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A Progressive Primary to Push for Jobs and End the Wars
It's bad enough that we lost progressive champions like Russ Feingold, and that the leadership and committees of the House will be taken over by advocates of domestic austerity and endless war. In addition, the airwaves and print media will now be filled with pundits saying that the lesson of the election is that Obama must move to the right and cut the budget, except the military. But the worst thing we must now face is that the 2010 election is likely a preview of 2012, unless at least one of two things happen: decisive federal action to boost economic growth and employment, now much more difficult to achieve than before, and some dramatic new element is introduced into our national politics that changes the character of national debate.
Jonathan Chait pointed out last week that based on the state of the economy, historical trends predicted a Democratic loss of more than 40 seats, enough for Republicans to take the House. In other words, on average, based on historical trends, the fate of the election was sealed when the Obama Administration proposed and Congress enacted an economic stimulus package that was much too small to counter the fall in domestic demand resulting from the collapse of the housing bubble. Everything else that happened in the election has to be judged according to the baseline expectation of the Democrats losing at least 40 seats - enough to lose the House - due to the failure to restore economic growth and employment with a sufficient stimulus to counteract the fall in private economic demand.
Paul Wiseman of AP noted this week that "a growth rate of 5 percent or higher is needed to put a major dent in the nation's 9.6 percent unemployment rate," but that isn't likely based on current trends: "Macroeconomic Advisers doesn't expect the labor market to recover all the lost jobs until at least 2013. Other economists say it could be 2018 or longer."
If 2012 is going to be different than 2010, there has to be dramatic action, and the record of the last two years, combined with the election result, suggests skepticism that the impetus for such dramatic action will come from Washington.
It could be tremendously helpful if there were a well-run Democratic primary for the Presidential nomination in 2012. I will explain what I mean by a well-run primary and what I think such a primary could do.
First, a well-run primary has to meaningfully address the conventional wisdom among many Democrats - not just among Democratic leaders, but among the base - that a Democratic primary contesting a sitting Democratic President is likely to be destructive. When you suggest the idea of a 2012 primary, many people immediately point to the precedent of 1980, when Ted Kennedy ran against President Carter. Many Democrats blamed Kennedy for contributing to Carter's defeat. As a causation story, one could argue that this overstates the effect of Kennedy's campaign, but in an important way it doesn't matter: a person who wants to build progressive power doesn't suggest things that are only slightly destructive. The central goal of a progressive primary has to be to build progressive power, and it has to make a convincing case that it is doing so; otherwise, it is a mistake.
Consequently, a key organizing principle of a progressive primary has to be something that many may find at first counterintuitive: it must not be directed against President Obama.
Instead, the primary thrust of a progressive primary should be the need for decisive federal action to boost economic growth and employment.
Secondary thrusts should include: opposition to domestic economic austerity measures, including any cuts in Social Security benefits such as raising the normal retirement age; an attack on the degree of control of our democracy by corporations, including the need for a fundamental reform of campaign finance; a direct focus on building the infrastructure of progressive power at the base, including voter registration and education, building the membership of organizations that do progressive electoral work, and the organizing of more workers into labor unions; ending the wars, bringing our troops home, and cutting the military budget.
In our current media environment, it's extremely difficult for progressive voices to break through into the center of national debate and remain there. A progressive primary has a good shot of breaking through. If you think back to the last time that progressive voices had a sustained presence on a range of issues at the national microphone, it was the 2008 Democratic Presidential Primary. That primary put the Employee Free Choice Act on center stage; that primary changed the national conversation about NAFTA and trade policy; that primary helped bring about the agreement for a timetable for military withdrawal from Iraq; that primary changed the national conversation about US policy towards Iran away from the threat of war. In our electoral cycle, a Democratic presidential primary is generally the apex of progressive influence.
A well-run progressive primary will register many people to vote. In the two years between general elections, a lot of people move, particularly a lot of young people. In states without same-day registration, this can be a significant barrier to participation. A person who registers to vote in a primary is probably someone you don't need to register for the general election. A progressive primary will build the base of progressive organizations and increase the attachment of progressive voters to the political process. Note that this wouldn't necessarily require progressive organizations to make a candidate endorsement; it would only require them to take seriously the idea of a presidential primary as an organizing, education and mobilization opportunity: a 50-state Town Hall for Democrats.
