Heidi Sloan's Plan for Political Revolution

Heidi Sloan, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, is running for Congress in Texas' gerrymandered 25th district, which stretches from Burleson, split between Tarrant and Johnson counties, just south of Ft. Worth, through Gatesville, Ft. Hood/Killeen and Texas Hill Country and into the heart of Austin (including the UT campus). The incumbent is a super-rich, super-corrupt used car salesman named Roger Williams. The district gave Trump a 55.1% to 40.2% win over Hillary and the PVI is R+11. Most of the district's votes come out of Travis County, which is overwhelmingly Democratic. The problem for Democrats lies mostly in Johnson, Burnet and Corvell counties, which are even redder than Travis is blue. This cycle there are 2 progressives, Heidi and 2018 candidate Julie Oliver, battling it out to see which will face Williams next November in what is shaping up to be another anti-red wave election.

Heidi is a farmer and an organizer, fighting for Medicare for All, a Green New Deal, worker’s rights, and safety and liberation for marginalized people. She didn't get into politics to become a candidate. Like a lot of folks, 2016 was a wake up call for her-- she told us she "saw the election of Trump as the consequence of a broken system, and I knew I had to act. For me, that action was not getting involved in elections but getting involved in my community. I became a grassroots organizer, and following that path has led me to see politics very differently than most people asking for votes these days." Below is a guest post she penned for DWT. Please read, enjoy and consider contributing to her campaign by clicking on the Take Back Texas thermometer on the right.



We All Deserve A Good Life-- How Come We Don't Have It?
-by Heidi Sloan

For the last 7 years, I've been a farmer at a housing project for the formerly homeless, and before that I spent years teaching toddlers with disabilities in public schools. I have spent my life on the margins, and in that time I have experienced firsthand how our institutions fail our people. Working in a preschool, I was very close to the problems at the root of our education system-- low wages and shamefully few resources for teachers, who spend too many hours in schools with too many students. I came to see that the leadership of teachers was key to addressing those problems, but teachers were not being listened to. In my work with the homeless, I grew weary watching more and more of my neighbors become homeless, knowing that no matter how well I did my job the structures that caused homeless maintained a never-ending pipeline of people destined for the street. In my personal life, I have cared for my mother, who struggles with finding and accessing the care she needs for her mental health. I have grown intimately aware of the many ways in which our health care system is designed to generate profit for insurance companies at the expense of healing the sick.

I tried to be the change I wanted to see in the world, and I came up against the limitations of being a single person in this world. And so in 2016, when Trump was elected, I decided to take a different path. I started to organize.

I joined the Democratic Socialists of America in Austin, and through that organization I learned what community organizing was by practicing it. I organized alongside the beloved Glenn Scott to win the largest affordable housing bond in Texas history. I organized alongside workers to win Paid Sick Days in Austin, a campaign which has been caught up in the courts but inspired similar successful campaigns in both Dallas and San Antonio after we won. I organized an 18-month campaign to move Congressional Representative Lloyd Doggett to sign onto the House Medicare For All bill. I stood with the Black community to block an egregious police contract.

What I learned through all of these efforts is that there is a way to build power outside of elections. For too many Americans, politics is about the one day every four years where somebody asks you to vote for them. For me, and for my fellow organizers, politics is about so much more than voting, and a person's power reaches so far beyond their vote.

The challenge lies in doing the work it takes to bring people into spaces where they connect with their power and find the courage to use it. That work is slow, and it requires patience and compassion and dedication to something greater than one's self. That is the work of movement building, and that is the work that led me to run for office.

I am committed to winning Medicare For All and a Green New Deal, to reforming our criminal justice system so it heals us rather than locking us in cages, to building power for the working class through unions, to securing safety and liberation for all people, to investing deeply in our families and schools and communities rather than in war and the destruction of our planet. But I understand that we will not win those things through elections alone. Over 70% of Americans already support Medicare For All-- we don't have this program for a reason, and the reason is that the institutions of power in this country are resilient to change that weakens capital and undermines the supremacy of the ruling class.

Our answer to this challenge is to run a class struggle campaign-- not to put one woman in a Congressional seat, but to organize a district so that no matter who is in office working people have enough power to hold their representatives' feet to the fire.

What's a class struggle campaign? A campaign that names and fights enemies-- as we did when we called out Governor Greg Abbott for scapegoating the homeless for political points. A campaign that crafts policy with directly impacted communities at the table-- as we did in drafting our platforms and endorsing the Homes Guarantee. A campaign that stands with our neighbors as they fight their fights-- as we did when we organized alongside Rodney Reed's family to stop his execution. A campaign that leverages its own power to build power alongside our allies-- as we did when we knocked doors to win a decarbonized Austin Energy, or when we mobilized around student protests, picket lines, and school closures. A campaign that follows the leadership of the working class-- as we did when I was arrested in solidarity with striking airport workers over Thanksgiving.

I am demonstrating the kind of leadership constituents can expect from me in office right now. But I wanted to make clear my commitments and my loyalties to the working class, and so our campaign has created an Organizing Platform which makes promises about the manner in which I will lead when in office. In this platform, I pledge to double union membership in the district, to never pay dues to the undemocratic DCCC, to invest in new leadership so that the continued growth of our movement doesn't depend on me being in office. I pledge to listen to communities of color when they take issue with how I am legislating, and to be available and accountable to my constituents with a clear set of promises to achieve that. I pledge not merely to vote on progressive legislation, but to organize and mobilize around winning the proposals we demand.

In our first three months, our campaign has knocked on over 20,000 doors. We have brought hundreds of volunteers into our movement, and we intend to bring hundreds more. Win or lose, we are building power that will outlast this election, and win or lose I am committed to the movement building work we are doing right now, which we did before and which we will continue to do. This is one fight, and we are all in. I invite you to join us in this fight.

Frackenlooper— This Cycle’s Eternal GOP Cat’s Paw Inside the Democratic Party

Frackenlooper seems to have acquired the template for the anti-“socialism” raving the right was using before FDR pulverized the Republican Party and the conservative Democrats’ so-called American Liberty League. Back in 1936, American voters responded to the conservatives’ dire rantings about “Socialism!!!” by reelecting Roosevelt 27,747,636 (60.8%) to 16,679,543 (36.5%). He won every state but Maine and Vermont— 523 electoral votes to 8. In Mississippi, FDR took 97.06% of the vote and did even better in South Carolina (98.57%). When the dust cleared over Congress, there were 334 Democrats in the House and just 88 Republicans. There were also 13 actual socialists. In the Senate, it must have seemed like the end of the world for the Republicans. Confident that their anti-socialism campaign was finally going to bear fruit, they stepped up the shrill nonsense, lost 5 more seats to the Democrats and ended up with just 17 senators to the Democrats’ 74. (There was also 3 socialists.)

