With health care reform on the ropes, the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA)-labor's number one legislative priority-on life support, a stimulus package yet to reach Main Street, no clear plan to close Gitmo, two wars going badly (July was deadliest month yet for U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan), President Obama's agenda has hit a snag, and his poll numbers are dropping. Among the president's supporters, anxiety is quickly setting in.
Last November, at one of the most perilous moments in American history, Americans gave Barack Obama and the Democrats a mandate to change the direction of the country. They wanted to turn a page from eight years of failure on almost every front.
Majorities favored a strong government hand in healthcare, more investment in infrastructure, aggressive action to combat global warming, tough measures to rein in corporate corruption, stronger enforcement of food and drug laws, protection of workers rights, an end to wars of aggression, better race relations and a humane immigration policy.
It was an opportunity for Obama and the Democrats to deliver bold and far-reaching policy changes. Yet the Democrats continue to cede political space to Republicans, even as the GOP teeters on the brink of self-destruction.
All things considered, this Republican disarray means the policy debate in Washington is for the Democrats to lose. But in order to win, Democrats must acknowledge the root of the problem. For more than 30 years they have failed to defend the state in the face of conservative attacks. This failure has facilitated a dangerous expansion of corporate power and weakened public confidence in government. Because the major issues facing the nation-health care, energy and climate change, education funding, rising poverty and homelessness-require state intervention, loss of confidence in government undermines progressive reform.
Resurrecting government will be necessary both as a foundation for restoring sound public policy and as a bulwark against runaway corporate power. It will involve many strategies, including putting to rest the myth of the private sector as inherently more efficient and effective than the public sector. Barack Obama should use the national podium to remind people that it is the private sector which brought us the collapse of financial markets, home mortgage lending crisis, excessive CEO compensation, and the disastrous health care situation the country finds itself in. Government is the one trying to fix the mess.
For starters, Democrats should respond to the GOP's anti-government message with simple, but passionate references to day-to-day examples of positive governmental activity-local police and fire protection, Medicare, Social Security, the Veterans Administration, Air Traffic Control, NASA, the Postal Service (750 million pieces of mail per day, and you get your mail in two days!-where else is there such efficiency?), the Interstate Highway System, Head Start, federal student aid programs, National Endowment for the Arts, the Food and Drug Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and funding of research that has produced ground-breaking scientific and health discoveries.
Second, Obama should understand that bi-partisanship is a means, not an end in itself. The president reduced the size of his stimulus package and added unneeded tax cuts hoping to get Republican support, but got zero votes in the House and just three in the Senate. He picked a moderate nominee for the Supreme Court, but GOP senators nitpicked and opposed her anyway, even though the court is dominated by hard-right ideologues Scalia, Thomas, Roberts and Alito. The cost-benefit analysis simply does not add up for the president. If the GOP will oppose him anyway, it makes no sense for Obama to offer compromised proposals. Democrats should pursue bold and visionary ideas-like single-payer national health care-and nominate strong progressives to the Supreme Court and the Federal Judiciary. That would give the country a real debate about real choices.
Third, Democrats must learn that politics is as much about ideas as opportunity. When swine flu hit, party leaders never tried to connect it to health care reform. Rather than explain the potential dangers of millions of workers who prepare food in cafeterias, serve in restaurants, work as nannies and care for seniors going without health coverage, the president only urged people to wash hands frequently and cover their coughs. By contrast Republicans, upon learning of the flu's alleged link to Mexico, began pushing their nefarious anti-immigrant agenda. The country could have been better served had Democrats used this event to promote the public good.
Fourth, Blue Dog Democrats must be reined in. They rode the wave of a progressive-leaning Democratic agenda and must not be allowed to frustrate progress. The president should go straight into Blue Dogs' districts and call them out, loud and clear. Their opposition to health care reform, he should point out, is not grounded in some high-minded ideological principle, as they claim, but a straight up quid pro quo. They have been paid by the health and insurance industries to fight against "government health care."
Furthermore-and this is important-Barack Obama needs to appreciate the sophistication of his African American base and take them more seriously. Instead of the single-minded and tired lectures about personal responsibility, the president should seize this critical moment to mobilize black people around his policy initiatives. For example, with his health care initiative floundering, the president could have used his July 16 NAACP speech to mobilize this middle-class audience to push congress to pass health care reform. Instead, he lectured them about responsible fatherhood. It would be refreshing if the president engaged black folk in a more elevated discourse. After all, don't African Americans also care about global climate change, foreign policy, labor rights and health care reform?
Lastly, labor and progressive movements must mobilize. Immigrant rights groups must mobilize, Environmental groups must mobilize. LGBTQ communities must mobilize. African Americans must mobilize. Indeed, the issues of health care, workers rights and global climate change need to be brought into the broader civil rights discourse. This could be what that movement needs to revitalize itself. In the end, as history tells us, there is no substitute for movement-building to address major crises. All these movements must galvanize and force Democrats to deliver what the public voted for. To that end, how about a one-million strong march on Washington to demand jobs and health care?
