Expectations and the Big Post-Election Debate

by: Mike Lux

Thu Jul 03, 2008 at 11:29


Every two years, after the election is over, Democrats have a big debate, but they take two different forms. If we lose, it's a debate why we lost, with the DLC and their allies always arguing, without fail, whether there is a single bit of data to back them up, that it's because Democrats went too left and too populist. If we win, it's a debate over what to do with our victory, with the DLC-style Democrats warning vigorously against over-reaching, and cautioning Democrats to be slow, careful, and incremental in whatever policy changes they pursue.

If, as seems quite possible (I'm too superstitious to say likely) today, Obama wins and Democrats pick up several seats in both the House and Senate, the debate over what to do with the victory will be joined especially fiercely. For the first time in sixteen years, and the only time over almost three decades, Democrats would control the Presidency and both the House and the Senate by significant margins. With a new President having run on the themes of hope and change, the expectations among the public for real change will be sky-high.

That's why this debate will be so crucial. Establishment insiders, and their cynical allies in the media, will be doing everything possible to stamp out the flames of hope and change, but the public will be expecting our party to step up to the plate and actually deliver the goods. Insiders will be yammering on about filibusters and bureaucracy and Obama's inexperience and committee jurisdictional battles, and how hard it is to get things done. And Democrats' "wise men" will be counseling Democrats to not over-reach, take your time, don't do anything too fast, don't do anything too big or bold or dramatic.

Given the size of our problems heading straight at us down the highway like a Mack truck, and the expectations of the general public, Obama and Democratic leaders need to be bold and big in their approach. The don't over-reach Democrats are going to start their calls for caution immediately- I would predict an op-ed in the Washington Post will appear on November 6th, the Thursday after the election, from Al From or Bruce Reed or Joe Klein or David Broder, or maybe from all of them, advising Democrats to be very slow and careful and bipartisan in their approach to issues. We in the progressive movement need to be ready, assuming such a wonderful Election Day comes as we hope, to immediately and vigorously engage the debate as to why we need big change, not the politics of caution.

Mike Lux :: Expectations and the Big Post-Election Debate

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Expectations and the Big Post-Election Debate | 65 comments
Getting a head start (4.00 / 3)
It looks like Ted Kennedy's office is already laying the groundwork to push Obama's health care plan. It's a good sign that legislators are already beginning to lay the groundwork to implement what will undoubtedly be one of the most difficult proposals to get through Congress.
How do you know? (0.00 / 0)
Isn't Ted Kennedy in treatment?
if true, its great news.
[ Parent ]
It's Been Reported... He DOES Have A Staff, You Know! (4.00 / 1)
Google is your friend

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
Damn it, be nicer. (4.00 / 3)
You do not have to be offended by every comment that rubs you wrong, which apparently then gives you permission to be bullying. I love your writing, and more than frequently your opinions and certainly your commitment, but driving people away who don't even disagree with you is more than unnecessary its counterproductive. Politics is the art of working with people you dont know, organizing is working with people you do know. Politeness is how to deal with everyone, even people you don't know.

Even reading this as exaggerated camp drama is untenable.

Heres a link that might help;
http://dignitarians.blogspot.c...

--

The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky

[ Parent ]
Jeebus! (0.00 / 0)
Know ye not the meaning of "snark"?  'Tis not all bitterness!

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
Just to clarify: (0.00 / 0)
Anything negative that Paul says becomes "snark" once someone questions it.  
[ Parent ]
I want more people to read Paul Rosenberg (0.00 / 0)
I feel like punching him on the arm as I hold the bar door open sometimes, figuratively of course, having never met him.

We are building something here, lets be more careful, lets all have more respect, all.

--

The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky

[ Parent ]
Link to your right (0.00 / 0)
If my name has become code for "idiot" that's fair enough, but I did post a link to the right.
    The BG article describes it as "universal heathcare," which would be a shift from Obama's plan. But the O. camp seems to be running a little fast and loose with their terminology.
[ Parent ]
November 6th? (0.00 / 0)
The don't over-reach Democrats are going to start their calls for caution immediately- I would predict an op-ed in the Washington Post will appear on November 6th, the Thursday after the election, from Al From or Bruce Reed or Joe Klein or David Broder, or maybe from all of them, advising Democrats to be very slow and careful and bipartisan in their approach to issues.

