Kevin Ritchie lives in Lee.

I became a Democrat in the 1970s. I’ve waxed and waned in my ideological alignment with the party, but I generally believed that the policies and platforms, whatever they were at any given moment, fit the times.

But, in the mid-aughts, policies and platforms diverged into a strident “fix all problems” mindset, and an economic blindness and self-righteous elitism. The party pulled away from the lived experience of the struggling working and middle class Democratic base. Dramatically changing social institutions and the loss of jobs that brought pride to the doing of them were the new norm.

Still, to most Democrats, the guy descending the golden escalator was first an oddity, then a joke, then a sideshow, then a thorn, then a harbinger, then an agent of ego-driven massive destruction and abuse of power. We watched the manipulations that were attempted in Donald Trump’s first term, then the orchestrated chaos and devolution that is his second term.

But, organizationally, the Democratic Party has mostly wrung its hands, raged at Trump/MAGA and waited for Congress, or the Supreme Court — or somebody, anybody — to “return us” to a safer past. There is no observable restructuring of a new political platform and into a new, winning “brand.”

Perhaps because of the insular, rudderless passivity of the party, nationally and in Maine, the leadership vacuum has provided an opportunity for desperate, determined, local organizing for Dems across the state. Many of us have found community, purpose, some measure of hope and the support and tools needed to resist the expanding American autocracy.

Maine now has active, intentional Democratic political organizing in many regions and towns, sometimes aided by the steadily humming campaign of Graham Platner, sometimes by national organizing platforms such as Indivisible and, less frequently, by the slowly coalescing state Democratic Party.  

Service centers — Lincoln, Machias, Caribou, Millinocket and others in the north — are often the hubs for this diligent but sometimes isolated grassroots work. These regional and county groups need each other, but they also need the overarching structure that can only come from courageously focused and genuinely collaborative national and state parties.

Recently, I became a member of the state Democratic Committee and, for all the hard work happening within the executive and other committees, I see no Democratic “brand” or mission or vision emerging.

The existing state platform on the Maine Democratic Party website is a long list of paragraphs that aspire to be all things to all people, expressed in overly comprehensive, expansively detailed rhetoric. It’s a laundry list. As such, it provides little direction and focus and inspires little passion, clarity of purpose or appeal to either the committed or the casual voter.    

National and Maine Dems still lack a relevant platform and “brand” more than 10 years on from Trump’s descent down the gold escalator. If, at the May Democratic state convention, delegates are asked to adopt a platform that’s basically a rearrangement of the deck chairs of the current platform, then we can expect candidates up and down the ticket to hit the iceberg in November. Again.

The time has come to end the condescension and fear from “the party” regarding the “too socialist, buncha’ communists, impossible to sell their ideas to moderates” progressives. We can’t — and shouldn’t — keep the progressive wing at arm’s length. If remaining in bed with big- money donors is the cost of making real change, we’re doomed in November. If leadership has the courage to proudly assert relevant labor-focused messaging — and risk losing those donors — then the party can reinvigorate voters.  

Similarly, party progressives can no longer cling to lofty, expansive and unyielding ideals of a transformed, perfected social democracy bursting forth in America, a la Denmark or Sweden. Progressives need to seek winnable compromises, or we lose. Again.  

Bad political platforms are Project 2025 — brutish, power-hungry, authoritarian, anti-Democratic, racist. Good political platforms are inspiring, pragmatic, meaningful — and they promise help with the actual needs of enough voters to result in wins. Sadly, we can’t count on the national party to make these hard changes.

We need Maine Dems for not just an energizing platform document, but a functional campaign tool — and a beacon of hope.