"It’s the hardest vote I've taken;" so said Al Franken of his vote for Obama's tax deal with Republicans. Franken explains his vote by declaring in a post on Huffington Post that "This isn't a great deal by any stretch of the imagination. But I got into this line of work because I wanted to stand up for Minnesota families trying to put food on the table and build a better life for their kids. And, for them, the only thing worse than a bad deal would be no deal at all. That's why I voted yes yesterday -- and why I will continue my fight for economic policies that create jobs, address our deficit problem, and build new opportunities for Minnesota." I find thus mea culpa disingenuous, shallow, and short sighted.
Disingenuous, because he would have us believe that those who voted against the Deal did not face the same fundamental issue of deciding between the immediate and the momentous. Does he really believe that Bernie Sanders, who made the role of excessive wealth in producing our current situation so clear in his eight hour filibuster, did not face the same situation?
Shallow, because Franken apparently believes that his job as a progressive is to pass laws for the benefit of the people. That belief leads directly to beltway politics in which the decisions, indeed the debate, is the province of a few elected "representatives." To the contrary, the job of a progressive is to educate and inform his constituency so that they can be the force he or she brings to the national legislature and so that when push comes to shove, as in this case between the wealthy and the rest of us, the people are prepared to fight. Had Franken done what Sanders has done his whole political life, namely meet with small groups of constituents not just at election time but routinely and in that context listened acutely and intelligently putting what he knew to be the case in Washington together with what his people knew to be the case at home and, in discussion, had offered a synthesis to be considered with those of his constituents, had he done these things, as Bernie has, he would not have to indulge in such childish angst. I have watched videos of Bernie interacting with small groups of his constituents. I have watched him conducting a high school class in civics which consisted largely of listening to their answers to questions he posed and responding to questions they posed. Bernie sees the job of the politician as including a large commitment to create an informed, comprehending constituency and listening carefully and intelligently to them. These are things that, I suspect, have never occurred to Al Franken. They are however essential to an effective progressive candidate. In progressivism the people are the power, not money. It is therefore incumbent upon progressive politicians to develop the best informed, most comprehending, constituency possible so that when push comes to shove, when you have to decide between immediate benefits and long-term disaster your people understand and are with you. People will sacrifice the immediate for the future if the alternatives and consequences are clearly laid out. The people who accepted FDR's leadership were not afraid to occupy General Motors' plants in a massive sit down strike. Their wives brought food to them despite the threats from General Motors. Earlier than that workers had to confront hired thugs in the Pullman strike and were machine-gunned in their tents in the Colorado miners' strike.
Finally, Franken's defense that he voted for the Deal so hungry people would continue to have food and shelter, if not a job, is even in this context, short sighted. Did he explain to his people that the social security tax, Franken disingenuously refers to it as a payroll tax, was a first step to weaken social security by depriving it of revenue and was intended to condition people to this process? Did he remind them that ever since LBJ used it to fund the Vietnam War they have let government raid their Social Security fund and that Congress had not seen fit to protect these funds by prohibiting their use for other purpose? We now have billions of dollars in IOUs that Congress now says there is no money to repay. Again, by continuing the Bush tax cuts we are transferring even more money to the wealthy. Did Franken lay out the enormity of the debt that this generation is imposing on those very children he seemed so concerned for?
In short, sacrifice, big time, is going to be necessary if the people are to wrest control of America from the wealthy. Due to technology and corporate and political takeover, the wealthy are deeply entrenched in our society. They control the production and distribution of our national product. They control our means of communication. They are heavily in the business of defining life for our citizens. It reminds one of the military's complaint about the difficulty of fighting insurgents because they are so thoroughly integrated into their society. Think of corporations as huge multidimensional insurgents focused on overthrowing our democracy and what we face becomes clearer. The insidious power of these proponents of privilege make it clear why progressives have a primary duty to educate, to communicate and to listen so that the people and the leadership progressively become one.
