Via Quick Hits, over at Common Dreams, Jeff Cohen argues that the "Netroots" should have made a stronger demand on H.R. 676, which would have led to a better public option. It is not a new idea, but I am quoting it here because of a major hole in its overall theory of change:
Had liberal groups sent out millions of emails building a movement that posed an existential threat to the health insurance industry, Sen. Baucus and Blue Dog Democrats and their corporate healthcare patrons might well be on their knees begging for a comprehensive public option - to avert the threat of full-blown Medicare for All.(...)
To win serous reforms, we need activist leaders who are tough-minded progressives making maximum demands for reforms that truly address our nation's problems. Leave the inside-the-Beltway deal-making to the politicians, properly frightened and moved by the roar of mass movements.
Given that he is complaining entirely about the leadership here, Cohen has an extremely top-down view of the diffuse, decentralized netroots (a word that he oddly capitalizes). He is also conflating two worthy, but distinct, ideas with one another. Frightening politicians into progressive action via mass movements and making more progressive demands are not the same thing, and have no causal relationship with each other.
My experience in politics has taught me that it is impossible to influence politicians unless they are frightened of you. Over the past couple years, the only votes we have managed to flip on major legislation have come as a result of either strong swings on public opinion (as happened in Iraq from 2004-2006), or from spending resources on advertisements and / or primary challenges (click here, here and here for a few examples). That the House quickly passed executive bonus compensation in the wake of the AIG bonus scandal is another good example. Non-progressive politicians will only act progressive when they are afraid doing otherwise will cost them something of great value (such as their jobs).
I also agree that it is best to start from the strongest possible negotiating position. If you pre-compromise your demands, then it is likely you will lose more ground in the negotiating process than those who do not. This is both because you have demonstrated a willingness to cave, and because you have already lost ground in the process.
However, making stronger demands does not make politicians more frightened of you all by itself. To put it another way, movements don't get bigger just because they make stronger demands. A person attending a rally, making a phone call to Congress, or writing on a blog does not become two people just because s/he made a stronger, more vehement demand. Members of Congress aren't afraid of us now because we usually don't represent a threat to their fundraising, their re-election, the pork they bring home to their districts, or the local media coverage they receive. The other side makes more phone calls (most of which are astroturf), has more lobbyists appearing in their offices, and does a lot more to benefit Blue Dogs and other center-right members of Congress than we do. None of that would have changed if we made more left-wing demands.
The amount of people and resources we have to frighten non-progressive members of Congress into progressive legislation is a different variable then the degree of progressivism we are making in legislative demands. Changing your demands does not change your ability to frighten members of Congress to accede to those demands. I agree that we need more ability to frighten members of Congress into action, and I agree that we need to start from less compromised negotiating positions. However, engaging in the later does not magically create the former, despite the lingering left-wing fantasy that a vast lumpenproletariat has not risen up simply because no one is representing their innate desire for revolution.
