Democrats Running on Empty and Living on a Prayer

In the 2014 elections, the Democrats' only "Hail Mary" hope in Hell had been, not just keeping the Senate, but winning back the House as well. Now (maybe for an entire generation) the Democrats have lost almost any chance at all of getting back any meaningful political power in Washington for a very long time to come — because their messaging during the 2014 elections was such an utter and dismal failure.

Rather than running on a more "populist" message (such as Senator Elizabeth Warren's), most of the Democrats had run on a "moderate" message — and many just ran away. Robert Reich wrote on his blog, "The midterm elections should have been about jobs and wages, and how to reform a system where nearly all the gains go to the top. It was an opportunity for Democrats to shine. Instead, they hid."

Now with a GOP/Tea Party Congress controlling either:

1) both the Senate and the House,
2) or just the House,
3) or just the Senate,

...what can someone such as Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden (or anybody else as a Democratic President) ever hope to accomplish after 2016? Is there anything they can achieve two years from now that Obama (if he wanted to) couldn't already do today? They would all have to govern almost exclusively by their veto power and executive orders.

The Democrats should have stuck to the same messaging (that worked the last time) that got voters to the polls to defeat Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election:

  • Raising the federal minimum wage, to put pressure on all employers to raise everyone's wages (and reduce the need for government assistance, like food stamps).
  • Taxing the billionaires the same tax rate as Warren Buffett's secretary to help reduce the federal debt.
  • Reforming the tax code so that multinational corporations pay their fair share of taxes (rather than allowing them to hoard trillions in offshore banks).
  • Reforming the financial sector and penalizing bankers for their illegal behavior, and stop allowing them to continue to manipulate the markets.
  • Reform the way college educations are financed, and supporting public education (and trade/skills programs) so that one doesn't have to come from a very wealthy family to attend a private 12-K school or an elite and very expensive University.
  • Saving and strengthening Social Security and Medicare so that younger workers can have something to rely on when they get too old or sick to work any longer (Republicans might require them to work even longer before retiring and then giving them a far lesser benefit — especially if Social Security is ever privatized by the GOP.)
  • Reminding working-class white voters that they use more government assistance than minorities do (and that the Democrats are not just the party for minorities or poor people, but for all working-class Americans — because over 94% of all wage earners make $118,500 or less a year (which is the maximum cap for Social Security taxes).
  • Reminding voters that the XL pipeline will only create 20,000 jobs to build over 2 years, and is said to only create about 40 permanent jobs — and that about 95% of the oil will come from Canada and will be sold on the global market, and will not do anything make the U.S. more "energy independent". The argument is always being made that moving the oil by pipeline is much better than moving it on Warren Buffett's railroads; but why move Canadian oil through the U.S. at all? Can't Canada refine and export their own oil? (Not to mention, the danger of running an oil pipeline over America's largest freshwater aquifer, because the GOP wants LESS government regulation and wants to eliminate the EPA — those who help clean up oil spills.)
  • Blocking bad trade agreements like the TPP that will give corporations even more power and control and will further hurt American workers. (Many Democrats have already learned from past trade deals, and want no more of them.)
  • Remind white voters and our senior citizens how they've been voting against their own best economic interests because of Republican propaganda and fear-mongering (the Democrats don't have their hands on your Medicare, but the Republicans will have their hands all over it with Paul Ryan's budget.)
  • Instead of repealing Obamacare, why not make it better? — or replace it with something such as Medicare for All. The GOP wants to repeal and replace Obamacare with Nothing at All.

The Republicans who are now in Congress are against most things that primarily benefit average American workers. But with the recent Supreme Court decisions favoring money in politics* (and voter suppression laws), how can we ever hope to change the Congress? And how can we reverse those horrible Supreme Court decisions with an amendment to the Constitution (and changing the election laws) with any Congress? We need publicly funded elections on the local, state and federal levels. (* The Supreme Court who ruled in Citizens United vs. FEC and in McCutcheon vs. FEC have effectively allowed the very wealthy and large corporations to steal U.S. elections to get legislation passed that mostly benefits them.)

