The sky is overcast and grey, an uncannily appropriate backdrop to the general mood of disappointment that has descended upon the day. As the reality of the situation at hand sinks in, it seems inevitable that things will only get worse before they get better. How much better just depends upon how much lower we sink into the messes we are in, and how long it will take us to overcome the years of our opponents planning. Right now we are standing at a base of a cliff which we will all have to scale in order to overcome. The Republicans have surrounded us; they are baying at our heels. They are consolidating the power which they have worked for decades to gain, quietly, intelligently, persistently and with confidence. Knowing that if they work together, that they will be able to overcome any opposing ideas, and their will, will be upon us. 

This is the culmination of their years of work, patience and cunning. We will have to do the same; we are at the bottom of the cliff looking up. This is not a good position to be in. There is no more room for the politics of the past, the infighting, the political games of power that everyone is guilty of playing. Games have no place for us anymore, this is not a time for dissention within our ranks, for squabbling over petty unimportant differences, over the most minor of the hurdles we are going to have to jump. This is the point of no return; do we scale the cliff with our hands? Hand to hand we can work, pulling each other up so that we can stand at the top and proudly look down. The alternative is not the legacy I want to leave for my children.

As the wolves circle our camp, we sit and enjoy the campfire, basking in the glow not paying attention to the shadows. They have been sniffing our scent following us lurking in the dark, calculating in their war rooms. They have organized an almost insurmountable army. We are the unknowing prey. We played our little games, some fun, some destructive, politics as usual. Now suddenly we are surrounded, they are biting at our heels. Do we stand back to back? Do we combine our forces? We are after all in a hole at the bottom of the cliff. We progressives are, after all, in the same hole. Do we push out as one, forcing the retreat of the wolves? Or do we continue to play the games, believing that we are still in the same world we were in before, the world where it was OK not to be unified, not to work together. There is no more time for the foolishness of the past. The past has caught up with us and is threatening never to be removed. 

Do we think that the wolves will not eat us if we stab our brothers in the back? They will eat us all. There will be no pity, even for those who appeared to be helping them. Their world view is not like ours, their world view will not and never will be inclusive of us or our values. We are surely deceiving ourselves if we think that undermining anyone of our brothers will help us achieve the lofty goals that we have set for ourselves. 

This is not the time.

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