Wall Street Journal (subscription) | Harvard Progressives Are Sly Wall Street Journal (subscription) Harvard Progressives Are Sly. A conservative dean at any American law school is worth noting. What is surprising, however, is that there are not more. June 25, 2017 12:35 p.m. ET. Save Article. Sign In to Save Subscribe to WSJ. Text Size. Small. Medium. |
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Harvard Progressives Are Sly - Wall Street Journal (subscription)
Progressive is the most popular buzzword in big-city Democratic politics in these times when a socialist came close to winning the partys nomination for president.
And Chicagos left-leaning activists could be as good at resisting the right-winger in the White House as anybody in the country.
Often, though, it looks like progressives aint ready to join together and play power politics.
A prime example is Cook County Clerk David Orrs announcement that he would not run again after completing his term next year.
OPINION
For many months, the word among progressives was that Orr would step down in the middle of his term, clearing the way for County Commissioner Jesus Chuy Garcia to replace him and get a jump on the 2018 election. Orr had supported Garcias mayoral challenge from the left in 2015, which forced Rahm Emanuel into an embarrassing runoff election.
In the end, Orr gave Garcia little notice when he was finally ready to make his big announcement Wednesday, on the eve of the county Democratic Partys slate-making session. Meanwhile, the very un-progressive county recorder of deeds, Karen Yarbrough, has maneuvered into pole position for the job-rich clerks office.
Looking at her offices history of patronage hiring allegations, its safe to say Yarbrough is no progressive. As vice chair of the state Democratic Party, shes very close to Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.
In the wake of this mess, one left-leaning Chicago politician grumbled that uniting his fellow progressives was as difficult as herding blind cats with no sense of smell.
A blind cat can at least smell its way to its food, the progressive pol said.
But Garcia says he doesnt want to be clerk after all and may place a much bigger and more important target the mayors office in his sights again.
It doesnt make my blood circulate thinking what kind of clerk I could be, Garcia told me Friday.
He confirms that he had discussions with Orr beginning about a year ago in which the clerk told him he might resign early.
As it turned out, Garcia said, he got a call from Orr informing him of his announcement only the night before the clerk publicly revealed he would complete his term and then call it quits.
Davids announcement came up pretty suddenly, Garcia said.
After thinking about the clerks job for a couple days, Garcia said, It doesnt move my spirit.
Comments by Garcias current boss, county Board President Toni Preckwinkle, foreshadowed his pivot.
Chuy Garcia is the floor leader of mine, Preckwinkle said on WTTW-Channel 11s Chicago Tonight on Thursday. I hold him in very high regard. Im not sure what hes going to decide to do. Ive heard rumors he has other interests as well.
Like running for mayor? asked the interviewer, Paris Schutz.
He has other interests as well, Preckwinkle repeated, circumspect as ever.
Garcia laughed when I read that line back to him.
Thats classic Toni, he said.
But Garcia didnt hesitate to say, Ive been seriously looking at taking another run [at the mayors office] in 2019.
How would a 2019 effort succeed where the last run came up short?
Many who didnt support me have expressed buyers remorse, Garcia said. Theres a lot of remorse, particularly in the African-American community.
Pointing to violent crime and to the bleak financial outlook of city government and Chicago Public Schools, Garcia said, I think the city is not better off than we were two years ago.
Still, he would not commit to running for mayor because, he said, it would be the toughest task facing any mayor in 35 years.
The challenges for somebody seeking to move the city in a different direction are very serious, Garcia said.
And before he could try to herd the whole city onto a new path, he would have to find a way to get Chicagos progressives to move in the same direction.
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Can progressive politicians pull in the same direction? - Chicago Sun-Times
Democrat Jon Ossoffs loss in the Georgia special congressional election has demoralized progressives who hoped it would signal an anti-Trump wave that could turn the House from red to blue in 2018.
The left is fractured, with disagreements between the Bernie and Hillary wings of the Democratic Party threatening to undercut its ability to turn out the base, appeal to independents and win over disillusioned GOP voters. The question remains whether the so-called resistance can transform itself from a throng of angry voices into a majority capable of creating lasting progressive change.
As activists take up this challenge, they should study the playbook of one of the most successful social justice movements in history: the fight for LGBTQ equality. In short order, our movement beat back the AIDS epidemic, ended sodomy bans, won access to military service and marriage and ultimately more than doubled public approval of gay identity.
There were several keys to the movements victories. But one lesson in particular applies to todays deeply divided politics: Success came when LGBTQ advocates learned to speak the language of those they most needed to enlist rather than those who already agreed with them.
Striving to see our cause through the eyes of folks we didnt know well, who were indifferent and sometimes actively opposed to our goals, meant adopting a principle from the world of social work: Changing peoples hearts and minds requires meeting them where they are. To some, framing our goals in terms aimed at more conservative audiences was tantamount to selling out. Yet we learned that such pragmatism could achieve more and more durable social change than ideological purity.
The battle for marriage equality is a case in point. For years, LGBTQ activists, who were largely (but not exclusively) creatures of the left, avoided making marriage a priority. Many considered it conformist, even retrograde, at odds with the most radical, passionately held ideals of gay liberation.
