Tag: progressive

Class War 101: We need a new progressive tax system

    It is time to set the top tax bracket above $1,000,000

    As you can see in the graph below, many people live in poverty compared to the few wealthy. Mind you, this graph does not include the Capitalist class of the top 2%

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    This next graph shows how income has grown by percentiles over the last few years. Notice anything?

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   That’s right. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

   If this is your first time, welcome to Class War 101

   Anyone with sense can tell that we can not pretend that the American dream is to be a $250,000aire. The dream is to own your own home, to have a family, to have health care when you need it and a retirement and education for our children.

    The way things are going, that will not happen anytime soon.

    40 + years of supply side trickle down free market economics have devastated states and federal budgets. It is time to face the facts. We need a progressive taxation system that adequately taxes the millionaires whose wealth would not be possible without America.

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    After living high on the hog for so long, the rich can not plead poverty

   It is time to get something back.

Open Letter to Progressives: Act Crazy Liberal! (Video)

I stumbled upon this video last night. Please watch and then discuss.

It is time to YELL LOUDER and MORE Effectively.

   I do not want to see the victory of the election where the Conservatives were roundly defeated thrown away by a political class that is corrupt and doesn’t care or the fools who would call for more pragmatism and patience.

   I say the time is now, and if not, when will that time ever come?

Thunder From the Left – How Progressive Dissent Shaped the New Deal

There has been much talk lately about the Great Depression, how it parallels our current economic crisis, and how passage of the New Deal might serve as a model for the Democrats and the new Obama administration in their attempts to rescue the economy.

But it is how the passage of the New Deal may serve as a model for the Progressive movement that I want to discuss here. For, as I will demonstrate, if it were not for the Progressive movement, and Roosevelt’s harshest critics from the left, we would have ended up with a very different New Deal – one which, arguably, would not have been much of a deal at all.

In what I like to call the Children’s History of America, FDR, elected on a reform agenda, swept into office and, within his first one hundred days, passed a bunch of bills that are known as the New Deal. Consequently, as the story goes, millions of people returned to work, the economy eventually recovered, and a new era of social security was ushered in that would last for decades. But this history is false. In fact, one cannot understand the passage of the New Deal, or FDR’s first term, without giving full consideration to the forces that rose up against him from the progressive, populist, and very angry left. For those forces did more to shape the New Deal, and ensure its success, than any other factor.

If you’re not a historian, chances are you don’t know that there was essentially a second New Deal – the sweeping set of programs enacted in 1935 – after the 1934 midterms and before FDR’s 1936 reelection campaign. Many historians even refer to this period as the Second 100 Days. In the children’s history, you don’t hear much about the “Second New Deal”. That’s a shame, for it was this set of legislative accomplishments that actually, more than any other, constituted what would be known as the New Deal. It is this set of programs that changed the country. Here is a partial list:

  • Emergency Relief Appropriation Act
  • Public Works Administration (PWA)
  • Works Progress Administration (WPA)
  • Formation of National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)
  • The Wagner Act
  • Public Utility Holding Company Act
  • Social Security Act

These programs, to a large degree, were the New Deal. The Emergency Relief Appropriation Act, along with the PWA and WPA created the government works program which eventually put over 10 million people to work.

The NRLB and Wagner Act effectively created organized labor by ensuring, among other things, the right to unionize and to bargain collectively with employers.

The Public Utilities Holding Company Act broke up the utility monopolies and ensured local ownership of public utilities. This was no small deal. Until its partial repeal in 1993 under Clinton, which directly led to the Enron fiascoes in California, and its full repeal in 2005, the PUHCA had maintained a tightly regulated, highly stable system of energy delivery for seventy years.

And then there’s the Social Security Act. No other program of the New Deal has had a more enduring impact and affected more lives. Yet it’s easy to forget just how radical this idea was in the 1930s. Roosevelt actually opposed it as too costly and opted for just the unemployment insurance part.(1) But, as it was in 1935, politicians were going along with a lot of things they had originally opposed.

