Democrats Start Speaking My Language

As we pull into the home stretch of the midterm campaigns, it's refreshing to hear the Democrats finally gaining their voice. Because let's be honest, their previous argument ("Things are bad, but they would have been much worse under Republicans."), though true, was pretty lame. That was never going to energize the base, bring the winning 2008 coalition back together, and drive voters to the polls.

Enter the new strategy: Cast the Republicans as puppets of megacorporations. What makes this an easy sell to voters is that everyone basically already knows it. We just don't talk about it much in campaigns.

For most of last week the message coming from Obama and national Democrats was about the huge amounts of corporate money being funneled into Republican attack ads and races. To sharpen it a little more, they pointed out that a lot of the campaign money being spent by the Chamber of Commerce, the premier lobbying group for big business, is coming directly from foreign corporations. Bangalore, Hyderabad, Frankfurt, Zurich. In a political system where corporate money knows no borders (but of course people still do), these are now centers of Republican power. The Chamber's response to all of this being exposed (essentially a shrug of the shoulders) makes it clear they think the bad PR is a small price to pay. It's well worth it if it means bringing even more money to bear upon smashing the progressive movement in America.

There's little the American people can do other than expose what's happening, make a lot of noise about it, and organize against it. And that's what Democrats from the president on down and progressives have been doing. I was happy to see MoveOn.org last week throw their weight behind this. (Check out their satirical RepubliCorp, the result of the complete merger of the Republican Party and Multinational Corporations.) It's true there's little else we can do other than agitate, educate, and organize against the corporate tidal wave sweeping these elections, but that's all we'd need to do, if we did it right.

I'm glad to see Democrats following this line of attack. Make this election--and every election--a choice between Republicans, transnational corporations, and the rich vs. Democrats, workers, and the middle class. (Virtually all of the contradictions to that dichotomy would be cases where Democratic elites join Republican elites and big money against the peoples' interests. So for now, yes, the Democratic party is too "conservative" to make this "choice" 100% accurate. Still, it's pretty good.) The problem is, you can't simply pull this out every October of an even-numbered year to fire up your base for get-out-the-vote efforts. Democrats shouldn't just campaign like this; they should govern like this. This should be the basic organizing principle and the foundation of the Democratic coalition. One party offers more power for the powerful, excuses for why corporations should run roughshod over the Earth, and the other party offers a real chance at democracy, peace, and a sustainable future. This should not be merely campaign rhetoric. It should be part of our national subconscious.

That's all for now. I plan to write a couple more posts on the upcoming midterms, so stay tuned.

One Nation Fed Up With Corporate Power

I spent Saturday down on the National Mall at the One Nation Working Together rally. It was a beautiful Fall day, and it was refreshing to see a whole host of progressive organizations marching together for jobs, justice, and education. I spent most of my time walking around observing the crowd, reading signs, and carrying my own sign.

Two Observations

1. I am always pleasantly surprised at how progressive marches, rallies, and protests have the feeling of celebrations. Every big march I've been to has felt like a street festival. There are virtually always drums and dancing. This was the case even back in March when we were protesting at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, where the health insurance industry's biggest lobbyist group was meeting to plot strategy to block reform. Activism and joy mixed together. What does this say about the Left? Of course I have not been to many right-wing rallies, but I don't think they have this kind of thing going on. Is there dancing in the Tea Party, at an anti-immigrant rally, or a gun rights rally? I don't think I've ever seen this difference between Left and Right discussed.

2. The crowd at the One Nation rally was as ethnically diverse as America itself. Latino, Asian-American, White, African-American, Buddhist, secular, Christian, Muslim, and Jewish. Not just individuals, but organizations were there representing each of these groups. This is what you get when your movement is based on the common good instead of on the wishes of only the most powerful ethnic group or of only the wealthy. It stands in stark contrast to the snow white Glenn Beck rally back in August and the right wing in general.

Proposing A Theme For The Progressive Movement

Here's me holding my homemade sign the day of the rally. (Face hidden so I won't be fired from my job.)