None of that has ever stopped the conservatives and Frackenlooper was out to prove the futility of it again yesterday. Going into the debate last night, Colorado’s detested ex-governor was polling miserably. According to the RealClearPolitics averages, he was backed by 0.3% of national Democratic primary voters, fewer Tulsi (0.8%), Tim Ryan (0.6%), Kirsten Gillibrand (0.5%), Michael Bennet (0.4%), John Delaney (0.4%) or de Blasio (0.4%). The only candidate doing worse than Frackenlooper was Seth Moulton (0.1%). His numbers are too low in Iowa to show up in the averages. Same in Nevada and South Carolina.

But there he was, crazy, dejected. rejected ole Frackenlooper, on Wednesday evening, strutting around the spin room at the Ziff Ballet Opera House in Miami, pretending to be a real candidate, yammering to any reporter who had nothing better to do than pay attention to a desperate madman, that the Democrats will lose if they embrace “Socialism!!!!” A beer brewer by trade, Frackenlooper insists that “The word socialism by itself has a lot of baggage in this country and especially in swing states ... it’s not a winning solution and I continue to say you don’t need massive government expansion to change this country.” Frackenlooper gets his chance to address the whole country tonight— along with Bernie and the other real candidates— from the debate stage, although no one quite understands how exactly he qualifies. There are two other candidates who seem unable to grasp what “democratic socialism” is and who themselves revel in corporate socialism and are staking their chance to break through to 1% by attacking it: John Delaney— who pumped $17 million of his own money into his long and failed campaign— and the other candidate from Colorado, Michael Bennet. Together, though, the 3 anti-“socialism!!!” candidates are polling about 1%.

When A Frackenlooper Falls In A Forest, Does Anyone Hear?

There's another primary going on-- for who will dominate the conservative lane in the Democratic primary. In the end, there aren't going to be 24 candidates-- probably just 3: a progressive (Bernie, maybe Elizabeth Warren), an identity politics candidate (likely Kamala Harris) and a conservative/establishment/status quo candidate (likely Biden). But entitled multimillionaires John Delaney and John Frackenlooper aren't giving up. Each is waging a slightly under the radar battle to prove he is the furthest right of all the other Democrats, likely in the hope of grabbing the Biden slot when he inevitably stumbles and self-destructs. Both are loathsome characters and it is impossible to tell which would be a worse candidate for the Democrats.

Yesterday, in a desperate plea for attention, Hickenlooper could hardly wait to get in front of a microphones to denounce the incredibly inspiring-- even transformative-- speech Bernie delivered on Wednesday. He persuaded the National Press Club to let him use their facilities for his anti-Bernie tirade, even though it was apparent from the first moment that he didn't understand a word of what Bernie had to say. His press release announced that Frackenlooper "will discuss successful private-public partnerships he oversaw in Colorado, including a program that dramatically expanded access to reproductive healthcare, reducing unintended pregnancy and abortion among young woman by more than half."

It's questionable whether or not Frackenlooper will be allowed on stage for the first round of debates and no one thinks he will make it onto the second round. The DNC says he has passed one threshold-- an ability to poll one percent in 3 polls, but has failed to have inspired enough individual donors 65,000 people, to be considered competitive. RealClearPolitics polling averages shows Hickenlooper with 0.4% support nationally, at 0.5% in New Hampshire and under 0.5% in Iowa.

His speech yesterday began with how he has "great respect for Bernie" BUT... he "fundamentally disagrees that we should do away with the democratic, regulated capitalism that has guided this country for over 200 years." Did Bernie say that? Here, watch it again and tell me where:




Frackenlooper claims that his reactionary position "is shared by many of my Democratic colleagues, but for some reason, our Party has been hesitant to express their opposition to democratic socialism. In fact, the Democratic presidential field has not only failed to oppose Senator Sanders’ agenda, they’ve actually rushed to embrace it. The majority of the Democratic presidential candidates support at least one of Sanders’ various proposals. Even, the self-declared pragmatists hesitate to directly criticize Medicare for All and the Green New Deal. While it’s true that no one of these policies would completely remake our economy on their own, Sanders said clearly on Wednesday that the goal of his complete agenda is to make the United States of America a democratic socialist country. The urgency now is even greater than before. Democrats must say loudly and clearly that we are not socialists. If we do not, we will end up reelecting the worst President in our country’s history."

Fuckface... I mean Frackenlooper failed to hear a word of what Bernie said. Or maybe Fuckface... I mean Frackenlooper sees FDR and the New Deal exactly the same way Republicans do-- as some kind of communist takeover. Fuckface... I mean Frackenlooper was all negativity, while the only negative words Bernie had were for fascists like Hitler and Mussolini and their current day imitators-- he named "Putin in Russia, Xi in China, Mohamed Bin Salman in Saudi Arabia, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, and Viktor Orbán in Hungry... plus the U.S. counterpart: Señor Trumpanzee.

Unlike Bernie, who explained how the greatest achievements of the Democratic Party have been made when Democrats have stood up to the GOP "socialism" smears, Frackenlooper ranted yesterday about how "Socialism is the most effective attack line Republicans can use against Democrats as long as Trump is at the top of the ticket.  As some have pointed out, Republicans may call Democrats “socialists” no matter how moderate we truly are. But Americans are smarter than that." Yes, they are-- but is Frackenlooper?

The Republican socialism smear campaign began in 1930, when Hoover was still president. Going into the midterms that year, the GOP help 270 seats in the House, to the Democrats' 164 and 56 seats in the Senate, to the Democrats' 39. As the Republicans howled "socialism" against the Democrats-- much the same way Frackenlooper did against Bernie yesterday-- the voters decided to start redistributing political power. After the 1930 elections, the House flipped blue and the Democrats wound up with a one seat majority-- 218 to 217, the Republicans having lost 52 seats. In the Senate, the GOP lost 6 seats but still controlled the body, 50-45. Two years later, the GOP ramped up their "socialism" bullshit, which turned Hoover into a one-term president. 22,821,277 voters (57.4%) picked FDR to 15,761,254 (39.7%) who stuck with the Republicans. FDR won all but 6 states. The Democrats flipped the Senate, winning 12 Republican-held seats for a 59-36 majority. In the House, 1932 was absolutely catastrophic for the "Socialism-screeching Republicans." Already in the minority, 101 Republicans were defeated, giving the Democrats a 313 to 117 majority.

The Republicans didn't learn a thing from their defeats. They decided to go even bigger with their anti-socialism smear attacks in the 1934 midterms. The voters responded decisively. The GOP 117 minority shriveled further. The new Democratic majority was 322-103 and 7 members from the Progressive Party were elected. In the Senate, it must have felt like the end of the world for the Republicans, as 10 more of them went down to defeat, giving the Democrats a 69-25 majority (with one Progressive and one member of the Farmer-Labor Party elected). It was looking like voters liked all that socialism.