A progressive primary will keep the need for federal action to boost domestic economic demand and create jobs at the center of national debate.
A progressive primary will act as a counterweight to the Washington voices who want to cut Social Security benefits, including by raising the retirement age.
A progressive primary will act as a counterweight to the Washington voices who want to extend the US military occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq, and to gin up confrontation with Iran. In particular, a progressive primary will counter efforts to make meaningless the drawdown of forces that President Obama promised next summer, and will increase the pressure for real negotiations in Afghanistan to end the war. A progressive primary will counter those in Washington who want to reopen the status of forces agreement with Iraq so that US forces can remain there after the end of 2011.
A progressive primary will shine a national spotlight on local campaigns for economic justice, like Michael Moore's TV show TV Nation used to do, because those will be campaign stops, like in the 1988 Jesse Jackson campaign: picket lines, lockouts, factory closings, hazardous waste dumps. A progressive primary will shine a spotlight on the need for labor law reform, to restore to private sector workers the effective right to organize that they were promised by the National Labor Relations Act.
A national progressive primary will encourage progressive candidates to run for Congress. It will boost their campaigns by adding attention and volunteers. Most progressives don't know who Bill Halter is, even though labor unions, MoveOn and other progressive Democratic organizations campaigned hard for him, and he campaigned on a platform of being more pro-Obama than his pro-corporate incumbent Democratic opponent. A national primary will drive attention and participation to these races.
Finally, a progressive primary will put demands for fundamental campaign finance reform on the table for national discussion, in a way that Washington is likely incapable of doing without massive and sustained outside pressure.
A recent film by Francis Megahy, "The Best Government Money Can Buy," sounds the alarm about corporate control of Washington through the current system of campaign finance and lobbying by the suppliers of campaign finance, as well as the bind that reform of the system ultimately has to be enacted by incumbents that have been produced by the current system. The results of the Congressional election have, of course, made Washington worse in this regard.
Megahy's film makes a convincing case that we need a sustained movement from outside of Washington to combat corporate control in order to reform the system. And a logical inference to draw from the film is that this movement needs to constantly tie the need for reform to the direct and major economic and political harms that that present election finance system is causing to working families.
The film documents, for example, how the current campaign finance and lobbying system has produced effects like $30 billion in tax breaks for oil and gas companies, a law barring Medicare from using its market power to negotiate lower prices for prescription drugs, and a law prohibiting the import of cheaper prescription drugs from Canada.
If you're concerned about corporate control in Washington, get this movie, and use it as a tool for education and organizing. .
And think seriously about whether a national progressive primary could help spawn an effective movement for fundamental reform, including, crucially, decisive federal action to drive down unemployment. Talk to your friends and colleagues about it. If we create a groundswell, we create the conditions in which an appropriate candidate will step forward.
The Best Government Money Can Buy TRAILER from Cinema Libre Studio on Vimeo.
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29 Comments so far
Show AllJust look at the results yesterday and how can I not agree? Of the 54 Blue dogs that ran half lost of the 80 or so Progressives only 4 lost. Give people a real choice and the party will do well again. Obama won using Progressive ideas and frames in 2008. He was a liar and never intended to govern as a Progressive and that made a bad mid-term worse. He will now do a Billy Clinton and tack hard right but this time it won't work for him because there is no economic boom coming to save him this time around. Obama is toast and all of us are toast with him if we stick to this fraud and loser. We need to primary him and every blue dog in the party.
Yep. The American People desperately need an FDR, and we got Bush Lite.
I agree with everything you said ... except for the "Lite" part.
"Obama won using Progressive ideas and frames in 2008."
Obama won by presenting himself as a Clinton left of center-centrist. The moment they found out different, independents, seniors and women left him in a heartbeat.
The Blue Dog's are pretty much gone. Frankly there is little support left for Mr. Obama.
the neo-liberal machinery has already started its campaign to hijack the word "progressive" and neuter the left.
