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President Trump helps to drive bigger turnout -- for Democrats

By Clarence Page, Tribune Content Agency on

Shortly after Inauguration Day, I began to see a new headline pop up in my email feed: "Run For Something."

At first I thought it was a cynical reader responding to one of my cranky assaults on the goofy habits and know-nothing babblings of our national embarrassment, President Donald Trump.

If you think you're so smart, I have heard, why don't you run for something?

Why, I respond, would I want to subject myself to the same abuse that I put politicians through in this job?

Nevertheless I have great respect for those who are willing to take the time and abuse necessary to, as an old saying goes, run something other than their mouths.

Such is the purpose of Run For Something, which turned out to be one of several new Trump-era political action groups that have popped up like Christmas stores in October to help advance progressive politics, outside of regular Democratic Party structures.

 

While the Democratic National Committee has tried to pull itself together in the wake of its shockingly unexpected loss to Team Trump, a lot of other independent anti-Trumpers are too impatient to wait.

Started by Amanda Litman, 27, former email director for Hillary Clinton's campaign, and her political operative friend Ross Morales Rocketto, Run For Something aims to enlist, fund and support an important group that often gets too little attention from Democratic party regulars: progressive millennials.

Run For Something and such other Trump-era progressive groups as Sister District, Swing Left, Flippable and Indivisible aim to do for the left what the tea party movement did for the Republican party's right-wing base in the Obama years.

I wished them luck but I didn't expect miracles. Then Tuesday's off-year elections in Virginia, New Jersey and some other states showed as elections always do that you don't need a miracle to unseat powerful incumbents in our democratic republic; you just need to get more votes.

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(c) 2017 CLARENCE PAGE DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.

 

 

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