And then came 1936. FDR was reelected in a massive landslide against the anti-socialism fanatic-- 27,747,636 (60.8%) to 16,679,543 (36.5%)-- leaving the GOP with just 2 states, losing even Kansas, where their nominee was from. And the GOP shed a further 5 seats in the Senate, leaving them with a sad rump of just 17 senators, sitting and mumbling "socialism!" to each other. In the House, there just weren't many more districts that could flip. But the GOP managed to lose 15 more seats. The House then consisted of 334 Democrats, 88 Republicans, 8 Progressives and 5 Farmer-Labor Party socialists.

Frackenlooper must have missed history classes when those years were being discussed. He went on to babble his regular bullshit about how he won in 2104 "by talking about how the state collaborated with non-profits and with business. By talking about how I worked with Democrats and Republicans."  He then went into a full-throated defense of Hillarism that the voters already rejected. "Democratic socialism," he claimed, "is not only a poor electoral strategy-- it’s a disastrous governing model. While Sanders has attacked those in the center for preaching incrementalism-- the reality is that pragmatists don’t say 'no' to big ideas, they figure out how to actually get them done. While government plays a vital role in tackling big challenges, it has rarely been successful alone. It is when government has teamed up with the private sector and non-profits-- that we have seen our greatest successes-- from the polio vaccine to the space race." And then some wobbly assertions that can't be substantiated: "I used that collaborative approach in Colorado, and, today, our state has near-universal health care. We’ve had the number one economy in the country for three consecutive years. I am the only person running who has actually done what everyone else is just talking about."

Today Frackenlooper is one of the most hated political figures in Colorado. There's virtually no office in the state he could win. But in his own mind-- and only in his own mind-- he claims to be a hero of the state. Both parties detest him, yet his campaign is based on bullshit like this:

And, we didn’t get any of those big progressive goals done by applying ideological litmus tests.

We took a pragmatic approach.

We understood that sometimes we would have to talk to Republicans.

We didn’t demonize the private sector.

We focused, above all else, on building a state that worked for everyone, by getting everyone to work together.    

Frackenlooper claims he understands-- though he doesn't, "that Americans are frustrated right now-- that they are hungry for bold change." His entire career proves that those are just random words to him. "I understand that our young people, especially, see socialism as an attractive alternative to the political gridlock and economic recession they experienced during their formative years. But it would be a grave mistake to abandon the American entrepreneurial spirit that has always been at our country’s core." Did he listen to a different speech by Bernie than anyone else did-- or, more likely, no speech at all... except the one Republicans made in 1930, 1932, 1934, 1936... "The reality," he claimed yesterday so the Republicans wouldn't feel lone with this losing message, "is that socialism increases tax burdens on working families while often failing to solve the problems it claims to address.  Medicare-for-All does not take on fee for service, the major driver of healthcare costs. (Conservatives fought like mad dogs against Medicare; they still do. Frackenlooper is one of them, no less than Mitch McConnell is).

"The Green New Deal guarantees every American a federal job-- virtually guaranteeing it will never make it through Congress. " Exactly what Republicans said for years about Social Security. "Free college proposals massively raise taxes-- while doing nothing to address economic opportunity for the two-thirds of Americans who will never graduate with a four-year degree...  For too long, our leaders let America’s economic policies drift away from our core values-- especially the value we place on America’s workers and the work they do. At times, our leaders were passive in the face of big forces like globalization and automation, leaving our workers to fall behind. For decades, economic policies have shifted to favor the wealthy and powerful over those who work every day to get by."

He just described his end of the Democratic Party, from Bill Clinton on. Will he ever go beyond 0.4%. Hard to imagine. While I was writing this post, I got a call from a NY Times reporter to talk about the Senate races. I'm just just mentioning that as an excuse for why the post may have come out a little disjointed. He reminded me what I hate so much about establishment Democrats like Frackenlooper. They're, first and foremost, careerists. It's always all about them... never about the values and principles and goals of the Democratic Party, values and principles and goals they absolutely loathe. In fact, all of them-- the Schumers and Lieberman's and Biden's and Frackenloopers... they are self-loathing Democrats. This people are far from being on the side of them working class-- and they have muddied the Democratic Party brand in there process of climbing their personal career ladders. I'm guessing none of what I said to the Times reporter will get into his story. He seemed relieved to get me off the phone so he could get back to the conventional wisdom that the only way to win seats in "red" states like Georgia, Texas and Iowa is to run conservative Democrats, even though I tried explaining how Harkin's wins and Stacey Abrams' and Beto's performances in those states negates the entire electoral premise of the DSCC (and DCCC) that Democrats can only win as lesser of two evils candidates. Kathy Ellis is running for Congress in a super-red Missouri district. She understands this and her campaign is based on it. Kathy Ellis, not John Frackenlooper, is a Democrat in the best sense of what it means to be a Democrat. Watch this video and you'll have a better idea of what I'm talking about and then think about contributing to her campaign here.

Bernie's Speech Today-- For All Americans: "Despair Is Not An Option... We Must Take Up The Unfinished Business Of The New Deal And Carry It To Completion"

Before the much anticipated speech from Bernie on how Democratic Socialism is the way-- probably the only way-- to defeat oligarchy, Oregon Republican Greg Walden ran to Fox to warn Republican voters that Bernie's policies would be disastrous. "When government takes things over," he wrote, "it seldom gets less expensive or more efficient. And there’s going to be an enormous bill for taxpayers. There’s no such thing as a free lunch, as we know. What concerns me most is about people’s access to health care because we know in countries where there’s a complete government takeover, they end up in a budget crunch and you wait in a hospital line, you wait to get diagnosed with cancer, you wait to get treatment. […] Why would we want to go down that system?"

I wonder if Walden wrote that himself today. Or did he just use the Republican Party canned speech-- which is exactly what that sounds like-- when they warned voters about the abolition of child labor, the 8 hour workday, weekends, the right to form unions, Social Security, the minimum wage, civil rights and then voting rights for minorities, consumer protection, environmental protection, Medicare, Medicaid... anything and everything that has benefited working families. All these things, to Republicans-- and the the Republican wing of the Democratic Party-- sound like doom and like communism and socialism and the end of the world.

I beg you to listen to Bernie's speech above. And send it to your friends and family. Here are some excerpts:

[I]f there was ever a moment in the history of our country where despair was not an option, this is that time.



If there was ever a moment where we had to effectively analyze the competing political and social forces which define this historical period, this is that time.



If there was ever a moment when we needed to stand up and fight against the forces of oligarchy and authoritarianism, this is that time.


And, if there was ever a moment when we needed a new vision to bring our people together in the fight for justice, decency and human dignity, this is that time.



In the year 2019 the United States and the rest of the world face two very different political paths. On one hand, there is a growing movement towards oligarchy and authoritarianism in which a small number of incredibly wealthy and powerful billionaires own and control a significant part of the economy and exert enormous influence over the political life of our country.


On the other hand, in opposition to oligarchy, there is a movement of working people and young people who, in ever increasing numbers, are fighting for justice.
 
They are the teachers taking to the streets to make certain that schools are adequately funded and that their students get a quality education.


They are workers at Disney, Amazon, Walmart and the fast food industry standing up and fighting for a living wage of at least $15 an hour and the right to have a union.


