One year ago today America was celebrating the inauguration of its first African-American President. Today that President's party is having one hell of a hangover... and it's not the happy kind. While some of the Democratic Party's leaders are calling for a retreat to the center, members of the activist wing are diagnosing the Massachusetts results as a failure to keep the party's base energized.
E.A. Hanks of The Awl sums up some of the frustration progressives are feeling in this "Breakup Letter" with "The Left":
I’m 27 years old. George W. Bush was elected my last year of high school and was re-elected my last year of college. The burgeoning of my political consciousness is entirely connected to his presidency.
I marched in protest against his war, I handed out flyers against his policies, I argued against his platforms, I volunteered against his campaign, and I mocked everything about him that I could—which, you know, was quite a lot.
But I standing on the National Mall, crying in the arms of that stranger from Georgia, I realized that the anger I had for President Bush gave me was nothing in comparison with the rage I felt for The Left.
I’ll recover from my first dance with Sturm und Drang, hopefully with a skosh more wisdom and bucket loads less ego, but I’ll never get over my complete and utter disillusionment with the Left.
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