So I’ve bored you over two posts with some platitudes and some minutiae. What does it really mean to the average person?

It means that ultimately, you matter…you control more of the process than you think you do. But you have to get involved…stick your neck out…get your hands dirty…etc. etc.

Senator Sanders has always had a cadre of loyal fans…I myself listened to him on Friday mornings on Thom Hartmann’s radio show. But when you get enough folks together that believe in you, and you get some folks in that group with some know-how, and you get some folks with some money involved…well…

And it’s not like Sanders was lying about the $27. Yeah, he got a lot of money from a lot of folks…but a lot of people simply gave him around $27. Which might not seem like much…but as someone that has directed a field campaign, you can do a lot with $27.

You can go knock on doors on a day off or a weekend to help inform people about a ballot issue or a candidate. You can stand out on a corner and encourage people to honk if they support a group (I’ve done that!). You can carry around voter registration cards and whenever a conversation turns to voting, you can register someone to vote…I know a woman in Wichita that does this all the time. And it works!

Sometimes, it’s hard to feel those little things add up. But those little things are the most important, and what can keep you going.

Let me throw in a final caveat though…money. People lament how much it lubricates pretty much anything involving politics. I think this one of the biggest turnoffs involving the two-party system as well. Have you noticed though that the only time a third party has gained any steam is when said founder of the party put his own money into it (Perot and the Reform Party)? I don’t know how we get money out of politics, and quite frankly, I’m not sure that all money needs to be removed from it. I’m certainly not opposed to cutting it back…I just don’t know where that line is, and the Supreme Court will likely have the final say on it again. Until we figure that out, I encourage people to follow the law, but take the money.

So in conclusion…maybe I’ve made a few people think with this series of posts. I think at last look, a whopping 5 people had read my first post in the series…whoooo! Like politics, like life…it takes serendipity…