History confirms you get big change when you aim high, not when you settle for incrementalism

Big ideas vs a small pragmatic approach

TIme and again we hear people say I like Bernie, but I don’t think he can get his ideas through congress. That idea didn’t accidentally end up in people’s thinking, it was put there by the Clinton campaign and the mainstream media. On the surface it sounds like a reasonable position. But is the small pragmatic approach of Clinton really the best way forward with an obstructionist congress?

In its current make up neither candidate is going to get their agenda through this congress. I think we know this from what we have seen with the Obama agenda. But Obama’s approach has been a slow pragmatic one and about the only things getting done after the first two years when he had a democratic majority in both houses of congress have been done almost exclusively with temporary executive orders. A tool that will be available to both Clinton and Sanders if they need to push through obstruction. But who will fight harder when they bring it back to the people and push again later? On record its clear that Sanders has been the one with the tenacity to fight for whats right even when its not popular and be ahead of public opinion.

So back to the incremental pragmatic approach, The question begs that if slow incremental is getting nothing through this congress how will bold ideas get through? This answer is actually that the bold approach will get more done and for two big reasons. 1) The excitement generated by real change will drive the kind of voter turnout that will flip the congress into a more progressive one. 2) A bold popular leader can go back to the American people, better define the reasons for the problems they face and get them to stand up to their elected officials holding them accountable for their votes or promising to vote them out next election cycle. 

Congress presently is corrupted and broken. Big ideas or small ideas will both be blocked by this corporatist congress who represent their donors not their constituents. By the same token either will get their ideas passed by a progressive populist congress.. If that’s the case if either can get their ideas through a more progressive congress, then wouldn’t it be better to aim higher and get things that really make a difference? FDR had huge ideas that nobody thought he could ever get done coming out of the great depression… but first he flipped the congress and then he reshaped our country for the better for generations with his huge ideas of regulating banking, taking care of the American workers, creating social safety nets, access to healthcare and free education, building the nation’s infrastructure, etc… ideas that created a strong vibrant middle class, a much higher quality of life and economic stability.

So that brings us to Bernie vs Hillary.

Bernie has the big bold ideas and Hillary has the small what she calls pragmatic ideas. Now we need to ask, which one of them can flip the congress. As was touched on briefly earlier, the one who can energize and expand the base... bring in more people, more voices. The democrats win when there is a large voter turnout and they lose when there is a small voter turnout.

Who can drive the biggest base of voters?

Bernie has been bringing out new voters, voters that have previously disengaged from voting, independent voters and even some disgruntled republican voters. When you add those to the dependable establishment democratic voters that's when you win. By contrast exit polling confirms everytime that Hillary is only getting the establishment votes and all new voters are lined up behind and deeply enthusiastic about Bernie and his vision. Even the establishment democrats who lined up early benind her because of familiarity or the idea that she is more likely to win have been more and more taking a closer look at Bernie and liking what they see. Its a safe bet the establishment voters will show up to vote against the GOP with either of them, but the young and independent voters who dont have a great record of showing up have been clear they wont show up for her. So if the establishment only is for her, that will result in a small turnout, which puts both the white house and down ballot congressional and state races at risk of going republican. Bernie alone seems to be the one who can drive the excitement of the young and independent voters to show up and combine with the establishment democrats for a larger voter base that gives the Democrats the big turnout they need to win more down ballot races and flip both houses of congress and races on the state level. RIght now polling shows

This assertion bears out as it shows Bernie beating Trump by as much as 20%. Statisticians will tell you that if he wins by that much, his coat tails will be long enough to indeed flip both houses of congress to the progressive one he can work with… if not in the first two years, likely within an election cycle or two if he keeps the revolution alive. We saw this play out with Obama flipping a bunch of down ballot seats when he drove the big turnout, but then losing them when he failed to bring his base back out in mid term elections… he also had shorter coat tails as his wins were 7% over McCain and 4% over Romney, nowhere near the double digit leads Sanders shows over both Trump and Cruz. Hillary by contrast shows much smaller margins against Trump and loses to Cruz and Kasich in some polling. That difference is explained entirely by the expansion of the electorate under Sanders and the shrinking demographics under Clinton.

Keeping the electorate engaged

It’s the populist candidates who not only expand but also engage the electorate. Again we saw this with Obama. In 08, he kinda ran a combination populist/ mainstream corporatist strategy. He got people engaged and took huge money from corporate interests and overwhelmed everyone with money and charisma. But how this played out when he got in is he was accountable to both. He had promised to bring change on a number of issues, but he was accountable to both the people and the corporate masters and needed to find a balance between the two. What this meant is that he would push for change, but not big bold change, only small incremental change that would give the people something of what they wanted, but not so much that it upset the corporate masters who had spent the previous 30 years buying our government and rigging the system. On issue after issue it seemed the people got something, but not enough to make a big difference in their lives. And this was with a democratic majority in both houses of congress.