"Democracy vs. Corporations: Which side are YOU on?"

I chose this sign because I believe all the various progressive constituencies (labor, environmental groups, peace groups, civil rights organizations, etc.) need a unifying theme. Well, how about this? On virtually every pressing social issue we face, corporate power stands in the way of progress.

Big corporations keep wages low and working conditions poor.

Big corporations fund fake science to create public doubt about climate change.

Big corporations lobby for ever-increasing defense budgets and new imperial adventures.

Big corporations stoke racist feeling to keep the public divided and powerless.

In short, big corporations thwart true democracy by empowering the few over the many. Therefore, all progressive individuals and organizations should act as one anti-corporate power, pro-democracy force. That should be the underlying struggle that unites all of the Left's various causes.

More Cell Phone Pictures I Took

From the World War II memorial looking west toward the Lincoln Memorial:

On the south side of the reflecting pool. We were near groups from the NAACP and the UAW.

If Billionaires Really Want To End Poverty

I recently came across GivingPledge.org. It's an effort by Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett to have the wealthiest Americans commit to giving more than half of their wealth to charity. There are currently about 40 billionaires who have made the pledge by posting an open letter on the website. I've been pleasantly surprised by some of the letters. Oklahoma billionaire George Kaiser's letter stands out:

"I suppose I arrived at my charitable commitment largely through guilt. I recognized early on, that my good fortune was not due to superior personal character or initiative so much as it was to dumb luck. I was blessed to be born in an advanced society with caring parents. So, I had the advantage of both genetics (winning the "ovarian lottery") and upbringing. As I looked around at those who did not have these advantages, it became clear to me that I had a moral obligation to direct my resources to help right that balance..."

"As I addressed my charitable purposes, all of this seemed pretty clear: I was only peripherally responsible for my own good fortune; I was morally duty bound to help those left behind by the accident of birth; America's root principle was equal opportunity but we were far from achieving it..."

"I am entranced by Warren's and Bill's visionary appeal to those who have accumulated unconscionable resources, to dedicate at least half of them back to purposes more useful than dynastic perpetuation."

This is not exactly the "by my bootstraps" mantra that you hear from a lot of the American Right. In fact, I think I know conservatives who would cringe at reading this letter. It's strange how people who view themselves as upper middle class or perhaps soon-to-be rich are often more interested in justifying extreme inequality (blaming the poor for being poor) than are the super rich.

Kaiser's letter and others discuss focusing their philanthropy on the causes of poverty and not just the symptoms. What they mean is breaking the cycle of poverty for families and providing equal opportunity for those dealt a losing hand at birth. That really is good work. And its obvious from their letters that many of these billionaires are good people with good hearts. But aren't these "causes" of poverty actually symptoms of a deeper sickness?

The sickness I'm thinking of is the very social and economic system that makes billionaires possible. You cannot have a tiny billionaire class without a big, poor working class. There can be no "unconscionable wealth" without unconscionable poverty somewhere else.

What I would like to see from The Giving Pledge is a promise from America's billionaires to fund efforts for systemic change in a progressive and democratic direction: a more progressive tax system, a national living wage law, a maximum wage law for CEOs, an Economic Bill of Rights for all Americans, greater taxes on inherited wealth, public financing of elections, an end to "corporate personhood," enforcement of workers' rights to organize, a constitutional amendment for full employment. These are just a few ideas to start with, and they could supplement, not replace, the philanthropic causes and charities already supported in The Pledge. Think of them as gifts that keep on giving. The point is, we could end poverty in America. We know how to do it. We could build a country where no one is poor, but it would probably mean that no one is a billionaire either.

Pardon Our Progress! Blog Renovations Under Way.

You may notice a slightly new look around here. I've gone with a wider template and added an extra column. This means less scrolling for everyone. I'm still figuring out what to do with all the new space and considering other upgrades, so bear with me. (If you'd like, you can bare with me too.)