The Green Party pulled nearly 3 million votes nationally for Nader in the 2000 general election, but couldn't garner 200,000 in 2008. As much as I admire their central philosophy, they seem to be "old news" to American voters.
There is no other viable third party at this time.
So what?
So, perhaps we should reformulate the Democratic Party.
In the late 1960's and early 1970's the Democratic Party became more democratic as a result of grass roots activism.
(And the party gradually became, once again, a tool of the wealthy class -- as any party will eventually as long as money is the driving force behind vote generation. But that is a worry for some other day.)
Two suggestions:
First, a movement is needed for a Constitutional Amendment to the effect that all political media advertising is illegal -- for or against any candidate for local, state, or federal offices.
Second, a high-profile Democrat should "throw away" his political career by challenging Obama in the 2012 primaries.
One of Robert Reich's best points in this article is that Communication really is important. Elections are won by firing up your base while at the same time bringing the swing-voters into your camp. Swing voters are, by definition, people with no firm opinions about how this nation works. How else could the November 1st opinion polls show that 67% of the country disapproves of the Republicans in Congress; AND when asked which party will cope better with the issues facing this country over the next couple of years, Democrats win 42-38%; AND, when asked who will handle the economy better, Democrats win 44-37%. When asked which party you approve of more in Congress, Democrats win 36-30%; AND, nearly every poll shows general disdain for the Republican Party – AND YET the GOP manages on November 2nd to get nearly every ‘swing voter’ to stand in line to hand control of the Congress back to the party that drove the economy into the ditch ???
Clearly, vast numbers of American voters are angry, disillusioned little empty-heads. The GOP noise machine has provided them sound-bite answers to believe in which seem to explain their plight. Sure, they are incorrect answers; but what are those swing voters to believe when there are no well-articulated answers coming from nationally recognized progressives? (By the way, the spokesman for our ideology cannot speak with condescension and call people “little empty-heads” like I just did. That is the kind of thing which makes it so easy for the Heritage Foundation and the Koch Brothers et al. to stir up anti-intellectualism.)
An articulate national candidate would undoubtedly fail to gain the nomination in 2012. He would thus “throw away” his political career to pave the way for someone else. The reformation of a national party will not be a quick and easy task. But it can be done. Today’s GOP is not the party of Eisenhower (who warned us of the dangers from the rising military-industrial complex) or Nixon (who once espoused a heath care reform not totally unlike Hillary Clinton’s) or even George H. W. Bush (who recognized Reagan’s economic policies as the “voodoo economics” which they were). The remaking of the GOP into a blatantly plutocratic machine with no room to seek common solutions did not happen overnight.
How about Senator Russ Feingold for a start? He could probably use a new project. And he has had experience as the voice of reason in the wilderness.
Progressives and voices of reason do not openly and proudly support genocide.
You can give me the crap about how "everyone else is doing it why can't he?" but there is no justification for things like advising Obama to ignore the settlements, which are in direct violation of so many international laws that noone even bothers to try to argue otherwise anymore. White phosphorous used on civilians? Feingold figures we should supply the occupiers with more. Sure, he's good on many other issues, but support of genocide pretty much knocks out any credibility when using the term "progressive" or things like "voice of reason". Feingold's response, based on my experience in calling his office and emailing him is to not respond. The first contact I sent him on this issue was answered with a form letter about how we must protect Israel's security. After that I started pointing out that the very things he has gone on record to support undermine Israels security, as any sane person can see, and after that I did not even get a response. I am a constituent as well.
Please, if you want to maintain any credibility whatsoever, do not mourn the defeat of proud sponsors of genocide, and please do not try to make real progressives try to swallow Zionism. Unless you want to lose again.
"AND, nearly every poll shows general disdain for the Republican Party"
Nearly every poll shows equal disdain for the democratic party.
(By the way, the spokesman for our ideology cannot speak with condescension and call people “little empty-heads” like I just did. That is the kind of thing which makes it so easy for the Heritage Foundation and the Koch Brothers et al. to stir up anti-intellectualism.)"
