This will probably be my last post until after New Year's, as I'm hitting the road and stepping away from a computer for awhile.
I've been thinking through some of the highlights and disappointments. As I look back, it's a mixed bag. It certainly has been a year of progress on some issues (legislation like stem cell research and Lily Ledbetter, various LGBT fights) and heartbreaking loss on others (public option, Ted Kennedy's death, marriage equality losses in Maine and New York State), and some outcomes that have yet to be seen (climate change legislation, marriage in New Jersey).
But there are three major things that come to my mind when I think of politics in 2009.
One is that Obama, in terms of style, has shaped up to be the kind of President many thought he would be, that being "Red state/blue state/we don't all have to agree on this." He clearly shies away from picking fights. The only two moments I can really think of where I look at him and think "that's the kind of President I want" (stylistically speaking) is when he aggressively took on the insurance companies in an October radio address, and his DNC Convention speech in 2008. Naturally, the answer to this critique from historians and defenders is the FDR "make me do it" quip. For me, I think it's true, but it's getting kind of old, and it reminds me of a comment I did on a 2008 post of Mike's titled "Labeling Obama" (excerpted here):
Why is it entirely the progressive movement's responsibility to bang away at Obama? I'm all for making sure the man gets elected and all the toning-down that comes with it, but for goodness' sake, it's his responsibility to abide by what he said:
"I am someone who is no doubt progressive"
"I believe in a whole lot of things that make me progressive and put me squarely in the Democratic camp,"
If he lies, and has a centrist, muddled presidency, it's somehow all our fault because "we" didn't fulfill "our" responsibility to make sure he acts the way we want him to?
I agree the movement has responsibilities, but I'd like my candidates to be truthful about where they stand and be boldly progressive and not cave in to polls. I'd like them not to cave into, in your words, the culture of caution, which Obama seems to be doing lately. But if he does, well, then, it's just the progressive movement's failure to keep him from doing so?
Candidates, and what you and I would call good Presidents, have an equal responsibility to be progressive in their actions, and I don't think you're asking Obama take on that responsibility.
I don't think Obama has taken that responsibility yet. As Chris wrote the other day, progressives have to give presidents "space" to move to the left by aggressive critique. But progressives should never shy away from demanding that Obama live up to his commitments either.
The second thing is that progressives really have taken a leap forward in terms of organizing progressive muscle in the House. The Congressional Progressive Caucus, thanks in major part to Darcy Burner and Mike, is more organized and action-oriented. Chris' Progressive Block strategy, while as he says there are still problems to overcome, is going a long way towards marshalling the votes we need to counter Obama and the Blue Dogs.
The third is that sometimes I think we out here on the blogs aren't heard as much as the moneyed interests. To some extent, that's true. But on the flip side, we placed advertising in Roll Call, The Hill, and the Washington Post aimed at Capitol Hill- something that only big-moneyed interests had previously done- and helped get Reid to put a public option in the merged bill. PCCC and other organizations have helped move people on the public option through their work. You contributed to send me to Maine, where I did organizing on the ground to help shine a spotlight on the campaign and generate action for them. Chris Matthews types see bloggers and commenters as just people ranting about the state of the world at each other. But we are proving them wrong, and to the next generation of communications directors and media figures, that's important.
On a personal note, although I've been working at OpenLeft since we launched in 2007, this is actually year I first started writing full-time. I wanted to thank all of you who read my stuff, link to it, and I really do enjoy the honest dialogue in the comments. I've only grown to love this site and the work we do more since I've started writing.
I especially wanted to thank you all for contributing to send me to Maine. Whatever the outcome, it did lend a great deal of help in the closing weeks, and as I wrote in the aftermath, we ultimately moved the ball forward. We'll get there.
This may well be my last post of the year, since I'm leaving for Christmas with the family tomorrow. I always pretend to myself that I might write something over the Christmas holiday, but between playing with the little ones, hanging out with the rest of the family, having dinners and lunches with friends, eating carbs and protein, and chopping wood and baling hay on the farm (okay, made that last one up- I mainly sit around and talk and eat on the farm, although I do sometimes ride in the tractor with Barbara's brother when we are visiting in the summer), I never seem to get around to posting anything. While some weird thing could change all that (weird is the name of the game in health care, for example), I'm very much guessing this will be it for the year of 2009.
Creigh Deeds on October 20: I'm against the public option.
Voters on November 3: We're against you.
That's an oversimplification, but not by much. Here's some data:
In the eight October polls taken before Deeds' comments about the public option he trailed Bob McDonnell by 11 points with 8 percent of voters undecided. Deeds' support was at 40.25 percent in those polls
In the 11 polls taken after Deeds' comments he trailed McDonnell by 14.3 with 4.5 percent undecided. Deeds' support was at 40.7 percent in those polls.
On election day, with no more undecided voters, Deeds lost by 17 percent. He won 41.2 percent of voters.
Summary: In the aftermath of Deeds' comments on the public option, his support, even as undecided voters finally decided, never really climbed. Either a lot of Democrats stayed home or the vast majority of undecided voters broke for McDonnell.