“The Populist Uprising “

By the spring of 1935, the New Deal was a failure. Not that some of the measures enacted in the first 100 days hadn’t helped. The economy had grown a little bit. Businesses started to feel a bit more confident. And a couple million people had gone back to work. But after two years recovery began to falter – the country was still in a depression and approximately 1/5th of the workforce was still unemployed. And to make matters worse, the Supreme Court had declared by unanimous consent that Roosevelt’s flagship program, the National Industrial Recovery Act, was unconstitutional. This was a devastating blow – the NIRA was not just another remedial government program. It was the remedial government program, a massive, very high profile national campaign that included a PR blitz, celebrity endorsements, and even a logo business participants could put in their windows. The administration had practically bet the farm on the NIRA and now it was dead.

But the Court was the least of Roosevelt’s problems that year. Public dissatisfaction with the lack of progress on the economy was reaching a fevered pitch. It appeared, from all sides, FDR was under siege.

The Hooverites and business leaders had opposed the New Deal from inception and thought Roosevelt had gone too far in his first hundred days. Many in High Society refused to even mention FDR’s name. (I don’t mean they wouldn’t talk about him. I mean they deliberately made a point of referring to him without mentioning his name.) But the real threat to FDR was from his own left flank. The Progressives, both Democrat and Republican, were deeply dissatisfied and thought FDR hadn’t gone far enough. They also believed he was far to favorable to the oligarchs, despite his having fallen from their graces.

There were others too, outspoken critics, often referred to as the demagogues, who, by late 1935 had grown so dissatisfied with FDR that they began to plot a third party run in the upcoming 1936 election. They too believed the New Deal was too protective of the banking interests and the wealthy and didn’t go far enough to help the poor. These included Father Charles Coughlin, an anti-Semite who railed against the bankers and the Jews, but none the less built up a following of as many as 40 million listeners to his radio show. He advocated nationalizing the banks and abolishing the Federal Reserve. And Dr. Francis Townsend, who advocated providing the elderly with a $200 a month income, had grown widely popular by mid-thirties.

Another threat to FDR was, and one that particularly caught his attention, was the a new progressive alliance in Wisconsin. Long a hotbed of progressive sentiments, Wisconsin had just elected a progressive Governor who actually ran as a “radical” telling voters, “I am not a liberal, I am what I want to be – I am a radical.” In the 1930 race for Wisconsin’s governor, Olson actually defeated his Republican opponent by an astounding 200,000 votes. Once in office, he introduced such progressive reforms as a progressive income tax, public unemployment insurance, and old age pensions. In 1935, he vowed to run against FDR unless he produced a more radical New Deal.

But it was Huey Long who posed the biggest threat. Despite his flamboyant, clownish demeanor, he was a lawyer and an incredibly astute politician. He had taken on the corrupt Standard Oil machine in Louisiana and won. This was unheard of. When elected governor of Louisiana, Standard oil owned that state’s politics. (This fact is often excluded by establishment historians’ accounts of Long’s own corruption. For all his faults, he entered a game that had few rules and adapted. As a result he was able to do an immense amount of good for the poor people of his state.)

Long’s popularity in the troubled years of the Depression had grown far beyond the borders of his state, however. And his ‘Share the Wealth’ program – where every citizen was guaranteed a base income of $2500, and every family would receive $5000 to buy a house, car and radio – was gaining immense support amongst the poor and working classes throughout the country. Democrats were concerned that if Long, who formerly had supported Roosevelt and the New Deal, was to launch a third party run in the 1936 presidential campaign, he could cost FDR the presidency.

And so, in 1935, as Franklin Roosevelt began preparing for his 1936 reelection bid, this was the environment he found himself in. A stalling recovery program, mass public dissatisfaction, and mounting opposition from his own left flank. The result was a dramatic shift to the left and the passage of a legislative coup that would have been unthinkable only two years earlier.