Why would they wait that long? Why not the 5th?  In fact, why not the Sunday before Election Day?

Really, Mike, for a political insider, sometimes I can't believe how naive you are!

</snark... no, wait, the snark never goes off!

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

In all seriousness (0.00 / 0)
In fact, why not the Sunday before Election Day?

I would not put it past them, especially if, by some miracle, Obama is leading big in the polls.

(Frickin' sellout corporate cocksuckers...grumble, grumble grumble).

[ Parent ]
Let's just get off to a good start (0.00 / 0)
So much seems to ride on how a new administration (and new Congress) begins.  Imagine if Clinton had not immediately gotten involved with the whole "gays in the military" thing on day one.

I think there is room for basic agreement among the DLC and progressives on some issues, like health care. Let's get a clear legislative victory on that first, as it deserves priority anyway. With that in the bank, then we can proceed to the inevitable issues that will inexorably cause division and tension within the party.  

Good start is important. (4.00 / 3)

But let's not rewrite history -  

Imagine if conservative Democrats like Sam Nunn hadn't decided to torpedo the Clinton adminstration on gays in the military on day one.



John McCain thinks we haven't spent enough time in Iraq
[ Parent ]
Boy Howdy! (4.00 / 3)
Or Baucus on repealing the 1872 Mining Act on Day 2.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
Or Chris Cooper on healthcare. (0.00 / 0)
Hey, isn't he back in Congress?

John McCain thinks we haven't spent enough time in Iraq
[ Parent ]
Jim Cooper (4.00 / 2)
And yes, unfortunately.  
[ Parent ]
I actually don't remember Nunn's role then (0.00 / 0)
Just out of curiosity, can you refresh my recollection (or point me to some resource on this). My memory was that somehow the Clinton administration was to blame for turning that issue into a much larger thing than it needed to be.
[ Parent ]
Information provided (0.00 / 0)
Here's an article on Nunn's role in DADT.

Can it happen here?
[ Parent ]
It was a huge campaign issue for them (0.00 / 0)
Clinton tried to make good on his campaign promise.  He then decided to completely cave upon the first instance fo being challenged, and came up with a "compromise" that pissed off both bigots and the actual affected group.
[ Parent ]
DLC and health care. (0.00 / 0)
I am actually more open to some of DLC's policy ideas than many of my fellow progressives are (they deserve credit for Nat'l Service, 100,000 cops on the street, and re-inventing govt, for example), but on health care, they were bad even when their friend Clinton was in the White House. They are likely to oppose any universal coverage bill Obama puts forward.
[ Parent ]
priorities (4.00 / 1)
We should probably pick our top priorities, and push hard for those.

I nominate ending the war, no. 1, reversing the police state infrastructure (Gitmo, illegal taps, etc.), no. 2, and addressing climate change, no. 3.

My guess is that the mortgage crisis/banking crisis will push itself to the front of the line.  By the way, does anyone have a plan for that?

Abolish Capitalism? (0.00 / 0)
My guess is that the mortgage crisis/banking crisis will push itself to the front of the line.  By the way, does anyone have a plan for that?

Before it abolishes itself?

</snark off... no, wait, the snark never goes off...

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

[ Parent ]
There is no easy answer .. (0.00 / 0)
many of the IB's are probably insolvent(though they'll never say that obviously) .. and it is one of the problems with the war .. we are spending money that could be used to shore up the economy .. the other problem is .. Bernanke doesn't want to raise rates(to deal with exploding inflation) before the election(so much for the Fed being immune from politics)
[ Parent ]
Obama's top three are ok with me (4.00 / 3)
He mentioned health care, ending the war and serious action on global climate change as the top three things he would hope to accomplish first term.

Here's my suggestion.  There is already pretty much a consensus in the environmental and even large parts of the business world that we have to do something about global climate collapse ASAP, and by November we will have had our first ice-free North Pole and hopefully not too much more extreme weather, but some, and probably more bad news from scientists.  So getting seriously started on global climate change should be No 1.  Plus it is a means of new investment and new jobs, so it attacks the economic problems too.

