This is a followup to my earlier diary, "Targetting Dems In 2010", which featured three different sorts of a spreadsheet of Democrats who voted for the Stupak Amendment. In this diary, I want to clarify my proposed overall approach, discuss some options within that framework, and encourage discussion of some particular points that need to be further clarified.
First, The Overall Approach:
(1) My intention here is to develop a methodology for supporting a plurality of strategies for building progressive power and getting rid of bad Democrats. While different people may feel strongly about different aspects of strategy (for example, "don't target Dems in GOP districts, because you can't expect better"), I think it's important to realize that it's impossible to expect everyone to agree on strategy. So we should support a plurality of strategies, looking for the best targets for each strategy.
(2) My use of spreadsheets is heuristic, not determinative. It's mean to guide our decisionmaking toward the best targets and away from the less promising ones, so that we can better focus our resources. But it's meant to assist us in reasoning consistently, and making reality-based decisions as much as possible. It's not meant to do our thinking for us, or to rule out the role of passion or of intangibles. It's a tool, nothing more, nothing less.
(3) I am not wedded to restricting ourselves to those who voted for the Stupak Amendment. It simply represented a very good pool of portential targets to start with. Another such pool would be all those who voted against the final bill (though I certainly do not support targetting progressives like Dennis Kucinich for voting against it becauseit was too weak.)
Second, Additional Factors To Consider:
(1) Add a category to identify leadership positions, such as committee or subcommittee chair.
(2) Add a category to indicate length of tenure.
(3) Add a catetgory to identify those who may be running for higher office.
(4) Add a category for those who seat is likely to be redistricted in 2012.
(5) Add categories for specific issue area Progressive Punch scores.
(6) Add a free-form note column for noting particularly eggregious actions.
(7) Add free-form note columns for recording on-the-ground attitudes and perceptions.
(8) Add columns with the filing date, primary date, and filing date for a general election challenge.
Comments are welcome regarding other factors we should track.
Third, Potential Options--With Rationales:
(1) Focus on those who won with a very small margin, as these are easiest to defeat with an independent progressive candidate in the general election, should a primary effort fall short.
(2) Focus on those in Dem districts, as a successful primary will almost certainly be elected in the general election.
(3) Focus on those with leadership positions, as this will strike at the organization heart of the conservadems.
(4) Focus on those recently elected (such as last 2 cycles), as these will be more easy to defeat.
Comments are welcome regarding other rationales--they need not be single-factor rationales such as those above.
I intersperse today's focus on the aftermath of the House vote on health care with this interview that shifts focus back onto the Obama Administration. Although the underlying subject matter is the environment and public health, the focus on openness, transparency, accountability, freedom from corporate influence, and fulfilling the promise of the 2008 campaign have application to virtually every issue in the book.
Part one of this interview discussed issues in general. It ended with PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch saying that Obama Administration stalling on whistleblower issues, "adds to the sense they don't have a policy, and without a policy, nobody is empowered to make decisions and so it almost operates as a de facto continuation of a third Bush term."
Part two looks more closely at some specific examples--two whistleblowers PEER is defending, and EPA's compromised relationship with the coal industry.
OL:Can you tell me about the case of Teresa Chambers?
Jeff Ruch: She was chief of the US Park Police. She was appointed by the Bush Aministraiton following a nationwide search in 2002. She's been a police chief in Durham, and a career law enforcement professional, and she came into office after 9/11.
OL:Could you explain what the Park Police Chief position is?
Jeff Ruch: The US Park Police is the oldest uniformed force in service. It was founded by George Washington. It was the first federal police force. They're part of the National Park Service, and they're responsible for everything from primary security at Camp David to the national monuments here in Washington DC, to the Statue of Liberty, and even sections of the Golden Gate Bridge. They're the urban professional police force of the National Park Service, they have about 600 officers. And so it's a fairly high level law-enforcement position. In Washington DC, they also have responsibility for all the parks and parkways, so they're a major presence here in the capital.
After 9/11, there were orders to drastically increase patrols on the National Mall, where the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument are. That took officers off of the parks and parkways. And the union representing the park officers had gone to the Washington Post with internal documents showing they were not sufficiently staffed to occupy all of these ports. And she as the Park Police Chief was designated to respond. For the agency. And she confirmed that the documents were accurate, which they were. And indicated that they in fact didn't have the force level.
Her interview called a tantrum in the Park Service and the parent agency, the Interior Department, as well as the White House. And three days after that article was published in the Post, she was called to the director's office, where the director was not present. A deputy and two armed guards were there and she was stripped of her badge and gun and identification, given a cardboard box for her personal possessions and marched out into the street.
To begin the process of focusing our anger toward productive corrective action in next year's elections, I've compiled a table with some relevant information about Democrats who voted for the Stupak Amendment.
In the wake of House passage of the health care bill & the Stupak Amendment, we clearly have our work cut out for us. Yet, at the same time, we have a tremendous opportunity: a very sizeable number of bad Dems have very publicly identified themselves in a way that average voters can readily grasp. Whether or not they can be defeated in primaries next year, they can clearly be organized against, and that means that progressive infrastructure can be built in their districts, to increase pressure on them in the future. And in some cases--where their general election margins are small--independent progressive candidates in the general election can be enough to defeat them. Newly drawn districts in 2012 will mean that more progressive replacement candidates will have a much better shot as a result. It's quite clear that we need to do this. There is really no other way to ensure that House members will show any loyalty whatsoever to those who elected them. And so here is a preliminary list of those who voted for the Stupak Amendment, along with some pertinent information for gauging who might be the highest priority to concentrate on getting rid of.