I have used Bernie Sanders as something of a paradigm of what a progressive politician should look like in our search for more of the same. However, I am conscious of the fact the Sanders functions in a small state with many small towns and it may be said that large states and major cities may not be susceptible to this level of citizen involvement.
To such concerns I would point out that large cities have realized Bernie's style of progressive politics. In the 1960s Saul Alinsky, using collegial and intensive involvement with Chicago's primarily Black poor people was able to develop organizational structures that empowered these people to better their lot through effective political measures. This was done on a neighborhood by neighborhood basis. A second way for progressive politicians to emulate Bernie's approach in the context of larger jurisdictions is by focused television or radio engagement. FDR did this on a national scale with his Fireside Chats in which he conveyed to ordinary people the state of things and what was being done. I remember, as a young teenager, our family sitting around our Majestic radio listing to these chats. Everybody respected Roosevelt and knew he would have something of substance to say. Again, you may have noticed that television evangelists are able to accrue a substantial audience by the intimacy they convey over television. That same intimacy can be conveyed over radio. I member (old people are forever uttering that phrase) when the soap opera "Ma Perkins" had a favorite character eliminated. There was massive outrage and mourning. These things demonstrate that we can create the intimacy necessary for politicians and people to work together in a joint effort to educate and improve a world that we have let technology dominate. Progressives need to investigate the use of public access channels on their local television cable stations. They need to investigate low power television, which can provide well-targeted, cheap broadcasting to local communities. Religious groups and now corporations are actively scooping there up. Why have we not seen Amy Goodman, Al Franken, Ralph Nader and other progressives pushing an effort to acquire some of these licenses for progressive purposes? I think the answer is that we are too focused on issues and candidates to focus on the people. We can create an environment for progressive, people-powered, politics to flourish. Where is the organized, MoveOn-like effort to do this?
Bob Newhard
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
On Rescuing Hostages
President Obama would have us believe that the best he could do in dealing with Republican's on extending the Bush tax cuts was to save the paltry middle class tax cuts and extend unemployment benefits historically granted when unemployment reached 7.2% which were being held hostage by the Republican concern for the wealthiest one tenth of one percent and their estate tax. This is so putrid with pusillanimity it stinks. Paul Krugman has an excellent analysis of Obama's game plying in an article that can be found at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/10/opinion/10krugman.html?pagewanted=print
However, I want to consider the undeclared ramifications and implications of this sickening fiasco.
To begin with, the real hostage was not the existing middle class, grievous though their situation is, the real hostage is our democracy. If we let the wealthy of this country continue to call the political tune we will loose the democracy that was born 234 years ago and which so many have fought to preserve from those who would destroy it. As a class, the wealthy of this country and their corporate institutions have made it abundantly clear that they do not want a democracy. They want an oligarchic plutocracy and their religious constituency wants a theocracy. They have suborned every democratic institution we have from our legislature, to the presidency to the Supreme Court. They have corrupted our societal communications and the national dialogue our democracy requires. This is the enemy Lincoln feared; the enemy from within. We are down to our last line of defense; the people in whom democracy ultimately puts its trust. There is no "reaching out" to those who are corrupting our national dialogue with fear and innuendo, who suborn our government with bribes and political payoffs, who divert vast sums from our national productivity to their own satiated ends. This enemy must be put in the searchlight of truth and justice so that its repellent selfishness is clear to all.
The duplicity and manipulativeness of Obama's rescue of the middle class becomes glaringly apparent when we consider that he knew from the day he began to campaign for President that the Bush tax cuts were due to expire during his term in office, if he won. Presumably he knew this was a monstrous gift to the wealthy, which was denying adequate education to the majority of American children, which adversely affected a broad range of government services required by the increasing homeless and jobless population, created by the financial shenanigans of this same wealthy class and, above all, is exacerbating a rapidly increasing wealth gap between the rich and the rest of us that is now threatening the continued existence of our democracy. I repeat, he knew these things going in. This being the case, where was the effort to raise the public consciousness of the seriousness of the threat posed by the excessively rich and the degree to which these tax cuts had contributed to it. Where was the connection between the wealthy recipients of these tax cuts and their financial institutions that created our current "Great Recession?" Where was the effort to use his bully pulpit and oratorical gifts to redress the long standing rule of wealth rather than people in this country? This tax issue was pregnant with all sorts of political potential to greatly improve our society and the quality of life within it. Why was it so tragically wasted?