Second, there is a growing consensus in many industries that we need to move away from employer-based health care.  This can be part of a trade-off with, for example, the auto industry as part of a package to help them produce smarter cars.  Health care has to be No. 2.

And it will be apparent to a large number of people that we need to scale back in Iraq to have money to pay for the first 2 and to have resources to shift to Afghanistan and Pakistan and to combat nuclear proliferation.  So he can probably get more of the service brass behind scaling back in Iraq than we usually think and certainly a majority of the people will go for it.  Best idea is to declare the surge a victory, praise his defeated opponent for thinking of it and Petraeus for managing it and then flanked by the rest of the brass say it is time to redeploy so the Iraqis can govern their own country and we can get cracking on No 1 and 2.

The key is in packaging things and stressing the interconnections, rather than always seeing them as discrete policy issues.  This is where Obama's rhetorical skills will be such an asset.

He doesn't have to tackle tax reform the first year (except for freezing the estate tax) because the Bush tax cuts will jsut sunset.  That can wait a year or two.

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.

[ Parent ]
I hate to say this... (4.00 / 1)
because it leaves intact the premise of imperial right to preemptive war, but I think you are right that declaring victory and taking our marbles home might work.

Andrew J. Bacevich made a terrific early contribute to the debate at the Boston Globe the other day, "What Bush hath wrought." Some key points:

Among other things, the Bush team has accomplished the following:

# Defined the contemporary era as an "age of terror" with an open-ended "global war" as the necessary, indeed the only logical, response;

# Promulgated and implemented a doctrine of preventive war, thereby creating a far more permissive rationale for employing armed force;

# Affirmed - despite the catastrophe of Sept. 11, 2001 - that the primary role of the Department of Defense is not defense, but power projection;

# Removed constraints on military spending so that once more, as Ronald Reagan used to declare, "defense is not a budget item";

And much more. There's going to be a generational job of revisioning democracy in a post-imperial, climate stressed world.  

Can it happen here?

[ Parent ]
President Obama could pen a new doctrine (0.00 / 0)
and publically repeal and repudiate the so-called Bush Doctrine.  He could sketch the outline of the "post Imperial US" and promote global cooperation and non-military approaches to common problems.

Do you think he will do so?

"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

[ Parent ]
Do I think he will? (0.00 / 0)
No. Not unless some combination of circumstances on the homefront and in the international arena force him to do a major rethink.

The first item is our job.

Thing is, if he can be elected at all, he might have the leadership potential to let empire down gracefully, but his history does not yet show much promise of this. Think Tony Blair, perhaps.

Can it happen here?

[ Parent ]
Twas ever thus (0.00 / 0)
"The first item is our job."

Although, after seeing "War, Inc." over this most patriotic of weekends, I'm not certain that changing only governments will get us where we want to be.

I think Obama might help his chances in the GE if he took a more aggressive approach on such issues, as they contrast so clearly with John McCain.


"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

[ Parent ]
Remember Senator George Aiken (0.00 / 0)
He suggested doing that in Vietnam, BEFORE Johnson's escalation--in 1966.  Richard Russell advised Johnson basically the same thing.  But Nixon and the Right goaded into escalating.  

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.
[ Parent ]
Economic Direction... (4.00 / 2)
One point that I think is often overlooked, at least in the media:

When our soldiers return, those who are ready to part from the military (which I suspect will be a sizeable portion) will be faced with an economy already struggling with unemployment.  

I do recognize that the new GI education bill should help sugnificantly, but I also think we should institute some FDR-style infrastructure programs which would not only employ people but also improve domestic economic activity for years to come.  I am typically hesitant to commit to infrastructure development due to its environmental consequences, but there is much of our infrastructure that is overdue for maintenance, and I think it deserves attention as we re-allocate funds post-war.  A couple of days past Obama pushed for increased volunteerism, which is certainly good in terms of citizen engagement and community development, but actually paying people to improve things would be still more productive.

Of course the same strategy could (and should) be applied to environmental restoration, although I think at this point infrastructure would have the stronger public support and so should initially be emphasized.  

