Great National Journal* article outlining what’s at stake ‘down under’ in Rhode Island during their next gubernatorial contest.
In one corner is former venture capitalist and hedge fund manager Gina Raimondo, who as State Treasurer has pursued Cuomo and Walker style ‘reforms’ of public pensions, pro-business policies, and has even won high praise from the Wall Street Journal. In the other corner is Providence Mayor Angel Taveras, who has also been a budget leader pulling the city of Providence out of bankruptcy but has done so by working in good faith with labor and building a blue collar/minority alliance.
The looming Democratic primary battle between the state’s two most popular politicians could also represent one of the earliest internal struggles between different factions of the new Democratic coalition that carried Obama to victory in 2008 and 2012. Raimondo is positioned to do well with the upscale wing of the party, because of her fiscal reforms. Taveras’s base is the working-class wing of the party and Hispanics, both groups protective of government programs at risk under budget cuts. Both officials had to deal with the deep-seated budget problems that have hit Rhode Island hard: Raimondo has challenged the unions head-on, while Taveras has sought accommodation with their demands. “These really incredible forces that could make the Democrats a permanent majority at the national level could also start cannibalizing the Democratic party,” said Wendy Schiller, a political science professor at Brown University.
Will Raimondo’s affluent and suburban New Democrat/Rockefeller Republican coalition or Taveras’ blue collar/minority base win out? And how might this portend future fissures in the Democratic party? Stay tuned.
*This was published before Lincoln Chaffee announced his party switch, for analysis on his chances look to this article
I’m glad our party is big tent enough to accomodate them. I hope and assume that whoever does win the primary endorses the other in the general.
If the Democratic Party, as a whole, goes any further in the Raimondo direction, I will leave it.
Having watched Raimondo and her ilk do their best to dismantle public ed and drive unions from the party, I can’t really take that attitude.
A “big tent” party without any guiding principles is useless. “Our party” is not a cause unto itself.
…I have feet in both camps in terms of my own opinions and I think it’s a coalition that has served us well. The emphasis I place on each side depends on particular circumstances. I don’t know enough of this particular race to comment specifically though based on this info I would be inclined to Taveras, but I’m fairly certain I would take Raimundo over any GOP nominee.
There was a reason my grandfather voted against Frank Sargent, Ed Brooks, and Eisenhower and it’s because he knew in the fiber of his being that the Democratic party was always with the working man and the Republicans, even Rockefeller ones, weren’t quite there. We can’t say that today, and instead of going after working class voters who should be our natural base we are hoping to ride the coattails of cultural resentment towards social conservatism (a generational reversal of the Southern Strategy and targeting Reagan Democrats). Our coalition was, can, and should again be defined by a unifying principle of economic fairness. Anything less is undemocratic.
You are saying not to vote for a Republican which is ultimately the conclusion I draw as well. I’m not advocating resentment politics; I just think having a business outlook or being rich aren’t automatic disqualifiers.
There are no longer any Rockefeller Republicans left. The defeat of Shays, retirement of Snowe, and defections of Chaffee and Specter to the Democrats sealed the deal. The “New Democrat” wing are essentially Rockefeller Republicans. A socially liberal party of business. The more our party resembles that party the less it resembles the one my grandfather, raised as a Republican I might add, joined when he voted for Truman in 48′.
is not a disqualifier. FDR, the Kennedys, John Kerry, Frank Lautenberg, Steve Grossman. All quite well off, all fine on policy.
Having a “business outlook” is, in my opinion, disqualifying in today’s world when it leads to the economic policies promoted by this new, technocratic brand of Democrat with Ivy League pedigree and Bain Capital-esque background. The business world of today is not the business world of 1970. Danny DeVito and Gordon Gekko won, Jason Robards and organized labor lost. I’m not on board with any Democrat who wants to dismantle public education. We can’t have, as jconway puts it, only a choice between Rockefeller Republicans masquerading as Democrats and Tea Party Republicans.
Far fewer class traitors today. The ones that get rich and run are nearly all socially liberal corporate centrist types-a la Bloomberg. Deval Patrick is the rare exception, and its hard to forget where you came from when you came from the Robert Taylor Homes.
such socially liberal corporate centrist types. Mostly good people, but like you I’m troubled by the lack of an economic vision in the Democratic Party. It’s a major reason I was so excited about Elizabeth Warren and remain so. We need that desperately.
But, as I said in November, her victory had as much to do with antipathy to GOP social positions as it did with closing the deal on her economic views.
Not every business is a big evil greedy multinational corporation or paragon of Wall Street. I would argue that Steve Grossman who is I believe the third generation of his family to run his family’s business has a “business outlook” of sorts. He is progressive and my choice to be our next Governor. Any number of people who own their own business, self-employed, etc. have business outlooks. Paul Tsongas once pointed out that you can’t be both projobs and antibusiness and I agree. To be clear not being antibusiness does not mean bending over and giving them everything they want.
Nobody is assailing Steve Grossman, I’ve defended him alongside you elsewhere and I believe Fenway is a fan. Let’s be clear. Grossman always ran a closed shop,always had cordial relations with labor, and has not mouthed right wing talking points about pensions, entitlements,or public sector unions. Raimondo, who I’d vote as the lesser of two evils against another Carcieri who opposed marriage equality. But she has used Walker talking points pitting poor and middle class social safety nets against middle class public employees. The solution is to soak the rich,close loopholes and shelters, and get them to contribute to this society. The solution is to sit down with labor, and if concessions have to be made, have them made in good faith. Tavaras did this and balanced a fiscal mess in Providence, winning some concessions from the unions without demonizing them in public or threatening their rights to collectively bargain.That’s real leadership and not the Sister Souljah camera mugging we have had to suck up for far too long.
I was simply using him as an example of a progressive with a business perspective.
This is why this primary and others are crucial. For every Baldwin and Warren we gain we lose a Harkin and Lautenberg. The culture war is over and social conservatism lost. Considering the difficulty we have had getting marriage equality in Illinois, the war on choice and science at the state level, this is hard to believe now. But social conservatives are dying off and few young people are rushing to take their place, in 15-20 years when the boomer cohort starts falling off the voting rolls we will have a socially liberal, ethnically diverse progressive supermajority that could finally get the economic justice and equality to complete FDRs pillars of freedom/second bill of rights.
My fear is, if both parties are socially liberal business friendly, empowered by loose financial and campaign regulation aided and abetted by Democratic indifference-once the culture war is won-the business class will go back I it’s natural home and the Democrats could be the permanent loser if they take their money with them. We have to take action now to have a progressive counter insurgency, even if we are ostensibly in power currently, to Kay the foundation for a post-culture war political landscape where we make and win our victories on economic grounds. We ignore income inequality and the death of the labor movement at our own long term peril.