I think the answer can initially be found in Bill Clinton's administration and the advent of his Democratic Leadership Council. With this came the political notion, that one could win more political battles by "out Republicanizing" the Republicans. Why, one might ask, would Democrats think that winning legislative battles and elections by emulating Republicans be even considered as a strategy. The answer, I believe, is that Democrats had been so often out of power since the Reagan Revolution, that they would do anything, even out-Republican the Republicans, to obtain political power. In brief, an obsession with politcs rather than with the welfare of the people overtook the Democratic Party and, in so doing, rendered it spineless.
I also believe that Clinton came to believe that money was more important than people in getting elected and staying in power. Money could buy television commercials, which politicians found more effective overall than speaking to and mingling with many groups at many places. Jim Hightower in one of his books recounts an episode in which a young congressional candidate, with a very active support group, was invited by the Democratic Party to Washington D. C. along with a number of other promising candidates for orientation and help in developing their campaigns. At the gathering he was introduced to a number of PAC leaders and lobbyists. The group of candidates was told that these were the people they needed to get to know because they provided the money for extensive television ads, etc. They were there, in short, to enable match making between candidates and lobbyists. The young candidate protested that these were the people and this was the process, namely beltway politics, which he and his campaign were opposed to. He was immediately counted out. His primary opponent who had lost to the Republican in the two previous elections received the funding, won the primary and again lost to the Republican. Obama, in my opinion, bought into this Clintonesque, DLC, beltway-centered Democratic politics.
Howard Dean as chairman of the Democratic National Committee tried to initiate a 50 state rejuvenation of the
Democratic Party structure. This would have done much to distribute Party power and resources more widely. He was vigorously opposed by Rahm Emanuel. One of the first things Obama did was appoint Emanuel as his chief of staff and remove Dean from his chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee.
Obama is but one of many who would call themselves Democrats, but who were at best powder-blue dogs.
However, things may be changing. With Nancy Pelosi's refusal to let Obama's tax deal come to the House floor and Bernie Sanders' filibuster challenge not only to Obama's tax deal, but more importantly to the destructive role of excessive wealth in this society, we may have discovered the long-sought political nexus for a Progressive challenge to the Democratic-Republican political duopoly of wealth. Now is the time, I believe, for Progressives to speak out and demand not only government of by and for the people, but that progressive leadership become as bold and energetic as Pelosi and Sanders in their attack on wealth and privilege. Ralph Nader has called for a Progressive candidate to oppose Obama in 2012. Let us end this nightmare of rampant plutocracy and, as Howard Dean urged, return America to its people. Let us rise up and free the hostages. Perhaps we are responding to Denis Kucinich's plea in the 2008 Presidential campaign, "Wake up America, Wake up." Nancy and Bernie may be our alarm clocks.
Bob Newhard
However, I want to consider the undeclared ramifications and implications of this sickening fiasco.
To begin with, the real hostage was not the existing middle class, grievous though their situation is, the real hostage is our democracy. If we let the wealthy of this country continue to call the political tune we will loose the democracy that was born 234 years ago and which so many have fought to preserve from those who would destroy it. As a class, the wealthy of this country and their corporate institutions have made it abundantly clear that they do not want a democracy. They want an oligarchic plutocracy and their religious constituency wants a theocracy. They have suborned every democratic institution we have from our legislature, to the presidency to the Supreme Court. They have corrupted our societal communications and the national dialogue our democracy requires. This is the enemy Lincoln feared; the enemy from within. We are down to our last line of defense; the people in whom democracy ultimately puts its trust. There is no "reaching out" to those who are corrupting our national dialogue with fear and innuendo, who suborn our government with bribes and political payoffs, who divert vast sums from our national productivity to their own satiated ends. This enemy must be put in the searchlight of truth and justice so that its repellent selfishness is clear to all.