[ Parent ]
restoring existing infrastructure can be good for the environment (0.00 / 0)
think of all the energy inefficiency that comes from a single pothole creates.  Not to mention the social benefits we'd get if we started building civic centers and the like again...
[ Parent ]
Also create a National Disaster Corps (0.00 / 0)
We should not leave disasters to the military or even the national Guard.  We should have a civilian disaster corps and a registry of people who are available,  There is a role for the Nat Guard but not the military as such, and it should be under civilian control.

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.
[ Parent ]
Cheap housing? (0.00 / 0)
Much of the financial storms can be traced back to rising prosperity amongst blacks and Hispanics. Not unnaturally, they wished to buy a home to acquire something in the way of permanent assets - something which previously had been mostly a white preserve.

The problem was the loans were dodgy and a slight economic downturn left too many of them out of their depth and financial houses were far too deeply sunk into the mire to get out, worsening the situation for everybody else with a sub-prime loan.

So now we have a struggling economy and a lot of foreclosures. How to do that and as an added benefit remove the huge racial gap in home ownership?

A massive program of construction of affordable housing, with tax breaks/government aid for those taking up the offer. This could go with the public works projects and rejuvenate the construction industry.

As added bonuses, having more of the economy tied up in assets should be a stabilising factor, construction would enjoy a decade long boom and if the plan went off well it'd really piss Grover Norquist off.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog

[ Parent ]
Historical analogy (0.00 / 0)
The way I've been reading this coming election, we are in many ways reliving 1932, and we're about to elect Jack Kennedy.

Kennedy had great rhetoric and did some wonderful stuff (namely, Apollo program and avoiding Armageddon in Cuba, the latter with Bobby's help).  But it was LBJ who stiff-armed Congress into passing Voting Rights, Medicare and Medicaid.

OTOH FDR was also viewed as a lightweight when he became President, and rose to the occasion.

Well .. (0.00 / 0)
Obama has been hiring some of neo-liberal economic guys .. so we'll see what happens
[ Parent ]
Maybe FDR Was SEEN As A Lightweight (0.00 / 0)
But that was clearly wrong-headed.  He had already done quite a lot as Governor of NY.  It was easily the largest state at the time, and the programs he put in place to mitigate the worst impacts of the Great Depression were seen as beacons of hope.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
Yes, it would be fairer to say.... (0.00 / 0)
....that in his early life he did not appear serious, but polio changed him.  As you say, he had initiated some social programs in NY beforer the 1932 election.

It is funny to read some of the rhetoric of the 1932 election.  FDR criticizing Hoover for his deficits and saying the last thing the country needed was more infrastructure.

[ Parent ]
FDR's biggest assets were (0.00 / 0)
His flexibility--he brought in a bunch of very bright guys and a few women too and told them to come up with ideas and they'd try them and find out what worked, then puch that.  Obama has this kind of non-ideological flexibility and isn't afraid of smart people.

His speaking ability--particularly the fireside chats that reassured people.  Obama's strengths are different--not so much reassuring as calling people to a higher purpose.  That will help, as it helped Kennedy.

Kennedy had a problem with hubris in the beginning.  He went along with the CIA and backed the disasterous Bay of Pigs, and with the guys who wanted to unleash the CIA and special ops in Vietnam.  He and Bobby also went along with things like plots to assasinate foreign leaders (Diems, Castro).  If Cheney tries to present him with the same sort of irrevocable commitment to something crazy in Iran, I'd expect Obama not to go along, as he's more inately cautious than Kennedy, who had a real reckless streak.

It's true, though, we lack an LBJ.  We don't have the southern Senate barons, but we do have some colossal egos and some entrenched conservative Dems like Baucus.  Here's here Obama has to go over their heads and speak to the people.

But the more expectations are aroused, the more push there will be against Obama to get things done.


John McCain--He's not who you think he is.

[ Parent ]
A Slight Correction... (0.00 / 0)
JFK didn't go for assasinating Diem.  He was genuinely shocked, as he thought it was to be a bloodless coup.  I'm fairly critical of him, but want to be fair.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
A little murkier than that . . . (4.00 / 1)
JFK effectively gave the green light to the coup plotters, and was shocked and dismayed when Diem was assassinated. Another case of the Kennedy tough guy attitude leading to outcomes at odds with the pragmatic Kennedy instincts.  

