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In GA-06, for instance, DemocratJon Ossoff's $8.3 million war chest isn't exactly a product of relentless candidate call times. Sure, Ossoff hasput in a stellar effort. But his candidacy took flight in unimaginable ways both inside the district and among small-dollar donors. (Tune in on April 18!)

But it's not just Georgia. In Montana, Rob Quist has raised $1.3 million for his congressional bid without accepting any money from lobbyists for corporate PACs. Republicans are so unnerved by Democratic traction in deep red states that a GOPSuper PAC was already taking aim at Quist last month in advance of the May 25 special election.

And did you catch that Kansas special election Tuesday where the Democratic candidate came out of nowhere to narrow the usual 30-plus point gap down to single digits?

So yeah, running for Congress isn't easy. But this upcoming cycle could be like no other for Democrats,for decadesto come.

The good news isheightened interest will make it much harder for the Democraticconsultant class to christen their preferred candidates to the exclusion of everyone else.

Bustos and her colleagues in the Illinois delegation gathered for dinner earlier this month to discuss how, with so many potential candidates, theyd land the best candidates in tough districts. Theyve decided to take a wait-and-see approach to watch who puts in the time and surrounds themselves with good teams.

Clearing the field is going to be a more difficult endeavor, said Balaban, the Pennsylvania consultant.

Finally, keep the option of running for state office in mind.

EMILYs List knows that many of the 10,000 women who have approached them this winter wont run for Congress or even for any office this cycle. But the abortion rights group is excited about building a bench for the future.

And with redistricting at play soon, some liberals believe its even more important to channel Democratic enthusiasm toward the state level.

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Energized by the resistance, surge of progressives express interest in running for office - Daily Kos

Todays comic by Ruben Bolling isWar Beat, the mag for journalists with missile-crushes:

United Air Lines cant catch a break. Scorpion falls from overhead bin, stings passenger.

The interview with Bill Nye on the Bernie Sanders show was viewed 4.5 million times:

The Bernie Sanders show, which is filmed in the Democratic partys DC-based studio, is atypical in ways beyond just presentation. Sanders has decided to bypass traditional media and broadcast exclusively onFacebook. And it is attracting to borrow a Sandersism a huge audience.

The first episode of the show featuredthe Rev William Barber, a protestant minister and activist who is a national board member of the NAACP. The conversation, aired on 16 February, focussed on grassroots mobilizing, and has been viewed more than 950,000 times. [...]

But it was the Nye broadcast that really got the Sanders team excited.

Texas A.G. Ken Paxtons trial begins Sept. 12: The trial was originally meant to begin May 1, but a change of venue also changed its start date. From the time before he was attorney general,Paxton has beenaccused of misleading investors in a company.If convicted, he could face up to 99 years in prison.But the trial beginning inSeptemberdeals with the lesser charge that hefailed to register with the state securities board. Prosecutors want to get that over withbefore taking up the more serious allegations against Paxton.

6 3 newborn the star at Houston Zoo:

Red-state progressives turn tables on forced-birther activists in fight to make Supreme Court abortion ruling effective across the states:

In June 2016 the Supreme Court ruled on the biggest abortion case since Roe v. Wade,Whole Womans Health v. Hellerstedt. In ruling that regulations for abortion clinics must be rooted in medical necessity and scientific evidence, the court not only struck down two egregious abortion restrictions in Texas; it struck a major blow against the entire anti-choice movement. [...]

The Supreme Court decision doesnt automatically strike all the laws across the country that restrict abortion access by other means, said Sarah Gillooly, policy director ofthe American Civil Liberties Union in North Carolina, over the phone. So in order for the decision in Whole Womans Health v. Hellerstedt to be real and enacted across the country, its going to require a two-part approach. In practice, she said, that means litigating every individual law that is in conflict with the Whole Womans Health decision, or state legislatures repealing those laws and codifying that decision.

Chicago vows to make public buildings 100% renewably powered by 2025:

That's no small feat: With more than900 city-owned buildingsincluding public schools and colleges, park district fieldhouses and buildings owned by the Chicago Housing AuthorityChicago has the country's largest fleet of public buildings. Last year, they accounted for eight percent of all electricity use in Chicago.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said the city willmeet its goalby acquiring renewable energy credits, purchasing utility-supplied renewable energy through the state's renewable portfolio standard and increasing on-site generation by installing morewindturbines andsolarpanels.

