Time to Organize: Fighting Despair in 2022 and Beyond.

May 3, 2022

Let me start with an apology for taking so long to get back to writing. This year has been challenging for me – in both good and difficult ways. Part of the difficulty for me has been watching how increasingly fascistic the Republican Party and its propaganda media allies have become, how inept the Democratic Party has been in facing this threat despite having control of Congress and the presidency, and how little so many Americans seem to care about it. The threat of fascism in this country is real. If the January 6th coup attempt, the resulting criminal cases, and the voluminous evidence we have from the House Select Committee do not convince people, then probably nothing will until it’s too late. The fact that the Democrats cannot even pass a voting rights bill or forgive/address student loan, medical, and credit card debt (while keeping the trillion-dollar tax cut for rich people in place) is not helping folks who worked hard to elect them in 2018 and 2020 get motivated for this November. The polling is terrible for Democrats right now, and as I have previously written they are the only electoral option in our system right now. It’s depressing.

Among the good things that have happened this year that have made writing challenging is the increased workload I have helping non-profits navigate state and local lobbying, campaign finance, and other voting-related laws. It’s been a real pleasure to do this work, and it is helping me deal with the despair of our current state of politics. Working with people who are laying so much of the foundation for organizing, mobilizing, and getting out the vote – as well as those folks working to advance progressive policy agendas in the states – aligns nicely with the work I have been trying to accomplish through this newsletter. I will have a link to my professional website for you soon. In the meantime, if you work with a non-profit or community organization and feel like you need some technical assistance on these issues, please feel free to send me a message and we can discuss.

There is an increased urgency to act this morning as we learn that the US Supreme Court is not just going to gut abortion rights (as Chief Justice John Roberts reportedly favors), but overturn Roe v. Wade altogether. There are reports – and you can rest assured they are in some part accurate – that Congressional Republicans are planning to enact a federal law outlawing abortion after six weeks should they win both houses of Congress this year. Of course, President Joe Biden will veto any such legislation, but fascists are relentless and they will just work on installing a president through any means necessary in 2024. You can also bet on these precedents being overturned by a Republican Court and Congress: Obergefell v. Hodges (gay marriage); Griswold v. Connecticut (contraception); Lawrence v. Texas (sexual privacy); Loving v. Virginia (interracial marriage); and more. The legal “reasoning” conservative legal scholars are using to urge overturning Roe have applicability to almost any fundamental right of privacy you can imagine. We’ll discuss this after the Court officially overturns (as seems likely this morning) or guts Roe.

To be sure, the fascists’ will is to grab power, not to pass a specific piece of legislation. Even if Republicans were successful in enacting a federal statute outlawing abortion, they will still use any means – cheating, lying, fabricating evidence, intimidation, even an outright coup attempt – to undermine free and fair elections in order to gain and maintain power.

In the meantime, we need to organize, mobilize, and vote. That’s what this newsletter has been about and it is now time for me to get into the swing of things – which will mean intensive work over the next 30 months or so. Trust me, regardless of what happens in November we are going to have to keep our foot on the pedal straight through the 2024 presidential election and probably even beyond.

For Margin of Error, I want to go back to my original intention with the newsletter and focus on that through the election this year and beyond. Here’s a review of why I write Margin of Error:

1) To support the efforts of traveling campaign volunteers and remote organizers and advocates.

2) To provide information that informs those efforts in a way that is easy to understand, but not distortive, and partisan, but not deceptive or misleading (we must avoid the sin of believing our own BS, even as we remain optimistic).

3) To help alleviate the anxiety felt by so many politically engaged or interested folks that is a[n intentional?] by-product of the 24-hour news cycle and clickbait culture.

The blog sprung out of the “trifecta briefs” I had been putting together for friends who were interested in traveling from their safe blue states/districts to areas of the country where they could maximize their volunteer skills, time, and energy. That work will continue – and expand – this year. I plan to have the briefs out in time for folks to make decisions about where they can best make a difference by late summer. I will write about targets well before that to give folks more time to consider their options. But complete briefs will likely be available in late August.

Here’s what I plan to do, and I hope you can join or support me.

• Providing you with campaign volunteer information, including comprehensive briefs on places where you can have the most impact (the trifecta briefs).

• Tracking and analyzing polling, campaign finance, and related election data.

• Reporting on voting rights and election law litigation and legislation.

• Working with community organizations and campaigns to win progressive change in 2022, 2023, and 2024.

What I am going to ask you to do is to support my efforts to continue to do this work. There will be several ways you will be able to do this, including through a paid subscription to Margin of Error (don’t worry; there will still be free stuff). I will lay this out in a separate post soon. Also, please share this blog with friends and colleagues and follow me on Twitter and Facebook and encourage others to do so. I don’t have the best social media game yet, but I am working on it. Finally, please consider making a serious effort to work on the campaign this fall as a traveling or remote volunteer – or if it makes the most sense: right in your own backyard. This newsletter is dedicated to supporting that work, and I hope more and more of you engage in it this year. And beyond.

Thanks for reading and expect to hear a lot more from me from now on.