They are young people taking on the fossil fuel industry and demanding policies that transform our energy system and protect our planet from the ravages of climate change.


They are women who refuse to give control of their bodies to local, state and federal politicians.

They are people of color and their allies demanding an end to systemic racism and massive racial inequities that exist throughout our society.

They are immigrants and their allies fighting to end the demonization of undocumented people and for comprehensive immigration reform.



When we talk about oligarchy, let us be clear about what we mean. Right now, in the United States of America, three families control more wealth than the bottom half of our country, some 160 million Americans. The top 1% own more wealth than the bottom 92% and 49% of all new income generated today goes to the top 1%. In fact, income and wealth inequality today in the United States is greater than at any time since the 1920s.


And when we talk about oligarchy, it is not just that the very rich are getting much richer. It is that tens of millions of working-class people, in the wealthiest country on earth, are suffering under incredible economic hardship, desperately trying to survive.



Today, nearly 40 million Americans live in poverty and tonight, 500,000 people will be sleeping out on the streets. About half of the country lives paycheck to paycheck as tens of millions of our people are an accident, a divorce, a sickness or a layoff away from economic devastation.



While many public schools throughout the country lack the resources to adequately educate our young people, we are the most heavily incarcerated nation on earth.



After decades of policies that have encouraged and subsidized unbridled corporate greed, we now have an economy that is fundamentally broken and grotesquely unfair.



Even while macroeconomic numbers like GDP, the stock market and the unemployment rate are strong, millions of middle class and working people struggle to keep their heads above water, while the billionaire class consumes the lion’s share of the wealth that we are collectively creating as a nation.



In the midst of a so-called booming economy real wages for the average worker have barely risen at all. And despite an explosion in technology and worker productivity, the average wage of the American worker in real dollars is no higher than it was 46 years ago and millions of people are forced to work two or three jobs just to survive.



And here is something quite incredible that tells you all you need to know about the results of unfettered capitalism. All of us want to live long, happy, and productive lives but. in America today the very rich live on average 15 years longer than the poorest Americans.



In 2014, in McDowell County, West Virginia, one of the poorest counties in the nation, life expectancy for men was 64 years. In Fairfax County, Virginia, a wealthy county, just 350 miles away, life expectancy for men was nearly 82 years, an 18-year differential. The life expectancy gap for women in the two counties was 12 years.



In other words, the issue of unfettered capitalism is not just an academic debate, poverty, economic distress and despair are life threatening issues for millions of working people in the country.



While the rich get richer they live longer lives. While poor and working families struggle economically and often lack adequate health care, their life expectancy is declining for the first time in modern American history.



Taken together, the American Dream of upward mobility is in peril. In fact, if we don't turn things around, our younger generation will, for the first time in living memory, have a lower standard of living than their parents. This is not acceptable.




...Across the globe, the movement toward oligarchy runs parallel to the growth of authoritarian regimes-- like Putin in Russia, Xi in China, Mohamed Bin Salman in Saudi Arabia, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, and Viktor Orbán in Hungry among others.



These leaders meld corporatist economics with xenophobia and authoritarianism. They redirect popular anger about inequality and declining economic conditions into violent rage against minorities-- whether they are immigrants, racial minorities, religious minorities or the LGBT community. And to suppress dissent, they are cracking down on democracy and human rights.



In the United States, of course, we have our own version of this movement-- which is being led by President Trump and many of his Republican allies who are attempting to divide our country up and attack these same communities. How sad it is that President Trump sees these authoritarian leaders as friends and allies.


This authoritarian playbook is not new. The challenge we confront today as a nation, and as a world, is in many ways not different from the one we faced a little less than a century ago, during and after the Great Depression in the 1930s. Then, as now, deeply-rooted and seemingly intractable economic and social disparities led to the rise of right-wing nationalist forces all over the world.



In Europe, the anger and despair was ultimately harnessed by authoritarian demagogues who fused corporatism, nationalism, racism and xenophobia into a political movement that amassed totalitarian power, destroyed democracy, and ultimately murdering millions of people-- including members of my own family.



But we must remember that those were not the only places where dark forces tried to rise up.



Today, we are all rightly repulsed by the sight of neo-Nazis and Klansmen openly marching in Charlottesville, VA, and we are horrified by houses of worship being shot up by right-wing terrorists. But on February 20, 1939, over 20,000 Nazis held a mass rally-- not in Berlin, not in Rome, but in Madison Square Garden, in front of a 30-foot-tall banner of George Washington-- bordered with swastikas-- in New York City.



But back then, those American extremists could not replicate the success of their authoritarian brethren across the ocean because we in the United States, thankfully, made a different choice than Europe did in responding to the era’s social and economic crises.



We rejected the ideology of Mussolini and Hitler-- we instead embraced the bold and visionary leadership of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, then the leader of the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.



Together with organized labor, leaders in the African American community and progressives inside and outside the Party, Roosevelt led a transformation of the American government and the American economy.



Like today, the quest for transformative change was opposed by big business, Wall Street, the political establishment, by the Republican Party and by the conservative wing of FDR’s own Democratic Party. And he faced the same scare tactics then that we experience today-- red baiting, xenophobia, racism and anti-Semitism.



In a famous 1936 campaign speech Roosevelt stated, “We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace–business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.



“They had begun to consider the government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob.



“Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me-- and I welcome their hatred.”

At this point the audience went wild and started chanting "Bernie!Bernie! Bernie!" He had to explain that he was quoting FDR but acknowledged that it sounded very much like today.



Despite that opposition, by rallying the American people, FDR and his progressive coalition created the New Deal, won four terms, and created an economy that worked for all and not just the few.



Today, New Deal initiatives like Social Security, unemployment compensation, the right to form a union, the minimum wage, protection for farmers, regulation of Wall Street and massive infrastructure improvements are considered pillars of American society.



But, while he stood up for the working families of our country, we can never forget that President Roosevelt was reviled by the oligarchs of his time, who berated these extremely popular programs as “socialism.”



Similarly, in the 1960s, when Lyndon Johnson brought about Medicare, Medicaid and other extremely popular programs, he was also viciously attacked by the ruling class of this country.



And here is the point. It is no exaggeration to state, that not only did FDR’s agenda improve the lives of millions of Americans, but the New Deal was enormously popular politically and helped defeat far right extremism.



For a time.



Today, America and the world are once again moving towards authoritarianism-- and the same right-wing forces of oligarchy, corporatism, nationalism, racism and xenophobia are on the march, pushing us to make the apocalyptically wrong choice that Europe made in the last century.



Today, we now see a handful of billionaires with unprecedented wealth and power.



We see huge private monopolies-- operating outside of any real democratic oversight and often subsidized by taxpayers-- with the power to control almost every aspect of our lives.



They are the profit-taking gatekeepers of our health care, our technology, our finance system, our food supply and almost all of the other basic necessities of life. They are Wall Street, the insurance companies, the drug companies, the fossil fuel industry, the military industrial complex, the prison industrial complex and giant agri-businesses.



