The ever brilliant Harold Meyerson continues the good fight over at the American Prospect with an article that really hits the divide among Democrats right on the nose. I highly recommend that everyone on BMG read it. It helps us understand what the stakes are, and how we can move forward as a party that remains true to its progressive values.
Some important truths:
Economic populism used to unite the party over foreign and social policy divisions, now economics divides the party while there is a strong consensus on social liberalism and security.
At the same time, the shift of older white voters, particularly in the South and rural America, from the Democratic column to the Republican has effectively eliminated social conservatives from the party’s membership.
The economic divide:
Democrats agree on what could be termed a basic economic program: raising taxes on the rich, increasing the minimum wage, investing more in infrastructure and education, extending health coverage through the Affordable Care Act. But at the state and, even more, the municipal level, they have substantial differences over the role of unions, the future of public education, and the privatization of services. The differences between Cory Booker and Bill de Blasio illustrate just how wide these gaps have grown.
about poverty, the Democratic Party will have no soul. Until we can honest regard the damage being done by 21st century capitalism, we can’t have that conversation. Poverty is the result of our current economic system.
DeBlasio is a step in the right direction. Elizabeth Warren, Sherrod Brown, Jeff Merkley are all staking out the positions we need to connect and fill in. I have doubts about my generation, the people 40-60 or so. Like Obama, we grew up in Age of Clinton and were poisoned by neo-liberalism. Market-based reforms for public programs is not going to make the world a better place.
Most of us grew up “on the left” anyway when it come to social issues and cultural issues. Now I think, with the economy as poor to us as it has been, and the old adage ‘go to college and you are ensured a good job’ torn to shreds by the economy, I think we have been burned enough and are cynical enough to get angry enough to do something about it. With the exception of the few friends in banking or in Silicon Valley, most of my friends are getting more and more comfortable calling themselves leftists, not just progressive or liberal, and wanting a more equitable economy. I think a change is in the air. I also think the failures of Obama have taught us all a valuable lesson on not relying on one man or one party to make this change.
The article highlighted by this diary even pointed out that Booker had taken on income inequality and there are in fact rich people who do the right thing. I agree that we need to discuss it and there are people who have been elected lately who make me hopeful that we will. However, I disagree strongly that we were “poisoned” by Clinton. We seem to too often forget when we blame people for not being perfect the context of the times. If we had consistently run Democrats of the stripe some would like throughout we would find ourselves on the losing end of a lot more elections.
For willing to force the GOP to stand up for strictly conservative principles, these are folks who are committed to a cause and are playing the long game not just for the next election. Clinton was the best Democrat we could elect in the Age of Reagan. What should have been an Age of Obama continues to be an Age of Reagan, and we can’t keep post poning our collective hopes for really transforming this country for the sake of winning elections. The Democratic Party is good at winning elections and may have a demographic lock for awhile-but it’s leaders keep playing policy like its the 1980s and 90s. The people are demanding income equality and full employment an their leaders are still droning on about deficit reduction. We should have the courage to lose an election to win a long term victory for liberalism.
…by significant margins. When the 2008 financial collapse put income inequality in stark relief we already had our nominee and of course we renominated him without opposition in 2012. I agree we need more who are willing to buck the austerity and deficit reduction orthodoxy.
his times. As are we. (You’re right, poison is the wrong word). His people, however, continue on. And these are not those times. Their actions directly resulted in the financial debacle of 2008. And how many of those folks have taken responsibility for their actions? I voted for Clinton and even supported him in the primary. I agree he was the Democratic response to conservatism, but there is such a thing as changing your mind.
The biggest concern among Lefties is that Hillary will continue the same neo-liberal policies that began with her husband’s administration. Right now, I plan to support her. She light years ahead of Obama when it comes to political acumen, but if she’s only going to slow the pace of going in the wrong direction, I’ll strongly consider the alternatives.
I agree that the hangers-on of the Clinton era may not be the best people for the new era, though even then I can’t completely shake the notion that they helped Clinton lead us through the longest sustained economic growth so must have been doing something right. We can and should push for cabinet appointees and congressional candidates to our liking as well so even if she wants to triangulate that triangle’s left leg will be stronger than her husband found.
was largely fueled by the tech bubble of the 1990s. A lot has been said about Clinton’s deficit reduction, which during a bubble, was probably a decent idea, but President’s typically have a hard time doing anything to affect the economy.
Here’s the NASDAQ composite from the time:
I do remember the tech bubble, but honestly it’s hard to distinguish the implication that the economy worked on its own from a typical GOP talking point from the time.
I think I something different from you in this interesting graphic.
I see a stock market not only growing, but growing at an increasing rate from 1994 to 2000. I see a precipitous plunge, followed (beginning in 2003) by a more gradual increase.
I was part of the “tech bubble” of the 1990s. In my view, it was a lagging, rather than leading, indicator. I attribute that 2000 plunge to the realization that the Clinton era was, in fact, ending. I attribute the precipitous collapse in mid-2000 to the realization that Al Gore would be the Democratic nominee, and that the Al Gore campaign was not resonating with the electorate. In my view, it reflects the market’s awareness (starting in late 2000) that the incoming president was utterly incompetent.
