I’m angry.

Carl Rove and the right-wing radicals he’s put in office are not afraid of strong feelings. Anyone who has watched them spin their dark, distorted version of reality for the past six years knows that fear is the meat on which they feed. It’s terror for breakfast, lunch and dinner, terror trotted out whenever another news story reveals them as the liars, misguided ideologues, and arrogant incompetents that they are, terror to drive flocks of the fearful to the voting booths.

The liberals who speak out at all, try as usual to be the voice of reason and realism, even though they know that their fact-based, nuanced views will be derided as cowardly flip-flopping or, now that a key election is closing in, labeled as flat-out treason.

I’m sick of it.

I’m angry that the Bush administration turned the tragedy of 9/11 into the travesty of Iraq.

I’m angry that our country was hoodwinked into a needless, divisive, and costly war.

I’m angry for the years of lies about Iraq’s nonexistent WMDs and links to al-Qaeda.

I’m angry that Bush and his bullies bamboozled us with a classic bait and switch—promising to protect us against terrorism, but giving us instead a war that’s creating more hatred towards the US around the world, and breeding a new generation of terrorists.

I’m angry that our “visionary” leaders could envision a Middle East remade in our image, but in their arrogance refused to plan for postwar Iraq or provide enough troops for a successful occupation and transition.

I’m angry that Rove’s cynical contempt for the American people, his unlimited permission to hammer on our most primitive emotional buttons, and his attack-dog eagerness to Swift Boat anyone who dares oppose his gang, has debased our political discourse to the level of a fight in the sewers.

I’m angry that many of the rights shining forth from the Constitution, rights that generations of patriots fought and died for, have been gutted while a supine Congress cowers in the corner.

I’m angry that our intelligence community shrugged off its obligation to “tell truth to power,” and instead provided the powerful with the propaganda they needed to bully us into war.

I’m angry that the press followed blindly, avidly swallowing the war-party line.

I’m angry that new laws have let the bloated rich grow even richer, while millions of American children have no health insurance and attend crumbling schools.

And I’m angry that America’s gleaming cloak, our vital ability to lead the world through example, has been tossed aside like old rag and replaced by secret prisons, torture called by other names, and naked power.

Damn right I’m angry. Aren’t you?

This November we have the opportunity to plough our anger into electing a new Congress. These elections are crucial, as Carl Rove and his cronies know all too well. If at least the House of Representatives regains a Democratic majority, the checks and balances that have been derailed since 9/11 can start to work again. There will be at least the beginning of a power base that can oppose the rampant, rabid right.

If, however, Bush’s minions eke out yet another win through their unlimited media budget, by waving the bloody terror card again and again, by hammering away at symbolic wedge issues, shamelessly sliming their opponents, and managing to discourage enough voters and discount enough votes, the rest of us—the huge majority of Americans who would never have gone to war to realize Wolfowitz’s dream of an American empire—will be in deep, long-term trouble.

We need to win big if we’re going to win at all. We need so many ordinary people who register to vote despite all the red tape, who vote despite the roadblocks, long lines and broken machines, and whose votes get counted despite Diebold and friends, that no amount of manipulation, machination, chicanery or fraud can keep us from being heard.

Let’s turn our anger into votes, votes that count.

REA for the institute