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After months of denial regarding the spread COVID-19, Donald Trump first embraced the role of being a "wartime president," then shifted again to wanting the war over immediately, saying, "We don't want the cure to be worse than the disease." A chorus of conservative voices quickly echoed him, suggestingolder Americans should be happy to die to save the economy "for their children." Although Trump hastemporarily retreated on that front, he appeared to feint toward that message again this week,and we'll be hearing echoes of it again, repeatedly.

This new line of argument vividly reminded me of the "South Park" episode"Margaritaville," discussed in striking fashion in Anat Shenker-Osorio's2012 book, "Don't Buy It: The Trouble with Talking Nonsense about the Economy,"which I enthusiastically reviewed at the time. "Don't Buy It" was based on three years of research into how economists, journalists, advocates, think tanks and others think and communicate about the economy, and the breadth of Shenker-Osorio's research made it all the more striking how well that episode captured a fundamental truth about our pervasive economic confusion a confusion that's now deadlier than ever.

That alone was enough reason to want to talk to her. But as it happens, Shenker-Osorio hasalso just released a COVID-19 messaging guide, whichbuilt on the race-class narrative project that I wrote about in 2018. "In moments of crisis, new narratives, new policies and new social behaviors are established," the guide begins. "How we act and what we say in this moment can help define perceptions, assumptions and policy preferences in our communities, states and country."

With so much of the future at stake in this moment, I couldn't think of anyone who could shed a more light on the bewildering and competing messaging around this dire historical moment.This transcript of our recent conversationhas been edited for clarity and length.

Your book "Don't Buy It" starts out with a discussion of the "South Park" episode "Margaritaville," which, properly understood, tells us a great deal about how confused we are and why, when it comes to thinking about economics. What happens in that episode?

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Roughly speaking, the residents of the Colorado town where the series take place face a grave economic downturn and, in trying to make sense of it, decide the economy is an angry and vengeful god to whom they've not paid sufficient homage. They attempt to appease this deity until one of the kids, toga-clad, gives a rousing speech about how the economy isn't actually real. It's merely how we measure what humans do.

What does it tell us about how economic matters are commonly portrayed anddiscussed?

Both when I wrote "Don't Buy It" and disturbingly, more so right now the economy is often portrayed as an all-powerful, personified entity. Previously, we would hear politicians admonish that we can't pass X policy because it will "hurt the economy" as if it were a being to which we owe our efforts and loyalties. And now, all the more brazenly, Republicanstellus we must sacrifice ourselves or perhaps our elders to the economy. When, as we know, the economy is ahuman invention; it's merely a means to measure what humans do.

Further, much like when priests were considered the lone conduits to God, today's Wall Streetbankers and corporate CEOs are modern interlocutors uniquely positioned to understand, prop up and maintain the economy. Just as pre-Reformation Catholics may have felt disdain at their priests selling indulgences, we may harbor anger toward this wealthiest one percent,but we're chastened not to go against their wishes lest we stir the wrath of "the economy."

You went on to discuss how conservatives have two clearly defined models or metaphors related to the economy, one describing whatit is, and the other whywe need to treat it deferentially.So, first:What's the "what"?

Conservatives, aided and abetted by progressives who also unwittingly employ the metaphor, tend to talk about the economy as a body. You can hear this expressed in language like "it's suffering" or "the economy is thriving." We have a "recovery bill" to get the economy "off life support" and "restore it to health." What this metaphor suggests is that in grave cases, we must "resuscitate the patient" (perhaps with a stimulus bill.) But as inthe business of daily living, you don't really want continuous external meddling with what your body does. And sothis lends credence to a laissez-faire approach to viewing government actions as "interference" that harms the all-critical market best left to its own devices. This outlines how we're meant to understand the economy, unconsciously the "what" of the thing.

And the "why"?

Historically, the right has peddled the notion that the economy was there to reward the good and punish the bad. Essentially, it's meant to incentivize desirable behavior i.e., working hard, investing, trying to amass more and keep people from laziness or imprudent spending. Thus, a program like welfare is deemed problematic because, in a worldview where your economic lot is purely of your own making, it rewards those who've made bad choices.