On todays Kagro in the Morning show, Greg Dworkin & Armando round up top headlines. KS-04 fallout. HuffPo allows that Daily Kos is back. Gop contracts Hitlerrhea. Trump flips on currency manipulation, NATO; learns N. Koreas complex & the Easter Egg Roll has nothing to do with China.

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Midday open thread: Red-state progressives push on abortion; Sanders' show connects on social media - Daily Kos

If you want to make a progressive squirm, tell him that history is cyclical. Whether they realize it or not, progressives borrow their entire worldview from Christianity, and therefore have a fundamentally millenarian view of history. The idea of cycles makes them uncomfortable.

Thats why Tom Ashbrook was so unnerved yesterday. Dont get me wrong, Ashbrooks radio program out of Boston, On Point, is usually a measured, thoughtful discussion of politics and current events. Its one of the few NPR shows that doesnt suffer from the obvious, sometimes cringe-inducing bias.

But Tuesdays show was a notable exception. One of Ashbrooks guests was Neil Howe, author of a book published in 1997 called The Fourth Turning, which argues human history is cyclical, not linear, and that its major cycles are marked by catastrophes like war or economic collapse. Specifically, Howe and his co-author William Strauss argue that history in America and most modern societies unfolds in a recurring cycle of four stages, or turnings, of about 20 years each. Each stage has its own characteristics, moving in progression from maturation, growth, decay, and then destruction or crisis.

Howe has described this last period, the fourth turning, as a time when institutional life is reconstructed from the ground up, always in response to a perceived threat to the nations very survival. He identifies 1945, 1865, and 1794World War II, the Civil War, and the end of the revolutionary eraas fourth turnings that constituted new founding moments in American history. He also says that were in a fourth turning right now.

Its an interesting theory, and theres ample historical evidence to recommend it. Theres nothing unorthodox about suggesting that history moves in cycles, of course, and the authors observation that our current moment in history, both economically and geopolitically, closely mirrors the 1930s is in many ways correct.

But among liberal commentators the book has now become synonymous with white nationalism and the alt-right. Why? For one reason, because Steve Bannon really likes it. But thats not the only reason Howes book is problematic. The larger problem is that it refutes the progressive view of history.

As a good progressive, Ashbrook couldnt let that lie. Setting aside his usual fair-mindedness and calm demeanor, he tried to brand Howe as an apocalyptic ideologue yearning for Armageddon. What bothers Ashbrook and other hand-wringing critics of Howes book is the idea that once you recognize were in a crisis cycle, some people (like Bannon and Trump) will want to accelerate the crisis to feed their own apocalyptic tendencies. At one point, Ashbrook asks, unaware of the irony, Are you encouraging people to race toward the rapture here?

Of course, a cyclical view of history precludes the idea of a rapture. Howe noted his book is descriptive, not prescriptive, and that a cyclical view of history is in fact the opposite of an apocalyptic view, which is all about history coming to an end. We can navigate these periods well or poorly, he says. This is not anti-choice, it is simply saying, be aware of the season youre in.

Ashbrook countered that World War II and the Civil War were kind of apocalyptic because millions of people died. Its not something that one would steer toward given the choice, he says.

Probably without realizing it, Ashbrook showed that a truly progressive worldview is far more dangerous than Howes cyclical theory of history. If you dont believe that nations must sometimes make hard choicessay, to stamp out slavery or Nazismthen a choice will eventually be thrust upon you under far worse circumstances. Ashbrook suggested, no doubt without meaning to, that America could have chosen some other course than to destroy Nazism. But as Howe said in reply, We had to fight them somewhere.

Progressives take it as a matter of faith that history has sides, that it is heading in a certain direction, and that its up to us to usher in a secular paradise. For progressives like Ashbrook, merely anticipating a crisis in the age of Trump makes a crisis more likely to happen, which mightharm the progressive cause. Hence, writers like Howe are guilty of enabling people like Bannon.

