Democratic Party

You can criticize the democratic party all day and night, but I think that, flawed as it may be, they are made up of people who genuinely want to make the United States of America a better place. In the past I have always done my utmost to avoid labelling myself as one thing or another, but I'm at the point when I'm comfortable saying this; I'm a democrat. I'm a democrat because I largely agree with all of the agendas of the party. I'm a supporter of women's reproductive rights, I'm an environmentalist, and I'm all for spreading social justice wherever and whenever ignorance rears its ugly head. Is the democratic party completely perfect? Of course not. Only a naïve child would think that. Many prominent democrats have been bought and sold by special interests and lobbyists, many of them have sold out for their own personal gain, and many have used their power to advance causes contrary to the supposed "moral compass" of the party. It's certainly a bad sign that so many figures running for the democratic presidential nomination have had to go well out of their way to prove that they aren't for sale. If anything, this is indicative that special interest funded candidates are a very real and very prevalent problem. Aside from that, however, my views most closely line up with those of the democratic party. The history of the democratic party is very interesting and worth going into as well. It's the oldest party in the United States, and had it's beginnings as the party of Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, and James K. Polk that more often than not bested the opposing "Whig" party. Today the Democratic party is significantly associated with social justice, which is interesting because in its early days it was the party of white supremacy and most of the southern states were democratic (known then as "dixiecrats"). However, during the twentieth century they made a significant shift towards being the party of workers and civil rights that they're known as today. I can't stand when people knock the switch in ideology that democrats and republicans most definitely made, because it's just plain ignorant of historical fact. Yes, the democrats, were at one point the party of the KKK but in the modern era, that certainly changed. Today there are virtually zero Klan members that would call themselves democrats. Ok, before you explode on me, just know that I will be making an entry after this on the Republican party, and I won't just be bashing them. I'll try to be as objective as I can so if you're a conservative reader, just hold tight. Now, back to the subject of the Democratic party. Again, I identify as a democrat, and unless some kind of drastic ideological shift occurs within the party, I don't see that changing anytime soon. Now on to the news of the here and now; yes I've been paying pretty close attention to the race for the Democratic presidential nomination. I've looked into all of the candidates that are officially running, and while I know some of them are bound to drop out before the first debate, I can honestly say that I would vote for any one of them over the dumpster fire that we currently have in the white house. It's interesting to see the ideological path that the democratic party seems to have taken. It seems like they are shifting away from centrists candidates (such as Hillary Clinton) and moving more towards the left. While I don't think this is a particularly bad thing, I think democrats need to be cautious with taking this path, as it may turn off many independent and undecided voters. At this point, whoever gets the nomination, whether it be Bernie Sanders, Beto O'Rourke, Kamala Harris, or any of the other many candidates, will most definitely receive my vote and my support. As much hate as the democratic party gets, I think they ultimately want to do what's best for this country and everyone in it. I'll finish by saying this; Let's go blue team!