We're seeing this play out right now in debate about unemployment insurance in the stimulus with Republicans up in arms about how paying people (a pittance) will make them loathe or unwilling to work. Paul Ryan, for example, famously railed against welfare as a hammock that lulled people into complacency.

Yetwe see progressives attempt to make arguments about how social welfare programs will "grow the economy" in the hopes of sounding like the reasonable adults in the room. This tacitly reaffirms the toxic idea that our purpose ought to be to serve the economy that the correct evaluation of policy is how it affects the GDP, and not actual humans. Andit doesn't even move conservatives because it still butts up against this idea that helping people who haven't done the right things is fundamentally wrong.

In essence, what the right fails to understand or just pretends not to get is this: Thereason that people are poor is that they have no money. That's it. And they've been systematically blocked from having enough by a racist, xenophobic and plutocratic system designed to take the wealth that everyday working people create and hand it to an ever smaller, decidedly white, generally male, few.

This dovetails with what we've heard from Trump and others, focusing on saving the economy anddownplaying the cost of human lives. Is there anything more specific you'd like to add?

Traditionally, the right-wing story on the economy had two parts. The first, as outlined by Ian Haney Lpez in"Dog Whistle Politics"and"Merge Left" [Salon interview:part oneandpart two], is that government is bad because it takes from good "hardworking people" (who we're meant to understand are white) and gives it to undeserving ones expecting handouts (dog whistle for black and brown.) Thus we should dislike and distrust government and want to contain its size and reach. The second part of the tale was that if you work hard in America, this land of opportunity for every rugged individual, you get your just reward in the form of sweet cash and piles of it. But the "work hard" part was always key.

What's been remarkable and, I believe, not well noted, is that Trump has largely abandoned the "work hard" part of the story. Since he came down that escalator to announce his campaign, he has relied on weaponizing racism, blaming some "other" to his aggrieved white base, without the corresponding push to put nose to grindstone.

Andobviously, this strategy of scapegoating, of deliberately attempting to divide us to distract from his total incompetence and unrelenting cruelty, is on full display with COVID-19. The "other" selected may vary but the same playbook applies.

You also found that progressives have a coherent model, as well, but that it's not nearly so widely recognized or articulated. What is that model and how does it help us better understand what the economy actually is, as well as what we should do?

Progressives do sometimes talk in a more helpful metaphor that likens the economy to a vehicle. You can hear this in language like "it's on the right track" or "the economy is veering out of control." Indeed, the language of economics borrows heavily from physics, with "acceleratingjob losses" and "friction," for example. But, we also use the aforementioned personified language, among other simplifying models. This makes it challenging to establish a clear, coherent, repeated refrain that unconsciously conveys to our audiences what the economy is.

The vehicle model helpfully implies a role for government. Just as we'd expect a car to have a driver in order to maintain control and get us to our desired destination, using language that unconsciously suggests that the economy can be understood as a vehicle primes audiences to desire an outside controller to "steer" the way.

A vehicle model, or other language that reminds listeners the economy isnotan element out of nature but rather a product of the decisions we make, lays the foundation that the purpose of the economy is to serve people. To extend the original metaphor, to get us where we need and want to go with as smooth and enjoyable a ride as possible. The economy must serve our needs, since it's merely the sum of our endeavors. Not the other way around.

How does this relate to what progressives should be arguing for now?

Applying this to today's debate, we are now fully enmeshed in the consequences of having accepted the right's framing for decades. They contend that you appease and please the economy by giving tax cuts to rich people and, now,handing kickbacks to corporations. The left, meanwhile, has argued that we help the economy by raising wages or enacting social programs or making health care more affordable.We agreed to let them set the terms and have been left debating who loves the economy best instead of forcing the far more relevant discussion: Whatis best for people.

Every time we argued, for example, that something was an "investment," we primed expectation that decision making in politics ought to center on GDP growth, not human welfare. Every time we contended that, say, Medicare for All would be much cheaper, we indicated we agree that health care should rightly be a market good and now we'll haggle over the price. This is the very definition of a morally bankrupt argument.

