This diary will be brief, but I wanted to draw the attention of kossacks to Katrina vanden Heuvel's appearance on The Ed Show today. Later when the footage is up (if I can find it, I'm not very good at such things), I'll post the link here.
This afternoon vanden Heuvel appeared on The Ed Show to speak on the dust-up over the Administration's unnamed source comments on the role organized labor played in the Arkansas primaries. Vanden Heuvel noted that despite their candidate losing the primary, their action did nonetheless push Lincoln in a more progressive direction on labor issues. In this connection, vanden Heuvel noted that progressives need to devote more energy to organizing and working on behalf of structural issues that pertain to working families. In addition to this, she stated that we need to develop a "steely eyed" fighting attitude like the attitude of the Administration towards progressives and organized labor, fighting vigorously on behalf of our causes and holding our elected officials accountable such that they know that they can't take us for granted.
However, the truly marvelous moment was when vanden Heuvel concluded her remarks with the statement that "the true fight is not between the left and the right, but between the top and the bottom." Truer words have seldom been spoken, and I believe this is precisely the sort of framing progressives need as we fight on behalf of our causes.
As I reflect on the debates between the vigorous Obama supporters here on dailykos and progressives, I get the sense that the two sides of this debate are working with fundamentally different political frames. It is not unusual to hear passionate supporters of Obama (and I was once one myself) claim that progressive critics of Obama are simply advancing rightwing and republican memes. Implicit in these rejoinders, I believe, is the view that the political fight progressives are fighting is a fight primarily against republicans. When fundamental distinctions are framed in this way (democrats versus republicans), their deep support for Obama makes perfect sense. The problem with this framing, the problem with seeing political issues entirely in terms of a struggle between democrats and republicans, is that it fails to recognize the neo-liberalism that infects our own party and that is against the collective interests of most Americans. As a result, we don't end up fighting this corruption within our own party.
However, for many progressive throughout the country, I believe the fundamental distinction is quite different. It is readily recognized that republicans are a dire threat to the welfare of our nation and the collective good, but the fight for many progressives is not so much between republicans and democrats, as it is a fight between the top and the bottom. What progressives want is a government that does not disproportionately represent the top, but rather that governs for the sake of the collective good and that represents the interests of working Americans. If progressives have had their ire up so much in relation to Obama, then this is because again and again the current administration has sided with the top against the rest of us. Whether we're talking about financial reform (or the lack thereof), healthcare reform and the disproportionate benefit to insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies, or whether we're talking about the current BP fiasco, again and again we see our democratically controlled government siding with big money interests against the will of the people.
In claiming that the true fight is between the top and the bottom, the point is that both parties are primarily beholden to these big money interests and that we need to struggle vigorous to reverse the neoliberalism that has corroded our entire political system. A number of people acknowledge this but talk about incrementalism. However, incrementalism is not good politics. In order for a party to enact its agenda it must be elected. If they are not elected they can't do much of anything. The problem with incrementalism is that it seldom works on behalf of the people and therefore pushes those voters in the middle away, insuring that we'll be out there in the wilderness once again and thereby becoming unable to advance our agenda.
This is exactly what happened with Clinton and is why so many of us passionately supported Obama over Hillary Clinton during the primaries. The neo-liberal assault on working families or average people began back in the late 70s and early 80s. This agenda held that the function of government is to create an unfettered business environment and investment opportunities through deregulation and privatization of government functions thereby creating new markets. With the election of Clinton over a decade later, deregulation and privatization continued apace in ways that would have made Reagan blush. Whether we're talking about Clinton privatizing military functions, NAFTA, or welfare reform, what we saw under Clinton was a profound pro-business conservativism that made a mess of millions of American lives.
The net result of Clintonian third way politics was to throw the democrats into the wilderness for a decade. Average American people no longer had a party that supported them or their interests, but rather had two parties that both supported big business over the interests of average working people. As a consequence, our populace found itself in an extremely anxiety provoking situation due to the precariousness of their economic circumstances and lack of social safety net. Face with a government that abandoned them they could only turn to culture issues in the domain of the political. Many Americans turned to religious fundamentalism. Why not? If their government won't help them, they could at least place their lives in the hands of God. Other Americans turned to virulent nationalism. Again, why not? If the economy had ground them under its feet they could at least find some sense of importance through nationalism. Others turned to forms of racism and misogyny to prop up their own sense of importance. And others turned to all three. These sorts of behaviors are directly correlated with people who feel and who are disempowered.
We need to avoid repeating these mistakes of the past and the only way to avoid repeating these sorts of mistakes is to come out strongly on behalf of Americans. vanden Heuvel is right. The real fight is not between the left and the right, but between the top and the bottom. We need a democratic party that vigorously supports labor over the exploitation of big money. We need a democratic party that steps up to the plate. And we need to pressure them to do this.