Another Reason For Democrats To Be Encouraged

The chart above is from a recent survey done by the Pew Research Center. It was done between July 31st and August 12th of a national sample of 4,000 adults, and has a margin of error of 2.6 points.

I think it shows just one more reason for Democrats to be encouraged in this election year. It shows the difference between Democrats and Republicans in political activism in four areas -- contacting an elected official, contributing money to a candidate or party, attending a political rally, or working/volunteering for a candidate or party.

While there are differences in the age groups, one thing is consistent -- Democrats are more politically active this year than Republicans. Why is that important? Because politically active people WILL VOTE (and they are more likely to encourage others to vote).

This does not insure a Democratic victory in the November election, but it does make it much more likely.

"March For Our Lives" Was Powerful Because It Was Inclusive

(Photo of participants in the "March For Our Lives" is from NBC News.)

The students who started the "March For Our Lives" movement were from a predominantly White high school in a fairly upscale community. If they had just limited their movement to calling for an end to school violence, they could have drawn a few thousand participants, and their movement would have fizzled out as many anti-gun movements in the past have done. But they were smarter than that and more caring -- and they understood that gun violence is a larger issue that affects all Americans (especially urban areas).

They reached out to communities that have far too long been ignored by our media and our politicians, and they invited those communities to participate. And that made their movement special and far more powerful than it could have been otherwise.

America didn't just see a few White students in that march. They saw the full range of diversity in this country -- and that was true not only of those who spoke from the stage, but also the millions who marched. They showed us the real America -- a nation of diversity. And they showed us the America that could exist if we lived up to our ideals -- a diverse nation loving and caring for each other.

We heard speeches from the students in Parkland and the students in Newtown. But we also heard from young people who live with the threat of violence every day (both in their schools and outside of them). We were shown a picture of how gun violence affects people across this nation -- and that made the experience much more powerful.

I admire these young people of all races and ethnicities -- both those who spoke and those who participated in the marches across this country. And I think they are going to remain a formidable force to be reckoned with in the future. They just got a taste of the power their generation has, and no one is going to be able to put that genie back in the bottle.

Let me say this to those remarkable young people. Activism is necessary to change the country, but it is not easy. There will be times when the goal will seem unreachable, but you must not give up or give in. What you are trying to achieve is too important. Remember the words of Gandhi, who understood the difficulty of social activism and the need for it.

Tom Hayden Switches Support From Sanders To Clinton

Tom Hayden (pictured here is a photo from tellingstories.org) was one of the leaders of the student revolutionary movement of the 1960's and 70's. He was one of the founders of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and served as its president, and he was a freedom rider in the civil rights movement. His leftist credentials are impeccable, and he continues to support progressive ideals and movements.

One might think he would naturally be a supporter of Bernie Sanders in this presidential campaign -- and he initially was. But he has switched his support to Hillary Clinton. Why? Here is some of what he had to say about that in The Nation:

Voting on June 7 is a personal responsibility for myself and other Californians, just as it is for my friends and colleagues in New York on April 19. What is to be done in this agonizing situation? I still believe a united front against the Republicans is the best and most necessary strategy. But I can’t vote for a united front on June 7.

I intend to vote for Hillary Clinton in the California primary for one fundamental reason. It has to do with race. My life since 1960 has been committed to the causes of African Americans, the Chicano movement, the labor movement, and freedom struggles in Vietnam, Cuba and Latin America. In the environmental movement I start from the premise of environmental justice for the poor and communities of color. My wife is a descendant of the Oglala Sioux, and my whole family is inter-racial.

What would cause me to turn my back on all those people who have shaped who I am? That would be a transgression on my personal code. I have been on too many freedom rides, too many marches, too many jail cells, and far too many gravesites to breach that trust. And I have been so tied to the women’s movement that I cannot imagine scoffing at the chance to vote for a woman president. When I understood that the overwhelming consensus from those communities was for Hillary—for instance the Congressional Black Caucus and Sacramento’s Latino caucus—that was the decisive factor for me. I am gratified with Bernie’s increasing support from these communities of color, though it has appeared to be too little and too late. Bernie’s campaign has had all the money in the world to invest in inner city organizing, starting 18 months ago. He chose to invest resources instead in white-majority regions at the expense of the Deep South and urban North.