And now that we're in this COVID-19 moment, we're on defense about people's lives and well-being. What we need to do is insist that life and health cannot be for sale. If a large number of people have to die in order for the economy to work, the economy doesn't work. And it never has.

It seems fair to say that conservatives have much more politically potent, widely-shared metaphors for talking about the economy ones that naturalize and moralize the existing order of things while progressives have less prominentbut much more realistic ones. You've studied many other political issues over the years. How does this situation relate to the broader issue landscape?

Conservatives have message and metaphor discipline. They have set overarching frames for talking about their worldview and then tightly controlled talking points for conveying their issues that emerge out of them. This allows them to always break a signal through the political noise. Sadly, research demonstrates that a message that's been heard more frequently is deemed more credible. Something you've heard often requires less cognitive load to process you can fill in the ending once you hear the opening lines.

Meanwhile, as has been widely catalogued, the left has many different, sometimes contradictory, frames and messages for the same issue. We have disparate organizations and leaders who often each have their own unique encapsulation. And on top of this, a tendency to want to get really creative and say something new create new branding, a new slogan each and every time. All of this works against our ability to get heard.

Sothat's the first problem:a multiplicity of narratives or frames as opposed to an unrelenting and coherent drumbeat.

The second problem is when we get in our own way byinadvertently reinforcing narratives at odds with what we want people to believe. Besides the examples named above arguing for universal care on the basis that it's cheaper, making the case for wage hikes as ways to grow the GDP, etc. we can add others. For example, the acceptance of the insurance industry talking point "pre-existing conditions." What this actually means is occupying a human body; there is no person on this earth without fallible body parts. Instead, we've helped prop up the notion that denying people coverage based on how our bodies work and what has happened to them makes sense.

In 2017 and 2018, you took part in a major project developing "race-class narratives" thatshow how progressives can win by embracingrather than running away from the intersection of racial and economic issues. This wasin part drawn from the work of Ian Haney Lpez, as you touched on already, but there was also continuity with your work in "Don't Buy It."

As I referenced earlier, the Race Class Narrative project emerged out of Haney Lpez's recognition that the right has weaponized race (among other identities) in order to keep working people divided so they can continue to pass policies that funnel wealth to their lobbyists and donors while pointing the finger elsewhere as the cause of our hardships. This project sought to craft and then systematically test out narratives that could weave together issues of race and class in order to both act as a ready rejoinder to this right-wing race baiting and prove more effective than standard left colorblind populism.

What we found, in broad strokes, is that messages that explicitly name race outperform those that stick only to economic issues, not merely with our progressive base but also with voters in the middle. And this was as true in a nationally representative sample when we first tested in 2017-2018 as right now, whenwe've just completed a fresh look among voters in six Midwestern states.

What's an example of these narratives?

An example would be: No matter what we look like, or where we come from, most of us work hard for our families. But today, certain politicians divide us from each other based onour color, our background, or what's in our wallets, hoping we'll look the other way while they hand kickbacks to their corporate donors and deny us the basics every working family needs. By joining together across racial differences, we can elect new leaders who will govern for all of us, not just the wealthy few.

That's just one example, but there are permutations of this narrative applied to criminal justice, education equity, revenue, immigrant rights and climate change, just to name a few. For a closer look at one robust and successful way we deployed this narrative in 2018, you can check out this "Greater Than Fear" episode about Minnesota.

What was most significant in terms of continuity with your earlier work on economics?

There is massive continuity across projects I've been lucky enough to be part of, beginning with work done on how to talk about poverty with Community Change, as well as related studies on how to talk about the economy and inequality, in particular. The through-line centers most around best practices in messaging, whatever the topic.

In brief, effective messages follow a set order: They first name a shared value;second, describe the problem; and third, offer an affirmative solution rather than an amelioration of harms. In contrast, standard progressive messaging often errs by having an opening salvo that's I like to call, "Boy, have I got a problem for you!"

Many other lessons like naming clear agents and avoiding negation learned earlier and summarized in this handbook are still very much in effect in what we see works for a race-class narrative message as well.

What was most significant that was new?