Gee, there's a good idea. Of course when you think people are that its hard for it not to show.
Resenting unwarrented arrogance is hardly "anti-intellectulaism"
"Two suggestions:
First, a movement is needed for a Constitutional Amendment to the effect that all political media advertising is illegal -- for or against any candidate for local, state, or federal offices."
I think that all voices seeking a better way forward should be heard, with respect. With respect, I would on strategic grounds counsel against putting time, money, energy, hope (!) into a campaign for any constitutional amendement, and I would on substantive grounds most especially counsel against an amendment to limit/bar speech.
The tea party certainly had its voice noticed by putting up its candidates in the primaries and many made it to national office. In the 4th Congressional PA district we could not muster a progressive challenger against bluedog Jason Altmire and labor ended up endorsing him despite all the insults he issued to them. (Jason barely survived-expect him to turn even more conservative.) The most "progressive" candidate in S.W. PA, Dan Connolly was still a supporter of the Afghan war. The progressives of the Democratic Party have done almost nothing in terms of an organized fight to move the Democrats to the left while the Tea Party has certainly been successful in moving the Republicans and in fact the whole national scene to the right. Is it because their ideas are better and more persuasive, or because they are closer to what the average American believes? I don't think so. I think it is because they were better organized and because they could put up candidates who entered the fray.
tammons
What? Someone who actually noticed the Tea Party wasn't just a small number of republican operatives? That it was indeed a grassroots movement. That it was indeed successful in framing the argument and kicking the democrats ass (and ours). That this is what a successful Third Party looks like?
I'm impressed.
"Is it because their ideas are better and more persuasive, or because they are closer to what the average American believes?"
Their ideas are not better than liberals and progressives, but I'd disagree and say they were obviously more persuasive.
Its hard to persuade anyone by lecturing them on their stupidity or telling them that you just "didn't explain it well enough" or they would be more appreciative. And certainly not by forcing things on them they do NOT want and absolutely oppose.
The problem comes in how to frame a response in 2012? What do you hang your hat on that would convince independents and seniors to return?
tammons -
Here's two hat rack hooks that come to my mind.
Listen carefully to those Tea Party activists, particularly those who identify themselves as "independent swing voters", even if they are social conservatives or free marketeer union haters. In the 2008 general election contest opposite John McCain, Obama courted those people (he went on Fox TV, he showed up at evangelical churches) and a substantial majority of self-described independents abandoned the GOP and voted for change.
Those same people desserted Obama and the DLC Washington leadership in furious droves last Tuesday, less than two years after Obama's inauguration. Why? Those independent swing voters (like the Democratic base, and the progressive left) expected two major things from an Obama administration: reversal of the Bush/Cheney war policies in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a fundamental fixing of the American economy that the banksters, Wall Street, the big multinational corporations, and the super rich had so recently trashed under Bush/Cheney's deregulated invisible-hand-of-the-marketplace mumbo jumbo.
By the summer of 2009, it was pretty clear the Obama economic team was part of the problem, not part of the solution. Cash for clunkers was neither the WPA nor Glass-Steagal. By December of 2009, with the President's depressing West Point speech, it was absolutely clear that the war in Afghanistan was going to escalate rather than reverse course. Even worse, the neocons' wet dream of an endless, blank check global war on terror with pilotless drones and special forces death squads was being embraced as Obama's national security policy too.
Those independent swing voters swung back, fast and hard, against the Washington Democratic establishment the moment it became obvious they'd been lied to about war and peace, and lied to about meaningful federal corrective action that would hold the corporate plutocracy accountable, rather than middle class or blue collar Main Street accountable, for the AIG-insured derivatives scams and rampant greed which crashed the national economy.
When I say listen closely to the Tea Party people, I'm thinking of an NPR radio interview I heard a few weeks back with a woman Tea Partier who was very obviously a social conservative and philosophically Republican in her economic thinking. She had voted for Obama in 2008. When asked why she had pivoted 180 degrees and now vehemently opposed Barack Obama and the Democrats, her response was to the effect "He turned out to be no different than the rest of them on the deficit. Obama promised to have the troops back from Iraq and Afghanistan by the end of this year, and he's not going to keep that promise either."