The Diem coup was not unlike GHW Bush's Ambassador to Iraq (unintentionally) greenlighting the invasion of Kuwait, followed by shock and dismay when it happened.

In one of his books, George Ball said that the Turkish invasion of Cyprus happened because Kissinger had concentrated all of the power of the US Foreign Policy in himself, and he was on a plane and out of touch when the invasion happened.

The Korean War started because the Truman Administration wasn't paying attention to Asia.

The lesson -- US Foreign Policy and the State Department need robust leadership, that pays attention to everything.

[ Parent ]
Not all that clear (0.00 / 0)
Although there are reports that JFK was shocked by the assassinations, he and his brother also made it clear that they wanted the Ngo brothers removed.  The CIA people in Saigon certainly knew assassination was in the works.  Richard Helms kept denying the Kennedys had ok'd assassination plots against Castro as well, but that is pretty well discounted now, at least as to RFK.  Lots of interesting stuff in Thomas Powers' book of essays on the CIA, and in "Legacy of Ashes" by Tim Weiner.  And of course there's "The Tears of Autumn" by Charles McCarry.  It's fiction, but he was there at the time and with the CIA.

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.
[ Parent ]
LBJ is probably Tom Daschle (0.00 / 0)
Let's remember, LBJ had to be pushed into doing a lot of that. He was no liberal. It's pretty difficult to be a great powerbroker and also to live up to the ideals of your supporters.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog
[ Parent ]
FDR's Greatest Asset (0.00 / 0)
was being president in 1932.  It was hard for him not to be bold (although not impossible - see Hoover, Herbert.) Same for LBJ.  The question isn't whether Obama is like FDR and LBJ - it's if we are like the industrial workers or civil rights movements.  

That doesn't mean that who is president doesn't matter - it does.  But the times matter more than the man (or woman.)

Politics is the art of the possible, but that means you have to think about changing what is possible, not that you have to accept it in perpetuity.

[ Parent ]
the DLC has an inherent advantage (4.00 / 4)
The DLC spends the time prior to the election drafting how they are going to spin it. Everyone else in the party spends their time working their asses off and are dead tired by the time the polls close.

On twitter: @BobBrigham
It's A Tick They Learned From Their Slaveowning Forebearers, I Suppose (0.00 / 0)
Lazy good-for-nothing party activists!

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3
[ Parent ]
People Power to the rescue (0.00 / 0)
Every progressive organization I know has also been devastated by the poor economy and the long, exhausting fight with dishonest and crazy right-wingers for the past 7 (or is it 30) years. And we'll continue to be faced by powerful entities: Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Fox News, etc.

Fortunately, we have massive people power this time around that will, fingers crossed, enable us to get a lot of Democrats elected (including a lot of progressives) and create a massive wave of expectation and pressure for far-reaching progressive change.

I'm hoping that every progressive policy group will prepare legislation that they'd like to see implemented -- a "Progressive Program for America" -- and we can push these through one after another for the first few months of 2009. First on my list are undoing/reforming all the bad legislation that was passed in the last 7 years. Then bolstering some of our allies -- like families with SCHIP, women/labor with the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, labor with unemployment benefits, unions with card check organizing, and GLBT with the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) -- so they are energized and able to build up the strength of their organizations. Then I would tackle the biggies: the Iraq war, universal free healthcare, climate change/energy policy, taxes, trade deals, indexing the minimum wage, a compassionate urban policy, a decent foreign policy, cutting the military budget, and challenging media monopolies.

There is a passionate desire for these kinds of far-reaching changes. If they come fast and furious from a lot of different directions, our opponents will have a difficult time organizing and sustaining opposition. Grassroots activists will be somewhat burned out from working to get Democrats elected, but if things go well, they should be elated by the results, and excited about the possibility of change.