The most significant was the central importance and effectiveness of explicitly naming race, both in our opening shared value and then again in narrating deliberate division or scapegoating.

In essence, politics isn't solitaire. We don't get to decide what voters do and don't hear because we can't make our opposition be quiet. Soour choice to stay silent about race, to not bring up immigrant rights, to not discuss reproductive health caredoesn't end conversations about these issues. It just means all conflicted voters hear is what the other side spews about them.

How politically powerful or persuasive were these "race-class narratives"?

Both in the initial testing, in subsequent forms of testing using different methods and in independent verifications by other pollsters, race-class narrative messages have demonstrated their efficacy. This has also held true in large-scale randomized controlled trials.And this is both for persuasion, shifting voters toward our policy preferences and beliefs,and mobilization, motivating ideologically aligned audiences to take action.

You recently put out a COVID-19 messaging guide, which among other things included narratives that vividly reminded me of the race-class narratives.

The guidance on COVID-19 follows the same formin terms of ordering, calling out villains in active constructions, offering positive directives to create good rather than ameliorate harms and so on.

An example would be: No matter what we look like, where we liveor what's in our wallets, getting sick reminds us that at our corewe're all just human.But for too long, we've let a powerful few divide us to pad their own profits by makinglife and health a product for sale and blocking our efforts to ensure paid time to care for our loved ones and recover ourselves. We must rewrite the rules to ensure everyone can access the care that we need withoutfearing we'll go bankrupt to do it. This is a moment that we muststand with and for each other across our differences and against anything and anyone who seeks to divide us.

What's particular to the COVID-19 case, or perhaps more acute, is the incredible need to hold in check the absolutely understandable fear and anxiety we are all feeling. Fear evokes in many of us a freeze response, an instinct to shut down and hold tight to what little we've got to try and protect those closest to us. This is all the more salient when public health practices demand that we keep physical distance. (Note how unhelpful it is to use the phrase "social distancing" in lieu of "physical distancing," precisely when we need social solidarity to an unprecedented extent.)

To the extent our messaging evokes a negative emotion again, only after we open with that shared value it ought to be anger. Anger at the incompetent and corrupt "leaders" who have imperiled so many more of us than necessary rather than fear for our own lives and those of others. Anger is an energizing, catalytic, negative emotion.

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Trump, the pandemic and "the economy": How progressives can fight his message - Salon

Although the Democratic primaries in the United States are a drawn out state by state process with varying rules for each contest, while the election of a leader for the British equivalent of that party, Labor, is a national affair with voting only allowed for members, how leadership contests in both have now played out offers some bracing insights into the future prospects of the left in what we might call the English speaking world.

What is most frustrating for progressives looking at both countries is the return of the same tired centrist politics after a few short years of hope driven by popular policy ideas brought forward by leaders who could really contrast themselves to the dominance of the right in their own parties, at least on economic issues, leaving the stage.

This is especially true under the current circumstances, when grassroots organizing and protest have been rendered impossible.

That the left as a political force in both the United States and U.K. is on the decline at a time when the solutions to the current health crisis, especially for the working people forced from their jobs through no fault of their own, will at best be rebranded, short term versions of progressive policy ideas dismissed as impractical just a few months ago, is a tragedy that will likely be with us long after the current crisis has ended.

As we might expect given the countrys longer commitment to social democracy over time, this is at present more true of the U.K., where Conservatives have enacted such policies as keeping workers employed bypaying them 80% of their wagesthrough the crisis.

In the United States, the rhetoric about the suffering of working people has been similar, but the relief offered thus far has been focused more on the top than the bottom or even the middle, with a bailout thatmimics the worst aspectsof the corporate welfare provided to the countrys banking industry in 2008 on an even more massive scale.

On April 4th, the results for the Labor leadership contest elevated Sir Keir Starmer to the partys top spot, with the former Head of the Crown Prosecution Service getting a little over 56% of the vote. His self-labeling as a socialist aside, the new leader, who handily defeated the second place finisher, Rebecca Long Bailey, considered the ideological successor to outgoing leader Jeremy Corbyn, represents the return to dominance of the moderate Blairite wing of the party.