What is striking, of course, is that candidate Barack Obama made no such promise (regarding Afghanistan, as opposed to the "dumb" war in Iraq), and set no such fast, precisely fixed timetable deadline. Neither had candidates Obama and Biden run around the country making stump speeches decrying white collar criminals on Wall Street causing a freezing up of the credit system, a foreclosure crisis and a catastrophic recession. Yet these were the expectations this angry, disillusioned woman obviously held when, in 2008, she held her nose and voted to toss the Republicans out of Washington after eight years of GOP rule.
Want to bring independent voters back? End the wars. Fix the domestic economy by taxing the 1% of the population who now control 40% of the nation's wealth at the rates that FDR, Truman, and Eisenhower had in place, at least until the deficit is under control. Hold Wall Street, Goldman Sachs, the banks, and the big multinational corporations accountable to the public interest, rather than letting them run the globalized economic show from the inside, as they see fit, for their own private gain. That last part, at least, is what the Democratic Party at a national level actually used to stand for.
As for what would convince seniors to return to a more progressive, revitalized post-Obama agenda, keep your eye on that bipartisan Commission that's plotting to gut the Social Security and Medicare safety net. Little George is already on record in his memoir identifying his biggest disappointmet as the failure to privatize Social Security. Expect House Speaker John Boehner and Mitch McConnell to reach across the aisle towards Obama and Harry Reid here, grinning ear to ear.
This should be a litmus test issue. Bail outs for Citibank, AIG, and General Motors, plus billions more for hi tech drone assasinations, while you raise my copays and cut my monthly Social Security check? Fuck you and the bipartisan horse you rode in on.
Just a couple of thoughts on where we can hang our hats in 2012, to bring back those independents and seniors whose support was so recently pissed away.
Bill from Saginaw
M.M:
You... routinely:
1. Take a stand against unions, as if they have the same clout as the mega-corporations who buy and sell candidates and their platforms like trading for rice on the New York Stock Exchange.
2. Take a racist stand against those you perceive to be "illegal" aliens, hiding behind the "letter of the law," and not taking the ramifications of NAFTA into account.
3. Take pride in your military background (and apart from idiot wars of conquest, see no problem with the military itself. I forget it you think its bloated budget and 700 + overseas bases are justified).
4. Take the view that the majority in this nation is right of center (even though MANY times statistics have been published in this forum relating the high percentages of those against war, against the bankers' bailout, and in favor of single payer health care. These clearly refute your claim that most fall into a centrist bracket; yet you chime on, like a paid parrot, with the same false right wing meme.)
5. Take a stand FOR the tea party.
But you call yourself a liberal? I realize the word, like so many others, has been largely divested of meaning... but if you're a liberal, Nixon was a hippie.
TAMMONS: While your analysis is fine as far as it goes, it fails to take into account three powerful influences:
1. Big money. This insidious factor determines who gets air time; and it's a proven statistical given that the candidate with the most air time almost always wins. Plus, big money supports those candidates that do ITS bidding. Therefore THEIR corporate-friendly messages will be the ones most heard!
2. Fundamentalist religion & the basic authoritarian personality structure: those who tend to think in conservative frames, also tend to follow authority figures. This segment identifies with the (conservative) status quo so long as it doesn't give too much away to minorities, those of other religions, or those perceived to be taking a hand-out. (Note: Military spending and/or corporate "pork" never figure into their calculus.)
3. Control of THE conversation through the financing of think tanks, added to the ownership of radio & TV stations. VERY specific messages get heard; and when these become the dominant messages, what happens is that the lies told often enough become perceived (by the viewers) as true.
It is disingenuous to suggest that the left/Progressives don't have an effective message when they lack the megaphone to even begin to test that hypothesis! Policies that the corporations find inconvenient are never given air time! Therefore true solutions are marginalized through invisibility.
"We Wont Be Fooled Again!...Until The Next Time We Are Fooled!"
Yes.
"What we have been doing didn't work! Let's keep trying it!"