[ Parent ]
Hmmm... (0.00 / 0)
I can see two sides to that strategy: on the one hand, it would get the ball rolling and at the same time bolster the resources of supporters; but on the other hand, could it not result in some of those supporters disengaging, content that their interests had been served?
[ Parent ]
Victory can mean disengagement (0.00 / 0)
Whenever good legislation is enacted, those who care most passionately about it may feel that they've gotten what they wanted and then drop their level of activism. But most people care about other issues besides their pet issue and with good leadership, they will continue to work for other changes. And I think we've now moved pretty far beyond the single-issue and identity politics of the 1980s -- I think/hope that most progressives understand we're trying to improve the common good, not satisfy their particular self-interest.
[ Parent ]
1932 (4.00 / 5)
Let's start using that language, setting the expectation that we expect Big Change on the order of FDR and 1932.

John McCain thinks we haven't spent enough time in Iraq
In Rolling Stone Obama laid out his 3 Minimum Goals (4.00 / 2)
Is there a marker you would lay down at the end of your first term where you say, "If this has happened or not happened, I would consider it a negative mark on my governance"?
If I haven't gotten combat troops out of Iraq, passed universal health care and created a new energy policy that speaks to our dependence on foreign oil and deals seriously with global warming, then we've missed the boat. Those are three big jobs, so it's going to require a lot of attention and imagination, and it's going to require the American people feeling inspired enough that they're prepared to take on these big challenges.

www.rollingstone.com

He has pointed in actions not words; against pandering to the oil conglomerates, against media concentration and toward civil liberties and gender issues. I'm sure we can mount a discussion that starts here and moves towards restoring the American democracy.

--

The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky

Rhetorical strategy... (0.00 / 0)
I think there are times when it's appropriate to keep details such as those you pull from the Stone article implicit a la "Speak softly and carry a big stick."  Bringing up such points is likely to creame enemies who may not recognize them if they remain unstated.

On the other hand, industries that can afford think-tanks are probably more likely to recognize implications than are progressive individuals, so perhaps making things explicit is the best way to gain the support needed to stand up to industry.

I am not convinced either way.

[ Parent ]
The thing about Democracy is people. Sounds like a sports announcer, but still.... (0.00 / 0)
True.

As the banks pull dimes out your wallet at each breath, as gas prices are climbing past theft to impoverishment, as corn ethanol causes food riots around the globe, the mass of people in their dissatisfaction need to be heard, deserve to be heard and will be heard.

Leadership resolving these issues and making a more perfect union, a better world is our job. Lets do that job with the highest possible respect for all of us involved, from soccer mom, to deployed national guardsmen, to latino factory workers and seniors in Jersey.

Voting and political involvement isnt a task we let people do, its because in a democracy (say this in unison) 'you answer to me.'

We need a mobilized, involved active democracy to save the country and the planet. My parents and yours and my parents parents, offered their lives for democracy, we must be willing to offer more than our safety.

--

The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky

[ Parent ]
Helping Team Obama (4.00 / 2)
Mike, have you read The Progressive Presidents: Roosevelt, Wilson, Roosevelt, Johnson by John Morton Blum?

http://www.chapters.indigo.ca/...

I read it years ago, but the lessons are clear -- most of the Progressive Reforms of the 20th Century occurred during very small windows of opportunity.

HillaryCare failed because it dragged on into 1994, and eventually led to the destruction of the Democratic Congressional Majority.

Obama's success depends on getting his program passed in 2009 -- those who counsel caution and a go slow approach are the enemies of change.  

Right (4.00 / 1)
LBJ's window had closed by this time in 1966.  By fall Ronald Reagan had won as governer of CA and the tide was turning.  But part of that was backlash.  It is essential not just to push for change but to do it in a way that includes people so that there is less fertile ground fopr a backlash.  So pushing for healthcare is great, along with a few days minimum mandated sick leave would ease things on people, plus the middle-class tax cuts, and measures to soften the blow of the changeover in energy policies. like car buybacks or rebates of some sort.  I don't mean go slow or water down policies, just try not to have there be undeserving losers.  

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.
[ Parent ]
Well, Race-Based Backlash Was Inevitable, Really (4.00 / 1)
But Johnson also damaged himself with Vietnam--and he didn't even believe in it.