The duplicity and manipulativeness of Obama's rescue of the middle class becomes glaringly apparent when we consider that he knew from the day he began to campaign for President that the Bush tax cuts were due to expire during his term in office, if he won. Presumably he knew this was a monstrous gift to the wealthy, which was denying adequate education to the majority of American children, which adversely affected a broad range of government services required by the increasing homeless and jobless population, created by the financial shenanigans of this same wealthy class and, above all, is exacerbating a rapidly increasing wealth gap between the rich and the rest of us that is now threatening the continued existence of our democracy. I repeat, he knew these things going in. This being the case, where was the effort to raise the public consciousness of the seriousness of the threat posed by the excessively rich and the degree to which these tax cuts had contributed to it. Where was the connection between the wealthy recipients of these tax cuts and their financial institutions that created our current "Great Recession?" Where was the effort to use his bully pulpit and oratorical gifts to redress the long standing rule of wealth rather than people in this country? This tax issue was pregnant with all sorts of political potential to greatly improve our society and the quality of life within it. Why was it so tragically wasted?
I think the answer can initially be found in Bill Clinton's administration and the advent of his Democratic Leadership Council. With this came the political notion, that one could win more political battles by "out Republicanizing" the Republicans. Why, one might ask, would Democrats think that winning legislative battles and elections by emulating Republicans be even considered as a strategy. The answer, I believe, is that Democrats had been so often out of power since the Reagan Revolution, that they would do anything, even out-Republican the Republicans, to obtain political power. In brief, an obsession with politcs rather than with the welfare of the people overtook the Democratic Party and, in so doing, rendered it spineless.
I also believe that Clinton came to believe that money was more important than people in getting elected and staying in power. Money could buy television commercials, which politicians found more effective overall than speaking to and mingling with many groups at many places. Jim Hightower in one of his books recounts an episode in which a young congressional candidate, with a very active support group, was invited by the Democratic Party to Washington D. C. along with a number of other promising candidates for orientation and help in developing their campaigns. At the gathering he was introduced to a number of PAC leaders and lobbyists. The group of candidates was told that these were the people they needed to get to know because they provided the money for extensive television ads, etc. They were there, in short, to enable match making between candidates and lobbyists. The young candidate protested that these were the people and this was the process, namely beltway politics, which he and his campaign were opposed to. He was immediately counted out. His primary opponent who had lost to the Republican in the two previous elections received the funding, won the primary and again lost to the Republican. Obama, in my opinion, bought into this Clintonesque, DLC, beltway-centered Democratic politics.
Howard Dean as chairman of the Democratic National Committee tried to initiate a 50 state rejuvenation of the
Democratic Party structure. This would have done much to distribute Party power and resources more widely. He was vigorously opposed by Rahm Emanuel. One of the first things Obama did was appoint Emanuel as his chief of staff and remove Dean from his chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee.
Obama is but one of many who would call themselves Democrats, but who were at best powder-blue dogs.
However, things may be changing. With Nancy Pelosi's refusal to let Obama's tax deal come to the House floor and Bernie Sanders' filibuster challenge not only to Obama's tax deal, but more importantly to the destructive role of excessive wealth in this society, we may have discovered the long-sought political nexus for a Progressive challenge to the Democratic-Republican political duopoly of wealth. Now is the time, I believe, for Progressives to speak out and demand not only government of by and for the people, but that progressive leadership become as bold and energetic as Pelosi and Sanders in their attack on wealth and privilege. Ralph Nader has called for a Progressive candidate to oppose Obama in 2012. Let us end this nightmare of rampant plutocracy and, as Howard Dean urged, return America to its people. Let us rise up and free the hostages. Perhaps we are responding to Denis Kucinich's plea in the 2008 Presidential campaign, "Wake up America, Wake up." Nancy and Bernie may be our alarm clocks.
Bob Newhard
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