Starmer, who has the kind of semi-chiseled features we might expect in a politician in a B movie, was the oppositions Shadow Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union prior to the last election in 2019. Despite divisions in the party over Brexit, Starmer made it clear throughout his tenure that he wished for the country to remain in the union and that he supported a second referendum. While the split in the Conservative government between the two sides was more visible at the time, it was clear that many Labor voters supported leaving the E.U.

While the endless squabbles about Brexit already seem to come from a more frivolous time, one of the main things that hurt Corbyn, especially in the countrys traditionally Labor supporting north in the 2019 election was the complicated stance on the issue (favoring a 2ndreferendum on whatever deal he negotiated with the E.U. along with a Remain option on the ballot) forced on him by Labor Remainers like Starmer.

Corbyn, himself a long time Euro-skeptic of the left, who had rightfully faulted the E.U. for its lack of democracy over his career, has been proven right by the bodysresponseto the spread of the novel coronavirus. Had he been more willing to fight, Corbyn could have offered a different vision from the fantasy presented by rightwing Brexiters who seemed to believe that their country would somehow become the great trading power it had been in the 19thcentury but instead chose to try and balance these opposing views.

Regardless, Starmers election, at least after the complicated process to reach the threshold needed to participate in the party vote, was asimple, well run affair,with Labors almost 600,000 party members using a ranked system to vote either by internet or mail and no need for these voters to take the risk of going to the polls at a time when health officials in most countries are asking people to shelter in place in their homes. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for the Democratic primaries on the other side of the Atlantic.

With Senator Bernie Sanders effectively exiting the race for the Democratic nomination this past Wednesday, any momentum the American progressive movement had feels lost. A major blow not only to the American left but numerous movements around the world inspired by it

While the vicious smears circulated by much of the U.K. press, which I am tired of re-litigating, ultimately undid Corbynism, at the same time, the undemocratic processes of the Democratic Party make it seem in hindsight that, just like his British counterpart, Senator Sanders never had a chance.

The Democratic party establishment and their allies in major media have shown their power over the selection of their presidential candidate in myriad ways during this cycle, from stage managed endorsements to a deeply flawed and failed process in Iowa (to say nothing ofsuspicious discrepanciesbetween exit polls and machine counts). However, the most egregious, even criminal abuse was going ahead with primary elections in several states during a pandemic, putting voters and poll workers at risk for what appeared to be purely political reasons.

Scenes in Wisconsin this past Tuesday should have terrified politicians (and citizens) on both sides of the American political spectrum. With just5 of 180 polling places openin Milwaukee alone due to a lack of workers, lineups were much longer than they should have been and social distancing seemed like an impossibility in the most heavily populated parts of the state.

Most heartbreaking were the voices of those waiting to exercise their right as citizens, scared but resolute in their desire to have a voice not only in the presidential primary but in local and state contests and in filling a seat on the states already Republican controlled Supreme Court.

As Quinn Blackshere, 27, of Milwaukeetold Buzzfeed Newsafter standing in line two hours to cast her ballot, People are strong and are willing to stand in these lines, but its not whats best for us. This isnt a fair choice to make.

The majority of the blame for the debacle should be placed firmly on the shoulders of Republicans, from those in the states legislature who voted to go ahead with the vote as planned all the way up to the United States Supreme Court, which denied the state the right to extend the deadline for absentee ballots.

As Wisconsins Democratic governor, Tony Evers, who desperately tried to postpone the elections,explained at a recent press conference, At every turn, they have fought, even all the way to the Supreme Court, even the most basic and commonsense proposals to ensure a safe and fair election. Theres no shame in changing course to keep people safe. And, quite frankly, to save lives. Our allegiance cannot be to party or ideology. It must be to the people of Wisconsin and their safety.

Having said this, the presumed Democratic nominee, Joe Biden,whose campaignhad called for the election to go ahead as planned, when asked by George Stephanoupolis of ABC News the day before the vote whether going ahead with it was, wise, said, Whatever the science says, we should do, without specifying that everything medical authorities had been saying for weeks demanded a postponement, instead engaging in empty platitudes about American democracy surviving earlier crises.

