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A group of former Democratic congressional staffers wants to stop President Trump and thinks emulating the Tea Party is the way to do so, assembling a new group called "Indivisible" to push back against Trump from the grassroots.

Their manifesto, "Indivisible: A practical guide for resisting the Trump agenda," is a 26-page "how to" manual written by scores of former staffers that outlines how progressives can use the most successful tactics employed by the Tea Party to their advantage.

"This all sort of stems from the disappoint and despair that we all felt after the election," explained Angel Padilla, a co-author who previously worked for Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill.

"To us it's not really about the party; it's about the things that we value," Padilla said. "As former staffers, we don't have many skills, but we know how Congress works," Padilla said, quoting another one of the authors, Ezra Levin, who worked for Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas.

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Trump wants to "reshape America in his own racist, authoritarian, and corrupt image," Padilla, Levin and Leah Greenberg, who worked for Rep. Tom Perriello, D-Va., wrote. "If progressives are going to stop this, we must stand indivisibly opposed to Trump" and congressional Republicans.

"We examine lessons from the Tea Party's rise and recommend two key strategic components: A local strategy targeting individual members of Congress; a defensive approach purely focused on stopping Trump from implementing an agenda built on racism, authoritarianism, and corruption," they wrote.

They advise voters to assemble at the local level and to focus solely on their own elected representatives.

"I still get these alerts that say, 'if you want X call Speaker Ryan,'" Padilla said. "That to us is wasted energy. The only way you're going to move Paul Ryan on this is if you happen to be a constituent or get enough of his constituents or House members" to move in your direction, he said.

The four actions that influence lawmakers most are when voters turn up at town halls and speak up; when they turn up at photo-ops, such as ribbon-cutting ceremonies, and ask them questions; when they show up at members' district offices for meetings or to protest via "sit-ins"; and when they burn up their phone lines with coordinated calls, the guide advises.

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"[W]e can all learn from their success in influencing the national debate and the behavior of national policymakers," the group says about the Tea Party. "To their credit, they thought thoroughly about advocacy tactics."

The "indivisible" group does not advocate replicating bullying and violent methods, which they say the Tea Party used.

"In terms of some of that violence and aggressive and abusive rhetoric and behavior we are 100 percent opposed to that as a tactic and it's not consistent with our values," Padilla said.

The indivisible guide says the Tea Party's "ideas were wrong, cruel, and tinged with racism."

Jenny Beth Martin, spokeswoman for the Tea Party Patriots, said she's seen the guide but argues that "indivisible" misrepresents the Tea Party.

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"It's intriguing that the same people who mocked and maligned us now think they have to model what we did," she said. "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery." However, "they mischaracterize what the Tea Party movement is. They've done that for the last eight years. They do that in their document. Our movement is peaceful," she continued. "We obey the law. We didn't have to tell people to obey the law."

Padilla said that after so many people accessed the initial Google doc where the guide was stored, people volunteered to make a website for it. Half-a-million people downloaded the guide in the month after it went live Dec. 21, he said.

"We had no idea what was going to happen," he said.

Word spread rapidly after former Labor Secretary Robert Reich promoted it, Padilla said.

During Saturday's women's march in Washington, protesters discussed it and recommended following it to the uninitiated. More than 2,400 local groups have registered with the website, http://www.indivisibleguide.com, Padilla said.

All the contributors, who now conduct activism training and speak to groups, are volunteers whose day jobs are unaffiliated with the cause, Padilla said. They also are not affiliated with or funded by any larger, better-known progressive groups, he said.

"We're just trying to respond to the need," he said. They have registered as a "social welfare organization" with the IRS better known as a 501(c) (4) but as far as fundraising or endorsing candidates, "that's way too premature," Padilla said. "We haven't really thought out where we want to go."

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Its main internal ethics entity, is investigating the matter, the Secret Service says.

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A Tea Party for progressives? Left steals an idea from the Right - Washington Examiner (blog)

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Below is a roundup of the scapegoats progressives blame for Clintons loss.

