Thank you Chris Bowers

Close Personal Friend Chris Bowers has the following to say about yesterday's ass-kicking that the people of this nation delivered to the Republican Party's ballsac:

The progressive movement brought in the money to close the fundraising gap. We brought in the message that the war in Iraq was not a good idea. We repeatedly stood up to both Republicans and the established media when even Democrats themselves wouldn't. We unearthed numerous Republican scandals. We built an alternative media empire on a shoestring budget so the progressive and Democratic message could directly reach millions of rank and file Democrats every single day. We fired up the base and kept them eager to vote, not the leadership. We stood up to "progressive" advocacy organizations who were selling out their members. We stood up to corruption and conflicts of interest in our own caucus. We fought tooth and nail against voter suppression of every kind. We brought in the hundreds of thousands of new activists for campaigns and we took over tens of thousands of vacated party offices and precinct captainships around the nation. We looked for a candidate to run in every single race in the entire country. We always supported the Democratic nominee once the primary was over, which our own leadership most definitely did not do. We fought for all Democrats, progressives, moderates, conservatives, and libertarians--even when others refused to do just that.

I agree. I have never been prouder to be a member of this movement. To be honest, this is the first election that I've busted my ass for that wasn't a losing effort. I mean, it was in the races I was intimately involved in*, but by and large, as a progressive, fighting for progressive control of Congress, we won. I helped us win. So did you. It feels good finally to say that.

*Thanks, Rahm, (again) for throwing away $3 million to fund a candidate with no original local backing in my district, all because Christine Cegelis was too liberal for ya. Paid off well, didn't it?

And while I'm at it, Chris' larger point in that post is that the professional election-masters have all failed us. Each of the defining points of htis election came straight from the Democratic base and netroots, not the upper echeclon. They deserve little credit for this, except for Howard Dean, who had the foresight to start organizing all over the country and not just in districts where we already win.