The reason Democrats might lose is they aren’t partisan enough

Recent polls show that a majority of voters admire candidates which don’t compromise on issues. When we look at the recent political history of compromise within the Democratic Party, we may discern a major source of voter discontent with Democratic candidates in the upcoming November elections. Recently, US House and Senate Democrats failed to call up for a vote the expiration of Bush era tax breaks for the wealthiest of Americans. According to a recent CNN poll, 69% of Americans support having the Bush era tax breaks for the ultra-rich expiring on January 1, 2011. Republicans adopted an “all or nothing” approach which clearly favored the wealthiest Americans and which Republican approach would have taken away Middle Class Tax Cuts from the Democrats’ Stimulus Plan and given them to the ultra-rich to the tune of $731 billion. The increase in the total national debt of $13.64 trillion from the Republican plan from continuing these tax cuts alone would be 5.4%. The White House also has adopted a “compromise with ‘yourself’” approach in an attempt to garner Republican support for issues even though the GOP has not supported anything put forth by the Democrats during the Obama Presidency. Witness the pre-legislative demise of the “public option” in health care which is still favored by a majority of Americans. Many Democratic candidates are running away from their votes for healthcare reform when according to a recent Pew Center study a majority of voters and large majorities of Democratic and Independent voters support those who voted for healthcare reform. So, while many believe that the “partisanship” of politics is destructive, it is clear that holding the line on your policies is more favorably viewed by voters than any type of compromise. Democrats are likely to learn a very costly lesson in the value of “NO!” come November, 2010. But, the lesson will mostly inform any future minority in the US House or Senate that obstruction and obfuscation are more valuable than compromise, even when a majority of voters support the other side of an issue.

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On A Christian Nation

Polls recently indicate that more and more Americans link being an American with being a Christian. Yet the consensus on what this actually means is as nonexistent as ever. We hear a lot about how this country was founded on "Christian principles" and that the Founders wanted this to be a "Christian nation." Yet with a few exceptions, most folks would likely chafe horribly should be actually try to return to anything close what that meant in 1787. The question of what the Founders intended is an interesting one, since even cursory research produces conflicting statements on both sides. Many of the most prominent clearly felt that what they had wrought in the Constitution was a device for keeping religion from distorting government. They intended, it seems, that people as individuals should decide for themselves, within a private sphere, how to believe and subsequently how to worship. The government, they claimed, should not be permitted to interfere with that. The question, of course, is whether they intended this to be the case in the other direction. In a way, it's a ridiculous question. How do you prevent an individual's religious ideas from informing his or her political actions? You don't. However the individual believes, that is what will be taken to the polls. All such questions may be similarly addressed---what goes on within your skull is yours and the government cannot interfere with it. But public displays, judicial acts, and legislation ought to be free of overt religious sentiment. Passing laws should be based on common welfare---if an exhortation to god is necessary to make a law seem "right" then that law is not Constitutional. It has to make secular sense. But the issue is muddy, because the same Framers often talked about christian principles and the common bonds of christian community, at least in private, and often in speeches. Is this a contradiction? I believe not. The problem is, the idea as currently framed and debated is simply out of context, not broad enough. What did it mean to be part of a christian community in 1787? That everyone went to church, prayed the same way, believed in the same god or description of god? At that time, I suspect, "christian community" was a label for a total package of cultural markers. One didn't have to believe overtly in any specific christian doctrine in order to accept social ideas about what made a community. Being a christian was a political, social, and economic condition as much if not more than a religious conviction. While you might not pray in that church down the street, you would defend it and move easily in the externalized community around it. What would this have meant in practice? [More . . . ]

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On reclaiming the United States

Last week, I had the opportunity to attend a fund-raising Gala for Missouri GRO (Grass Roots Organizing). GRO is an impressive progressive organization. It was founded by a small handful of rural activists, mostly women who, according to a history of the organization written by Tony Pecinovsky, "wanted more accountability from politicians and big businesses alike." Most of its members are people who live in rural Missouri, "people who live in small towns not necessarily known for their progressive politics." GRO is part of a nationwide network of progressive organizations, National People's Action, that has coordinated local activist organizations pushing hard for health care reform, Wall Street financial reform and other important issues. GRO is anything but shy. Consider this account (from the literature handed out at the gala event last week):

GRO carried out a winter-long anti-payday lending campaign that backed QC Holdings [Owner of the company that runs one of the biggest payday lending chains in the country] into a corner of public scrutiny and legislative pressure. On April Fools' Day we learned the Missouri legislature gave the payday loan industry a solo "hearing," led by theVice Chair of the Financial Institutions Committee, who owns a payday loan store inCabool, Missouri. The industry went totally unchallenged. They took over our public domain. So we decided to take over QC Holding's private domain in corporate words, Overland Park, Kansas. . . . We mobilized all150+ of our people up 15 floors on elevators to take over the corporate penthouse suite of the Missouri's largest payday lending operation.

In short, GRO has made a lot of noise where corporate power is runing amok. Because of this moxie, GRO has earned the respect of many in Missouri and outside of Missouri. At its fund-raising gala last week, GRO filled a large downtown St. Louis hotel ballroom with supporters who gathered to hear the keynote speech delivered by John Nichols, Washington Correspondent of The Nation Magazine. Nichols is also co-founder (with Robert McChesney) of Free Press, one of the country's leading media reform organizations. Prior to speech, John Nichols gave me permission to videotape his speech so that I could make it available here at Dangerous Intersection. In Part I of his speech, Nichols makes the argument that we do not really have a debt crisis. He passionately explains what kind of crisis we actually do have. In Part II of his speech, Nichols takes a hard critical look at the United States Supreme Court decision, Citizens United v. FEC. Nichols reminded the audience that the first American tea party was an anti-corporate tea party. Toward the end of Part II, Nichols argues that in order to take our country back, we will need an anti-corporate revolution-- we will need to go around the "corrupted" United States Supreme Court by organizing at the grass roots and enacting a Constitutional amendment declaring that "No corporation is the equal of a citizen" and "Citizens are supreme."

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Stop the political hate radio insanity!

Ok, I’ve had it! I can't stand it anymore! The foulmouthed fruitcakes have truly taken over the airwaves and it’s time for sanity’s sake to put a stop to it, one step at a time. STEP 1: Every time one of the loonies says something obscene, profane, or indecent on the public airwaves report it to the FCC! I entered “FCC complaint” in the search portion of my internet page and got the FCC home page. I also found helpful the folks at the Parents Television Council (PTC) for how to make a FCC complaint of obscenity. Let’s take our fruitcake buddy Rush Limbaugh for example. Rush hasn’t met an insane hate filled statement he is unafraid to make about the Democratic Party, President Obama or anything democratic. On March 22, 2010, at or about 1 p.m. after the historic passage of healthcare reform, Rush said on his radio program and on the television feed of his program that; “We need to defeat these bastards…we need to wipe them out!” I know, some might say that “bastards” isn’t profanity or obscene or indecent. I sought out an arbiter of taste. I wanted to be supported in my efforts to ban these…people. I went to the PTC website. Yes, I have been there in the past to look up what they say about some kids’ movies and shows, so there! Sure enough, “bastards” is a PTC no-no. Stop the Insanity! [More . . . ]

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