So, there's another lesson to remember.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

[ Parent ]
And it's really amazing that he let the conservatives scare him so (4.00 / 1)
I know that Truman's struggles over China and MacArthur would have certainly been traumatic for any Democrat in Congress at the time, but at the same time


He had just completely embarrassed Goldwater as being a crazy right wing lunatic that was going to destroy the world with his insane reactionary rhetoric.  Surely, he kenw how to counterpunch if he was accused of having 'lost' Vietnam.


Has anyone tried that attack against the right since?  Why has no one tried to replicate the strategy and messaging behind that absurd landslide victory?  I understand that the 1968 convention derailed that against Nixon, but still...

[ Parent ]
A combination of things (4.00 / 1)
Johnson defeated Goldwater, but then came the student protests and the Watts riots, then more riots, and by 1966 Reagan had beaten Pat Brown for Governor of CA and was building a movement.  He was obviously more slick and dangerous than Goldwater, and of course Nixon was plotting his comeback.  I was at UC Berkeley in 1964-1966, then living in SF from the summer of 1966 for several years.  The climate changed very dramatically from the fall of 1964 to the fall of 1966, and then even more by 1968, with increasing polarization on both sides and the middle confused and somewhat unnerved by it all. I do think that Johnson's ambivalence over Vietnam precluded him from taking that tack against Nixon.  It was tried by Carter against Reagan, but Carter didn't have the stature, much less the ruthlessness, of LBJ and couldn't pull it off. Ted Kennedy had his own problems in 1980.  And by then the Dems had let themselves be cowed by the "Who lost Vietnam" garbage, from which they have still not really recovered.

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.
[ Parent ]
I agree. (0.00 / 0)
He doesn't have to get everything important done in 2009, but he sure does have to have some early successes that are on a big level.
[ Parent ]
It's really about (4.00 / 3)
Ending the Bush Dog dominance in Congress.  They're the ones who will carp, and break ranks, and be the first to shit on Obama's plans or key pieces of progressive legislation.  They'll be rewarded handsomely for doing so with slots on sunday talk and plenty of talk about how wonderfully bi-partisan they are.

We will need to create leverage early against them.  Assuming Obama will live up to his promises, he will of course have significant leverage over fundraising as President and the bully pulpit.  So if he gets an actual mandate (52% or higher PV) that would help.

Clinton was robbed of his mandate by Ross Perot spoiling his majority win.  I don't think Bob Barr will manage anything like that and Nader is a spent commodity, so hopefully we can see a Democrat win a real majority of the vote.  Dems took a solid majority in 2006, so we know there are enough voters willing to check those D's on the ballot.  

This is why Congress is important! (4.00 / 3)
Our additional picks for the Better Democrats list later this month will be geared toward pushing Congress in a more progressive direction by putting in the most progressive with a good chance of winning and those who will replace the least progressive.  Granted that doesn't directly attack the Blue Dog problem, but it will undercut them.  And once the election is over, we can build the Blue Dog Primary Fund to take some of them on.  If the demand for change is strong enough, it will effect even them.  Their big issue is killing change by demanding "fiscal responsibility," but a Pres Obama would have the ability to reward and punish that Bush now has.

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.
[ Parent ]
Great point, in fact its time to begin organizing for the 2010 midterms now (0.00 / 0)
Lists and recruiting and solidifying and funding. Network building right now. Identification and support.  

--

The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
[ Parent ]
Yes Congress is huge (4.00 / 3)
Going off of Mike's point, I think it's really important that if you have a Democratic congressperson or senator, to let them know how important it is BEFORE the election that we get these things passed. Heck it's even important in places like PA were Specter is a senator and will be in for a tough fight in 2010. He knows that if he's perceived as a roadblock to UHC or card check in PA, his a** is toast. Goodbye AFL-CIO endorsement. So we need to start now letting our congress critters know what's important, because ultimately they will be the make or break point for what gets done.  
[ Parent ]
Crashing Gates, Building Access Roads, Gaining Influence (4.00 / 2)
While there are plenty of issues worth prioritizing, as some have begun to do in this thread, an element of being prepared that stands out for me is to be ready to push for and participate in a new and more open process for crafting, debating, amending and passing legislation.  One that is transparent to citizen oversight and conducive to influence and input from outside the Beltway.

While there may be better ones, one example that comes to mind, since I was doing a little research on it yesterday, is single-payer health insurance, and healthcare reform in general.  

