June 2014 – The South Lawn

I had not intended on running for any political office in Alabama. Why would I? I am a relative newcomer to the state, my political roots are elsewhere, and the prospect would have been difficult enough as a pretend socialist, to say nothing of being a real one. But as 2013 continued to unfold and I watched the Alabama Democratic Party lurch from screwup to screwup, I started to give the idea more thought.

“I mean, it ain’t like I would have to campaign campaign. I would simply place my name on the ballot, create a design for ‘signs’, and see where it takes me. And it’s a run for the State Democratic Executive Committee; how hard can that be?”

Anyone that knows me could tell you that this sort of minimalist thinking was not bound to last very long. But nevertheless, on January 28th, I announced that I was in it to win it:

https://twitter.com/DougWilliams85/statuses/428320914087092224

After I decided to run, I thought I needed to try recruiting a team of progressives and young folks to run along with me. So I went to College Democrats meetings and tried to give as fiery a speech as I possibly could to get people motivated to join me on the June ballot. I ended up recruiting three other young Democrats to run for seats in either Tuscaloosa or their home counties and, after collecting their $50 filing fee and paperwork, I headed off to the state party headquarters in Montgomery to officially file the paperwork to run.

The paperwork that I filed on February 6th to run for the SDEC.

My brief time spent at headquarters crystallized all the reasons I had decided to run in the first place.

When one thinks of Alabama, what comes to mind first? Is it the Civil Rights Movement, which made the state ground zero for its organizing efforts? Is it that movement’s most recognizable leader, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.? Is it The University of Alabama or Auburn, which holds a combined 17 national championships in Division I-A football? Is it the steel mills that once served as the backbone of the state’s industrial power, or the space and rocket research that we are known for now? Maybe it is the musical tradition of this state, with natives like Lionel Richie, Percy Sledge, and Hank Williams, Sr.?

Nah. If you are a liberal or some other sort of left-leaning individual, Alabama is probably known first and foremost as one of the most conservative states in the Union. After electing Republican governors for most of the previous two decades, Alabamans helped House Minority Leader Mike Hubbard (R-Auburn), along with Senate counterpart Del Marsh (R-Anniston), storm the statehouse in 2010. That election gave the Republicans near total control of state government, with a supermajority in both houses and nearly all the statewide constitutional offices. In 2012, the defeat of former Lieutenant Governor and then-President of the Public Service Commission Lucy Baxley meant that there were no longer any Democrats holding statewide office in Alabama. And while there has not been any polling on the gubernatorial race here, it is safe to say that Gov. Robert Bentley (R) has this pretty well locked up. He will likely be assisted by the fact that, for the first time in Alabama history, there will be no Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate. That’s right: Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, who became one of only two nominees for the federal bench since the Depression to be blocked by the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1986, will sail into his fourth term without even so much as a campaign.

The situation is pretty damn ugly for Alabamans on the Left. But news came through today that put smiles on many a Democrat’s face today: Birmingham is one of the six finalists to host the Democratic National Convention in 2016. This would seem to be great news. As the mayor’s chief of staff put it, “You have to look at Denver pre and post-convention, Charlotte, pre and post-convention, and then you’ll get a sense of what it means to a city in terms of economic impact and pride to those who live, work and play in those cities. And then there’s the impact that you can’t measure. It has both short-term and long-term effect.”

Who could pass up an opportunity to go after something like that? Positive economic benefits in the short- and long-term! A shot in the arm to Democrats across the Yellowhammer State! A commitment to make a play for the South!

This sounds fantastic! And yet here I am, proceeding to write about why Birmingham would be, in the words of Alabama native and never-was candidate for governor Charles Barkley, a TURRRRRRIBLE decision to host the DNC in 2016.