One Pissed Off Voter

By Naeem Mohaiemen, AlterNet. Posted October 7, 2004.

Like many during election season who live in “safe” states like New York, Gita Drury has focused on the swing states for the coming elections. In the past, her organization, the Active Element Foundation, raised money for grassroots youth groups nationwide to raise young voter participation. But because Active Element is a non-profit organization, the groups it works with are barred from anything that might smell of political advocacy. Wanting to get more directly involved, Gita took a leave from her job to work with Active Element’s sister organization, The League of Pissed Off Voters. Because the League has a more politically flexible 501(c)4 tax status, it is allowed to do unlimited lobbying. It also has an affiliated PAC (Political Action Committee), which allows it to make endorsements and actually help elect candidates at all levels – local, state and federal.

The League’s mission is to re-engage “pissed off” young people who are turned off by traditional, big-money electoral politics. Some of their recent projects include the book "How to Get Stupid White Men Out of Office," the online network Indyvoter.org, and the Progressive Voter Guide Tool. They are allied with youth groups that are ferocious, engaged and outside the mainstream – they include the National Hip Hop Political Convention, PunkVoter, Next Wave of Women in Power, United Students Against Sweatshops and Voter Virgin.

With one month left to the elections, Gita and the rest of the League are in hyper-drive mode, criss-crossing the country and reaching out to young people who are "pissed off " at the political situation but not necessarily motivated to vote. In the midst of her busy schedule, she took a break to talk about the League's strategy, why voters are pissed off and why voter organizing is sometimes more effective than protest.

Gita, let's start with a conversation we had the night before the Republican National Convention (RNC). At that time, you said that the enormous energy being focused on protesting Bush's presence could distract from voter registration work. Expand on that theme a bit. Do you feel it distracts from the less sexy, but equally vital work of voter registration? When is protest relevant and when is it a distraction?

I don’t like the whole "protesting versus voting" debate. That’s how we end up fighting amongst ourselves over tactics. What we really need is both! I actually think the RNC protests were really important and inspiring. They didn’t end up taking that many material resources, mostly people power. However, my point was that this particular presidential election could easily be decided by a few thousand votes, in states like Ohio, Florida and Wisconsin. I give the organizers a lot of credit for being politically smart by keeping everything non-violent and not playing into the hands of Karl Rove. I would like to see our community put just as much energy into beating the Republicans as protesting them. It’s not enough to protest – we have to get them out of power.

IndyVoter targets youth and minority communities, as well as others. Do you feel black & Latino communities are totally ignored by Democrats because they presume they have their vote? Has the Kerry campaign been better on this, or about the same? I understand that there was some talk about some hip hop heads talking to the GOP after being ignored by the Dems. What's going on with race and the Dems?

Yeah, it’s a real problem. Democrats have been taking people of color, young people, queer people for granted and/or ignoring them.

But I think we are also sometimes naïve about the complex line the Democrats have to walk to get elected, given the realities of America. The Republican strategy to peel off the white working and middle class has been to portray the Democratic party as being controlled by special interests, i.e. African Americans, corrupt union bosses, "tree-huggers," "man-hating feminists," gays, etc. The Republicans have an incredible propaganda machine that plays on the racist fears of the white majority, particularly men, to get them to vote against their own class interests.

In 1988, the Republicans destroyed Michael Dukakis by portraying him as soft of crime. The centerpiece of this strategy was a black prisoner who had committed a crime while he was on furlough. This was the infamous Willie Horton ad that pulled the rug out from under Dukakis. So, in 1992 Clinton won by portraying himself as tough on crime and by intentionally distancing himself from Jesse Jackson and scapegoating Sister Souljah. And he won. Ever since, white Democrats feel like they have to distance themselves from minority communities in order to win at the national level, or in any majority white district in most places in the country.

Naeem Mohaiemen is editor of progressive website Shobak.Org and director of the documentary "Muslims Or Heretics."

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