here's my latest column:

Reese's World: Perspectives from the Editor
Staying Positive and Getting Out the Vote

I am so Proud of our community! We have gotten real about supporting Kerry wholeheartedly; we’ve formed a national model, via LGBT4Kerry.com, for grassroots and fundraising support from our unified community to a presidential campaign; we have coalesced around our candidate like never before; we have dedicated ourselves to swingin’ states around the country through local activities and personal travel work; we have swayed people’s minds on individual and cultural levels; and we’ve done all of this while calmly and valiantly weathering difficult legal setbacks here in California, electoral challenges in other states, name-calling from our governor, being vilified during presidential and congressional speeches around the country, being used as a wedge issue once again, and somehow having faith and hope for the future.

And yet, lately, I’ve sensed a quiet dread in the community. I’ve had it too. Kerry’s campaign has seemed to be lagging; the enthusiasm and hope we had in the summer has dissipated; Bush keeps getting great press no matter what happens; we keep worrying over lackluster polls; and we’ve seemingly lost our faith. We’re still saying the right words and doing the right work and telling everyone all is fine, but underneath we’re a little depressed. It’s time to admit our depression, no matter our fear. We can’t regroup unless we admit where we are.

Why are we sitting around feeling sorry for ourselves? We’ve let the national media, the pundits, the polls, the supposed national mood (all of which are fungible and fluid and easily directed throughout any campaign) get to us too much. Is it obvious for me to say that this is what Karl Rove and Bush and the Republicans want us to do and feel? We know that they know that we know that we lose if we simply give up, but that we win if we fight strongly and proudly. And yet, we’ve been letting them lull us into quiet sad sleepy submission because of our worry and fear.

So let’s start getting back on track.
Was the election yesterday? No!
Is it already over? No!
Have we already finished fighting for our lives and our nation and our ideals? Hell No!

We know this, but we worry. Just like any human does. The best antidote to depression is to end our cycle of worry and get motivated again by doing and striving and loving and hoping. Our energy and excitement is contagious. The country is ripe for change. The polls we tend to worry about have said this desire for change consistently, regardless of the fluctuations of the campaign. The country is ready for change. The country is moving in our direction. And we know this! We are registering record numbers of new voters locally and nationally—people who were never interested in an election before. What an amazing achievement, and one that is hardly taken into account by the media or the polls.

Read the latest Democracy Corps Strategy Memo from James Carville and Stan Greenberg, and you will see that we simply have to stay strong, keep working, and get out the vote, and WE WIN!

This edition of the Alice newsletter is all about rekindling our fire, our enthusiasm, our hope, and our excitement about winning in November. We are going to win in November! We are changing the hearts and minds of the country! We are making a difference, every day! We are a part of history!

We are going to defeat Bush and send him back to Crawford for good. We are going to have an amazing time in the next four years of the Kerry Administration where our equality is standard and strengthened. We are so close to the top of the shining mountain and we are about to reach the once-thought-to-be-unattainable summit. We can and will do this! We are doing this!

Now let’s get back out there with all the enthusiasm and faith and hope that we’ve had before in our best moments and that we know is inside us, and use it to win this. Because we CAN. And because we are going TO WIN!

PostScript: This column went to print before Thursday's rockin' debate where Senator Kerry, our next president, kicked Bush's butt. We've always heard, and been witness to, the idea that Kerry is a big closer, and here's one more political race he's about to win. As Eleanor Clift writes for Newsweek after the debate: "Republicans thought they had the race wrapped up. All their candidate had to do was repeat his road-tested slogans. But 90 minutes of Bush is a long time.... Kerry spoke crisply and clearly, and he looked presidential... It’s a tactic of Karl Rove’s to create an aura of inevitability about Bush... Now the momentum shifts. The Kerry crowds will get larger and more enthusiastic..."
And it's all true. We are on the march to victory! Keep on keepin' on. There's work to be done.