Color me a Democrat

By | February 8, 2006

It wasn’t easy, but I decided it was time to leave the Green party. I’ve been a member of the Denver Green Party since 2000. I joined up when Ralph Nader still sounded sane. Being part of a third party seemed like a good idea to me. And I don’t regret my choice. The local Greens have been working to make a lot of changes locally. That’s a very good thing, and is exactly what the Green Party should be focussing on.

But things have changed a lot over the last six years. And it’s now time for me to change back to the Democratic party.

Below is the text of the email I sent to the local Greens, announcing my decision:

From: Michael Fierro To: discuss-DenverGreens@yahoogroups.comDate: Feb 2, 2006 2:55 PM

Subject: resigning as moderator of this list

Greetings! As of yesterday, I am no longer a moderator on this list. I have decided to temporarily leave the Green party and join up with the Democratic party. I know that whoever replaces me as a moderator will do a great job. For the most part, members of this list are intelligent and respectful, a combination which makes moderation a breeze.

I wanted to let everyone know my reason for leaving the Green Party. It was not an easy decision. However, I had to go with my conscience. My conscience led me to the Green Party in 2000, and I am thankful for that. As small as my contributions have been over the last five years, I still feel like I’ve done something good. Like we’ve made a difference, on a small scale.

But I also feel like I’ve lost track of the big picture. There’s a president in office who has entagled our nation in an illegal war against a country that did not attack us, a president who seems intent on stripping our civil liberties and funnelling money from the lower and middle classes, giving it all to the uber-wealthy. Even worse, we have a Congress who seems more than willing to allow him to do this. And we now have a Supreme Court that is tailored to rubber-stamp anything that the president asks them to.

Our nation and our form of government is in danger. Major changes are needed on a national level to right these wrongs. And unfortunately, the Green Party isn’t going to be able to drive these changes. We are not a national force, we are a local, grassroots organization. We can make large changes on a community level, but our influence on a national level is nil.

The Democratic party, on the other hand, has the power and money to make changes on the national level. I know that the Democratic party has its problems. It has its share of corrupt officials and corporate influence. But it also has a lot of people within it who can drive change on a large-scale. And my conscience tells me that I need to be dedicating whatever resources I can towards their effort.

And so that’s what I am going to do. I’m going to join up with the Highlands Ranch Dems, do whatever I can to help Bill Winter win Tom Tancredo’s seat in the House, and try to pressure Senator Salazar into voting with the Dems instead of the Republicans.

Assuming that the political environment stabilizes back towards center (or better yet, left-of-center), I’ll be back! Hopefully that won’t take a couple of decades. 🙂 Until then, it’s been great! I am sure I’ll run into at least some of you from time to time.

Cheers!

—Michael Fierro biffster@gmail.comY! Messenger: miguelito_fierro AIM: mfierro1http://biffster.org http://weightjournal.com—-“As long as the prerequisite for that shining Paradise isignorance, bigotry, and hate…I say the Hell with it.” —Inherit the Wind (kingubu)