After the vote took place the following day, whenspeaking to CNNs Chris Cuomo, the former vice president walked back his and his campaigns previous statements, saying the election should have never taken place.

Also, while it was earlier in this crisis, it shouldnt be forgotten that the partys leadership,represented by DNC Chair Tom Perez, called for the Florida, Arizona and Illinois to go ahead with primaries on March 17th, with at least2 poll workersin Florida later found to be infected.

After what has been revealed so starkly about the whole political class in most western countries by this ongoing health crisis, voters in both the U.S. and the U.K., especially on the left, will need to be wary of growing calls for unity governments, which will hamper the ability of formerly opposition parties to criticize government actions.

For the time being, the left and the movements powering it must organize online, support the struggles of low wage workers suddenly deemed essential after being dismissed as unimportant for so many years and prepare for the struggles ahead.

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The eclipse of progressivism and the transatlantic return to the center - NationofChange

The downloads folder on my computer is jammed full right now with endless charts depicting data and analysis of both the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic shocks rolling across the world, and naturally they can tell a widely varying story depending on the data quality and, most crucial of all, the assumptions that go into any model that generates projections about the futureeven the near future. Experts and models disagree! Whod a thunk it?

More importantly, what is a responsible president or prime minister to do? President Trump is naturally taking fire for not following the experts, even though it is a simple matter to point out that the experts (including even the sainted Dr. Fauci) were downplaying the risks of the Coronavirus as late as the end of January, when liberals, the media, and some health experts howled at the moon when Trump imposed the travel ban on China. All the while, the experts at the CDC were botching the rollout of a reliable COVID-19 test.

More broadly, though, it is worth lingering for a moment on the fetish for expertise, which runs especially strong among progressives ever since Woodrow Wilson at least. No one is against specialized expertise as such. After all, when you want heart surgery or a complex legal transaction processed, you will naturally turn to an expert surgeon or lawyer. (Or auto mechanic if you need your car fixed, etc.) But as you move beyond this kind of common sense specialized expertise to a more general style of expertise as applied to complex social and political phenomena, the scene changes.

The great examination of this issue is Philip Tetlocks 2005 book Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know? The answer to his first subtitleHow Good Is It?is, not very. In fact, rather terrible. He begins the book by pointing out the massive failure of nearly all the experts to foresee the decline and collapse of the Soviet Union. I couldin fact have, in my two Reagan booksgo much further than Tetlock on this question, pointing out for example how bad the CIAs analysis of the Soviet Union was right up to the very end. I dont mean just off by 50 percent, but often completely wrong in the opposite direction. And yet liberals seemed shocked that the CIA didnt have much of a handle on bin Laden or Iraq back in 2001 and 2002.

While it is perfectly sensible to seek improvements in technical expertise and its integration into decision making by our political leaders, this misses the main point. For a century now, progressives have representedexpertiseas a distinct claim to rightful rule, akin to the classical claims on behalf of democracy and aristocracy. You can see this at work right now in the deep thinkers who are saying that Joe Biden ought to pick Bill Gates as his running mate, or that Dr. Fauci should be made president by acclamation.The progressive conceit of expertise lies at the heart of a lot of the progressive contempt for the non-credentialled deplorables of flyover country who, progressives think, dont deserve self-government.

Whenever a progressive says we should follow the evidence because we must have evidence-based policy-making, you should reach for your wallet (for starters). Because today we all too often have the opposite: policy-based evidence-making. This is especially true in the whole climate change circus, but it is also quite evident now in the virus crisis. Remember that Imperial College London model that predicted 250,000 deaths in the UK, subsequently scaled back to 20,000? The person behind that model, Neil Ferguson, gave an interview to the Financial Times today that includes this shocking admission that his model was a clear instance of policy-based evidence making:

The paper came out that day partly because there was pressure on government to be showing the modelling informing policymaking, so we worked very hard to get that paper out at that time.