When activists did include marriage on their agenda, they tended to speak of it in legalistic terms that stressed entitlement to equal rights; they emphasized the deprivations lack of insurance and tax benefits, for instance associated with being denied a license to wed. Those tactics werent ineffective; they helped create domestic partnership protections in many towns and states, and by 2004 notched one all-out victory: Same-sex couples gained the right to wed in Massachusetts in a state Supreme Court decision.
Yet social conservatives were stirring a backlash and also racking up wins, proactively passing same-sex marriage bans in dozens of states. As troubling, public approval of marriage equality, which had been rising throughout the 1990s, plateaued at around 34% in 2000. LGBTQ advocates had the support of staunch liberals, but they were failing to win over the next batch of supporters needed to build a majority coalition: the moderates of the moveable middle.
So marriage advocates scrutinized their message. Backed by donors dedicated to winning the battle, gay rights organizations hired pollsters to conduct focus groups of moderate liberals and conservatives who supported gay rights but not gay marriage. The results hit strategists like lightning. When straight people were asked why they cared about marriage, they mentioned love, commitment and family; yet they thought gay people wanted to marry for different reasons: the rights and benefits. The moveable middle wasnt moving because its members didnt recognize same-sex couples wish to wed as similar to their own.
In response, several gay groups created new campaigns that framed the issue in starkly personal terms. What if you couldnt marry the person you love? asked one ad field-tested in Santa Barbara to counter Californias infamous Proposition 8. Although most Southern Californians voted in favor of the anti-gay-marriage ballot measure, in Santa Barbara County it lost by 10 points.
We quit talking about legal benefits, talking from the head, said Tim Sweeney, a longtime gay activist. Instead, the marriage equality battle would turn on core values. The trick was to appeal to human empathy rather than to merely emphasize demands or appear to be subversive.
By 2011, a slim majority of Americans were telling pollsters they supported same-sex marriage. It was no coincidence when, the next year, President Obama announced his support as well. When he did, he adopted the movements language of common values, saying that incredibly committed monogamous same-sex relationships among White House staffers had changed his mind. Likewise, three years later, when Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy penned his majority opinion in Obergefell vs. Hodges, he referenced the emotional resonance of marriage, citing its nobility and worthiness, in guaranteeing it to same-sex couples. Marriage equality, now supported by 60% of Americans, was the law of the land.
Some on todays left act as though the only way to achieve their goals is by catering to the most liberal leanings of the group. A very progressive manifesto is how Bernie Sanders recently characterized what Democrats need to win back power. Yet its far from clear that a to the barricades image is the best way to advance progressive aims. Indeed, it was a positive message based not on outrage but common human values that took gay marriage from fringe to respectable to just plain normal.
Pragmatic engagement with those who werent the natural supporters of LGBTQ rights made lives tangibly better for gay people and inched us all closer to realizing a truly progressive vision.
Nathaniel Frank is author of Awakening: How Gays and Lesbians Brought Marriage Equality to America and director of the What We Know project at Columbia Law School.
Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook
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Progressives Are the New Puritan Busybodies - WSJ - Wall Street Journal (subscription)
Two progressive groups are teaming up for a six-figure radio ad buy targeting Republican Sens. Jeff FlakeJeff FlakeSenate should seek to retain its 'blue slip' tradition for judicial nominees Progressives target Heller and Flake on Senate GOP bill The Hill's Whip List: Senate ObamaCare repeal bill MORE (Ariz.) and Dean HellerDean HellerTrump called Cruz to press him on ObamaCare repeal bill: report Biden rips Senate GOP healthcare bill, says it 'isn't about healthcare' Pro-Trump group launches seven-figure ad buy against GOP senator opposing repeal bill MORE (Nev.), using veterans from their home states to warn against siding with the Senate GOPs healthcare reform plan.
Stand Up America and VoteVets.org are behind the buy, first reported by The Hill, which warns that the GOP's planned cuts to Medicaid could weigh heavy on veterans.
Nearly 2 million veterans rely on Medicaid for our health care. But if the Affordable Care Act is repealed, Medicaid will be slashed making it harder for veterans across Arizona to get healthcare, veterans say in the radio ads.
Thats outrageous and its wrong. You cant repeal the Affordable Care Act and call yourself pro-veteran.
Stand Up America has also made smaller digital buys in Ohio, Maine, Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania, home to senators that Democrats believe could be convinced to vote against the bill, calling on residents to call their senators and demand that they vote against the plan.
The Senate plan, releasedThursdayafter weeks of secrecy, repeals controversial pieces of ObamaCare such as its insurance mandate, instead providing tax credits to help defray the cost of insurance premiums.
It also includes deep Medicaid cuts, rolling back the Medicaid expansion that provides coverage for about 11 million people and eventually making changes to Medicaid that slows the growth of payment caps.
The bill will only need a majority of senators to pass, giving the Republicans room for two defections thanks to Vice President Pences tie-breaking vote.
Four senators have already come out against the plan as is, although theyve suggested they could be convinced if changes are adopted, leaving Democrats scrambling to pressure enough senators to sink the bill.
Heller and Flake are in a particular bind thanks to their vulnerable positions heading into their reelection races they are the only two Republican senators that Democrats have a real shot at ousting.
And Heller has received no air cover from key Republicans in his state, specifically Gov. Brian Sandoval, who has emerged as a vocal critic of the plans Medicaid cuts.
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Progressives target Heller and Flake on Senate GOP bill - The Hill