The Fall And Rise Of The American Labor Movement

At the beginning of the 21st century, labor unions in America may be weaker, politically and socially, than at any time since World War II. It's certainly the case that union membership has declined sharply since it's peak in the 1950s.

It's no coincidence that the same period has also brought:

• A steady decline in tax rates for the richest Americans, from it's high at 92% in the 1950s to where it is today at just 35%.
• A steady increase in the share of total national income going to the richest 1% of Americans.
• A stagnation in workers' real wages, despite rising worker productivity.
• A sharply growing imbalance in the ratio of CEO pay to worker pay.

The decline of union power has meant the rise of corporation owner and management power. The privileged few who sit atop our economic structure are now better off compared to the rest of society than at any time in at least the last 80 years, maybe longer. By some measures, you would have to go back to the 1920s to find comparable economic inequality; by other measures, you'd have to go back to the Gilded Age of the late 19th century. Unions built the middle class, and the decline of unions means the decline of the middle class.

Two sweeping changes have tipped the scales against working people, in other words against the great majority of society. First, there's the change in the kinds of jobs available in America. The shift from a manufacturing economy to a service economy has deservedly received a lot of attention. That shift has often meant trading high-wage union jobs with benefits for low-wage non-union service sector jobs. The labor movement, for its part, is doing its best to mirror this change and organize the industries of the new economy. But the evolution from a manufacturing economy to a service economy is not just about trading one industry for another.

Consider the kind of job your father or your grandfather had. There are pretty good chances he worked a single job for many years, perhaps his whole career. He may have worked with the same group of people the whole time. I'm thinking of my father-in-law, who started working for a telephone company when he was 18, climbing telephone poles. He stuck with it, became a job steward with the union, and today he's close to retirement with a job that he loves and that has provided a comfortable middle class life for his family.

Now compare that to the job situation of young people you know today. Odds are they change jobs pretty frequently--maybe every year or two. Sure, there may be some benefits to hopping around. We like to think we can choose jobs like we choose consumer goods. But what does that do to a worker's willingness and ability to work for changes in any particular workplace or industry? There's not going to be much organizing or activism in a workplace when no one is there long enough to really get to know their co-workers.

And maybe that's the point. We're becoming a nation of itinerant workers. Worker power has been dispersed. Management power has been concentrated.

The second big factor tilting the scales in favor of corporate power is the phase of "globalization" in which we currently live. The big capitalists have gone global, but labor is mostly still local. This obviously gives capital tremendous leverage against labor, like a boxer who bobs and weaves and circles the ring fighting one who stands still. A corporation that experiences "labor difficulties" can simply pack up and move to the other side of the planet. So-called "free trade agreements" mean that borders and certain laws do not apply to corporations, but you can bet they still apply to workers.

But here's the chink in the armor of corporate power. Corporations need workers to serve them. The capitalists may have virtually all the wealth, but labor creates all wealth. It is, by definition, a parasitic relationship. If the host cuts off the parasite, then the parasite dies. For now, big business may trot the globe looking for the place where workers are easiest to exploit. They may create an American foreign policy that casts workers' movements in other countries as dire threats to American security, justifying the use of American military power to keep their foreign labor cheap. Industrialist Richard B. Mellon once said, "You can't mine coal without machine guns." Today he might say, "You cannot run multinational corporations without the occasional Western-backed military coup."

But eventually, God willing, corporations will find popular resistance everywhere they go. Eventually the same technologies that enable corporate management to span the globe will also enable workers to unite around the globe in shared struggles. We see glimpses of this now. But if a global democratic movement is going to challenge global tyranny (undemocratic governments and corporations), then international labor solidarity will have to become a more potent force.

Which brings us back to the good ol' USA. American unions will not be able to effectively reach out around the world until they build their own strength right here. We're going to have to organize strong, fighting unions of fast-food workers, big-box store employees, office workers. There was a time in American history when union organizing could break out almost anywhere, even the military. We need to stoke that fire again. We'll have to think globally and act locally in order to act globally and benefit locally. It's a tall order but one that's worthy of the history of the American progressive movement.

