hforh1

Now and forever

Last February, we were in the middle of the rough post-Super Tuesday stretch of caucuses leading up to the March 4th “meet me in Ohio” showdown between Hillary Clinton and Obama. Tim Russert brayed and bellowed for Clinton to drop out of the race. Keith Olbermann harrangued her “to just quit already”. Chris Matthews called her every name in the book, between bouts of tingling sensations running up his legs.

Morale on Team Hillary was low, and Eeyores started popping up everywhere.

That’s what we called people who listened to Russert, Olbermann, and Matthews and decided to “just give up”, people who turned everything those three cable news pigs said into self-fulfilling prophesies. Eeyores stopped coming to phone banks because “Tim Russert said there’s no point”. Eeyores skipped canvassing days because “Keith Olbermann said we are wasting our time”. Eeyores missed rallies because “Chris Matthews says it’s over”.

And worse than that, Eeyores brought down the mood and fighting spirit of those around them, too — not just letting Russert, Olbermann, and Matthews conjure little black rain clouds over their own heads, but manufacturing new storm clouds to spread to all their friends and families.

We watched in horror as Eeyores we knew depressed whole branches of the Hillary phone trees.  They’d email articles by Dick Morris and other Hillary haters, never bothering to question any of it — just spreading that filth without question. And, of course, Eeyores would never remember that Russert, Olbermann, and Matthews swore Hillary would lose New Hampshire. Then, she was supposed to lose Massachusetts, California, New Jersey, and even New York on Super Tuesday.  Then she was supposed to lose Nevada, according to the prognosticators at MSNBC and CNN.

But she won all of those states — and, yet, Eeyores could only dwell on the negative remarks made by clear Hillary-haters on TV.

And there wasn’t anything out there to counter all of that. There was no one calling the media out on its bias, remembering what they said two weeks before, posting counter arguments to whatever Tim Russert, especially, was braying about that day.

We had one very good friend in particular, Astrid, who was a persistent rain cloud.  HillBuzz began as daily emails to her, countering the negative things Russert, Olbermann, and Matthews said on air (all things Astrid would cut and paste and forward to Heaven knows how many people each day, which they’d then forward on to who knows how many others, without anyone questioning the statements those three Obama cheerleaders said). Soon, people Astrid would forward rain clouds to would email us, asking if all of it was true, and we’d add them to our daily email blast as well.

And then, we realized it would be much easier to start a running blog, and post articles and insights we found each day, so people could stop by and see what we’d found whenever they needed to (instead of waiting for us to blast out another email).

None of us had ever blogged before — and had absolutely no idea what we were doing.  One night, while running a phone bank into Texas and Ohio, we got together and pulled up Blogspot.com and set up our blog, calling ourselves “HillBuzz” to be that swarm of busy Hillary bees buzzing rebuttals to Tim Russert et al on the Internet, telling people the things the in-the-tank media wouldn’t.

Our first-ever post was about Obama’s use of sexist language, calling him out for saying Hillary Clinton was apt to “bring the claws out” whenever cornered.

And the media never once called Obama out for that (or anything, really).

So we found ourselves incredibly busy on a daily basis, just highlighting the things the press wasn’t properly covering. HillBuzz ultimately consumed our lives, as we’d spend all of our free time researching and writing for the site, when we weren’t phone banking, canvassing, fundraising, or traveling for Hillary Clinton. We stopped going to movies or out to dinner with friends, because we’d rather have dozens of strangers at Buzzquarters burning up the phone lines into Pennsylvania or Wisconsin or wherever, while all of us blogged in another room.

Everyone we knew put everything they had into the campaign.

And, after Clinton suspended her presidential bid in June, we all found ourselves in uncharted territory because we never believed Obama would be a good president, we still don’t trust him, and decided to support a Republican for the first time in our lives.  If we thought the hatred and nastiness aimed at us during the primaries when we supported Hillary over Obama was bad, we certainly didn’t know what we were getting ourselves into when we backed McCain/Palin.

But, in a strange and sick way, all the hate flung at us by the Obama trolls just emboldened us more. Everyone who told us to shut up just made us want to write and post more. It was hard to be a Democrat supporting a Republican.  We alienated a lot of lifelong partisan friends, and struggled to break free of that partisan thinking ourselves. It was tough, but we knew in our heart what we were doing was right. We believed in McCain/Palin, and saw them as the next best ticket for America, after Clinton was out of the race.

And so we worked as hard for them as we did for Hillary Clinton — and in the process, we acquired a new respect for and understanding of Republicans we never had before.  Never again will we walk through life with partisan blinders on. Never again will we call Republicans ugly names or automatically hate people just because they have an (R) after their name. Never again will we sit back while good, qualified, hard-working female candidates of either party are ripped apart by the media (in the form of vile pigs like Russert, Olbermann, or Matthews).

After the election, we didn’t know if we should continue this site, because of the amount of daily work it takes, and the fact that it was intended to be just a tool for the campaigns (which were ended, disappointingly so). But, we still kept getting a high number of hits a day, and people seemed to enjoy our snark, so we kept on working.

HillBuzz has become a part of our lives now, and we can’t imagine ever stopping. We’re a bunch of Hillary Democrats living in Boystown who’ve made friends with other moderates all across the country because of this site.  We connect with Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike on a daily basis in ways that open our eyes and educate us. We learn something new every day working on this site, and we hope all of you out there share a laugh and do the same thing as well.

It certainly has been an adventure…one we want to see continue for a very long time to come.

We started HillBuzz on blogspot, before security issues there prompted our move to wordpress.  We have a vision for a new and improved site of our own that will launch sometime later this year, on our own server, completely under our own control, that will do things wordpress can’t currently do.  Right now, we’re saving up to afford all of that, as well as investing in some computer classes to teach us the Photoshop, Adobe Acrobat, and other skills we’ll need to create a truly interactive and innovative site — snarking on politics, foreign affairs, and current events from a moderate, pro-woman, Hillary Democrat point of view.

So the Eeyores of the world always have a sunny place to go free of hallucinatory storm clouds.

So the Russerts, Olbermanns, and Matthews of the world don’t have the last word.

So there’s always a place on the internet where Hillary Clinton and her life’s work is celebrated, and all the women (and men, too) of Generation Hillary just emerging on the political scene in her footsteps have a ready-made set of cheerleaders of their own.

We intend to keep putting chips in that glass ceiling…adding to the cracks Hillary Clinton, Geraldine Ferraro, Shirley Chisholm, Carol Mosley Braun, Elizabeth Dole, and Sarah Palin each added, in her own way, until the day a woman takes the Oath of Office and stands in the Oval Office…next to her husband Bill and daughter Chelsea…or her husband Todd and daughter Piper, whatever the case may be.

Hillary Clinton wakes up every day and works her heart out to make a difference towards the goals she believes in.  We have neither her talents, smarts, or energy…but we do have her example.

We were changed forever by Election 2008, and by the strength, courage, and determination Hillary Clinton showed on the campaign trail, and now as our 67th Secretary of State.

Who knows what the future holds for any of us, but around here we certainly hope there’s another campaign in Clinton’s future. We’ll come running, if there ever is.

But, until then, there’s a little bit of Hillary inside each of us that’s never going anywhere. And, hopefully, neither will this site.

If you like what we do and can help us reach our goal of developing our own site, we’d appreciate anything you can contribute.  Birthday presents today are gratefully accepted.

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