After all, humanity is supposed to be marching toward that secular paradise. Even when bad things happenlike Trump and Bannonits okay because, as Obama liked to say (quoting Dr. Martin Luther King), the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. Or, as Ashbrook asked Howe, What about working for peace, justice, international equity? The things that might hold a crisis at bay?

But because some crises cannot be held at bay, utopia can be a dangerous destination. A hundred years ago, we were determined to stay neutral in the First World War, to work for peace and justice and international equityeven in the face of a European conflict that saw mass civilian casualties and the first use of chemical weapons, on the western front. Eventually, a choice was forced upon us and we went to war, but not before millions had already been slaughtered.

Today, after eight years of the Obama administration refusing to make hard choices abroad, international crises are mounting. Before long, we will no doubt be forced to choose, despite our desire for peace, despite wanting to hold crisis at bay. Maybe it will be in Syria, where a half-million people have already been slaughtered, some of them by chemical weapons.Who says history isnt cyclical?

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Why Progressives Hate Steve Bannon's Cyclical View Of History - The Federalist

Millennials represent one of the most progressive generations in history. From their support for raising the minimum wage to establishing free community college, to backing Black Lives Matter, young people strongly support progressive values and policies.

But a new report shows that financial support for conservative youth organizations far outpaces support for progressive youth organizations, to the tune of tens of millions of dollars. In 2014, the most recent year for which data is available, conservative youth organizations had access to almost three times more money than liberal youth organizations.

This takes a real toll on young people who aspire to work in the progressive movement.

The report describes the struggles of one young woman,Sarah Duensing, who had her sights set on working on Capitol Hill after graduating from college. Sarah was told by her college career counselor that there was only funding in her state of Utah to work with conservative policymakers. Still determined, Sarah moved to Washington, D.C. to pursue a position on the Hill anyway, but was never able to find a paid internship. Ultimately, she gave up her dream of working on Capitol Hill.

There are many times in my life that I have been forced to choose paid work at someplace that was irrelevant to my goals, such as a testing center or Old Navy, instead of political engagement, just because I needed to pay the rent, Sarah said.

Her experience was certainly not unique. The report states that of the 100 U.S. Senate offices, 27 Republican offices and only 15 Democratic or Independent offices offer paid internships.

The gap in funding between conservative and progressive youth organizations has actually gotten worse. Progressive youth organizations are now out-funded by conservative groups by a three-to-one ratio, up from a two-to-one ratio in 2008. With the exception of one progressive youth organization in 2014, contributions to such groups have flatlined as contributions to conservative youth groups grow.

The 2014 total revenue of the largest conservative youth organization, the Charles Koch Institute, was greater than that of the four largest progressive youth organizations combined.

Progressives might assume that the difference is the much deeper pockets of the right. But in addition to giving more money, right-wing funders are offering support with fewer strings attached, with an eye toward the long-term health of the conservative movement. While progressive funders tend to support specific projects, often tied to voter turnout for elections, conservative funders are more likely to focus on leadership development, capacity building, or to give unrestricted funds.

This has paid off through a new generation of conservative elected officials, judges, and thought leaders who have been trained by a well-oiled conservative leadership pipeline.

Young people believe in progressive values. In just the few months since the election, nearly 100 new progressive organizations have taken root, many of them organized by young people. This enthusiasm needs to be supported and developed in order for it to translate into long-term change at the state, local, and national level.

A few initiatives have responded, including the Young People For program, which supports long-term leadership development training, and Generation Progress, which uses activism, journalism, and events to engage young people across the country.

The grassroots energy awakened by the 2016 election marks a real opportunity for reinvigorating the left. Many small donors, together, can fund a movement as well as a handful of the super-rich. But it takes organization and long-term thinking to have a serious impact on policy. Progressives can help by providing support to turn this passion into effective, lifelong advocacy.

Christin Cici Battle is the director of Young People For at People For the American Way Foundation. Maggie Thompson is the executive director of Generation Progress at the Center for American Progress.

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Progressives Need to Put Their Money Where Their Youth Is - Progressive.org

Becca Tasker, a junior majoring in anthropology, first started researching civil rights in middle school.

She had learned about the murder of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old African American boy who was lynched in 1955 after being falsely accused of flirting with a white woman.

I was always into history, and I started learning about the formation and fight for civil rights in the U.S., she said. My parents encouraged my curiosity by buying me books when they could, and taking me to the library.

