Take a deep breath

The primary election is over, though it's too soon to find out if our phone banking and GOTV efforts paid off. I can take a deep breath and return to a semblance of normal insanity. Tonight I'll go to a victory (?) party for my candidate, who was running neck and neck with the big-business-funded candidate, despite being outspent. It still helps a little to have strong grass-roots support.

With the takeover of our political campaigns by big-money interests--a 20-fold increase in spending since 1979 here in California--it's heartbreakingly difficult for the little guy to prevail. It takes so damn much time and commitment. That's why I work to achieve Clean Money campaign finance reform.

Today, in GOTV, I worked with a woman from Scotland. I asked how they did it in Britain. She said spending, and donating, were severely limited, so you didn't have the deluge of campaign mailings--five or six a day lately--there, and campaigns were much shorter and depended on people going to the trouble to understand the issues and where the candidates stood on them. It all seems so civilized. Why are we such a backward country? We're like Mexico or something, where every politician is for sale.