The High Road, or how I lost by ignoring reality

(My latest diary from DailyKos)

I am not the best of writers, and I don’t have the patience to do all the research needed to thoroughly educate and raise the awareness of all the Kossacks across the nation, but I want to try to start a conversation that goes a tad beyond the Democratic nomination.  I need help though.  This is where you come in. 

I want people to think about the bigger picture of the forces who are trying to influence the 2008 election (Presidential AND Congressional).  I see two disturbing trends.

The first is the momentum behind candidates that talk about not accepting special interest campaign funds.  Sounds simple enough, but what about independent campaign expenditures?  Can the Democratic nominee raise enough funds from average Americans to beat McCain’s campaign PLUS the campaign waged by independent special interest groups?  Of course not.  Because of campaign finance reform laws are not comprehensive (namely that we don’t have mandatory public financing) the money has to, has, and will come from somewhere.

The second trend is how little I see progressive’s discuss the huge elephant in the room.  I am going to pick on one part of that huge elephant: Freedom’s Watch.  Someone here knows more about this than I, but I don’t see enough people talking about it.  They alone want to raise and spend close to $250 million to influence the election in 2008. 

Freedom’s Watch will raise close to a QUARTER OF A BILLION DOLLARS to influence the election

They side with the conservatives, the tax-cut and spend folks, the global capitalists, etc.  They are not the only ones.  Yes, the Democrats have some big money thinktanks and funding groups gearing up as well.  They have always had labor.

But are we painting ourselves into a corner?  How can the Dems accept a $53 million AFL-CIO campaign to defeat McCain AND say they don’t accept or condone special interest groups?

AFL-CIO launches aggressive campaign against McCain

Where does this leave us people?  I don’t know exactly, but I want to see it addressed.  It feels like people are ignoring it because they know they can’t yet compete with that kind of funding and that it has the potential to do more damage to the eventual nominee than the intra-party war could right now. 

Will you join me in asking those who know to take it seriously and start talking to us?  Recommend this diary, and directly ask Kos to address this.