Even on his biggest boldest accomplishment (Obamacare), we got a recycled republican plan with a few tweeks. We didn’t get universal healthcare wanted by most progressives, we didn’t even get the compromise of the public option.The health insurance industry was kept in charge of our healthcare and with their hands in the till. Even the drug companies got a sweetheart deal of disallowing negotiation on drug prices. All of the real bold change we voted for wasn’t blocked by the republicans yet, it was taken off the table and watered down by the corporatists democrats who were protecting their big money donors. Obama, Pelosi and Reid took the bold ideas off the table before negotiations even began. Then after two years of getting little done on big issues and Obamacare the closest thing they got to bold change not implemented yet the Obama coalition unplugged and the republicans took the House and state houses all over the country.

So pragmatism in effect got less done and the young voters, independent voters and progressive voters who had been won with big vision unplugged and handed control off from the corporately owned democrats to the corporately owned republicans. The biggest difference between them was social issues, but in the areas of a rigged economy, deregulation of both the economy and environmental protection and taxation inequality they were on the same page. They called it pragmatism or incremental change, but what we really had was two parties owned by the same interests on those issues who didn’t try for more, because they both wanted the same things.

So with young, independent and progressive voters who had so much hope of change now disengaged we saw the destructive forces of the other side rear its ugly head on social issues. Woman’s issues, gay issues, criminal and social justice issues were under attack. Voting rights were threatened and unions/ worker rights came under attack. And this didn’t happen because Obama over reached, it happened because he aimed low and lost his coalition, his revolution if you will.

FDR got it right

FDR came in right after the great depression. Congress was corrupt and obstructionist. Corporations had become too powerful and had crushed both entrepreneurialism and workers rights/ income. The country reeled as the rich got richer and nobody else had any money to spend. Sound familiar?

FDR didn’t come in pushing for incremental change. He pushed for bold action.He led the United states during a time of worldwide economic depression and war. His program for relief, recovery and reform known as the New Deal, involved great expansion of the role of the federal government in economy. He pushed for and got Massive regulation on banking and wall street (Glass Steagall, Securities Act of 1933 and FDIC). He pushed for social safety nets that would uplift and support the poor, unemployed, sick and elderly. He emboldened the socialist labor union movement and together and got a minimum wage as well as 40 hour work week. During a time of massive unemployment and underemployment he created jobs building the nation’s infrastructure that held for generations as the envy of the world. He created programs to aid family farmers and migrant workers. He provided free education up to high school to sustain the economy with an educated workforce. Together not only did his policies lift us out of the great depression, but also created policies that kept our economy safe for generations and built a big vibrant middle class and a protected working class.

Bernie Sanders plan borrows directly from the FDR playbook

Let me repeat that, Bernie Sanders big bold change borrows directly from the FDR playbook… It create jobs with infrastructure repair. Expands education from free public schooling through high school to through public college to keep up with the newer high tech economies. He is supporting labor unions and pushing for a living wage with a $15 minimum wage which would naturally drive wage increases many rungs up the ladder. He wants to bring back Glass Steagall and other wall street and banking regulations to unrig the economy. Ask the wealthy and corporations who have stopped paying their fair share of taxes to start paying them again by closing down tax loopholes, tax havens and subsidies the wealthy have used to hide income from taxation. He has plans to not only protect social security and other social safety nets, but to expand them in times of need. He wants to guarantee health care to all Americans the way most of the industrialized world has already done for their citizens and in so doing bring down the cost of healthcare and its drag not only on the family budgets but on the economy as a whole.

History supports big bold change

His plans are bold but also realistic. Everyone told FDR he was over reaching and would never get his plans implemented. But as he did, the people rallied behind him and his revolution saw him re elected 4 times while sweeping in a progressive congress and judiciary behind him. It changed our country for the better for generations. Throughout history we see virtually all real change coming from people with a big vision who aim high.

So on the question of small pragmatic incremental change vs big bold vision I think history has been clear with FDR, Martin Luther King, the Labor Union movement, JFK and LBJ that when you push for big change that’s when you get it. When you aim low, you open the door for the other side to take it all away.

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An Open Letter Response to Senator Barbara Boxer

Senator Boxer, In response to your open letter asking Senator Sanders to apologize to Hillary I have to take you to task. You are requesting the apology of the wrong person. 