The Supremes that killed Democracy

With congressional district gerrymandering, voter suppression ID laws, and anti-democratic dark money, how can any changes at all ever be made? What would President Elizabeth Warren’s plan be to counter any of this? Harry Reid only belatedly chose her for a leadership position in the Senate...but that's too little, too late. He should have done that right after she was first elected to the Senate on her more populist message. That might have greatly helped the Democrats during the 2014 mid-term elections.

The old school Democrats have proved during the last mid-term elections that they don’t have what it takes to get out the vote on their more “moderate” / “centrist” / “third way” form of messaging. They are too cowardly to run on middle-class and progressive values for fear of being called “socialists” by the Republicans (especially in red states). But Democrats have to remind voters that even red states overwhelmingly voted for a progressive Democrat when they voted for FDR in four consecutive elections. Is the current Democratic party ashamed of FDR, the way they apparently were of Obama?

The Washington Examiner (published by MediaDC, a subsidiary of the ultra-neo-conservative Clarity Media, which also includes The Weekly Standard and Red Alert Politics) recently wrote:

"Senate Democratic leaders are quietly cheering Republican senators such as Texas' Ted Cruz, Kentucky’s Rand Paul and Florida’s Marco Rubio to run for president in 2016. Their reason: Pulling just three Republicans out of the Senate to campaign essentially eliminates the new GOP majority in the chamber."

But they are off by a count of "1" — because there will mostly likely be 54 Republicans vs. 46 Democrats in the Senate after Senator Mary L. Landrieu (D-Louisiana) loses her runoff election. So the GOP would more than likely still maintain control of Senate. And a Senate race analysis of 2015-2016 shows a "tossup" for Harry Reid's State of Nevada, with the remainder being "safe" or "leaning" for Republicans. (Here's the next round of Senators up for re-election).

Going into the next election cycle of 2016, there appears to be no dramatic changes possible in the House and Senate in Congress. And any Democrat that might be elected President would most likely face the same exact political and policy frustrations that President Obama experienced all throughout his presidency — the only difference being, who will "compromise" (give away) more to the Republicans. Someone like Bernie Sanders wouldn't cave in on the TPP trade agreement, whereas, Obama (beholden to his corporate donors) probably would — even though he might use it as a bargaining chip for compromise on some other legislation.

The Democrats needed to, not move more to the supposed "center", but more to the "supposed "left", which is the actual "center" for most Americans — despite what the major media will try and have us believe (90% of the media is owned by 6 large corporations).

More Democrats need to join and promote the progressive caucus, who promote the values that most Americans (sometimes, unknowingly) actually agree with — like raising wages and strengthening Social Security.

So the question still remains: What can Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden (or any other Democrat for that matter) ever hope to accomplish in 2016 that President Obama can’t already do today? Especially since the Democrats are now Running on Empty and Living on a Prayer.

Meta: 

Comments

The Democrats just need to go back to being Democrats

The core problem, IMO, that Americans are facing is the way wages are dropping relative to productivity- http://politicsthatwork.com/graphs/wages-as-a-percentage-of-productivity

There are two main things eating up the rest of the productivity: employer profit taking and the cost of benefits-http://politicsthatwork.com/graphs/division-of-productivity

Only the Democrats can even talk about either of those things and they have a whole laundry list of ways to solve each of them. They just need to put that message out there to the people loudly and clearly.

"had ran"????? Note to journalist

I am aware that the Net has so few editors to check for errors, but a so-called journalist ought to be able to conjugate verbs. "Had ran" which is an error in this piece, despite the value or invalidity of its message, so distracts the reader from the message as to force us to conclude the journalist is ignorant, which, I'm sure, isn't the case. Watch your language, especially if you're trying to convince others of your point of view.

Thanks!

...for the English lesson and for referring to me as a "so-called journalist". Maybe one day I might be ;)

states voted for raising minimum wage when on ballot plus GOP

Most interesting in that states where raising the minimum wage was on the ballot it passed with flying colors while they voted in GOP who reject minimum wage. Super blue Oregon voted almost 80% against illegals getting driver's licenses yet voted in an obviously corrupt liberal governor.