This article has some great ideas for a progressive platform to run a primary challenge. The author however makes a fatal mistake, “do not run against Obama”, spoken like a good little democrat. The purpose of a primary challenge should be to oust Obama. Obama is going to be elected in 2012 that fix is already in. The only people who can stop that from happening are the progressives. Beware of good little democrats in sheep’s clothing. In case progressives have not noticed change is still on the table. There is another group of people that progressives can tap into if they can win a challenge against Obama. The throw the bums-out-group. Three elections in a row really speak well for this group. Too bad senators can not be wasted as quickly as representatives can. Unfortunately too many progressive voices make a living off of the status quo and change would jeopardize their good life. The next generation of progressives is really going to be something and the one after that will truly be the end game. After all change takes a life time, one generation to think it, one generation to learn it, and one generation to live it.
SOLREV: I was thinking along similar lines.
Many sages in this forum recognize the covert manner by which Obama co-opted the anti-war movement along with those interested in genuine health care delivered in the most fair, efficient, and economical way. Clearly that would NOT include the insurance middle-men.
This article seems to be reading the pulse of all the disaffected, and instead of allowing this force to coalesce through an alliance of varied interests groups whose needs are not being met... it instead regards this "entity" as a genuine threat to the (sold out!) Democratic party. Therefore, once again its pundits suggest the "wisdom" and need to work within the confines of a thoroughly compromised, perhaps dying institution.
How many times can an entity fall on its own sword, lie about its motives, and still get up and demand a standing ovation from a rapt (as opposed to raped) audience?
I've used the parable of the 2-dimensional world in this forum before. Creatures locked into that 2-D world lack the capacity to look up. Their only options, as they can conceptualize them, exist in moving to the left or right. But we are NOT ensconced to that degree... unless we believe that there are only two viable options for our nation's political identity and future.
When both "left" and "right" play to an imagined center and thereby sell out the ideals of the majority, the time to look up and outside the left-right contours has arrived. Clearly our lives, along with the ecological sustainability of this planet, depends upon this!
All that needs to be changed (and realized) will not happen through the political body that just played us for suckers; delivered the faithful like sacrificial lambs placed on the altar of amoral corporate entities that run the show, along with both "parties" present to dominate the stage. Time to shut the lights out on this theater of the absurd, and invest in something more authentic, engaging, and viable.
BILL S: I appreciate your thoughtful post. I suspect you've always been a good lawyer; but I venture to add that your own skills at argument and polemic have been vicariously honed from your generous contributions to this forum. (Debates here, included.)
Progressives have lost the propaganda war. Nothing will change until that is reversed. Can it be reversed in the context of today? I doubt it. Reactionaries must first run their course. Progressives allowed the tail, abortion and gay rights, to wave the dog for too long. Now the dog has been badly beaten and is on life support. Meeting people's basic needs must always trump the interests of splinter groups. We earned this shellacking fair and square. In an age of hyper change, fixed ideologies are misfits. Creativity is the currency of the present. Progressives have been ideologically destroyed by reality. The new Progressive construct must be built on reality and fueled with creativity. We didn't lose the battle yesterday, we lost the war. It's time to abandon the old ship and board one that will float. If splinter groups choose to drown by clinging onto the wreckage of the old ship, that's unfortunate, but it's their choice. Getting real is no longer a choice.
I think you're overstating things a bit.
"Creativity is the currency of the present. " Creativity is the tactical phase of moving forward. Values, mores are the bedrock of a political/social belief system.
Democratic socialism is based on the core value of providing the greatest good for the greatest number. Creativity comes up with the ways and means of achieving that.
Also, progressives have been removed from the public debate by the reactionary forces that control the mass media. They haven't been ideologically destroyed. Most folks in this country are decent, kindly...at least in my travels. The firehose of hatefulness that pours out of their TV's has highjacked the public mind.
What we need to do is use our intelligence and creativity to get around the lock on information which has so deformed the nation.
Where there's life...there's hope...
GENERAL: I totally concur. STONE has great acumen in some areas, but his focus on "right to life" obscures his vision at times. We all have dominant interests and related blind spots. It's part of being human. No exceptions.
