Obama Re-election: Time to Compartmentalize

I've had this title languishing on my blog for weeks: "Obama: Buyer's Remorse...but..." and now "buyers remorse" is everywhere from Bill Maher to Joan Walsh to Miss Piggy. I waited too long to be the clever one. Oh well. In any case, they certainly popularized it way better than I could have so I have to go with something else. Here is my original thought anyway: As miserable and disappointed as I am with Obama's leadership, Ladies and Gentlemen, it is time to put aside all expert opinions, brilliant psychological analyses, psychic prognostications, the gray hair count, the disgust, and, ok, the buyers remorse and Compartmentalize! Everyone who's ever been in therapy, or into actual survival, knows this much about compartmentalizing: "This process is performed in an attempt to simplify things, and to defend against anxiety." Get it? We are shifting gears, people. I am proposing ALL of us do this...put all those negative, pissed-off thoughts to bed in a corner of your hippocampus - you can trot them out after the 2012 election. In case you're wondering if I've gone off the reservation, no, I haven't. I'm an angry progressive...and a pragmatic one...just like Obama calculated.


Now, it is time to be our most dysfunctional selves and pretend like it's 2008. Well, almost. It's kind of like masturbating...just try your hardest to conjure the memories of the energy and adoration, the fantasy bubbles of hope and change, the hotness of the candidate himself, to fire you up and get out there to volunteer to re-elect Barack Obama President of the USA. "The American People" (you know who you are), we HAVE to get this done - to work work work to push back the vile Taliban Tea Party and servile, ass-kissing Republicans from ever getting near the White House. No matter what you think. That Republicans have an assortment of Marat-Sade escapees for candidates, DO NOT TAKE ANYTHING FOR GRANTED.


GOTV, "get out the vote" as it is popularly known among us volunteer cognoscenti, will be critical to winning this election. No issues, no polls (don't listen to them except maybe Nate Silver), no trash talk should deter us from #1: registering voters, and that means not only new voters, but people who have moved, been in prison, changed their names or political affiliation - they need to be registered or re-registered, as the case may be. Then, it's knock on doors time. There is nothing more meaningful than speaking to people in real life, and that's the GOTV part. No, Facebook is not "communicating" - you have to have your feet on terra firma and talk the talk and walk the blocks.


This is not a polemic about Barack Obama. Remember American People, we are compartmentalizing, we are focused. OMMMMMM. We are NOT, I repeat NOT, considering a Hillary, Barney, Russ, Andrew or anyone else to run against Obama. That is silly and non-productive. Get out your 2008 campaign gear, stare at your HOPE poster, pin on your iconic Shepard Fairey buttons and hook up with your local volunteer group to help get this campaign going. Do we have a choice? No. I mentioned this in a post 55 days into O's administration, that he would take us for granted because he already understood that he was the only game in town for liberals and progressives. No matter. History will deal with him. Of course, there's always the fantasy of him getting it right in his second term but that's jumping ahead. The game is ON. Now.


But wait! We have double duty this time. We MUST take back Congress. Dicks though they be, we must also work to re-elect incumbents and elect Democratic newbies. Yes, the system is rigged. Hold your nose and Just Do It.