I don’t hide the fact that I have been a registered Democrat for more than 50 years. I have held local elected office, been on my Democratic Town Committee (which chooses candidates), been a delegate to the State Convention for 30+ years and been a delegate to the National Convention about half a dozen times.
I don’t support every candidate who runs under the D banner and I have crossed party lines to vote. That said: CT is a CLOSED primary state. If you want a say and vote in choosing who will be on the November Ballot; you must be affiliated with the party to vote in the Primary. As the old American Express ads said: Membership has its privilege.
By being active in the party at the local levels I have been able to affect change that benefited Jews (such as closing the public schools on RH and YK…Mom was a public school teacher and this benefited staff as well as students). The former R administration in my town was quite corrupt and the Ds have cleaned things up, while the D with a 100% stranglehold on Bridgeport and New Haven have destroyed the cities.
Those of us who choose to live OOT in small towns and cities value involvement in local government that affects our lives every day.
America is not Europe or Israel. No one who registers to vote (and I have been the D Asst Registrar of Voters for the past decade) is a ‘card carrying member’ of a party. Our newspapers are not organs of the parties. We do not vote a Party List, but individual candidates. I doubt most Ds or Rs even know what is in their State of National Party Platform adopted for a particular year , or care what it says.
All politics is local. I choose to work in a party that was/is open and welcoming to minorities and in my Town that means D. The local Rs are very Anti-Semitic, have shifted way to the right and believe America should be a Christian Country and Jews and other minorities should do things their way, not have rights protected.
I have never advocated that others join my party, instead I have worked to elect specific candidates.