Stealing Huey’s Thunder

Now, while it would be convenient for my thesis to depict Roosevelt as a failed moderate who was too orthodox to rise to the occasion and so was destined to historical failure were it not for the populists coming in to set him on the right path and rescue his legacy, that simply would be incorrect. The truth is much more complex. For example, some measures enacted in 1935, like the National Labor Relations Board and the Wagner Act, had been under development in Washington for years. On the other hand, Social Security, with retiree pensions, was a direct response to Dr. Townsend. In fact, the whole idea had been dubbed the “Townsend plan”, though he was not the first to think of it.

And how precisely populist pressure affected Roosevelt is not wholly known. According to Raymond Moley, one of FDR’s top advisors, the president had confided in him that much of the Second New Deal was to “steal Huey’s thunder”.(2) And some hold the position that the threat of a Long presidency merely gave the president and the Democrats cover for programs they had always supported. Call it the “now make me do it” view.

Fortunately for my thesis, however, it doesn’t matter either way. The end result was that pressure from the left, often in the form of rage and condemnation of the president, moved this country dramatically in a better direction and either forced, or allowed, depending on which you prefer, Washington to enact progressive legislation that served the people.

Historians don’t all agree on the extent of the impact of this pressure. But one need no further illustration than the appeals of New York Times columnist Arthur Krock. Krock was a highly prominent and influential writer in his day. A sort of “dean” of the press corp in Broderian terms. He had won four Pulitzer Prizes and mostly towed the establishment line. So his warnings of the potential of Huey Long occupying the White house struck fear into the heart of the monied class. Here is an excerpt from one of Krock’s warnings:

In Washington; Roosevelt, Long or Townsend Our Social Security Choice

New York Times – Jan 18, 1935

“Nevertheless, as a glance at any Senator’s correspondence will demonstrate, many, many people–perhaps several millions–believe firmly in the practicability and justice of the Townsend plan. Mr. Long, on his oath as a tribune, gets “more than 50,000 letters a week, 99 per cent approving” his share-the-wealth formula.

Alternatives Less Cheerful.

“All this should tend to reconcile those who “wonder why the President is bringing up this utopian stuff now, when business is flat on its back.” It should convey to them that business could be a lot worse off than in its supine position.”

And so it was. The “utopian stuff” was passed and signed into law. Not out of the will of good men wanting to do the right thing. But out of fear. Fear that unless they were willing to give the people a little piece of the pie, the people would take the whole thing.

1. Conrad Black, Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Champion of Freedom (pg. 342)

2. Raymond Moley, After Seven Years

Progressive Feedback Works: Obama Drops Business Tax Break

In meetings last week, several Democratic Senators were critical of Barack Obama’s inclusion of a $3,000-per-job tax credit for business in the stimulus plan as potentially unworkable and unikely to create jobs.  See Sen. Harkin: Obama’s Plan looks like “trickle-down”; Summers: “Message Heard, Loud and Clear” (referring to Senators Kerry, Conrad and Harkin).

Obama is serious about collaborative decision making.  He listened and has now acted:

Bowing to widespread Democratic skepticism, President-elect Barack Obama will drop his bid to include a business tax break he once touted in the economic stimulus bill now taking shape on Capitol Hill, aides said last night.

WaPo: Obama Shelves Jobs-Credit Proposal, Democrats Said $3,000 Tax Incentive Could Be Abused by Businesses

More about progressive feedback and why it’s essential to Obama and all of our success, after the fold.

Planning NOW for 2010

On Tuesday voters will go to the polls to participate in what shall undoubtedly be yet another sham election in which the occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is determined (but not necessarily by the voters).  Either Republican John McCain or Democrat Barack Obama is going to be dictator, but regardless of who it is come January, we’re still screwed.

This entry assumes Barack Obama shall become dictator Tuesday, but it can just as easily be applied to McCain should he cheat his way into office.

