Do The Work
By Kelly Fenton
Ignore the noise. Do the work.
There is an ongoing debate among folks in the Outagamie Democratic Party whether this aphorism was coined by one of us or if we are parroting some bit of wisdom we gleaned from somewhere else.
But wisdom it is, and with a year to go before the most important election of our lives I am urging my fellow progressives to heed it, to make it a part of their everyday lives.
The secret to – and the beauty of – Ignore The Noise/Do The Work is that doing the work is perhaps the only thing that allows you to ignore the noise.
Some (I would suggest) largely meaningless polling in a New York Times story over the weekend had hair catching fire in progressive circles all around us. And because there are alarmists out there, the fire spread rapidly. Panic ensued.
I get this. In 2016 and 2020 I obsessively refreshed Nate Silver’s 538 presidential polling aggregate throughout the day, with my moods contingent on the numbers that popped up on my screen.
And to what end?
To no end. It was all a time and energy drain and didn’t get us one step closer to electing our candidates.
Here is what is more important than a poll a year out from the election: Talking to voters, finding out what’s on their minds, offering truthful alternatives to the false narratives that have taken hold, filling information gaps for people who aren’t really paying attention, underscoring the urgency of voting next year and urging them to think about joining us in our efforts.
What I am discovering talking to people is that independents and even Democrats are obsessed with Joe Biden’s age. What I am attempting to convey to these people is that, while President Biden is indeed the age he is, he is navigating highly complex international crises with aplomb and to great commendation, that he has engineered some of the most progressive, job-creating legislation of any president in the past three decades, and that he is a decent man who cares deeply about our democracy. And, most importantly, that he is a bulwark against the authoritarian alternative, a man who is only a few years younger than Biden and a malignant narcissist to boot.
People need to hear this message and they need to hear it from earnest and concerned fellow-Americans. The longer they don’t hear this, the more rooted the false narratives become.
So, please, stop pulling your hair out trying to understand why anyone would continue to support Donald Trump. That way lies madness and, worse, exhaustion. And exhaustion and despair is at the very top of the GOP playbook. Don’t fall for it.
Furthermore, try to avoid fostering the Biden-is-too-old-I-wish-we-had-a-younger-candidate narrative among your friends. Just stop. This feeds the beast.
Get to work. Turn away from the noise.
We are canvassing all week and if you can help we’d love to have you. Sign up here to pick up a packet and go tell voters the truth about what we are facing.
https://www.mobilize.us/wisdems/event/590462/
We would also love to have you attend our one-hour Democracy 101 forum on Nov. 20 at 7 p.m. at our party office at 516 W. College. Learn some basics on how local and state politics work and what our own county party is about, our recent near unanimous successes and our plans for continuing that into next year. We hope to see you there!
*Blog posts represent the views of the author, but do not necessarily reflect the views of the local, state, or national Democratic Party*
