"Where were you in November?"

Thursday, there was a demonstration and set of workshops at my university held by a coalition of progressive student organizations. The event, scheduled to coincide with the demonstrations in Washington, drew in folks from the College Democrats to Chicano/a organizations to the Environmental crowd. Sitting in the back, listening to the speeches, I spotted a young Democrat friend of mine. “I hate this shit,” she said under a cupped hand. “Where the hell were all these bastards in November. They didn’t do shit, and now they want to protest…” I tried to tell her that these “bastards” are worth trying to organize, that they mean well, that they will grow and learn that we need politics as well as puppets if we are going to do anything worthwhile. She wasn’t having any of it.

I must say that I sympathize with her. It is hard to take seriously the subset of radicals who were essentially AWOL from the largest grassroots mobilization the Left has seen in decades. Now we see them happily going to protest marches or holding ‘where to we go from here’ meetings. It is a good question she asks. Indeed, where were they in November?

Some of them were helping out, begrudgingly. In a recent wrap-up of the election in the Nation, Medea Benjamin, entrepreneurial Diva of California Green politics stated that it was an “enormous concession” for “progressives” to work to elect John Kerry. An enormous concession? Was it really that hard for her to not make the same colossal, arrogant destructive mistake she made in 2000 by campaigning for Ralph Nader? Does it really take so much difficult moral work to shut up and listen to the pleas of African American, labor, feminist, queer and environmental organizations all of whom said that the defeat of George Bush was worth fighting for? I’m sorry, but I just don’t see what’s so hard about that.

Others, however, simply sat it out. It is this crowd who so enflamed my young Democrat friend: those who couldn’t be bothered to work to elect Kerry because he wasn’t leftish enough, but have the time now to march or kvetch or handwring.

For some of these folks, it is an ideological posture. Elections are not important for their outcomes. Campaign are judged on whether they will help to create more radicals, or more radicals of their particular stripe.

I stand by what I said to my friend. We do need to reach out to young progressives and argue and struggle about these important questions. But, any progressive worthy of the name should think twice about striking so enlightened a pose that they theorize themselves out of the most important election of our lifetime.