Blue America welcomes the original Netroots candidate, Darcy Burner
by digby
Back in 2006, when Blue America was just a young PAC, one congressional candidate seemed to emerge from out of our own ranks, so conversant with the way the new technology had merged with progressive politics that she became the first real Netroots candidate. It was, of course, Darcy Burner of Washington state, a brilliant former Microsoft executive who famously declared that she knew she had to step into the arena when she realized that she needed to leave a better world for her young son.
We endorsed her enthusiastically in both of her heartbreakingly close losses in 2006 and 2008 and followed her subsequent work in Washington DC as Director of the Progressive Caucus Foundation with interest. While there, she learned the inside workings of the congress, built relationships and alliances with other progressives and deepened her policy knowledge to truly impressive levels. Yet through it all, Darcy has closely maintained her connections to the Netroots and commitment to the Progressive Movement we’ve been trying to build from the beginning. She was one of those rare people with the integrity and backbone to be in Washington DC without being of Washington DC.
But we couldn’t be more thrilled that she has now gone back home to the Pacific Northwest to give it another go and run for congress herself— and we are proud to endorse her for the congressional seat in the new WA-01 district.
We need people like Darcy in the congress more than ever because, as she says:
We can’t fix what’s broken with our country if we don’t fix Congress. Our Congress is full of crooks who trade on insider knowledge, of people who have sold their souls to the very people who have broken our country. Even the good ones, the members who want the right things, too often give up too easily on important fights, or can’t figure out how to fix the deep structural problems that undermine us.
We need people there who are tenacious and who won’t give up when things get hard.
Indeed we do. And Darcy is nothing if not tenacious.
It’s not going to be a cakewalk. She’s facing a primary with several dismal Dems, one of whom may very well get tacit backing from the Party. (Darcy wasn’t afraid to speak her mind when she was in Washington. They know she will not be compliant.) And once she gets through that gauntlet, she will be facing a probable GOP opponent who will be very well financed.(Aren’t they all?)
She’s got great name recognition, even though this is a new district, and is she very popular in the populated Democratic part of it. We understand that the progressives are rallying around her in the more Republican rural area. So she’s got an excellent chance.
But she’s going to need our help. Big business isn’t going to support a real progressive. Super-PAC gambling billionaires aren’t going to support a real progressive. The Party is terrified of Big Business and Super PAC billionaires so it isn’t going to support a real progressive. That’s going to be our job.
Please join us in the comments as we welcome Darcy back for her first chat of the election season. She’ll be taking questions for the next hour.
And please donate what you can to her campaign here. If you want to begin the real hard work of hope and change, this is the place to start.