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1. Fake News

Hillary Clinton used her first public speechsince her election loss to blame the epidemic rise of fake news for her defeat.

The epidemic of malicious fake news and false propaganda that flooded social media over the past year its now clear the so-called fake news can have real-world consequences, Clinton said earlier this month in a speech on Capital Hill.

Clinton said lives are at risk because of fake news, calling ita danger that must be addressed and addressed quickly.

2. Huma Abedin

Clinton advisors, still reeling from defeat, blamed her longtime aide Huma Abedin for their loss.

She was enjoying the red carpet and enjoying the photo spreads much too much in my opinion, a close Clinton insider toldVanity Fair.She enjoyed being a celebrity too much.

Abedin, whod spent 20 years as one of Clintons closest confidants, caused a campaign crisis weeks before the election aftertheFBI announcedthatemails related to its Clinton private server investigation were found on a laptop shared by Abedin and herestranged husband Anthony Weiner, who is being investigated for allegedly sending sexually explicit messagesto a 15-year-old girl.

3. Putins Personal Beef

Hillary Clinton claimed last week that Russias hack of her campaign was an attackto undermine our democracy, and was ordered byVladimir V. Putinbecause he has a personal beef against me.

Putin publicly blamed me for the outpouring of outrage by his own people, and that is the direct line between what he said back then and what he did in this election, Clinton said in speech to a group ofdonors referencing charges she made that the Russian President rigged theparliamentary elections in his country in 2011.

Vladimir Putin himself directed the covert cyberattacks against our electoral system, against our democracy, apparently because he has a personal beef against me, she said.

4.FBI DirectorJames Comey

During a post-election conference call with Clinton surrogates,Clinton campaign chairmanJohn Podesta referred to FBI Director James Comey as the person who we think may have cost us the election, The Hill reported.

Two weeks before Election Day,Comey wrote a letter to Congress informing lawmakers of the discovery of a new batch of emails (found on Weiners computer), related to the investigation of Clintons use of a private email server while she was Secretary of State.

Two days before the election, Comey announcedthe FBI found no new information in the emails. But by then, Clintons camp believes the damage to their campaign had already been done.

5. Millennials

Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook mentioned young voters as one of the reasons for Clintons loss.

During anelection postmortem event at Harvard, Mook placed blame on young peoplewho were voting for third-party candidates as one of the reasons Clinton loss.

6.Racism

During the same post-election session at Harvard,Clinton communications director Jennifer Palmieri blamed Breitbart News and its former executive chairman turned Trump campaign CEO Stephen K. Bannon for Clintons loss.

If providing a platform for white supremacists makes me a brilliant tactician, I am proud to have lost, Palmieri said. I would rather lose than win the way you guys did.

7.White women who voted for Trump

Clinton campaign celebrity surrogate Lena Dunhamscornedself-hating white women who voted for Donald Trump, and blamed them for her candidates defeat.

Its painful to know that white women, so unable to see the unity of female identity, so unable to look past their violent privilege, and so inoculated with hate for themselves, showed up to the polls for him, too, Dunham wrote in an essay for herLenny Letter blogpublished days after the election.

8. Electoral college

During his final press briefing of the year, President Obama blamed the Electoral College for Hillary Clintons election loss.

The Electoral College, Obama said, is one of the structures in our political system as envisioned by the Founders that sometimes are going to disadvantage Democrats.

The Electoral College is a vestige, its a carryover from an earlier vision of how our federal government was going to work that put a lot of premium on states, he added.

9.VoterSuppression

Democratic National ChairDonna Brazile blamed brand new voting restrictions put in place to depress votes in many swing states.

In many swing states, voter suppression succeeded in its ultimate, if unstated goal: diluting democracy through disfranchisement, Brazile wrote weeks after the election.

FollowJerome Hudsonon Twitter@jeromeehudson

Continued here:
9 Scapegoats Progressives Blame for Hillary Clintons ...