I have been a HUGE supporter and advocate for you over the years. As I watched the Democratic party get dragged by third way/ corporatist democrats farther and farther from the policies of the left, I always knew we had Barbara Boxer still fighting for the left. Here in California I joked well at least we have one Senator who understands what it means to be a democrat and begged anyone to primary Diane Feinstein who seemed to be a republican on far too many issues.

But alas just as we are set to lose your leadership to retirement, have old school democrats also lost you to the tragedy of what the democratic party has become? A party that represents free trade, private prisons, big oil, big pharma, GMOs, punishment society and forever the risk of having our party team with the 1% in the rigging of our economy, the courts and deregulation? That's right only one of these two candidates has spent her career with the "D" next to her name. But its the one with the "I" next to his who has always remembered what the Democratic party represents.

Senator Sanders owes nobody an apology. But the same can not be said of his opponent who has spent months pandering and pretending to represent issues she has fought against for decades, positions nobody on the left feels she will still be representing after the primaries. And she has spent months lying about and smearing Senator Sanders on his record. On issues he has fought for and she has spent a career fighting against or being complicit in the republicans fight against.

It is Secretary Clinton who owes Senator Sanders and us all an apology. She can’t have it both ways... she can’t yell about the party as she destroys it from within. She can’t complain about tone, when all the negative tone and hypocrisy is coming from her. Senator Sanders finally responded not only to her smears and lies, but also to her commitment to keep smearing and to throw the kitchen sink at him just to win. I remember the PUMAs (Party Unity My Ass) of 08, where her supporters felt it more important to fight for her and not for issues. They did so not on their own, but following her lead.

I am profoundly disappointed in your support of the "D" over the party ideals. And profoundly disappointed that you would side with one of the architects for the theft of the people's party over the man who has woken up the electorate to the fact that they have lost both parties to the same corporate masters.

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You can save your Hillary math, Bernie is really the one in the drivers seat and they know it

Another Progressives Rant

The mainstream media and our Hillary supporting friends like to constantly remind us that that no matter what Bernie does from here, he can’t catch Hillary in delegates. The pundits love going to their computer maps on TV and showing us that even if Bernie wins the rest of the states 55 to 45 he still won’t catch her in earned delegates. Lets just be honest, they are trying to convince you to give up so you won't vote or will give your vote to the establishment.

But what they aren’t telling you is that neither candidate is on a path to win the minimum number of earned delegates needed to win the nomination. That both will need super delegate support to secure the magic number on earned delegates alone. And that super delegates wont actually be voting until the convention when all primary and caucus voting is done. At that point they as super delegates are tasked with selecting the candidate who will be the best candidate for the party to win not only the white house but also down ballot races in the general election.

The following breakdown will show why this is still anybody's race to win and why Bernie not Hillary actually has the inside track at the nomination.

Bernie is winning blue and purple states, Hillary won red states

So let’s look at the map. Hillary so far has done very very well in the deep red southern states (solidly republican). These states all ran early in the primaries and she ran up a big delegate lead largely because of these conservative states. She did this at a time when few people knew who Senator Sanders even was, let alone his record or what he was advocating for. In the south they don’t generally look for change, so they stuck with who they were comfortable with and that was Hillary. Its not an accident that the red states run early, having conservative states vote before the challengers are known gives a huge advantage to the establishment candidate who is generally the best known candidate going in.

By contrast Bernie is doing very well in well in blue (solidly democratic) and purple (swing) states which will be critical to a win in the general election. The vast majority of the remaining states are democratic leaning or swing states and Bernie is surging hard in all of them. He is even taking a national lead in the polls.

Bernie expands the base.

Who supports who? Well few will argue that Hillary has broad appeal with the Democratic base and that Bernie has overwhelming popularity with the young and Independent voters. How this plays out going into a general election is that both can count on the establishment vote who are just as concerned with with who they are voting against as they are about who they are voting for… they vote for the D in part because they fear the GOP.

But only Bernie Sanders can expand the base beyond the establishment democrats. History shows that the Democrats win when they have a large voter turnout and lose when it’s a small voter turnout. Obama turned out the young and independent voters in Presidential years and the democrats won up and down the ballot. But in midterm elections the expanded base stayed home and the democrats lost. Bernie has been clear throughout the campaign that for his revolution to be successful he needs a big voter turnout and he needs that support not just for him, but down ballot to give him a congress and state houses he can work with to pursue his bold agenda. Those young and independent voters who will make the difference between wins and losses up and down the ballot have been clear that not just any blue will do, they want their votes to be earned. They have also been clear that they will not vote for Hillary. So super delegates if paying attention have been put on notice that the broad base they need to win back the congress and at the state levels likely won't show up unless Bernie is the nominee.