They are the entities with unlimited wealth who surround our nation’s capitol with thousands of well paid lobbyists, who to a significant degree, write the laws that we live under.



Today, we have a demagogue in the White House who, for cheap political gain, is attempting to deflect the attention of the American people away from the real crises that we face and, instead, is doing what demagogues always do-- and that is divide people up and legislate hatred. This is a president who supports brutal family separations, border walls, Muslim bans, anti-LGBT policies, deportations and voter suppression.



It is my very strong belief that the United States must reject that path of hatred and divisiveness-- and instead find the moral conviction to choose a different path, a higher path, a path of compassion, justice and love.



It is the path that I call democratic socialism.



Over eighty years ago Franklin Delano Roosevelt helped create a government that made transformative progress in protecting the needs of working families. Today, in the second decade of the 21st century, we must take up the unfinished business of the New Deal and carry it to completion.



This is the unfinished business of the Democratic Party and the vision we must accomplish.v

In order to accomplish that goal, it means committing ourselves to protecting political rights, to protecting civil rights-- and to protect economic rights of all people in this country.



As FDR stated in his 1944 State of the Union address: “We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence.”



Today, our Bill of Rights guarantees the American people a number of important constitutionally protected political rights. And while we understand that these rights have not always been respected and we have so much more work to do, we are proud that our constitution guarantees freedom of religion, freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, a free press and other rights because we understand that we can never have true American freedom unless we are free from authoritarian tyranny.



...As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all of God's children.”


To realize this vision, we must not view America only as a population of disconnected individuals, we must also view ourselves as part of “an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny,” as Dr. King put it. In other words, we are in this together.



We must see ourselves as part of one nation, one community and one society-- regardless of race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, or country of origin.



This quintessentially American idea is literally emblazoned on our coins: E Pluribus Unum. From the many, one.



And, I should tell you, it is enshrined in the motto of our campaign for the presidency-- Not me, Us.



Let me be clear. I do understand that I and other progressives will face massive attacks from those who attempt to use the word “socialism" as a slur. But I should also tell you that I have faced and overcome these attacks for decades-- and I am not the only one.



Let us remember that in 1932, Republican President Herbert Hoover claimed that Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal was, “a disguise for the totalitarian state.”



In 1936 former Democratic New York Governor and presidential candidate Al Smith said in a speech about FDR’s New Deal policies, “Just get the platform of the Democratic Party and get the platform of the Socialist Party and lay them down on your dining-room table, side by side.”



When President Harry Truman proposed a national health care program, the American Medical Association hired Ronald Reagan as their pitchman.



The AMA called the legislation that stemmed from his proposal “socialized medicine” claiming that White House staff were, “followers of the Moscow party line.”



In 1960, Ronald Reagan in a letter to Richard Nixon wrote the following about John F. Kennedy: “Under the tousled boyish haircut is still old Karl Marx.”



In the 1990s, then Congressman Newt Gingrich claimed President Bill Clinton’s health care plan was “centralized bureaucratic socialism.”



The conservative Heritage Foundation has claimed that the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) was “a step towards socialism.”



Former Speaker of the House John Boehner claimed the stimulus package, the omnibus spending bill and the budget proposed by President Barack Obama were “all one big down payment on a new American socialist experiment.”



In this regard, President Harry Truman was right when he said that: “Socialism is the epithet they have hurled at every advance the people have made in the last 20 years…Socialism is what they called Social Security. Socialism is what they called farm price supports. Socialism is what they called bank deposit insurance. Socialism is what they called the growth of free and independent labor organizations. Socialism is their name for almost anything that helps all the people.”



Now let’s be clear: while President Trump and his fellow oligarchs attack us for our support of democratic socialism, they don’t really oppose all forms of socialism.



They may hate democratic socialism because it benefits working people, but they absolutely love corporate socialism that enriches Trump and other billionaires.



Let us never forget the unbelievable hypocrisy of Wall Street, the high priests of unfettered capitalism.



In 2008, after their greed, recklessness and illegal behavior created the worst financial disaster since the Great Depression-- with millions of Americans losing their jobs, their homes and their life savings-- Wall Street's religious adherence to unfettered capitalism suddenly came to an end.



Overnight, Wall Street became big government socialists and begged for the largest federal bailout in American history-- some $700 billion from the Treasury and trillions in support from the Federal Reserve.



But it's not just Wall Street that loves socialism-- when it works for them. It is the norm across the entire corporate world. The truth is corporate America receives hundreds of billions of dollars in federal support every single year, while these same people are trying to cut programs that benefit ordinary Americans.



If you are a fossil fuel company, whose carbon emissions are destroying the planet, you get billions in government subsidies including special tax breaks, royalty relief, funding for research and development and numerous tax loopholes.



If you are a pharmaceutical company, you make huge profits on patent rights for medicines that were developed with taxpayer funded research.



If you are a monopoly like Amazon, owned by the wealthiest person in America, you get hundreds of millions of dollars in economic incentives from taxpayers to build warehouses and you end up paying not one penny in federal income taxes.



If you are the Walton family, the wealthiest family in America, you get massive government subsidies because your low wage workers are forced to rely on food stamps, Medicaid and public housing in order to survive-- all paid for by taxpayers.



If you are the Trump family, you got $885 million worth of tax breaks and subsidies for your family’s housing empire that is built on racial discrimination.



When Trump screams socialism, all of his hypocrisy will not be lost on the American people. Americans will know that he is attacking all that we take for granted: from Social Security to Medicare to veterans health care to roads and bridges to public schools to national parks to clean water and clean air.



When Trump attacks socialism, I am reminded of what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “This country has socialism for the rich, rugged individualism for the poor."



And that is the difference between Donald Trump and me. He believes in corporate socialism for the rich and powerful.



I believe in a democratic socialism that works for the working families of this country.



What I believe is that the American people deserve freedom-- true freedom.  Freedom is an often used word but it’s time we took a hard look at what that word actually means. Ask yourself: what does it actually mean to be free?



Are you truly free if you are unable to go to a doctor when you are sick, or face financial bankruptcy when you leave the hospital?



Are you truly free if you cannot afford the prescription drug you need to stay alive?



Are you truly free when you spend half of your limited income on housing, and are forced to borrow money from a payday lender at 200% interest rates.



Are you truly free if you are 70 years old and forced to work because you lack a pension or enough money to retire?



Are you truly free if you are unable to go to attend college or a trade school because your family lacks the income?



Are you truly free if you are forced to work 60 or 80 hours a week because you can’t find a job that pays a living wage?



Are you truly free if you are a mother or father with a new born baby but you are forced to go back to work immediately after the birth because you lack paid family leave?



Are you truly free if you are a small business owner or family farmer who is driven out by the monopolistic practices of big business?



Are you truly free if you are a veteran, who put your life on the line to defend this country, and now sleep out on the streets?



To me, the answer to those questions, in the wealthiest nation on earth, is no, you are not free.



