It is really easy to bang away at the keyboard sneering and playing Monday Morning Quarterback with our politicians at all levels.  Which isn't to say that those sneers and second-guesses are unearned.  But at the end of the day if we really, really want to look ourselves in the mirror, or face our children and say we are really making a difference then it is time to push ourselves away from the desk.  Time to walk the walk.

Which is why I announced this week that I am running for Clinton City Council for an At-Large seat.  The election is this November 6.

Just a couple of weeks ago, via Ed Fallon's IM for Iowa mailing list I got a message urging people to run for their local offices.  Ed said,

Somehow, we have to get beyond the ridiculous, popular notion that all politicians are crooks.  Heck, even my favorite folk singer, Don McLean, said as much from the stage as he performed the closing act at the Iowa State Fair earlier this month, calling all presidential candidates “liars.” Do some tell lies?  Sure.  Big ones.  But if McLean would choose to pay attention, he would hear a lot of truth in what some of the candidates have to say.  In fact, some campaign rhetoric follows the same themes McLean so poetically expresses in his music.

I don’t know how to put this any more emphatically, so imagine that the next sentence is highlighted, bold-faced and underlined (this e-mail program only allows caps):  WE ARE THE GOVERNMENT.  IF POLITICIANS ARE CORRUPT AND ACT ONLY IN THE INTEREST OF BIG BUSINESS AND THE VERY WEALTHY, IT’S BECAUSE WE LET THEM GET AWAY WITH IT!

I've spent a lot of time in my life as the person or a person behind the candidate.  I have always said that I would take my turn, when I had my fortune made and I could do and say what I wanted.  But that would mean that I would allow my children to grow up in a city and a region that is not the great place to live, work and do business that I know it can be.

There is a lot of work to be done.  If this campaign is to be run right — that is to say run to win — then there are doors to be knocked, funds to be raised, signs to be put up and voters to be turned out.

The cman blog is going to go on hiatus until after Election Day.  But, I will continue to blog, just in a more focused way.  I'll be blogging about what it is like to run a local campaign in Iowa as a first-time candidate.  Please join the conversation over at www.andersonforclinton.org

Later,

Connor Anderson

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