What I get out of this is people do not want what Obama keeps pushing but they don't want what the GOP keeps pushing either. In other words, if we had true representation, instead of corporate money pushing and saturating the airwaves so instead of elections we get mass psychology manipulation hysteria.

Media Control

None of those presidents has ever abused their media control to blast individuals in congress. Imagine what would happen with a tattletale president moaning about whoever for whatever reason.

"Dear American people, such and such hates how good your life is, and wants more money. Such and such thinks you shouldn't have the right to choose anything for yourself, blah blah blah."

Rand Paul: Hilary Clinton’s Worst Nightmare?

SOURCE:
http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2014/11/18/this-is-why-rand-paul-is-hilary-...

The author believes that the Democrats have a strategy to marginalize Elizabeth Warren to better promote Hillary Clinton; but that Rand Paul might run to beat Clinton in 2016 — and to the dismay of the more neo-conservatives. (And then maybe the new Congress might obstruct Rand Paul the same way they did Obama.)

"The Huffington Post published an article detailing how the Democrat establishment had already made its move to cleverly neuter Warren by giving her more power within the Senate. For example:

'Throughout Senate history, individual members have often steered away from leadership positions, worried that the horse-trading and consensus-gathering that leadership involves would neuter their power. But the Senate has been evolving in recent years into a much more leadership-driven institution, in which individual senators and even chairmen have less power than they once did compared to caucus leadership. Today, decisions that would have been made in side negotiations, in committee or on the floor are instead made by leadership ... It’s those meetings that Warren will now be a part of. At the same time, she will diminish her ability to maintain that inside position if she criticizes the party from the outside. That dilemma, however, has been with her every step of her career, as she has moved closer to the center of power.'

We’ll see how this turns out, but it looks to me that the Democrats are giving her [Warren] a sense of importance so she 'plays ball'. Particularly when it comes to 2016."

I think Warren is trying to learn to play ball

She has to, especially in that God forsaken corporate bought and paid for institution. if she doesn't, she'll get very little for her state.

Bernie Sanders is a good example of how to play ball and not lose one's integrity but even he has made some outrageous votes in the last few years.

Democrats

The U.S. Is that very rare thing, a judicial dictatorship. Even short periods of Democratic control of the Senate fail to change the right wing majority on the Supreme Court.
So why don't Democrats learn the obvious lesson. Focus on states rights, cut back on Federal spending which goes to Republican areas and spend the money in places where Democrats rule. At the moment the Right are being given a free pass. Their supporters get the benefits without
Providing support. Of course, the big mistake was not allowing the South to secede so it could rot in poverty.

Obama in bed with tax dodgers

As of November 12, Antonio Weiss is President Obama’s pick to oversee the domestic financial system — including the implementation of the Dodd-Frank financial reform act and consumer protection agency at the Treasury. Antonio Weiss also put together the deal for Burger King to move to Canada to avoid taxes. Elizabeth Warren proclaimed:“Enough is enough. It’s time for the Obama administration to loosen the hold that Wall Street banks have over economic policy making.”

http://www.thenation.com/blog/191289/next-big-fight-between-progressives...

Senator Chuck Schumer might be right...

He is making points that outraged me back in 2009 when I once considered myself a Republican (before converting to a Progressive by the end of 2010).

The New York Times quotes New York Senator Chuck Schumer:

"Democrats blew the opportunity the American people gave them. We took their mandate and put all of our focus on the wrong problem – health care reform. The plight of uninsured Americans and the hardships caused by unfair insurance company practices certainly needed to be addressed. But it wasn’t the change we were hired to make; Americans were crying out for an end to the recession, for better wages and more jobs; not for changes in their health care. This makes sense considering that 85 percent of all Americans got their health care from either the government – Medicare or Medicaid – or their employer. And if health care costs were going up, it didn’t really affect them."

After reading through that New York Times article (and their links) read Paul Krugman's take
here at Mark Thoma's blog and then read his reader's comments.

Then read this: Who Pays for the Minimum Wage? (which is also at Mark Thoma's blog; and after reading that article, read all his reader's comments).

As an aside: December 5, 2014 marks a new all-time record high for the DOW: 17,991.19

http://www.google.com/finance?cid=983582