We may have lost an important and symbolic battle but the war is not over.
We lost one seat and not our majority. Although the media and beltway pundits seem to have forgotten that we live in a democracy and that a simple majority rules, we have not. The flagrant abuse of the filibuster by Republicans is an obscene attack on our democratic values. Scott Brown should not be able to turn the tide of health care reform with his one vote. Democrats must push back at every opportunity the idea that a supermajority is necessary in order to govern. Democrats must push back against the Evan Byahs who would have the agenda move even more to the center.
I've been glued to my laptop all night reading the MA election results. I just can't bear to turn on the T.V. My stomach has been churning all night with the fear that Martha would lose and apparently that fear was not unfounded. Some of the comments in the various election threads have been pretty discouraging. I think I even read that someone was getting out of politics for the next three months. But I beg you, please don't go!
What we need is a revolution (peaceful of course). And we need every available foot soldier. Now more than ever we need boots on the ground. Along with online advocacy, petitions, blogs with action items, we need visible in your face "old school" styled activism. At an OFA event last fall, I met a 90-something year old woman who told me how different things are today than in the Great Depression era. She said back then people were in the streets. That type of involvement is not visible today. I truly believe that Obama wants to see that type of action. He said this in his speech on Sunday:
What we need to do is to just ask what lessons we can learn from those earlier generations about how they sustained themselves during those hard winters, how they persevered and prevailed. Let us in this Joshua generation learn how that Moses generation overcame.
Let me offer a few thoughts on this. First and foremost, they did so by remaining firm in their resolve. Despite being threatened by sniper fire or planted bombs, by shoving and punching and spitting and angry stares, they adhered to that sweet spirit of resistance, the principles of nonviolence that had accounted for their success.
Second, they understood that as much as our government and our political parties had betrayed them in the past -- as much as our nation itself had betrayed its own ideals -- government, if aligned with the interests of its people, can be -- and must be -- a force for good. So they stayed on the Justice Department. They went into the courts. They pressured Congress, they pressured their President. They didn’t give up on this country. They didn’t give up on government. They didn’t somehow say government was the problem; they said, we're going to change government, we're going to make it better. Imperfect as it was, they continued to believe in the promise of democracy; in America's constant ability to remake itself, to perfect this union.
And this:
Let's work to change the political system, as imperfect as it is. I know people can feel down about the way things are going sometimes here in Washington. I know it's tempting to give up on the political process. But we've put in place tougher rules on lobbying and ethics and transparency -- tougher rules than any administration in history. It's not enough, but it's progress. Progress is possible. Don't give up on voting. Don't give up on advocacy. Don't give up on activism. There are too many needs to be met, too much work to be done. Like Dr. King said, "We must accept finite disappointment but never lose infinite hope."
We at the precipice. We are facing the challenge of a new age and we're wondering where do we go from here? But in some ways as bad as this loss is, it could be a good thing in that it wakes us from our malaise, our negative funk because our leaders didn't push hard enough. (Hopefully, it lights a fire under every single WH adviser who discounted the base).
Beltway pundits will try to tell Obama to go small, do a Clinton. We'll have to deal with their crowing for weeks. But we should take all of their negative analysis, along with our frustrations and say to the WH in no uncertain terms that WE WILL NOT ALLOW YOU TO PUSH ANYTHING OTHER THAN A PROGRESSIVE AGENDA. We do we have to lose? Too much is left on the table - financial reform, climate change, health care, jobs. The future of this country is at stake. If we're going down then we better damn well go down fighting as real Democrats, liberals, progressives or whatever we call ourselves.
Here's what I propose:
We need to build a coalition of every single progressive or Democratic group. I'm talking NAACP, the Urban League, DFA, MoveOn.org, Progressive Democrats, La Raza, OFA, National Action Network, Rainbow Push, every union, churches that believe in social justice and others including liberal radio hosts.
Once we've built that coalition and have developed a database that each group can tap into and use to provide information about events and strategies. We need to plan marches and rallies in every state culminating in a MLK March on Washington styled event. I know everybody marches on Washington now, but I'm talking something huge with inauguration size numbers on the National Mall. We have to be vocal, visible and active for the remainder of 2010 and beyond.
At this point it is not about Obama, Pelosi or Reid. It's about us and our capacity to create the type of change that we say we want even in adverse circumstances. I don't want future generations to look back at this moment and say that we failed them when it mattered the most. That we didn't put our blood, sweat and tears on the line even when it seemed that we had given all that we could. I know many of you have been fighting - hard. But please don't give up now! We need everyone in the game now more than ever. I'm a big believer in the idea that all things (even bad things) can work together for good. We can turn a disadvantage into an advantage.
We need organization. We need motivation.(It would be nice to have a leader who is not an elected official who has the rhetorical skills, charisma and smarts of Obama or MLK. Unfortunately, I can't think of a single person) We need cooperation. We need a plan that is actionable immediately. We can't let the talking points from the Republicans and media pundits set in. The narrative will be that the progressive agenda is doomed. I know I'm probably not going to watch cable news for a while.
I think I'm going to start contacting a few organizations to see if we can start working on something. I've never done anything like this but I just can't sit by and let this country be destroyed.
Will you join me? Or if you have a better idea or suggestion please post.
---This is my first dairy, so please forgive me if it's not formatted correctly.