While the Bill of Rights protects us from the tyranny of an oppressive government, many in the establishment would like the American people to submit to the tyranny of oligarchs, multinational corporations, Wall Street banks, and billionaires.

It is time for the American people to stand up and fight for their right to freedom, human dignity and security.



This is the core of what my politics is all about.



In 1944, FDR proposed an economic bill of rights but died a year later and was never able to fulfil that vision. Our job, 75 years later, is to complete what Roosevelt started.



That is why today, I am proposing a 21st Century Economic Bill of Rights.

• The right to a decent job that pays a living wage
• The right to quality health care
• The right to a complete education
• The right to affordable housing
• The right to a clean environment
• The right to a secure retirement

...At the end of the day, the one percent may have enormous wealth and power, but they are just the one percent. When the 99 percent stand together, we can transform society.

These are my values, and that is why I call myself a democratic socialist.

At its core is a deep and abiding faith in the American people to peacefully and democratically enact the transformative change that will create shared prosperity, social equality and true freedom for all.

A generous Blue America donor said she would split $100 between all the Blue-America endorsed candidates on our congressional page if I could explain the Bernie speech and what he means by "democratic socialism in one simple sentence, but, she insisted, not a run-on sentence. Actually, I think it's very easy and I think she should contribute to Bernie's campaign. She says she may but right now she's leaning towards Elizabeth Warren, admitting that it's because she wants to see a woman president. I can understand that, and I'm thankful it's Elizabeth Warren and not Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar, Kirsten Gillibrand or any other non-transformative candidate. Anyway, above is the Bernie contribution thermometer. Please click on it and donate what you can. Here's my simplified one non-run-on sentence explanation: The democratic socialism that Bernie is talking about is the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt version of the Democratic Party before Bill Clinton finally sold it out entirely to special interests. Does that work? Many people aren't old enough to remember a Democratic Party when it actually was the party of the working class rather than a party tap dancing around Wall Street financiers.

The Corrupt Forces Of The Status Quo Come After A Young Latina In Brooklyn-- Meet Julia Salazar

Blue America is primarily a PAC that endorses candidates in congressional races, but occasionally we endorse in a state legislative race. With thousands of legislative seats up for grabs, we look for men and women who will strengthen Democratic benches in their states or who have an important and extraordinary contribution to make. Right now we have a dozen candidates on our state legislative page, half of whom in primaries coming up imminently. One of our candidates is Julia Salazar, running for the New York state Senate next Tuesday in Brooklyn's 18th district, which stretches from Greenpoint and Williamsburg in the north all the way down through Bushwick to Cypress Hills in the south. Her opponent is Martin Malavé Dilan who was first elected to the Senate in 2002 and is generally considered an Albany sleazeball with financial ties to the IDC, the crooked Republican wing of New York's Democratic Party.

Salazar, a community organizer, is running as a progressive from Dilan’s left, focusing on issues such as affordable housing, healthcare, and immigration while refusing donations from the real estate industry, which has been generous to Dilan and, even more so, to Klein and the IDC. She has criticized Dilan’s record, particularly on housing and tenant protections, over his eight terms in office, highlighting the rampant gentrification that has hit the northern Brooklyn district, which includes Williamsburg and Bushwick, and taking aim at his vote for vacancy decontrol, which he has since disavowed.

..."The recent flood of endorsements for Julia Salazar and IDC challengers demonstrate how electeds and key institutional players are following the cues of progressive grassroots activists,” said Susan Kang, a spokesperson for No IDC NY, a group opposing the former IDC members which has its own multi-candidate campaign committee. “Incumbents like Dilan with deeper connections to the real estate interests than his own constituents are out of the step with the current political moment," she added.

Julia is a Democratic Socialist, like Bernie and Alexandria. She identifies as Jewish and because her father came to the U.S. from Colombia also identifies as coming from a working-class immigrant background. Her right-wing brother-- with his own political ambitions-- has called these claims into question and her honestly has become an issue, stoked by Dilan, his IDC allies and other conservatives within the Democratic Party. On Wednesday, 9 of her classmates from Columbia University stepped forward with a compelling OpEd in the Jewish Daily Forward to settle the ginned up controversy over her background.

We came to know Julia during her college years, a key period where her politics and Jewish identity were shaped and formed. Her personal story is complex, and it has been misrepresented by her opponents as she has gone from being a private individual to a public candidate for office over the course of just a few months.

We are writing this letter to affirm who we know Julia to be as a Jew and as someone with moral character that we believe more than qualifies her to represent North Brooklyn in the New York State Senate.

All of us lived in Jewish community with Julia at Columbia and Barnard. We knew her as a woman with her own place in Judaism’s complicated history who yearned to connect with her roots and her past. Julia’s story is a celebration of 21st-century American Jews who embrace Judaism and Jewish life as adults, even when provided few resources to do so while growing up.

As an activist and student leader in the Columbia Jewish community, Julia was a model of integrity. Fierce and committed, she was never afraid to stick her elbows out, especially when she perceived injustice or unfairness.

Yet she also approached leadership with a quiet dignity and humility. We knew Julia as someone who took risks yet wasn’t afraid to question her own beliefs or even change her mind.

She is the sort of Jewish leader we are proud to see seeking elected office in these times.

So we have been furious and saddened to see articles questioning her character.

It seems there are those who want to plant a seed of doubt about Julia, her Jewishness, her class background, and the many-layered heritage of men and women who come from immigrant families. We can only conclude this is an attack on her candidacy, in part because the policies, programs, and politics that she is advancing are resonating in her district and across the country.

It also suggests that Jews like Julia-- a working-class Latina woman who grew up outside of traditional Jewish educational settings-- aren’t fit to lead. These misdirections are plain wrong and deeply hurtful.

During Julia’s time on campus, we shared Shabbat dinners with her. We prayed with her. And we knew her in the many informal ways that living in a Jewish community draws its members close to one another.

We are happy and proud that Julia has found grounding and purpose in Judaism, in her values, and, now, in local politics. But we cannot be silent when cheap shots for political gain have placed a beloved member of our campus Jewish community under attack.

Now more than ever, we need truth to be at the center of our democratic process. We believe that Julia’s integrity and leadership qualities are unquestionable, and we hope this helps her potential constituents confirm what they have surely already sensed from her remarkable campaign.

The people of North Brooklyn have a chance to elect a new state senator with a serious vision for her district. Julia’s calls for universal rent control, affordable housing, single-payer healthcare, labor rights, immigrant rights, a living wage, and more are the kind of progressive policies that our unequal society-- and our Jewish tradition’s model of covenantal community-- demands.

Voters should be thrilled and excited to cast a vote for Julia on September 13th.

