View From the Chair

Bringing folks back to their real political home, the DFL, is one of my primary goals as the new Chair of the Aitkin County DFL.  Anyone that has participated in the Aitkin County DFL knows the members to be some of the nicest, most caring people in the community.  No wingnuts, no extremists, no radical lefties, just regular folks that want affordable healthcare, for everybody. 

We want what most Minnesotans want, good schools that lead to equal opportunities, a healthy environment with clean water for drinking and fishing, sensible government regulation to insure a healthy food supply, quality courts and law enforcement, well maintained roads and bridges, to name a few priorities.

So how and why has partisanship grown so out of control, when most Minnesotans still really want the same things for us and our neighbors?  As a Democrat, I also ask, why have so many people drifted away from the DFL and often voted against their own economic and community interests?

Well, it is not because of, but perhaps in spite of the Aitkin County DFL.  We are more interested in improving your household finances, than bedroom and bathroom divisive social issues.  But the media and the hyper-partisan class thrive on division and drive ratings and fundraising with sensationalizing what should be mundane policy discussions.  Worse yet, they pit neighbor against neighbor and agitate for shouting matches over civil debate and discourse.  Most of us know this by now, but how do we combat it when social media and even broadcast news feeds division 24/7?

Civility starts in your own backyard, love your neighbor, treat others like you wish to be treated yourself.  Remember that we really all want the same things in the big picture.  Remember that things were more civil when people found ways to compromise.  Getting along is not a four letter word.  Partisanship has gotten out of hand because dark forces and dark money in our society has benefitted from chaos and division, not because people are inherently conflicted.

Here in the Aitkin County DFL, we are engaging in new initiatives to communicate with the community in respectful ways, bringing forth the real important issues in our community, not the ones imported by the media.  We are not a wealthy community by comparison, so we need to protect our rural hospitals and their funding sources, we need to push the state to invest in infrastructure including high speed broadband that can help us compete in the new economy, we need to protect our lakes and rivers, maintain snowmobile and ATV trails and public access hunting.  We have sensible gun rights advocates in the DFL, but shooting deaths is fair game for discussion.

Here in the Aitkin County DFL, we agree that political correctness has gone too far.  Not everything is racist and sexist and people should be able to speak their minds.  We agree that elitism is off-putting and no one should be looked down upon or talked down to.  That is not who we are and that is not how we conduct ourselves.

If you are ready to advocate for our community with dignity and respect, drift back to the DFL and learn for yourself that we are part of the solution, and not part of the problem.  Join us at an event, a meeting or a club meeting.  There are lots of ways to participate and learn and grow with your neighbors in the DFL.  We all do better when we all do better!
—John McIntosh, Chair Aitkin County DFL