A question I have for those with more political experience and healthcare expertise than me is: is there any reason why single-payer solutions (e.g., Conyers' HR 676) shouldn't get a chance to "be heard" and see if they can attract public support in whatever "transparent" policymaking process the Obama Admin decides to set up?  If the answer is yes, than the second question is what can we do to help it be heard and understood, gain popular support, and be seriously considered in the "open debate" we will be wanting and Obama has said will occur?

Regardless of whether single-payer is a good candidate for this, maybe this thread can trigger a mobilization around key issues where its clear that Obama will either need strong support or strong pressure from the netroots.

More specifically, why not start a focused netroots effort to endorse, or if need be draft, specific legislative proposals that can be put on the 2009 legislative negotiating table, and accompanied by collateral material to back them up, netroots-based PR campaigns to insure they aren't ignored, etc.

The myBO "Get FISA Right" group and its open letter seems like an early and partial prototype for this kind of effort, where the tools set up by Obama the candidate (and latter Obama the president) can be used to push him in progressive directions and hold him accountable for doing so (or not).

My understanding is that OL's Mike Lux is an example of someone who has at least one foot on the "inside" in DC, while also being firmly anchored as a progressive.  These are the kinds of folks who could play a key role in identifying the points of leverage, paths of opportunity and looming dangers (in terms of process, people, issues, etc.), for doing some test runs of a system to support transparency, accountability and citizen influence.  These test runs might be focused on particular issues, but their larger goal would be to start building and evolving a strong and sustainable "open government" process that could become the "normal" system for the functioning of American democracy at the federal level.

This may sound like pie-in-the-sky "reformism", but it seems to me that the 08 election is a unique opportunity for real systemic change in the functioning of our federal government which, on balance, is arguably less-than-useless in its current mode of operation (or, to be more generous, can and should be a lot more effective in serving the public interest).  And there's no guarantee that we'll ever get another opportunity quite as ripe as this one until the looming line of Mack trucks Mike refers to will have wreaked too much havoc for there to be time, energy and national will for anything but desperate triage and firefighting.  Ripe is good, but overripe can get toxic.  

To turn around Mike's metaphor a bit, our federal government has been steering right into those Mack trucks.  We need to get and keep our hands on the wheel, and to have control of the gas and break pedals--and do it pretty fast.  

It really is time for Democracy 2.0 (or 3.0, or whatever).  Version 1.0 is hopelessly infected with viruses, and has corrupted way too many files in related systems, like healthcare, the economy, national security, education, energy, the environment, etc.  My sense is that the netroots and elements of the Obama campaign can provide core "software kernels" upon which such an upgraded system can be built.

Good ideas (4.00 / 1)
I can't speak for Mike, but I worked in CA state gov't for many years.  The affected industries know how to pull the levers of power really well, and it is really important for people on the other sides to get involved, attend hearings, submit comments etc.  I used to advise activists how to get more involved because having that pressure helped an agency resist industry pressure and do closer to the right thing.  You have to push for more than you can get, or even more than you really want, so that the agency can compromise with you and with the other side and still have a decent outcome.  And it is a lot of work.  There are already major players on health care--unions, doctors' groups (most of whom now support reform), hospitals, tons of health policy groups like the Kaiser Family Foundation, insurance and hospital trade associations etc etc.

The main thing I think is to plug into a network (like the ACLU on civil liberties, some of the groups on food and farm policy, other groups in other areas), be prepared to follow the issue closely and give input to Congress and then to the agencies when they do their regulatory processes.  It is hard to be really active on more than one issue or issue area, though, because you have to become pretty well informed to have a significant effect.  But it certainly can be done.

John McCain--He's not who you think he is.

[ Parent ]
I wonder if .. (0.00 / 0)
GM and Ford would go for UHC now .. given their problems .. if so .. that would be huge .. because legacy costs are killing them .. and UHC would take care of the health care end ..  they have no real reason not to be on board
[ Parent ]
Ideas. (0.00 / 0)
A lot of really good ideas here, we should keep strategizing about how to leverage our collective assets and power.
[ Parent ]
Expectations and the Big Post-Election Debate | 65 comments
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