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A few weeks ago, I posted a diary that called for progressives to reclaim populism and have a tea party of their own. SmartyJones posted about the coffee party in the comments, which I will admit that I was skeptical of. That is until it went viral. Progressives like me are rightfully pissed off at the status quo. I like the individual Democrats in Congress that represent New Jersey, and I feel that I am fairly represented. However we are pissed off that the national (and state) Democratic Party lacks the spine that is needed to stand up to the schoolyard bullies better known as Republicans. The coffee party movement was started to counter the tea party movement on the right, but it also has another theme which is commonly associated with coffee—wake up. I think that progressives need to wake up to the reality that is American politics. So many of us worked so hard during the election of 2008 and simply expected President Obama and Congress to govern as progressives and we could sit back and enjoy the ride. As the last year has told us, this is as far from the truth as it comes. Democracy is not a spectator sport, and we need to remind our elected officials on all levels that they work for us. However, unlike the tea party movement, the coffee party does not have the funding from industry and billionaires. It’s received some media coverage, but nowhere near what the tea party has received, nor does it have it’s own cable news channel. I think that the coffee party movement is real. Like so many other movements and organizations, they have been using the social networking site Facebook to expand their operations. As of this writing, the national coffee party movement has over 90,000 fans with 64 individual chapters throughout the country, and the New Jersey chapter has 572 fans. Nine events in various counties throughout New Jersey are planned for Saturday March 13 in various coffee shops. I plan on attending the one in my county and will hold off judging the movement until after the meeting. I have many hopes and fears about the movement itself. My biggest hope is that it will equalize the calls and letters that our elected officials receive from us (as Congressman Pallone said at a conference that he hears from the tea party more than progressives), and it will wake up many of the casual progressives to political involvement. My biggest fear is that the attendees of the coffee party movement will be the same group of (about two dozen) people that attend all of the other progressive events throughout the county (that are already very involved). I will call the coffee party a success if it brings new (and younger) blood into progressive politics. I really hope it does because I believe we will need this movement in full force come November.
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