The right-wing campaign against Julia has them throwing every crap accusation they can muster and make up against her. The shady characters at Tablet, a status quo Democratic Party hack operation, has been leading the smear campaign. Their latest bullshit is that she was suspected of impersonating a family friend, Kai Hernandez, the then-wife of baseball player Keith Hernandez. The assholes at Tablet have been trying to get someone to run with this but no legitimate papers wanted to because Julia was never charged with anything. One of the UK scandal sheets did pick up on it from Tablet though, dredging up the "fake Jew" nonsense and claiming she was having an affair with the Mets legend while he was in the middle of divorcing Kai. Salazar sued Kai claiming she "engaged in character assassination by falsely accusing her." Kai paid Julia to settle the case. Tablet is so obsessed with destroying Julia-- and progressives in general-- that they're peddling this crap worldwide.

We agree and if you'd like to help Julia win her race against a corrupt, real estate developer-backed conservative, please consider contributing to her campaign by tapping on the thermometer above.

When Bernie Was Growing Up Congress Had An Amazing Congressman, A Democratic Socialist From Harlem Named Vito Marcantonio

Yesterday Little Marco triumphed in the Republican primary in Puerto Rico. Although only 36,393 people voted, he won an impressive 73.8% and all 23 delegates, despite being the self-appointied senatorial spokesperson against Puerto Rican bankruptcy in the name of robotic Austerity. He probably won because he was the only Republican who campaigned there and because, unlike Cruz, he's somewhat popular among Hispanics.

Rubio is anything but a champion of Puerto Ricans. The last Member of Congress who really was, was a Democratic Socialist from Harlem named Vito Marcantonio, one of the most fascinating leftists in the history of Congress. My grandfather told me about him when I was a little boy and said he was the best politician in America. He was betrayed by the Democrats when they teamed up with the GOP to run a joint candidate against him. His kind of principled independence made the rest of them look like the crooked self-serves most of them were. But I'm getting ahead of myself since I'll bet most DWT readers don't know who he was. (To me, of course, he was a precursor to Bernie.)

When he was born, in 1902, East Harlem was an impoverished ghetto filled with... Italians snd Puerto Ricans. He was conversant in both Italian and Spanish. Young Vito joined the Republican Party, the Democratic Party of the day being a cesspool of corruption, far worse than it is today. His political idol was Fiorello LaGuardia. When he was 18, still a student, he first met LaGuardia who was drawn to a speech he made advocating for something that the conservatives of the day said was "impossible": Social Security.

If it is true that government is of the people and for the people, then it is the duty of government to provide for those, who, through no fault of their own, have been unable to provide for themselves. It is the social responsibility of every citizen to see that these laws for our older people are enacted.

Ironic that his wife, from New England, was Miriam Sanders. He served as LaGuardia's campaign manager when he was elected mayor of New York. (By the way, LaGuardia was nothing like phony progressive Bill de Blasio, a Hillary Clinton Democrat.)

At 32, he was elected to Congress as a Republican but was defeated after one term by corrupt Tammany Hall Democrat James Lanzetta-- who had originally beaten LaGuardia for the seat-- and was beaten taken out by Marcantonio first in 1934 and again in 1938, after Marcantonio had ditched his GOP membership and joined the American Labor Party, a better fit for him. He served from 1939 until 1951, a champion of Puerto Rican independence, of immigrants and of civil rights for blacks long before that became a thing. He was colossally popular with his constituents and often won the Democratic Party and the Republican Party primaries as well as the American Labor Party primary. He refused take any dirty campaign contributions and self-financed his own campaigns, working as an attorney while he was in Congress. Also while in Congress he was investigated by the FBI for being sympathetic to communists. From John Simon's Rebel in the House: The Life and Times of Vito Marcantonio"

Just thirty-two years old, Vito Marcantonio must have cut a figure in startling contrast to the drawling Southern gentlemen in white linen suits who ran the House. Marc’s high-pitched, nasal, machine-gun rapid delivery bespoke the accent and street smarts of East Harlem. His three-piece, off-the-rack, broad-striped suits and beige fedoras-- they resembled the wardrobe of Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls-- did little to soften his persona of self-righteous belligerence. An unlikely Don Quixote had arrived to tilt at the windmills of power.

In 1935 Congress met under extraordinary circumstances. It was the fifth year of the Great Depression. Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal had been buoyed by relief programs passed during the celebrated “Hundred Days” of 1933 and by the president’s radio rhetoric. But the economic recovery he had promised was still nowhere on the horizon. More than a quarter of the work force was still unemployed. Despair was rampant. To many, the Democrats and Republicans seemed bankrupt, a view held even by the few radicals who had been elected to the House. Marc began to stake out a political position not only far to the left of the major parties, but of the most zealous of the other radicals. Marcantonio opposed the military appropriations bill of 1935. He saw the ROTC provisions of the bill as “forcing American youth to goose step through the classroom,” as stifling “liberal thought in our institutions,” and as part of “a strong tendency toward government by edict…an urge for regimentation.” Marcantonio attacked the FDR administration’s Social Security bill as inadequate and supported a doomed alternative that provided for unemployment insurance covering all, to be administered by unions and farm organizations.

Marcantonio took up the gauntlet for a stronger National Labor Relations Act; he called for a wealth tax; and he championed the outlawing of privately owned public utility holding companies. It was in support of this legislation-- the Public Utilities Holding Company Act-- that Marc took the floor and, in a speech which later became legendary in East Harlem and on the left as well, announced that he was a radical:

If it be radicalism to believe that our natural resources should be used for the benefit of all of the American people and not for the purpose of enriching just a few…then, Ladies and Gentlemen of this House I accept the charge. I plead guilty to the charge; I am a radical and I am willing to fight it out…until hell freezes over.

Marcantonio’s Congressional accomplishments were notable for a lawmaker outside the two-party machinery that superintended the Congress. In part his success was due to his diligence. Throughout his fourteen-year tenure, his attendance record was outstanding. He never missed a debate on important legislation and, whether a nominal Republican or, as he was after 1938, the sole representative of the American Labor Party (ALP), he was often the informal floor leader for liberal Democrats and others on crucial bills-- organizing Congressional and public support, planning and directing parliamentary strategy.

Marc was practical. Despite his view of administration funding requests for the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and other relief agencies as inadequate, he would fight for them as better than nothing at all. In 1939, an FDR request for $150 million was bottled up in committee by conservative Southern Democrats. Marc forced the bill to the floor (and to a vote) by daily tacking an obstructing amendment on every piece of minor legislation to come up. When one congressman asked for $400,000 to fight the pink bollworm in his state, Marcantonio retorted, “One week from today 400,000 pink slips will be delivered to WPA workers. How about the $150-million for the unemployed?”

Marcantonio’s greatest legislative crusades were on behalf of two civil rights bills: the Anti-Poll Tax Act and the Fair Employment Practices Commission Act (FEPC). Marc introduced the first Anti-Poll Tax bill in 1942. When the bill was pigeonholed in the Judiciary Committee Marc began a slow campaign to obtain 218 signatures on a petition to force the bill to the House floor. He ensured that each signature, as well as the impassioned floor debate received maximum press coverage. Arguing that the abolition of the poll tax would extend “democracy to disenfranchised Negroes and whites,” he connected the bill’s passage to the war effort, saying, “The continuance of the poll tax is discrimination and makes for disunity….Abolition of the poll tax abolishes this form of discrimination and makes for unity that is vital to victory.”