We had our chance to get Obama to listen, but far too many Democrats decided it was better to shut up and get in line behind him rather than force him to adopt left-wing policy positions.  What’s worse, we frittered away our chance to hold Congressional candidates to the proverbial fire.  I think the only way we can shape things is to work toward 2010 by making sure progressive independents and Democrats are elected.

Primary runs are only half the equation.  If they succeed (as they did in states such as Maryland), great, but we also need to have independent candidates ready to challenge recalcitrant Democrats in general elections.  If politicians don’t fear losing the elected seats they hold, they won’t have any incentive to represent their constituents.  I can’t think of a better way to put the fear of electoral loss in right-wing Democrats than the prospect of losing their seats of power to strong independent candidates or, if those persons fail to win, the Republican candidates.

If you haven’t already started locally, and I presume people have done this across the country, I strongly suggest spending the next two years building up to state-level offices.  Pick a local political party that has a record of getting results (e.g Progressives in Vermont and Washington, Greens in California, and so forth), and get disenfranchised progressives to join and organize.  Hold meetings to figure out which members are best suited to run for public office and then pool money to get them on the ballots in your communities.  Candidates should be screened for potential scandals, have records to match their rhetoric, and be able not only to communicate effectively, but seize and maintain control of the discussion.

Do that and you may be able to shape things in time for the 2010 midterm elections.  The time to start is not then, but now, in 2008.  Time’s wasting, so let’s get busy!

Everything Connects and the Surrender of the Left

One day I will write more on “everything connects” but I think it does. FYI, I prefer to use the term “left” rather than “liberal” or “progressive” because I see left, right and center to be a kind of organic whole and those terms are more inclusive. The “center” in fact is made up of two poles–one is where the left and right meet in a kind of compromise and is generally where the social conformists line up and is generally where politics operates (and is the only healthy place for it to operate in a Democracy by definition. On the other end of the center where the extreme left meets the extreme right.

Because our political and cultural system operates under the laws of systems analysis I don’t believe that anyone in our political system is “wrong” just that diffent ideological stances all have a positive function and that is to keep a balance (homeostasis)–the system is only wrong when it is out of balance. Currently we have a kind of cultural/political fever in which the right has become too strong (in fact cancerous) and the left too weak.  

Social Justice (don’t shoot the messengers), the grand experiment of Yes We Can

Cross posted at  KOS

Social Justice. Some of us were introduced to the idea in church, appropriately because Jesus preached social justice. Altho social justice is an important theme in all major religions, some churches like the Catholic Church have offices of Social Justice. In deed the term was coined by a Jesuit priest in the mid 1800’s, based on the teachings of Thomas Aquinas.  

It got a lot of press both good and bad in the 60’s when Jesuit priests preached social justice and organized the impoverished of South America. Social Justice is the heart of Liberation Theology and Black Liberation Theology.  Follow me below the fold for a little background on social justice, why shooting the messenger is counter productive and oh yes, the grand experiment of YES WE CAN.

Progressives, Liberals, Movements, and Political Parties

Cross-posted from my blog at Campaign for America’s Future.

Lately I’ve been getting an increasing recurrence of the same questions: what is the difference between liberals and progressives, and what is the difference between the Progressive Movement and the Progressive Party?  The answers to these questions are important, for as we inch ever closer to the general election in November and as primary battles across the country reach their conclusion the future of our country and our world shall be determined by them-and by how swiftly we figure them out.

The first question I shall tackle is, what is the difference between a liberal and a progressive?  For that I’ll quote the Huffington Post’s David Sirota, who explains it far more eloquently than I can:

I often get asked what the difference between a “liberal” and a “progressive” is. The questions from the media on this subject are always something like, “Isn’t ‘progressive’ just another name for ‘liberal’ that people want to use because ‘liberal’ has become a bad word?”