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Why 'Progressives' Go Berserk Over the Thought of Senator Sessions - Observer

The question remains whether the energy displayed Saturday will carry over into other ongoing local struggles.

Thousands of protesters attended the Cincinnati Sister March in solidarity with the Women's March on Washington, January 21, 2017. (Jen Lake)

Thousands marched Saturday in the Sister March in Cincinnati, one of the few Democratic strongholds in a state that Trump carried with 51.3 percent of the vote. Estimates put the crowd that gathered in Over-the-Rhines Washington Park at 7,000, an impressive showing in this metro area of just over 2 million people. Speakers at a rally prior to the march addressed the crowd on behalf of Planned Parenthood, a local organization supporting survivors of gender-based violence, and the Islamic Center of Cincinnati and Black Lives Matter Cincinnati, among other groups. The event attracted participants who were concerned about a variety of issues, from preserving the Affordable Care Act to combating police violence and preserving a science-based approach to climate change at the federal level.

In the crowd I met Debbie Sims, who sat on a bench holding a sign that read Hands Off My American Dream. It featured a simple drawing of a house and a seal identifying her as a member of Communities United for Action, a local organizing project that focuses on abuses in foreclosures and payday loans. Sims said shes worried that a Trump presidency will take us back a decade to the dark days of the last financial crisis. I know a lot of people who, during the Bush administration, lost their homes, lost their jobs, she told me. Sims is concerned about the concentration of power on the right, particularly as a resident of a state with a Republican governor. With the Republicans taking over, we dont have a leg to stand on, she said, explaining what had drawn her to the march. We have to fight. We cant just let the poor not have a voice. Debbie Sims holds a protest sign at the Cincinnati Sister March, January 21, 2017.

The effects of reactionary federal policies may not have hit this city yet, but the cultural impact of the Trump victory has. This weekend, swastikas and racist and homophobic graffiti were painted around the campus of Withrow University High School, where the student body is 97 percent young people of color. The phrase Fuck Niggers and Faggots was painted on sidewalks, and other slurs and swastikas were painted on signs and benches alongside the presidents name. Earlier this month, a vandal painted a swastika on the sign of a local Jewish seminary, Hebrew Union College.

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In Hamilton County, 52.7 percent of voters supported Hillary Clinton. Its a slim margin that means most of those voters have neighbors and coworkers who support Trump. The counties that surround Cincinnati all went red: Clermont, Butler, and Warren County all went for Trump by more than 60 percent. Fran Carr and Pate Hutson live in Columbus but came to Cincinnati to march on Saturday with family. They are using Indivisible, an online resource compiled by former congressional staffers that explains how to best pressure elected officials, to figure out how to best organize with like-minded people. Carr also receives the Daily Action text, and said she makes a related phone call to legislators every day. But she said that of the many ways she commits herself to fighting the Trump administration, the hardest thing is engaging with friends who support him. One of my friends believes theres no such thing as white privilege. All of the examples I give, the ways that we enjoy white privilege, he just denies, Carr said. I keep finding a way for us to listen to each other. Its exhausting, its nauseating and its necessary. Jasmine Grant, left, at the Cincinnati Sister March, January 21, 2017.

Jasmine Grant, who is black, attended the noon rally, but as late as 11 am she was debating whether or not to show up. Grant was aware of the national conversation about whether the issues of women of color were being sidelined in the marches or else addressed hastily in a last-minute effort to respond to criticism. In the end, Grant opted to participate. I equally share in the frustration that when we have these conversations [about feminism], sometimes it seems like women of color are missing from those conversations, she told me. But in order to have a voice, I need to be here.

The question remains whether the energy displayed Saturday will carry over into other ongoing local struggles. For example, will the thousands who poured into downtown Cincinnatis streets show up for issues that matter to those who care about police violence? Will they show up for the retrial of Ray Tensing, a white former University of Cincinnati police officer who killed Sam Dubose, an unarmed black man, during a traffic stop? Thats the question members of Black Lives Matter Cincinnati raised when I asked how the march connected to their work. The first trial ended in November in a hung jury. Black Lives Matter activists at the Cincinnati Sister March, January 21, 2017.