Some of these people--such as Stupak himself--have designs on higher office next year. Making sure that they fail should be a top priority for us. Narrow general election victories and low Progressive Punch scores indicate vulnerability to general election challenges and disappointed core constituencies, respectively. Crucial vote scores for this current session are particularly salient in terms of potential for recruiting activists to work against them. Another re-sort according to general election percentages is presented on the flip.
Another example showing that Versailles conventional wisdom is crap. And that Dems face real problems if they further weaken health care reform, rather than strengthen it. Something to help strengthen our resolve in fighting back against the Dems who voted against us last night. We're going to need a lot more polling like this next year.
Here's a summary of our poll of 800 Virginia Democrats and Independents who voted for Obama in 2008 but didn't turn out for gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds in 2009:
Creigh Deeds seen as "not progressive enough" by huge margin. 64% of Democratic Obama voters and 58% of Independent Obama voters said Deeds was "not progressive enough" compared to only 8% of Democrats and 16% of Independent Obama voters who said he was "too far to the left."
Obama's voters want the public option. 88% of Democratic Obama voters and 80% of Independent Obama voters favor a public health insurance option to compete with private insurance plans. 93% of those polled said health care is "very" or "somewhat" important when they vote.
Creigh Deeds hurt by opposition to public option. When asked, "Before the election for Governor, Democratic candidate Creigh Deeds said he would side with conservatives and push for Virginia to 'opt out' of the public insurance plan. Did this make you more excited or less excited to vote in this year's election, or did it have no impact?" 41% of those polled said it made them less excited, only 6% said it made them more excited (7 to 1).
Without a public option, Obama voters will continue to drop off in 2010. 43% of Democratic and Independent Obama voters said they are less likely to vote at all in the 2010 general election if Congress does not pass a public option as part of health care reform, compared to only 8% who are more likely to vote. If they do vote, by 46% to 6%, they will be less likely to vote for a Democratic candidate if Democrats do not pass a public option.
Barack Obama calls tonight "history." AFL-CIO calls it a "great step forward." SEIU calls it "courage."
Here's the note I just sent to our Progressive Change Campaign Committee team:
Tonight was the opposite of a "bold progressive" night. With a huge majority in the House, a vote with only 219 Dems should have been because progressives pushed this bill to the limit. Instead, it was watered-down, watered-down, watered-down. And still, only 219 Dems. This is why we fight. We need to change this.
We need to elect more bold progressives to Congress. No more lame Democrats.
Final Update: Health care reform passes the House 220-215. One Republican votes in favor (Joseph Cao, LA-02), 39 Democrats vote against. List available shortly.
Before that, 64 Democrats, and all but one Republican, voted in favor of the Stupak amendment. That amendment bars any health insurance plan that covers abortion procedures from entering the new health insurance exchanges established by this bill.
Stupak said earlier today that this bill had enough votes for passage even without his amendment. Further, President Obama has supposedly promised that he will personally work to remove that amendment from conference committee. We shall see.
The list of Democrats who voted in favor of the Stupak amendment, but against the overall bill, should be available soon. Just as important as primary challenges, we need to create an alternate DCCC, so that progressives don't see their money spent on anti-choice, anti-health care Democrats. A Stupak amendment of our own, if you will, to make sure that our money doesn't end up funding shitty Democrats.
Previous updates have been moved to the extended entry.
After this health financing reform legislation passes the House, it seems the burden for coming up with the costs associated with pregnancy and pregnancy prevention will likely fall more entirely on women afterwards than before. This is nothing new.
For years uncounted and still today, the vast majority of unpaid labor associated with raising children has fallen on women. Just as the career costs, Social Security benefit costs, unemployment eligibility costs, and most of the other opportunity and financial costs associated with two decades of working for helpless people who can only pay you in hugs, fall largely on women.
On top of all this volunteer work they do, society has collectively decided not to give a damn that women are paid less when they are paid, nor that their greater healthcare costs have to be paid for out of either these smaller salaries, or family money whose use they often have to justify to someone with greater social status.
And today, a few too many Democrats are coming out to stand with Bart Stupak and basically say that they're fine with this unpaid labor of love becoming mandatory for women who can't pay to avoid it, nor have the patience of saints to be abstinent.
This seems to me to be an expression of unimaginable hatred for women, who literally risk their lives every time they decide to carry a child a term, and the poorer a woman is, the less access to medical care and good nutrition she has, the truer that is. It might not be politic to talk about, considering that it can't be measured in money, but each of us owes a debt to our mother that can never be repaid and it's a mockery of the sacrifice of every mother to make motherhood a matter of force.
There is no other circumstance in the present-day US in which a human being is forced to risk their life or health for someone else. When it's done in combat or public service, soldiers get medals, firemen and police get commendations. When it's an organ donation, there's praise and thanks for a generous gift. When women do it in pregnancy, it's no less than they owe.
Women are more than half the population, we are 'most people.' A third of us will have abortions in our lifetimes because either our health was at risk or we simply could not afford a two decade commitment to more unpaid work. Yet in spite of that, too many people see nothing wrong with shaming us, marginalizing our concerns, stigmatizing our necessary health care options, and condemning any independent, not-male-approved exercise of our sexuality.
It's unfair, some say, that 'the rest of society', by which they mean men, should have to support any of women's expenses, in any way, because it isn't like they benefit. And after all, they already did all that exhausting thrusting and pumping, and btw, you're welcome. Words fail.
I intersperse today's focus on the aftermath of the House vote on health care with this interview that shifts focus back onto the Obama Administration. Although the underlying subject matter is the environment and public health, the focus on openness, transparency, accountability, freedom from corporate influence, and fulfilling the promise of the 2008 campaign have application to virtually every issue in the book.
