubt leaving out many good ones, there are Roy Cooper, Janet Cowell, Josh Stein, Ken Lewis, Cal Cunningham, Deborah Ross, Caroline Sullivan, Grier Martin, Anthony Foxx, Eric Mansfield, Rachel Hunt Nilender.
There are groups filling the leadership vacuum left by the Democratic Party headquarters: Progress NC, Lillians List, the League of Conservation Voters, anti-gun violence groups, Bob Etheridge’s Old North State Caucus, Sam Spencer and the Young Democrats, William Barber and the NAACP, Yevonne Brannon and Great Schools in Wake. Others are bubbling up.
There are nonpartisan groups like Bob Phillips and Jane Pinsky at Common Cause and Bob Hall at Democracy South.
There is an impressive cohort of smart, seasoned operatives and consultants: Thomas Mills, Brad Crone, Reid Overcash, Tori Taylor and many more that I don’t know well enough yet, but will.
There is an army of committed, digitally connected young people that the late Jamie Kirk Hahn and Nation Hahn began organizing in the gay-marriage campaign. That fight could turn out to be to North Carolina Democrats what the 1964 Goldwater campaign was to the Republican Party in the 60s, 70s and 80s.
A party with this kind of talent – in a state with our history and today’s out-of-synch leadership – can mount an electoral revolution. Especially paired with the passion and commitment that thousands of people are showing on Mondays.
Posted in General, North Carolina - Democrats