The answer, in my opinion, is no-there is a fundamental difference when it comes to core economic issues. It seems to me that traditional “liberals” in our current parlance are those who focus on using taxpayer money to help better society. A “progressive” are those who focus on using government power to make large institutions play by a set of rules.

To put it in more concrete terms: a liberal solution to some of our current problems with high energy costs would be to increase funding for programs like the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). A more “progressive” solution would be to increase LIHEAP but also crack down on price gouging and pass laws better regulating the oil industry’s profiteering and market manipulation tactics. A liberal policy towards prescription drugs is one that would throw a lot of taxpayer cash at the pharmaceutical industry to get them to provide medicine to the poor; a progressive prescription drug policy would be one that centered around price regulations and bulk purchasing in order to force down the actual cost of medicine in America (much of which was originally developed with taxpayer R&D money).

Let’s be clear: most progressives are also liberals, and liberal goals in better funding America’s social safety net are noble and critical. It’s the other direction that’s the problem. Many of today’s liberals are not fully comfortable with progressivism as defined in these terms. Many of today’s Democratic politicians, for instance, are simply not comfortable taking a more confrontational posture towards large economic institutions (many of whom fund their campaigns)-institutions that regularly take a confrontational posture towards America’s middle-class.

Burning the Midnight Oil for Progressive Populism

NB: This is a candidate diary with the references to the candidate removed. The candidate diary itself will go live on the Big Orange, sometime a little after midnight.

One serious confusion in some progressive populist thinking online has been a misunderstanding of the role of the progressive blogosphere as a tool for building a progressive movement.

However, as a progressive populist looking at the passive-voice descriptions that “populist messaging fails because there is not a populist movement” … I feel like jumping up and down and yelling, “read your history books you idiots!”

A populist movement is not created in coffee house discussions, whether live or online … it is created in the process of fighting for things, and in the process learning how to engage in a political fight and transform ourselves from political consumers to citizens of a Republic.

And without populist messaging leading the way, there will be nothing to take to our fellows when we get out amongst them.

Picture Credit: David Leeson (#8)

How can we demand courage from our leaders when we have so little?

Cross posted at KOS

How can we demand courage from our leader when we have so little?

How can we continue to support candidates who do not support us NOW?

How can we uphold the Constitution when we allow others to abrogate our most important responsibility, our vote?

How can we beg for change when we cannot face change?

How can we save the planet when we cannot save ourselves?

Follow me below the fold and I will give you my take on why who and what we are can be another recipe for a continuing disaster.

Hold on Progressives, help is on the way!

In today’s Washington Post, writer Rick Weiss, in an article entitled Synthetic DNA on the Brink of Yielding New Life Form may have documented the solution to all our problems. Scientists believe that in creating and growing synthetic DNA, they are on the brink of creating new life forms.

Note from a “self-styled” progressive

According to the Great Armando I am a “self-styled” progressive.  Why?  Apparently because I spoke up about how I felt regarding one of Armando’s posts.  

Well Armando, while you feel you are being a true progressive by typing all day and verbally bashing the majority of the members on this web site, I have a different approach:

1. I bought a farm so that I can help to feed my community without pesticides and herbicides.

2. I came out against the War in Iraq one year before the war in Iraq started.

3. I was asked to join the Kerry Campaign because of my skills with web advertising, promotion, construction, and my enthusiasm.  My main goal was to bring in visitors to the Official Kerry Forums.  I brought in over 50,000 people to not only visit but actually register and begin the first real national presidential discussion online.

4. I was the first blogger/web guy to get involved in the Cindy Sheehan March to Crawford.

5. I helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for the victims of Hurricane Katrina.

6. I have personally built over a dozen blogs and websites for other progressives so that their voices could be shared with the world.

7. I am replacing my old Subaru with a new Hybrid car to reduce my impact on the planet.

8. I have posted over 500 links to DocuDharma in various search engines, directories, news services etc.

So, you tell me Armando, am I a real progressive?  

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