Siouxrose, my strong belief in life as a predominant value rests in my Traditional American Indian lifeways. The words "right to life" miscasts my thoughts. I encourage others to respect all life as a good path, but I would "never" judge the actions of another person. A small clarification but an important one. To the best of my ability to comprehend, I do believe that abortion and gay issues have severely damaged progressives politically; however, I would never judge anyone personally and I do try to love all people. My thoughts are not hate based. I think you probably already know that. JMHO
Right on schedule: All of you on the left who voted Green or Socialist or wrote in Gene Debs for Congress or went fishing now need to come back to the Democratic Party for 2012. This time we can do it! I know we can! Just look at the portents from Tuesday! Blue Dogs lost. See! There's hope!
There will be a steady stream of this crap for the next 2 years and it will come from the usual suspects. We know who they are.
Or, of course, we could think about 1968, the ONLY time a primary campaign against a sitting President was successful - until Robert Kennedy was shot.
The upshot: Hubert Humphrey, a broken man with the VietNam War hung stinking around his neck, as well as Daley's police riot at the convention, was the nominee, and Nixon was the next president.
Great precedent, that.
The articles demanding a Democratic presidential primary in 2012 started to roll out yesterday less than 24hrs after the midterm polls closed. It won't be easy, the Democratic establishment has quietly been changing the rules to make it almost impossible for anyone to challenge Obama. Difficult, yes-entirely impossibe, no.
In my opinion, progressives have no other option. Hillary is out of the question, she's been co-opted by Obama [hold your friends close, your enemies closer], she voted for the Irag War, her hubby Bubba would be a huge anchor for her to drag along behind her and, i think she's over her being robbed of the 2008 nomination. In my opinion, any Democrat willing to challenge Obama would have to come from outside the traditional Democratic establishment.
Any Sarah Palin type populist challenge from the grassroots of progressive America would likely have to be a Wendall Berry type-leadership from the bottom-outsider. His or her main spokespeople would have to be also. There's a new way to do organizing now and it's bottom up, not top down like the traditional model. Obama used it to successfully catch a ride on the populist wave. Now that the populist wave has left him flopping around in the undertow, it's time for a 'real' reprogressive to use these tactics to challenge the heartbeak kid.
The new tactics use the new technologies of social networking and the blogosphere to bring together the ideas and energy of many minds to form a broadly based coalition of the young, the old, the poor and the dispossed. Any challenger would have to accept no corporate donations and limit any individual's donations to a small [maybe $100] amount. Any challenger would have to tear a idealist page out of the Tea Party planner, they'd have to state clearly that ideas are open debate and compromise, but that ideals are not.
The clock is already ticking, the Iowa caucuses, with thier fairly open rules of engagement, are the first stepping stone to nominating and electing a 'real' progressive in 2012. Be there or be square.
Run a "progressive" Democrat in the primaries.
LOL!
Good luck with finding one.
No such thing exists.
BTW, Feingold was no REAL champion. After all, he voted for the Obamination health care DEFORM. "Progressive" NOT.
What a joke.
in my ongoing desire to make life somewhat bearable, i imagine things......like an uproar at the dem convention(oodles of media attention)....the case against obama and bipartisan compromise laid bare, and then the SPLIT......
THE AMERICAN PARTY IS BORN(it appeals to rt and lft): it appeals to clean air, clean water(do americans really know the extent of lake and river pollution, and why?), clean politics (everyone is sick of the bought and paid for), ethical treatment of the old(the party is not afraid to say this and that it is also a RELIGIOUS obligation), it is against the fed(the rt and lft applaud),the end to war(some hate the expense/some hate the killing--the party is against both)etc....see?
yes it's up hill, the media, i know.....HOWEVER, it's either try to fix this shit or like monty python and "runaway runaway" ..peace
It is not the economy or the "too small" stimulus that caused the election to go GOP. It is the rightwing control of the message especially on talk radio.
People do not even know one third of thre stimulus was tax cuts. They believe Obama has raised them. Up is down and black is white.
No matter what he accomplishes or doesn't the key is to STOP the misinformation of the electorate and tha won't be easy.