The bill passed the House, only to die in the Senate. Marcantonio succeeded in having it passed in the next session, using the same tactics, but it suffered the same fate.

Marcantonio used similar tactics to garner support for legislation with strong enforcement provisions outlawing employment discrimination. Marc also clamored for a federally supervised absentee ballot for soldiers (to ensure that black GI’s would be able to vote in the 1944 presidential election). The opposition to both measures was led by the racist Mississippi Representative John Rankin who said “the Gentleman from New York…is harassing the white people of the Southern States.”

Because the Democrats’ margin in the House grew smaller with each election, it made sense for the Democrats to court Marc. By 1942, Marcantonio had become the leader of the New York County American Labor Party. ALP endorsement, which Marc was in a position to determine, often was the margin of victory for Democratic candidates. Moreover Marcantonio had become nationally recognized. Civil rights, effective price controls, the rights of organized labor, and preserving the wartime alliance with the Soviet Union were all topics he addressed on nationwide radio broadcasts. In 1944 Harper’s magazine ratified Marcantonio’s growing status:

At forty-two Marcantonio is well on his way to becoming a first-class national figure, though one of the most unorthodox sort. Heretofore, his influence in the Congress has been that of a gadfly, not a leader….Lately, however, he has shown real genius in turning his liabilities into assets, in playing the political interstices for all they are worth.

But by 1946 FDR was dead, and his successor, Harry S. Truman, pursued an anti-Soviet Cold War foreign policy. Running on the slogan “Had Enough?” Republicans won both the House and the Senate for the first time since 1928. The New Deal coalition was dead. Despite this, Marcantonio was still able to weave his political magic. In April 1945 he had called on Secretary of Commerce Henry A. Wallace to investigate discrimination against African Americans in professional baseball, setting off a campaign that was to break the color line in the national pastime. In 1947 he supported an amendment offered by Adam Clayton Powell to desegregate public facilities in the District of Columbia. When Southern opponents of the legislation charged that the Bill would provoke race riots, Marc replied,

Now we hear the same cry…in respect to a simple request that this Congress rise up to the dignity of the nation-- the dignity the world expects us to rise up to, of practicing the fundamental precepts of Democracy for which men died, both black and white….This is Washington which many would make the Capital of the world. Are we going to hesitate to remove from the Capital of the United States the blot of discrimination and segregation?

Unfortunately, Congress responded, yes.

1946 found most workers with sharply reduced real wages, a result of inflation during and especially after the war. Unions in auto, steel, electrical, coal, and oil industries struck, causing the loss of more working days in 1946 than in any year since. With increasing frequency, Marcantonio rose to oppose attempts to repeal the gains that had been made by organized labor. Marc told the House,

Men do not strike for the fun of it. [They are] provoked by the scheming, uncompromising, unreasoning tactics of profit-bloated, tax-benefited corporations…beating the drums against American workers in order to intimidate Congress to pass anti-labor legislation.

Marcantonio’s last leadership role in the House was his fight against the Taft-Hartley Act, the turning point in a formidable anti-union campaign that has lasted to this day and has reduced the U.S. labor movement to its current pitiable state. He spoke against the bill on the floor, asking, “What is your justification for this legislation?” A labor union, he explained, is a worker’s “only defense against exploitation,”

You are making him “free”-- and impotent to defend himself against any attempt by industry to subject him to the same working conditions that existed in the United States 75 years ago. You are giving him the freedom to become enslaved to a system that has been repudiated in the past not only by Democrats but also by outstanding progressive-minded Republicans….Under the guise of fighting communism you are, with this legislation, advancing fascism on American labor.

Marcantonio’s greatest contribution in the fight against the bill was tactical. Convinced that public opinion could sway the Congress, he tried to hold up a vote to give citizens time to write, wire, or phone their Representatives. Employing a rarely-used procedural rule, Marc demanded a reading of all sixty-nine pages of the act, plus the lengthy report on it from the House Labor Committee. The national media, almost without exception supporting the bill, attacked him bitterly as a left-wing obstructionist.

Marc continued to fight for labor, civil rights, and public housing. He spoke against Truman’s Cold War programs and was the only member of the House who refused to join a standing ovation for the President when he called for Marshall Plan aid for Western Europe. Seeing the Marshall Plan as Cold War legislation designed to bolster anti-Soviet policies, he consistently tried to revive the war-time alliance of the major powers.

In 1948 he was the informal floor leader for the opponents of the Mundt-Nixon Bill, which effectively outlawed the Communist Party and required the listing of “Communist front” groups by the attorney general. But Marc was leader only by default; others were afraid to do more than cast a vote against it. Knowing there was no way to defeat the legislation, Marcantonio asserted, as he had done on other occasions, that history would judge the bill. He spoke not only to his colleagues but for the historical record.

I know many will succumb to hysteria and others will give us the usual flag-waving and red-baiting, but let us look back in retrospect: 1798-1948, 150 years. The men who opposed the Alien and Sedition Acts-- Livingstone, Madison, Jefferson-- they constitute the bright constellations in the democratic firmament of this Nation; but those who imposed on the American people those tyrannies of which this bill is a monstrous lineal descendant have been cast into oblivion, relegated where mankind always relegates puny creatures that would destroy mankind’s freedom.

In his remaining years in the House, Vito Marcantonio would speak his mind and vote his conscience, but he was alone. In 1950 he lost his seat. The same year, Richard M. Nixon won election to the Senate by asserting that his opponent, Helen Gahagan Douglas, had a voting record that was similar to Marc’s.

Vito Marcantonio was defeated in 1950 by James Donovan-- who was backed by both the Democratic and Republican parties, as well as the Liberal Party-- allied against him because he opposed the Korean War and because the establishment saw his independence as a threat to themselves. After leaving Congress, he practiced law but had a heart attack and died in 1954, age 51.

This morning, the Seattle Times, in an inspiring endorsement of Bernie Sanders for president, described him in terms reminiscent of Marcantonio.



"Authenticity and consistency are so rare in politics these days-- no wonder a strong number of voters are supporting U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders’ bid to become the Democratic candidate for president."

Sanders’ signature candor is a refreshing change from status quo politics.

Many Americans share his frustration over the fact that more and more power is being concentrated today in the hands of a few.

He is the only candidate in this race, on either side of the aisle, who has spoken forcefully-- and over years-- against Wall Street’s willingness to take enormous risks while expecting public bailouts.

Sanders advocates for breaking up big banks now and bringing back a new version of the repealed Glass-Steagall Act that would prevent financial institutions from spending customers’ money so recklessly in the future.

Sanders bravely calls out the role of big money in politics and supports a repeal of the U.S. Supreme Court’s disastrous Citizens United decision. He has long warned about the dangers of media consolidation, which limits the range of information citizens need to maintain a strong democracy.