The event was politically amorphous, Brian Taylor of BLM said of Saturdays rally, at which fellow BLM organizer Ashley Harrington spoke. The sentiment of the event is anti-Trump, but what people are for is yet to be seen.

Photos by Dani McClain except where otherwise noted.

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Marching Against Trump, Progressives in Cincinnati Put a Blue Dot in Red Ohio - The Nation.

Columns

Jan 24, 2017

Progressives protests against all things Trump his sexism, crudeness, lack of impulse control, bigotry, fondness for Putin, conflicts of interest, lying, ties to Wall Street and more offer encouragement to the protestors but do too little to convert a critical mass of voters to progressive positions.

The protests and marches that have most notably changed the countrys direction have been dedicated to particular goals that were always kept in focus. Demonstrations against the Vietnam War were about ending the war. Civil rights demonstrations were about ending segregation.

Saturdays womens marches purported to be about womens issues, such as reproductive rights and equal pay, but there was also an element of women taking on the whole of Trumpism. They would have been more persuasive and more likely to spread if their goals had been less diffuse. Suppose, for example, equal pay alone attracted a large following of people who were so committed that they became one-issue voters. The resulting new wave of office holders would be supportive of many related progressive issues. One has but to think of the NRA.

Not only that. I quarrel with the notion that some issues are womens issues, as if they had no affect on men. If Roe v. Wade is overturned, for example, women will be affected more directly, of course. But abortions will continue, and it will be mens sisters, mothers, wives, daughters who break the law and risk dying of sepsis. Identifying issues as purely or strongly of benefit to women (when in fact those same issues apply to all of us, albeit in different ways) risks losing the support of the half of voters who are men.

So heres a question. If women wanted to stress the one goal that would be most effective in countering Trumps excesses, what would it be?

Reproductive rights? If that was going to get people out in the streets in a way that would defeat the anti-choice forces and usher in a generally more progressive government, it would already have happened.

Free trade? Too little understanding of that one. Too nuanced. Too little agreement. Seemingly too remote from the daily lives of ordinary people.

Military involvement abroad? That would work if we still had a draft and children of the powerful were fighting and dying. As it is, we hire people to do the fighting, and they dont elicit the same empathetic response that drafted soldiers do.

Grace and elegance in the use of English as a requirement for being president? I wish. But we proved with George W. Bush and now Donald Trump that too few voters value that.

Black Lives Matter may eventually change some things, but it hasnt yet. Occupy Wall Street had its 15 minutes of fame, but that was about all.

The demonstrations against the repeal of Obamacare and messing around with Medicare and Medicaid that occurred on Jan. 15 suggest it might be such a galvanizing issue. It was important enough for the people of Saranac Lake and numerous other locations to come together, march and organize. Those efforts may slow the dismantling of existing public medical care systems. Maybe more. I fervently hope so. I doubt, though, whether saving Obamacare is the galvanizing issue that will bring enough people together to make progressivism in general a force that wins more battles than it loses.

My bet is that the most effective counter to the excesses and retrograde positions and tone of Trumpism is well-organized, well-financed, take-no-prisoners opposition centered on unfair distribution of wealth and insufficient regulation of Wall Street. Alas, Bernie has probably aged out of another campaign. I hope there is someone out there who can fill his slot before its too late.

In this column two weeks ago, I made the case for trying to talk with people on the opposite side as the only way to lessen our divisions. You may find this piece inconsistent with that. I dont think so. I still believe in talking. Its just that while doing that, the left should also be working (demonstrating, marching, thinking, running for office) to make progressivism dominant. After that happens, well still be divided, and well still need to talk to each other.

Paul Willcott publishes somewhat longer essays about once a month at http://www.geezerblockhead.com.

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