Last point about the young and independent voters. They are not only critical to winning this election, but they are in fact critical to the very future of the party.

Bernie has the momentum

Again back to the math the pundits keep pushing. They gleefully point out that if Bernie wins the rest of the states by less than 57% (some use even larger numbers) that he wont catch Hillary. But in this argument they often concede that Bernie is likely to win a lot of the remaining states (which as was pointed out earlier are mostly blue and purple states). So following this scenario, if Hillary keeps losing even if she keeps them to single digit losses, she will be asking the party to support the candidate who has lost almost all the states for the three months leading into the general election and did so with all the media and party support. Sports fans back me up on this… how many sports teams that build a big lead early in the season and back into the playoffs clinging to that lead with a bunch of late losses go on to win championships? Not many. A politician on a losing streak with lots of negative stories of their late collapse and on the issues they are losing on is badly damaged going into the general election and even the party and its super delegates know it.

Super Delegates are there to protect the party, not prop up a loser

Since neither is on track to win the nomination without super delegate help and most believe the earned delegate count will be close. That puts the power of who gets the nomination on the super delegates. Before we even knew who was running a majority of the super delegates endorsed Hillary. But as was mentioned earlier, they don’t actually cast that vote til the convention. In fact hundreds of them still haven’t committed to either candidate despite the narrative being pushed by the mainstream media. So they all (those who have endorsed and those who have yet to endorse) have the entire primary process to evolve. They in theory are there to do what’s best for the party and the party was clear who it liked a year ago. But the race and the landscape is changing rapidly. The guy who wasn’t even in the race yet or was polling at 3% when most made their endorsements now has turned this into a completely different race than most were expecting. He is not an after thought, he is winning the people and poised to win most of the states critical to the democrats.

Before Debbie Wasserman Schultz redefined the role of super delegates as to stop grassroots movements, they were promoted as a way to protect the best interests of the party. We were further told that they would not ignore the will of the voters. What the party insiders believed to be in the best interest of the party a year ago, is looking less and less likely to still be what’s in the best interest of the party. Bernie doesn’t need all the super delegates, he just needs enough to reach the magic number. And let’s face it, the hundreds of super delegates who have yet to choose sides have already made a statement by holding off on endorsing Hillary even when the pressure was intense to do so.

Even the polling has changed

Hillary was leading in the national polls by 70 points when she got most of her endorsements. And as she swept through the southern states she still held high double digit national polling leads. But the little known Senator from Vermont is now better known and people like what they see and hear. He has won 8 of the last 9 contests all by varying degrees of a landslide. He is surging in every remaining state and has taken a 2% lead on Hillary nationally. What makes these numbers more dire for Clinton is that he has a small lead and the states that she used to build her big lead are still in that number. Every race, even the ones he has lost showed virtually all young and independent voters were with him (generally both groups by a staggering number hovering around 80%).

Early in the campaign we only got polling about Hillary or even Biden in head to head match ups against the republicans and Hillary never really looked that good in those. In time she started looking better taking a lead on most of them although often within the margin of error and in some instances we see her losing. But then pollsters started including Bernie in those match up polls and Bernie was beating everyone even with landslide numbers against Trump and dominant wins against Cruz. Experts have projected that if he beats Trump by the margins in those polls the Democrats will not only win back the Senate, but may also win back the house. So want to know how you get big bold change with a congress that is hellbent on obstruction? Simple you flip the congress and shame those who don’t get purged into listening to the voters or get purged in the next election cycle.

Forget the math, who wants to win?

The dynamics are changing If Bernie continues to run the table in the 2nd half as many expect he will. He is surging big time in every remaining state so that scenario is looking likely. more and more likely. And this is before he got a tacit endorsement on his moral economy from the Pope. The race has shown us that he moves votes from her to him and energizes the base in every state once he gets there to campaign. People respond to him in a way nobody was expecting. The more they see and hear him, the more they like. So moving forward nearly everything about his race has changed since many of the super delegates endorsed Hillary and those trend lines are still going in his direction. By the convention if he keeps winning, Bernie will have most of the blue and purple states, he will have the larger base of voters and donors, he will have the momentum, enthusiasm and the longest coat tails down ballot.

Bernie is the safer choice for this election and for the future of the party. Super delegates are there to protect the party. Only the most stubborn figure to decide to stick with Hillary and blow up their party just to prove they can fend off a grassroots movement for the soul of the party. If Bernie keeps winning regardless of the percentages, he is in the drivers seat not her and their delegate math arguments are going to keep getting harder and harder to make.