I see, in the graphic, the market making an adjustment to the economic policies of the Bush/Cheney administration. In my narrative, the “tech bubble” is just one of the ways that adjustment showed itself.
In the 1990’s Republican efforts to de-regulate were largely successful, mostly because of spineless Democrats in the Senate and a triangulating POTUS. Officially, they were able to de-regulate banking, accounting services, telecommunications and energy. Un-offiicially, or perhaps better to say ‘sub-rosa’ ,they were able (with the enthusiastic support of Clintons treasury secretary and economic advistors) to prevent adequate regulation of things like financial derivatives.
The de-regulation of the telecommunications sector led directly to the (then) largest bankruptcy in history, Worldcom. The de-regulation of the energy sector led directly to rolling blackouts in Californian (remember those?) and to the debacle that was Enron. Entwined in all of this was the accounting scandals of the late ’90’s that broke in 2000-2001
But here’s the rub: Bernie Ebbers (and others) went to jail for WorldCom. Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling (and others) went to jail for Enron. The ‘big five’ accounting firms were charged and had to make accounting and, in some cases, restitution. As a result they were decimated and hardly exist now. Even then, the biggest case at the time was the MicroSoft anti-trust. There was even talk of breaking up the company. All this is proof that, whatever you think of Clintons economic advisors, his justice department was on the case.
So I think that, yes, Bush was incompetent and people knew it and this had some bearing on market awareness. I think equally important was the (ultimately limited) amount of chastisement felt over ‘irrational exuberance’ and the cops (Justice Dept) cracking down… and the knowledge that such an era was over. One of the first things Dubya did in office was to direct John Ashcroft to drop the MicroSoft case. That, more than anything, IMO, set the stage for the housing bubble and the ultimate near-complete meltdown of the economy: it was a clear signal that there was a no sheriff in town.
That pretty much says it all — this describes the GOP administrations since my childhood, and especially so during the George W. Bush administration.
Richard Nixon was the Sheriff of Nottingham. Gerald Ford made sure the bad guys got away. Ronald Reagan was more clown than “sheriff”, George H. Bush saw nothing and did nothing.
This from the party alleged to be “conservative”.
The GOP is the “tough on crime” party.
Let’s not pretend this is just the GOP. The Obama administration has failed to prosecute the people responsible for the financial collapse, maintained immunity for telecoms that help with illegal wiretaps, and despite the “too big too fail” headlines there still haven’t been any anti-trust cases since Microsoft. There is no rule of law under the current Justice Department — just selective enforcement for, say, accessing a website.
I make no excuses for the ways that the Obama administration has betrayed progressives like me who supported him.
I think we see the enormous impact of the 1 percent’s ownership of ALL the mainstream media. The lies and distortions of the GOP are ignored or mis-reported, those lies become “truths”, and the plundering of the 1% continues.
I can’t imagine George McGovern, Eugene McCarthy, Richard Drynan, or a host of other Democrats tolerating the abuses that you mention. LBJ was drummed out of the presidency as a result of less egregious (though still awful) abuses.
The “new Democrats”, like Barack Obama and — I fear — Hillary Clinton, are as beholden to the top 1% as any Republican.
It is time the Democratic Party moved past them, just as we moved past the racist southern Democrats in 1968. If we lose an election or two, so be it.
But his conclusion about a lack of popular movement to bolster the Dem economic left whistles past some of what’s already taken place — and begs the question of how a popular movement like that can survive if the Dem establishment would just as soon suppress it.
He mentions fast-food workers fighting for higher wages, but conspicuously absent is any mention of the largest economic protest of the last 5 years: Occupy Wall Street. How much good will a popular movement be if Dem mayors, helped by a Dem Dept. of Homeland Security, crack down on it, while all too many Dem pundits and insiders criticize it?
I suspect Occupy’s main draw and simultaneously its greatest flaw was its insistence on no hierarchy and no management if the protest. That insistence led to a directionless protest that ultimately fizzled out and employed a ton of varying coil disobedience strategies that were akin to throwing darts randomly to see if they hit a target.
Foreclosure defenses, the Moral Monday protests in North Carolina which brought a diverse faith community with a growing populist left to protest specific budgetary cuts, and protests and sit ins directed at specific banks were effective. I think expanding the movement along those lines while running primary candidates against DINOs would do a lot to make the movement better known and conducive to small and bid D democratic change.
is that a popular movement, by its nature, will have a diverse makeup that won’t always comfortably align with the Democratic Party’s partisan needs.
For one thing, a lot of the public is outside the party loop; they want economic justice but they’re not interested in PCCC-style primary work. And some opportunities for protest will rock the Dem boat more than others. Moral Mondays are a reaction to right-wing Republicans, so they’re a plum opportunity for Dems to join the movement by running against the GOP. But inevitably there will be protests like OWS that exist for their own sake (rather than targeted outcomes) and indict both GOP and Dem leaders like Obama and Thomas “Civil disobedience doesn’t work for Boston” Menino.
Maybe Menino should join check his city’s history, ironically home to the original and real “tea partiers”! Samuel Adams would tell him that civil disobedience worked just fine for Boston thank you very much:)