The New York Times has a discouraging but, I fear, largely accurate piece today describing the
closing window of opportunity for progressive reform in the wake of the Katrina catastrophe, and why progressives should see this as an issue of urgent national concern:
As Hurricane Katrina put the issue of poverty onto the national agenda, many liberal advocates wondered whether the floods offered a glimmer of opportunity. The issues they most cared about - health care, housing, jobs, race - were suddenly staples of the news, with President Bush pledged to "bold action."
But what looked like a chance to talk up new programs is fast becoming a scramble to save the old ones [...]
"We've had a stunning reversal in just a few weeks," said Robert Greenstein, director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal advocacy group in Washington. "We've gone from a situation in which we might have a long-overdue debate on deep poverty to the possibility, perhaps even the likelihood, that low-income people will be asked to bear the costs."
This is urgent. Katrina put issues of race and class on the national radar in a way that won't be repeated for a very long time. But the opportunity to discuss and
act on these issues -- progressive issues -- is being largely squandered.
The right wing understands the situation. They have mobilized to use Katrina as an indictment of government programs, and the very idea of government. They see the Gulf Coast as a testing ground to prove the national relevance of right-wing policies from school vouchers to corporate tax-break "opportunity zones."
Let's be clear: If progressives fail to seize this opportunity, what will suffer are not only the people of the Gulf Coast, now at the mercy of real estate speculators, energy developers, far-right ideologues, and other nefarious interests.
We will also lose a once-in-a-decade chance to resurrect core issues of the progressive agenda on a national scale.
This is our moment. Endlessly speculating about DeLay's indictments or the Plame investigation may be fun, but the Gulf debacle is something progressives can do something about, now, that has the potential to permanently shift the debate about fundamental inequalities in our society.
As progressives, we need to step up to the plate, and focus as much energy and resources as we can to 1) support the growing fight for a democratic, just and sustainable rebuilding in the Gulf, and 2) put issues of poverty and inequality at the top of the national agenda. The thousand people who died and hundreds of thousands who have suffered in Katrina and Rita's wake deserve nothing less.
Visit Facing South, a voice for the progressive South:
http://www.southernstudies.org/facingsouth