By William Crandell

Quite often I find myself amazed at the tenacity and the will to carry on the fight by some of my fellow Democrats.
We are living in an age when our own government seems to be attacking the disenfranchised at every turn and cheered on by the hate rhetoric of Fox News and talk radio.
Liberal community activists continue to take to the streets to stand up for the impoverished and those in our society that are forgotten or ignored and have very little political voice in our democracy. They continue to champion for equality and the right of every American to live a free and healthy life and endeavor to build a better future for our children.
One recent example is the individuals who continue to fight against the emergency managers that now rule over 50 percent of the African Americans in this state.
The people of Michigan made it clear last November when they voted to pass Proposition 2 that they didn’t want despots ruling their school districts and cities, armed with the ability to sell off precious assets like the artworks of the Detroit Art Museum and voiding union contracts, causing further harm to their city’s economy.
The people have a right to determine their local representation for better or for worse, and no single individual should have that much power.
Another example of their dedication is the persistence of the coalition of groups fighting to get Medicaid expanded in this state, doggedly holding rallies, participating in letter-writing campaigns and calling their politicians and demanding that they stand up to Tea Party threats and do the right thing for the citizens of Michigan. Every one of them is willing to fight to ensure all Americans have access to healthcare.
Another example of their resolve is the new Keep Michigan Wolves Protected petition. Even after the group collected hundreds of thousands of signatures to put a referendum on the ballot in 2014 to let the voters of Michigan decide if they want wolves to be hunted to extinction in our state, members of the legislature passed another law giving them and the Department of Natural Resources the ability to allow people to hunt them anyway. So the group started all over again collecting signatures to keep them from decimating the wolf population.
Recently, I was working the Democratic tent at the Berrien County Youth Fair and I asked one of the other volunteers why they continued to fight against a GOP controlled legislature, senate and governor — all of whom obviously only cater to the wealthy and to the special interests groups.
“We fight to ensure the American dream for our children,” they stated. “Even if we lose in the end we’ll be able to say we didn’t lose the American dream for our kids because of a lack of will. We put up a good fight. We lost the dream because the GOP sold it to make a buck and they will have to answer to history for it.”

William Crandell is a community activist and active member of the Michigan Education Association and the Michigan Democratic Party. He is also a member of the South County Democratic Club where he has served as their communications director and as the chairperson of the SCDC Blue Tiger Community Action Committee.