Heather Cox Richardson reminisces about how her Letters from an American newsletter came to be two years ago. She has persisted through the turmoil and scandal of the last two years buoyed by the kindness of her readers as we all watch to see whether government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall (or shall not) perish from the earth.
Richardson writes:
If you are tired, you have earned the right to be.
And yet, you are still here, reading.
I write these letters because I love America. I am staunchly committed to the principle of human self-determination for people of all races, genders, abilities, and ethnicities, and I believe that American democracy could be the form of government that comes closest to bringing that principle to reality. And I know that achieving that equality depends on a government shaped by fact-based debate rather than by extremist ideology and false narratives.
And so I write.
But I have come to understand that I am simply the translator for the sentiments shared by hundreds of thousands of people who are finding each other and giving voice to the principles of democracy. Your steadfast interest, curiosity, critical thinking, and especially your kindness—to me and to one another—illustrates that we have not only the power, but also the passion, to reinvent our nation.
Richardson speaks for me. Thank you for coming back, day after day, to listen to us rant.
Another Heather, this blog’s proprietor, began writing here New Year’s Day 2003 after attracting a following at Atrios’s blog. She wrote that being invited to write by Atrios was “kind of like having Eddie Van Halen invite you up on stage to join him in a guitar solo.”
That’s how I felt when Digby invited me to join her in August 2014. (We’d met at a conference in 2009.) I began writing occasional commentaries for the Asheville Citizen-Times in mid-September 2003, got named an official (unpaid) “community columnist” in 2005, and finally started up my own blog in March 2006. (It’s still out there gathering electrons.) Eventually, a local rabble-rouser invited me to join Scrutiny Hooligans (R.I.P.) before Digby asked me to fill in over a weekend. The weekend never ended. The Citizen-Times’ then-editorial editor, a Digby fan, greeted me at an event, smiled broadly, shook my hand and said, “My friend, you have arrived.”
And so I write.
Rising early to write each day, three time zones ahead of Digby, is not only a matter of passion “to reinvent our nation.” It is a matter of mental health (as much as daily exercise). In such times, I suspect it is for Richardson as well. The platform allows me to play the inside-outside game. Inside Democratic Party politics and outside throwing occasional rocks. As I told a cynical friend recently, it beats feeling like political road kill:
Sometimes in politics you get run over. But being in the fight means I stopped feeling like road kill decades ago. The antidote to cynicism and despair is stepping back into the fight the way Rick Blaine does at the end of Casablanca. I told him it’s empowering especially when you feel powerless.
Also, the struggle must bring out the Irish in me, I said.
Is this a private fight or can anyone join?
Thanks be to Digby.