To which the Financial Times comments:

The above implies the government was aware of the potential death toll or the one being projected by the scientists on their advisory committee, anyway but had not considered a drastic lockdown strategy until it became clear that the likely number of deaths from any other strategy would not be seen as politically acceptable. It seems, therefore, that the paper was published at that time partly to help justify a change in the messaging. AU-turn doesnt seem like quite the right term, therefore, for what happened.

It is possible that when the dust settles months from now, a careful review of everything from the evidence, data handling, bureaucratic miasma, practical decisions, and economic consequences might reveal not merely mistakes and failures but possibly mistakes and failures on a scandalous scale.

The point is: It is not anti-science to be skeptical of claims to expertise in social and political matters. In fact I wouldnt much trust a leader who wasnt skeptical.

Excerpt from:
Experts, Pseudo-Experts, and Other Progressive Conceits - Power Line

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Some days it may feel like were in apocalyptic times, but in the midst of the chaos and fear, there is reason for hope. The virus has made the ideological debates of the primaries ever more real and strengthens the case for government and the need for solidarity and imagination as we step into the future.Ad Policy

I dont want to be a Pollyanna, especially when so little is known about what happens next with the coronavirus pandemic, but its important now to hold onto hope. So here are a few things progressives should feel proud aboutand that Ive been focusing on.

If the coronavirus teaches us anything, it is that we are interconnected, and while we each have a responsibility to care for ourselves, we also bear a responsibility to the whole. We are in this together. Justice, we see, is not a moral but an existential issue. People should never have been packed into jails, immigration detention centers, or homeless camps, but at this moment, we do not have the option of looking away. In a global pandemic, our fates are intertwined.

There couldnt be a better argument for why government and social services matter, for everyone. As social distancing has become required to quell the virus, policies like paid sick leave become no-brainers. Access to free health care becomes less of an abstraction to people in power and more urgent than ever. And relief for students and debtors who cant work to pay off their loans becomes a duty. Bernie Sanders may or may not be our next president, but his ideas could deeply shape our response to this moment.

When Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected in 1932, the country was still struggling through the Great Depression. In 1934, Roosevelt pulled together a Committee on Economic Security and passed the National Social Security Act in August of 1935. It didnt achieve everything hoped forand it was added onto over the yearsbut its worth remembering that this program, which is now a pillar of American society, was established in a moment of turmoil.Current Issue

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In last Sundays debate, we saw different approaches taken by the two Democratic nominees. While Biden agreed that we can take bold and temporary actions to address the coronavirus pandemic, Sanders made the point that weve been in a public health crisis of a different kind for a long time. It is likely that we will get some temporary relief for families, but the question that requires hope is how we ensure were making meaningful and lasting changes.

Having lived together through the crash and bailout of 2008, electeds and the public are more aware that a stimulus cannot simply benefit corporations; it must also benefit the broader public. The 2011 popular uprising Occupy Wall Street was in response to the inequitable bailout, which saved the banks that then continued to foreclose on families. There were too few constraints and strings attached to the stimulus. This time we can do things differently.

This time, no one should lose their home; this time, new affordable housing must be built. Social Security should be increased and student debts should be canceled. Elizabeth Warren has laid out how she would do a stimulus at this moment, putting the grassroots first. Andrew Yangs advocacy for a universal basic income is being met with bipartisan support and we may soon see a cash transfer to individuals. Movement and advocacy organizations are already geared up and fighting to make sure that this bailout is not a corporate payday.

There was a striking moment in Sundays debate when we moved from a conversation about the coronavirus to one about the climate crisis. For a moment, the word crisis held renewed force. A crisis is a time when the government can take big actions, mobilize all its resources, and create massive changes in our social structures. If we acknowledge that the climate crisis is indeed a crisisone that is greater than the pandemic we face todaywe can expand our imagination around what is collectively possible.Progressivism

The conversation around a Green New Deal has already created a new vision for how we can mobilize the economy in ways that transform our energy systems and reduce carbon emissions. While it has not yet been crystallized into legislation, the Green New Deal resolution provides a guide for how we might rethink the way we tackle a global problem at the scale required.

