June 8, 2018

This week Chris Hayes, who to his credit is covering the 2018 phenomenon of women's activism more than many of his colleagues, reflected on the Super Tuesday primaries with a look at the women candidates who are extraordinarily successful at organizing at the grassroots level.

Listen particularly to the New York Times' Michelle Goldberg, who has been talking to on-the-ground women election workers this year:

I pulled out what Goldberg says in this clip because it's a narrative that needs to be noticed. This is very predictive of what I believe will happen in November:

MICHELLE GOLDBERG: It's such an interesting phenomenon, and I think relatively undercovered compared to the tea party because it's big and it's happening everywhere. It's happening far from the coasts where you have these middle-aged women who were maybe, you know, politically aware before they voted. Maybe they voted in most primaries. Didn't necessarily know what congressional district they lived in, and who were so horrified and scare and traumatized and humiliated by the victory of Donald Trump that they became political obsessives. I met these women in Arizona who all of a sudden can tell me extremely precise precinct congressional district. And they're everywhere. And they are so determined to change politics in this country.

And I feel like the one through line these women candidates have, is that they're people who kind of have a lot of confidence, right? People who have sort of had to -- who have worked in institutions and respect how they work and maybe also particularly in the case of teachers, have networks in their community.

You know, and I find this even with -- you know, even with progressives, right, men who they hate Trump, they abhor everything that they're doing, but the women I know, they just find it intolerable, right? It's like this poison gas in the air that kind of this putrid that mars every single moment. I used to think maybe I was kind of unique. I'm a politically political person. I live on the coast. But I meet women all over the country. They cannot stand what is happening.

The thing that keeps these women going is they're forming these new communities. I've talked to these women. They have whole new sets of friends. They have completely transformed social lives. So they're not just atomized people angry looking at their computer. These are now social worlds, and that keeps people going.

Also worth reading: "The Age of the MSNBC Mom" at NYT, in which one Tennessee school teacher notes: "Playing nice and trying to find common ground hasn’t gotten us very far."

We're coming for you, Donnie.

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