So on a chilly Wednesday night in March, Tasker taught four students gathered in room 227 of the Cathedral of Learning about civil rights and liberties when protesting. The event, called Know Your Rights! was part of a weekly meeting for Pitt Progressives, a new Pitt club focused on getting left-leaning students on campus engaged in the community.

Tasker, the social media coordinator for Pitt Progressives, covered the legal limits for American protesters, photographers and detainees. She instructed her audience on exercising their First, Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights without going too far and risking arrest or injury at the hands of the police.

This year, more than 250 protesters, some of whom were Pitt students, have been arrested in Pittsburgh and in Washington D.C. for aggravated assault, resisting arrest and trespassing charges all related to protesting.

Other campus groups have continued to raise funds for those who are currently still facing legal charges making Taskers presentation all the more relevant.

If you are detained, ask what crime you are being detained for. Until you ask to leave, you cant walk away you could be charged with a crime, Tasker told the students. How the cops will react depends on what theyre questioning you for, the color of your skin and what part of the country they stopped you in.

Sam Spearing, a junior political science major and Pitt Progressives business manager, said that knowing your rights is especially important for young people who are fresh to the political scene. Spearing referred to nationwide protests that broke out after Trumps controversial executive order banning travel between the United States and seven countries with majority Muslim populations.

[Knowing your rights] has a newfound relevance, said Sam Spearing, a junior political science major and Pitt Progressives business manager. Theres been a lot of civil disobedience recently at the JFK airport after the [first] travel ban, for instance.

Jeff Migliozzi, a junior marketing major and president of Pitt Progressives, said the group grew out of Students for Bernie, an organization dedicated to supporting Bernie Sanders efforts for the Democratic bid during the 2016 election. Although Students for Bernie was focused on the primary election and most of its group members did not join Pitt Progressives, it officially became a student group three months after the 2016 election.

Before the Pitt Progressives, the left wing at Pitt had to choose between the anarchists or the College Democrats. We wanted to fill in the void between them, he said. The Democratic Party is more corporate-leaning. As for middle ground between us and the anarchists, there is probably much less because we do not believe in violence or their general philosophy on society.

This meeting was about civil rights, but the Pitt Progressives meetings are different each week members will present a topic, listen to a guest speaker or hold an event. The gatherings are centered on a common desire to make students more politically active, according to Jeff Migliozzi, the clubs president.

The main goal of every meeting is getting students more involved politically in our community at the federal, state, city or university level of politics, Migliozzi, a junior marketing major, said.

The club recently had an open mic night March 29 for students to express their feelings about the election and the inauguration through poetry, rap and spoken word. At its next meeting on April 12, they will hold a poster-making party in anticipation of the Pittsburgh satellite of the March for Science on April 22, which they are planning and participating in. The March for Science, held on Earth Day, in Washington, D.C., brings attention to funding cuts to the sciences under the Trump administration.

The march is going to have thousands of participants and scientist speakers, so it is far larger in scale than anything else we have done, Migliozzi said.

Although Migliozzi would not say which guest speakers are attending the Pittsburgh satellite march, he said the organizers will announce the speakers next week in a press release.

According to Tasker, Progressivism isnt solely about action its about taking leftist ideologies and making policies that will work for the people.

[Progressivism is] about moving forward with our actions to make the world a better place, Tasker said. We want to continue the passion from the 2016 election and mobilize students to create a passionate movement to help the greater Pittsburgh area.

More broadly, the Pitt Progressives will focus on working toward universal health care, raising the minimum wage and resisting the Trump administration by supporting the sanctuary campus movement.

It is important that every person, progressive or not, defends the most vulnerable in our society, and that includes immigrants being rounded up by ICE. We are a nation of immigrants, and Pittsburgh is a city of immigrants, Migliozzi said.

And though Trump hasnt been in office for even 100 days, Migliozzi said Pitt Progressives is already looking toward increasing student engagement in the next election, four years from now.

Voter registration will be huge next year. National organizers of 2016 campaigns noted the lack of political engagement and turnout for such a big school, he said. We need to change that [through activism], and this can be done without any official party affiliation.

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Pitt Progressives aims to fill gap in the left - University of Pittsburgh The Pitt News