Happy Labor Day

I hope you all enjoyed your Labor Day weekend. I had to work, but I managed to squeeze in a Jimmy Buffet concert, so it wasn't all lost.

Tune in tomorrow for what I intended to be my Labor Day post. I'm going to talk about what I see as the future of the labor movement in America and why the movement will matter to you, regardless of whether or not you currently give a damn about unions.

Oh, and since it's not yet midnight, it's still not too late for you to thank a union member for being part of the movement that has kept America from drifting into fascism! After all, the labor movement is the democratic movement.

Same Old Fight, New Stupid Location

Newsflash: The debate about the Park 51 building (the non-mosque not at ground zero) is not really about the building. America does not generally care about municipal zoning issues. Nor does America care about maintaining some sacredness (or secularity) in the blocks around ground zero in Manhattan, as evidenced by the diverse-as-America assortment of establishments in the neighborhood.

Have the protesters even said how far away is far enough? Chris Matthews interviewed a guy from "America's 9/11 Foundation" who wants the center moved but could not or would not say how far. It makes sense that they're mum on that question, because the moment they name a distance, it reveals how ridiculous the whole thing is. Five blocks? A mile? They'd be just makin' stuff up.

So it's not about location. But this whole discussion has become--just because so many people are talking about it--a discussion about what kind of country America will be. "Why are we even talking about this?" was the correct reaction at first. But as the story stayed in the headlines, my thinking slowly changed to, "Ok, so this is where we have to fight for religious freedom and tolerance." Democracy's battlegrounds pop up in strange places sometimes. Obviously the Republican noise machine picked this particular battleground. They think that near ground zero they can throw confetti in our faces to shut us up and invoke the 9/11 dead to cancel our most cherished freedoms. Conservatives picked the battleground, but now progressives have to show up.

This has become a debate about whether or not we as Americans actually believe what we say we believe. Will we be free to practice whatever religion or beliefs we choose? Are we comfortable enough in our institutions to allow a diverse "marketplace of ideas?" Can we disagree with what our fellow citizens say but defend to the death their right to say it?

To all these questions, the Right says, "Hell no!" They say some people are offended. They say Islam is bad. They say America is a "Christian nation." What they're getting at is that they believe might makes right. They believe they can roust up an angry mob and intimidate an unfavored group into submission. Today it's Muslims. Yesterday it was African-Americans or women or gays and lesbians or Latinos. Go back further and it was Irish, Italians, Germans, Slavs. To them, there's always a threat among us, and the threat always is some of us.

I'm not saying every conservative is a racist or bigot, and I'm not saying everyone protesting the Park 51 construction is a racist or bigot. I am saying that racism and bigotry are and always have been extremely important to the Right's political fortunes. (And it's not pure coincidence that this racially-heated issue is huge in right-wing media at the same time Republicans are trying to re-take Congress, repeal health care for all, and extend Bush's tax cuts for the rich.) I'm also saying that if your skin ain't white enough, you probably are not safe walking through the conservative protest crowds near ground zero. Just ask this man, who was physically threatened and chased away for no apparent reason other than being Black and among the crowd.

So if the Right is doing what it's always done, it's good to see the Left at ground zero doing what it's always done too.

This is some sloganeering I can get behind. It's interesting that the first banner is by folks from SocialistWorker.org. It's an under-acknowledged fact of American history that progressive/radical working-class organizations have often been at the forefront of the struggle for racial justice and civil rights. In fact, the left-wing of the labor movement and the civil rights movement have often been synonymous.

This is the same old fight at a new stupid location. If the Right is gonna show up to do its usual thing of dividing working people against themselves (notice in the video above it's a guy in a hardhat getting in the face of the African-American man, who is reportedly a union carpenter working at ground zero), then the Left must show up to do its thing of uniting us against racism, bigotry, and division.