There are plenty of Democrats in Virginia these days. President Obama won the state by a margin of more than six percent. Recent Democratic Governors include Tim Kaine and Mark Warner. Both Senators are Democrats. But you have to get them to show up and you have to give them reason to be excited about your campaign. Also, when a policy is very popular and will actually help people in a time of great need, you should probably not oppose that policy. Just a thought.
U.S. stocks were poised to open higher Wednesday, as Wall Street cheered a number of Republican election wins ahead of the Federal Reserve's latest policy meeting decision.
And later in the story:
But positive market momentum appeared as investors were encouraged by several Republicans victories, including the governor races in both New Jersey and Virginia.
More broadly, the wins reflect a sharp rebuke by Americans of current policies in Washington, including massive spending programs that have helped grow the federal deficit.
"The election results suggest that perhaps the referendum of the Democratic Party, more specifically President Obama, is being challenged in the marketplace," said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott.
So the stock market, which has been going mostly up for 8 months (apparently cheering uh...something), is set to go up some more this morning. And this is proof that investors are happy about the races for Governor in NJ and Virginia. Nevermind that a lot of investors, like Warren Buffet, George Soros, etc. are Democrats, apparently it is just a given that:
1. Investors are Republicans
2. Happy political results for Republicans = market goes up
Of course the market has been going up and down for the last month. I guess that's because, on some days, Republicans are feeling happy and confident and on other days they are feeling sad.
Obviously this is just as ridiculous as the "markets hate Obama" meme from last February which mysteriously faded away when the markets began moving upward. Amazingly this story is not posted as an editorial but asa front page story on CNN Money.
Anyway, even if you accept the premise, what does that say about the markets? "We like it when Democrats lose because then the gap between the rich and poor widens and we can buy another chateau."
These past two weeks, the Kansas Democratic Party has been asking people to share their personal health care stories in the hopes of convincing Congress that now is the time for real reform.
You see, it's easy to forget in the rush of policy discussions and politics decisions that this issue isn't about politicians, special interest groups, or even the insurance companies. It's about you. And, it's about people like Ann L. from Augusta, KS.
As we come off the high of the Inauguration, we have to get ready for what will be some very tough fights ahead. I have been doing some thinking about the challenges of this whole post-partisan theory of change, and wanted to spend some time addressing it strategically.
As you may know, I recently did an interview with Sam Stein at the Huffington Post about my new book, The Progressive Revolution: How the Best in America Came to Be, where I talked about the fact that history doesn't really support the whole post-partisan, bring everybody together theory of change-that every big change in American history has only come after a very intense and rancorous battle to the end between progressives and conservatives. That caused some heartburn for some of my friends in the Obama White House, but I stick by what I said. There are a lot of nuances and layers to what is going on right now, and we need to do some real thinking about the strategy going forward.
Two quick conversations, along with that delightful fact from yesterday that Obama did an executive order that nullifies Every Single Legal Order and Opinion on Interrogation From the Bush Years, are making me feel very happy today.
I was talking to Deepak Bhargava, President of one of the leading groups on poverty issues in the country. He said that he and his staff had gone over the Economic Recovery bill with a fine tooth comb, and to his delight it was the "best piece of legislation for helping poor people he had ever seen". Pretty high praise.
I ran into Jim Zogby of the Arab-American Institute over the lunch hour, and he said that between the call to Abbas, the appointment of a major player like Mitchell to be the Mideast peace envoy, and the executive orders, that Obama had been signed did more to advance the Mideast peace process in 48 hours than had been done in the previous 8 years, by far.
I know there will be days when I'm disappointed, but I am feeling pretty good today-conversations like this make me feel like, however far we have to go, real progress is indeed being made.
After the U.S. Supreme Court upheld one of the country's strictest voter ID laws in April, several states rushed to pass similar bills before the year's end. By December, more than 25 states introduced legislation to require voter ID at the polls. Though none of these bills were successful this year, lawmakers in several states are hoping to revive such restrictive requirements in 2009.
Since July of this year, at least seven states have pre-filed or carried over voter ID legislation for the 2009-2010 sessions, including Nevada, Maryland, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia.
Recent analyses of the 2008 general election find that overall participation increased on November 4, with a significant surge in voter participation among historically underrepresented Americans. Yet, while some lawmakers have been inspired by the recent voter turnout to propose election reforms that expand access to voting rights, others continue to focus on creating additional barriers to voting.
This month we won a historic electoral victory. But our work didn't end on election day - it only started.
As President-elect Obama said on election night:
"This victory alone is not the change we seek. It is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were."
The time to make real, lasting change is upon us.
Now we must repair the damage inflicted by eight years of Republican misrule, and put our country back on track. As progressives, we must fight to ensure that the Democrats in control of our government respect the voters and enact policies that put the American people first.
This is a critical time for our country. We can't sit back and let the Republicans in Washington push the Democrats to the right. We'd like to as everyone to take a moment to check out our Progressive Priorities 2009 petition, and share it with your friends. Your signing the petition will let our leadership know that we want progressive change, not a Republican-lite government.
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