Badge Of Honor

In 2005 I was trying to explain why I was drawn to the Cindy Sheehan protest outside of the Bush "ranch"/stage set in Crawford, Texas. I told the story of the first time I ever went to jail.

I remember in 1966 I heard about the first big draft board rally in NYC. I was living a couple hours away and I was really just a kid. But I somehow managed to get into New York and I somehow managed to get to the front of the rally which started out as a protest by 10 people and ended up with tens of thousands. An agreement was reached between the police and the organizers that the 10 leaders would get arrested as a symbolic gesture of nonviolent protest and everyone else would sing a few folk songs and go home peacefully. Well, no one consulted me. As the police ushered the 10 under the barricades I attached myself to Dr. Spock (not the Vulcan, the baby doctor) and claimed I was his aide and he might have a heart attack and die if I wasn't with him. The cop who challenged me-- he knew the difference between 10 and 11-- looked puzzled but Spock laughed and agreed and in I went-- to jail. It was my first time, though not my last. But the first was the best. It was a cell filled with the coolest people in NY: Allen Ginsburg, Tuli Kupferberg, Ed Saunders, Benjamin Spock... Eventually the rest of the crowd got pissed off and everyone wanted to be arrested so the police started arresting everyone until there was no more capacity. And then they let everyone go. It was all kind of good-natured.

I marked my territory. For other people at other times it was far less "kind of good-natured." Saturday night dozens of Occupy protesters were brutalized by the NYPD and many were arrested. I remember when I was interviewing a candidate for a Blue America endorsement once we were going through all his bona fides and his positions on our issues and I was still trying to get a bead on who he was. Then he revealed he had been an SEIU organizer when he was younger and had been arrested 5 times. Interview over; we endorsed him.

This week, in helping to explain to his supporters why he was backing Jesse Jackson, Jr. in a tough primary fight against a dull, conservative Democrat, Alan Grayson explained why some people, political leaders included, feel it's important to get arrested sometimes.

For most people, prison is punishment. For a few, it becomes a badge of honor.

One Member of Congress told me that every few years, he gets arrested. So that people can see whose side he's on.

Eugene Debs was sentenced to ten years in prison for protesting against United States involvement in World War I. Debs ran for President from prison, and he received almost a million votes (3.4% of the total).

And on March 11, 1986, on his 21st birthday, you would have found Jesse Jackson, Jr. in jail, for protesting at the South African Embassy in Washington, D.C., against apartheid in South Africa.

Both before and after that, if you wanted to find Jesse Jackson, Jr. at lunchtime on Thursdays, you wouldn't go looking for him in a diner or a fast-food joint. You'd find him at 444 N. Michigan Avenue, in Chicago, in front of the South African Consulate, protesting against apartheid. Week after week after week. The protests at the Consulate started in 1977, and they went on for more than a decade.

The protests ended only after Nelson Mandela was released from his 27 years of incarceration – another badge of honor. On the day of his release, Mandela made a speech that was broadcast around the world. Mandela called for peace and reconciliation. On the stage with Mandela that day was Jesse Jackson, Jr.

For the past quarter-century, in one way or another, Jesse Jackson, Jr. has devoted himself to the causes of justice, equality and peace. He is the kind of Democrat that Democrats always ask for: tough, fearless, compassionate and unstoppable.

He faces a serious challenge in his primary on Tuesday, from a former Democratic Member of Congress.

He needs our help. He deserves our help. Let's help him.

Remember, we don't just need more Democrats. We need more Democrats, and better ones. We can't let one who is this good slip away.

We've been writing a lot about the primary in Illinois tomorrow, mostly in terms of the progressive vs ConservaDem battles in IL-10 (Ilya Sheyman's race) and IL-13 (Dr. David Gill's race). But there are other important races around the state as well, and Jesse Jackson, Jr. should be able to crash Debbie Halvorson. Besides Grayson, Jackson has been endorsed by President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Gov. Pat Quinn, Raul Grijalva, Aretha Franklin... and he's ahead in the polls. But the NY Times explained some of the problems-- even beyond the ethics investigation involving Blagojevich-- that Jackson faces.

Like Congressional districts across the country, Mr. Jackson’s territory morphed last year in a statewide remapping process and now includes parts of Ms. Halvorson’s previous district. The new boundaries may have created another vulnerability for Mr. Jackson, altering the racial makeup of his district enough-- from about 68 percent African-American to only 54 percent-- to raise questions about whether Ms. Halvorson has a chance to become the first white candidate to win the seat in three decades.

Ms. Halvorson, a former Illinois state legislator and one-term congresswoman who lost her seat in 2010, is also getting some unsolicited help from Campaign for Primary Accountability, an anti-incumbent “super PAC” that helped defeat Representative Jean Schmidt of Ohio, who was widely thought to have a safe seat, in a Republican Party primary this month.

The group says that it is aiming at both Republicans and Democrats in races where “there is high unfavorable ratings for the incumbent,” and that it plans to spend six figures against Mr. Jackson.