Bernie comes from a place that is familiar to me, the New York culture of democratic socialism. From the Port Huron Statement forward, I have believed in the democratic public control of resources and protecting the rights of labor. My intellectual hero is C. Wright Mills, a Marxist who broke with what he condemned as the stale “labor metaphysic” of the communist and socialist parties, embracing instead an international New Left led by young middle-class students around the world. Mills was fresh, honest, and always searching. The 1962 Port Huron Statement declared that we needed liberals for their relevance in achieving reforms, and socialists for their deeper critique of underlying systems. We did not declare ourselves for socialism but for a massive expansion of the New Deal, combined with an attack on the Cold War arms race. We called for a basic realignment of the Democratic Party through the force of social movements, but not through a third party. We even went “part of the way with LBJ” in the face of the 1964 Goldwater threat. From there the Democrats divided over race and Vietnam, eventually leading to Nixon. Even in the ’80s and ’9os, our campaign for “economic democracy” chose not to identify as a socialist movement. With the coming of the 2008 Wall Street crash and Bernie’s campaign, our political culture has changed profoundly in its tolerance of socialist ideas. But is it enough after this truly divisive primary season?

I wish our primary could focus more on ending wars and ending regime change too, issues where Bernie is more dovish and Hillary still harbors an inner hawk. Both Bernie and Hillary call for “destroying” ISIS, whatever that might mean—but it certainly means we are moving into yet another “war presidency.” At least there is strong bipartisan opposition to the open-ended deployment of troops on the ground. But Hillary’s penchant for intervention and regime change can only be thwarted by enough progressive Democrats in Congress and massive protests in the streets and online. Neither candidate so far is calling for the creation of a new peace movement, but that’s the only way to check the drift into another war.

So here we are, at the end of one generation on the left and the rise of another. Both camps in the party will need each other in November—more than either side needs to emerge triumphant in the primary. We still need the organizing of a united front of equals to prevail against the Republicans. It will take a thorough process of conflict resolution to get there, not a unilateral power wielding by the usual operatives. It’s up to all of us. 

Back To The Police State

I'm an older guy and I remember well the government intrusions on private United States citizens back in the 1960s and 1970s.   Back then anyone who opposed the policies of the U.S. government and weren't afraid of airing those views were branded as un-American and were spied upon by the FBI and other policing agencies (at the federal, state and local levels).   But while the spying on American citizens was widespread, the most egregious violators of citizens' rights was the FBI.

I have been a left-winger since those times myself, and I have consorted with many activists who opposed U.S. government policies and engaged in some demonstrations also.   I wouldn't doubt if there was a file in the FBI archives with my name on it.   But those outrageous activities by the FBI were exposed and many believed they had been curtailed from repeating those same police state tactics.

But then a few fundamentalist religious nuts took out a couple of buildings in New York City and another in Oklahoma.   This has terrified many Americans -- most of whom have little or nothing to fear from terrorists.   This fear has caused the government to once again begin violating the rights of its own citizens.   It began with the Patriot Act, then went on to silly and unnecessary airport restrictions and regulations, and now it looks like the FBI is up to their old tricks again.

Americans like to brag about living in a free country, but with each passing day we are living more and more in a country that is starting to look like a police state -- where the government locks up their social and political problems and spies on citizens and conducts unwarranted raids on the homes of citizens.   We are once again letting our fears eat away our freedoms by letting the government assume powers our Founding Fathers never wanted it to have.

Last Friday was a prime example of how bad things are getting.   In Minneapolis and Chicago, several residences and at least one office were raided by the FBI.   While no one was arrested, the places were searched and computer equipment was seized.   The residents were given subpoenas requiring them to testify before a federal grand jury -- and subpoenas were also issued in Illinois and Michigan.

There is no evidence that any of the people raided or given subpoenas have broken any law -- if there was they would have been arrested and charged.   No, this is old-time government harassment of citizens who disagree with government policy.   All of the people were activists and connected to activist organizations such as the Palestine Solidarity Group, the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, the Twin Cities Anti-War Committee, and the Students for a Democratic Society.

None of these are violent groups or promote violence in any way.   But that didn't matter in the 60s and 70s and doesn't seem to matter now.   And those on the right shouldn't be celebrating these civil rights violations, because groups on the right are being spied on also.   It is just a sad fact that the present government, like those in the past, will only allow disagreement within a very narrow limit.   That is not only un-American, but it is the definition of a police state.

Americans need to make a decision and act on it.   Do they want to be afraid and let the government control their lives and political beliefs, or do they want to be free.   You can't have both.   I choose freedom over fear.   What do you choose?