These are hard times, times when we need to be kind, caring, and generous to one another. These are times when we must develop our empathy and recognize that our neighbors may be losing family and friends. But exactly for that reason, these are also times when we must be visionary and expansive. We must be firm and unrelenting in the fight to ensure that this moment is a transformative one, that this moment doesnt leave anyone behind. In the midst of our isolation, this is the time when we must come together.

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Progressives, There's Reason to Hope. Really! - The Nation

WASHINGTON The coronavirus pandemic is worsening across the United States, with some states limiting bars and restaurants to carry-out only and forcing gyms and other businesses to close.

Early Saturday morning, the House passed legislation to enact paid sick leave for some people affected by the coronavirus, increase food assistance to students and families, and provide free testing for the disease.

It's about putting families first, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said last Thursday at her weekly press conference.

But its also an opportunity, congressional progressives have said, to prove that their policies work at a time when theyre consistently under attack for being too expensive or unrealistic.

I really think that our push for Medicare for All is being highlighted or the need for a system like that is being highlighted right now with this, Congressional Progressive Caucus cochair Rep. Pramila Jayapal said in an interview with BuzzFeed News Thursday. You can see we're having to waive costs of tests we're waiving the costs of other barriers that would prevent people from seeking medical care. And all of you know, a lot of those things would be a) so much easier and b) wouldn't be an issue if we have Medicare for All.

Jayapals home state of Washington has been hit particularly hard by the coronavirus. The state had 769 confirmed cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, and 42 deaths, according to the most recent data from Johns Hopkins University researchers.

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As of last Thursday, about a dozen people in nursing homes in the state had tested positive, including one person in Jayapals own district, she said, a development thats highly concerning due to the fact that older people are at the most risk should they contract the disease.

The coronavirus response package that passed the House requires some employers to provide full-time employees with up to 10 days of paid leave. Jayapal said she believes it could be a rare test run for progressive policies.

We are clairvoyant, Jayapal said, referring to the inclusion of many progressive policies in the Democratic response to coronavirus. Its not only an opportunity to prove their priorities will work, she said, but also that they are necessary for the rest of the economy to survive.

A lot of times what happens is, you know, these things get pitted against some other cost, she said. They're said to be too expensive or impractical or not necessary. And what a crisis like this shows in a time like this shows is that they are actually all of those things. They're practical, they're necessary, and we can afford them because the cost of not doing them is way more unaffordable.

But its not a perfect test for Jayapal. After BuzzFeed News spoke with the Democrat, the bills paid sick leave policy was altered to exempt large companies with more than 500 employees.

The legislation, which also includes increased food security benefits, is still the subject of intense negotiation on Capitol Hill. It still needs to pass the Senate and President Donald Trump is pushing for a payroll tax cut and federal assistance for the oil and gas industry in response to the pandemic.

Not only is he trying to focus on corporations and, really, corporate interests, but also doing things that are illogical, like trying to bail out [the] oil industry that you know are completely unrelated Rep. Mark Pocan, who serves as Jayapals cochair on the Progressive Caucus, said in an interview with BuzzFeed News Thursday.

Trumps bailout plan is similar to the response to the 2008 financial crisis, Pocan said, and he thinks its misguided.

We gave money to Wall Street, we gave money to the auto industry, we gave it to big companies or big industries, he said. This time, Nancy [Pelosi] has been very, very clear that this is something that's family-focused first.

Republicans on Capitol Hill have balked at Trumps payroll tax cut proposal, and though they have resisted House Democrats plan, Jayapal said Thursday she believed it was possible to pick up some Republican votes on the package, particularly because the proposals are temporary and tied to the virus.

I've never believed that these ideas are partisan. I believe that they would bring enormous comfort to and support to everybody across the country, whether you're in a red district or a blue district, she said especially, now, she added, because the cost is death.

Earlier Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said that the Democrats proposal as currently drafted was dead on arrival in the Senate and merely left-wing political messaging. But Friday afternoon, House Democrats and the White House struck a deal, which passed the House last week and is set to pass the Senate early this week.

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Medicare For All And Paid Sick Leave Are Often Dismissed As Impractical. Progressives Say The Coronavirus Proves Theyre Not. - BuzzFeed News