As a prelude to all these preludes, from 2014 straight through to the present day, recently I was approached separately by two local Democratic Party stalwarts, both expressing the same basic sentiment: C’mon, Rog, shouldn’t we all be in the same tent, rowing together, and defending the Alamo against the GOP?
I’m certainly willing to talk things over. But as a show of sincerity on their part, maybe it’s time to relax almost eight years of social media censorship, because doesn’t social media censorship send me an unmistakable signal that they don’t want to hear anything I might conceivably have to say?
Let’s set a course for February 16, 2017.
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ON THE AVENUES: In 2014 as in 2015, then 2016, now 2017…yes, it’s the “Adamite Chronicles: Have muzzle, will drivel.”
A weekly column by Roger A. Baylor.
Column reruns are inevitable, although I try to keep them to a minimum. It comes down to time – time enough to write, and writing well enough to be coherent. If I can’t clear the bar, there’s always next time.
So it must be this week, and now here’s the prelude to this week’s encore, because until something changes, it’s a point worth repeating yearly if necessary.
With considerable trepidation last Saturday morning, I went over to the 40/8 Voiture off State Street to observe a Floyd County Democratic Party “chat” with John Zody, Indiana’s state party chairman. The topic was the state party’s future prospects at a time when unmitigated catastrophe has created fresh new opportunities. Given that our local party has absorbed three consecutive catastrophes without changing a thing, I’m skeptical overall, and yet eternally curious, so I went.
Roughly 40 other persons attended the chat, perhaps half of them residents of Floyd County, with the remainder hailing from nearby counties in Southern Indiana. Ballparking it, there probably were more women than men, and perhaps a dozen attendees were younger than 45. All were white save one – maybe two. I was impressed with their sincerity, and Zody seems like a pleasant enough chap, if consumed with the usual anodyne managerial boilerplate.
Surprisingly, a few intrepid souls even dared to speak aloud Bernie Sanders’ name, albeit with eyes nervously darting around the room lest their non-centrist wayward skulls be...Read more
