Blue America Endorsement: Mckayla Wilkes (MD-05)

There's a big primary on April 28-- a kind of Northeast mini-Super Tuesday-- featuring New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Delaware, Rhode Island and Maryland. For the sake of argument say Bernie sweeps all 6 states. That could be the biggest news of the day, unless there's a major upset in Maryland's 5th district. The 5th, the southern part of the state, one big DC suburb that includes all or part of Prince George's, Charles, St. Mary's, Calvert and Anne Arundel counties. The district is very blue-- D+16. McCain, Romney and Trump, all won around a third of the vote. So what's the upset that could outshine the presidential race?

MD-05 has been the home base for the congressman from K Street since 1981. That would be Steny Hoyer and that would be far too long for anyone to be in Congress. Hoyer stopped representing his constituents long ago and is the most lobbyist-oriented member of Congress. As majority leader, he slows down anything and everything that smacks of progressivism-- and his opponent this cycle, Mckayla Wilkes, is all about progressivism. Blue America officially endorsed her campaign today and I asked her to tell Blue America members a little something about herself. If you'd like to help her replace Steny Hoyer-- and put someone who backs Medicare-for-All, the Green New Deal, criminal justice reform, free state college, money in politics reform... into the House where an incumbent who opposes all those things is now, please consider clicking on the Blue America 2020 congressional thermometer on the right. 





Running To Take Power Back From Special Interests
-by Mckayla Wilkes

My name is Mckayla Wilkes. Growing up, I didn’t believe in politics and I didn’t trust politicians. My father was murdered before I was born, and so my aunts helped raise me. After I lost my Aunt Sharon in the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the Pentagon, I needed help. I needed someone to talk to. Instead, I was incarcerated for skipping school. Like so many people across the country, I’ve experienced firsthand the exploitation of our healthcare and criminal justice system. Profit is centered instead of people, and corporate politicians are more beholden to their donors than their constituents.

My congressman, Steny Hoyer, takes money from the fossil fuel industry, private health insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, and the war machine. He refuses to support Medicare-for-All, the Green New Deal, or ending the War on Drugs. Just this past year, he referred to cannabis as a “gateway drug.” As someone who was arrested for possession of marijuana, I know the toll that the racist and misguided War on Drugs has had on our communities. I’m the right person to represent Maryland’s 5th District because I can resonate with so many of the ordinary, working-class people here.

While Hoyer may have large corporate PAC donors, we can defeat him. Since 1990, no challenger to Hoyer has raised more than $6,000. I’ve already raised over $150,000 and I’m outpacing Hoyer in small-dollar donations 4-to-1. Moreover, we’re actually out in the community; I’m holding 8 town halls around the district this winter, and my team and I knocked on over 6,000 doors last weekend alone. Everywhere we go, it’s clear that Marylanders are fully ready for change. If we can speak to enough people before April 28th, we will win.

  I’m running because I believe it will take a movement to pass Medicare-for-All. It will take a movement to pass a Green New Deal, to end homelessness, to reform our criminal justice system, and to end the endless wars. I’m running to be a part of that movement and to bring in people like me who didn’t trust the political process. I’m running to take power back from special interests and be a representative who is responsive to her constituents. Above all, I’m running to create a fairer, more just, and more compassionate world. All I need is your help to do it.

Despite The Iowa Democratic Party's Screw Ups Tonight, It Looks Like Bernie Won-- And Tomorrow A Berniecrat Can Win A Congressional Seat In Maryland

Immense turn-out in Iowa this evening-- bigger than anyone expected and the biggest in history in some the precincts.

Tomorrow is election day in Baltimore-- actually a special election to fill the open 7th district seat, previously held by Elijah Cummings. The district includes the western and northern parts of the city, plus suburbs and small towns to the west and north of the city in Baltimore and Howard counties. The district is unassailably blue-- PVI is D+26. Blue America endorsed state Senator Jill Carter and yesterday, so did the Baltimore Sun.

The 55-year-old city resident, lawyer and daughter of civil rights leader Walter P. Carter would add a female voice to the Maryland delegation, which has been missing since Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski retired in 2017, and she knows Baltimore-- the heart of the district. Ms. Carter was an early opponent of a mass arrest policy that disproportionately targeted African American residents in the city under the Martin O’Malley mayoral administration. And she has continued the theme of equity in justice and improving opportunities for those caught up in the system ever since.

She was also behind legislation introduced last session to end contracts between the University of Maryland Medical System and its board members, which launched a Baltimore Sun investigation that led to the board’s overhaul, and Mayor Catherine Pugh’s resignation and criminal conviction. And she has long served Maryland: She was also a state delegate for 14 years.

The big criticism that the editors of the Sun managed to offer is that "Senator Carter is considered the most progressive candidate in the race, and some of her ideas lean too far left." That should an incentive for even more people to vote for her than the rest of the endorsement!

It is also expected that Biden's big loss in Iowa today, will reverberate everywhere else. No one wants to back a loser. In fact, Biden's firewall (South Carolina) was already starting to get shaky even before today's verdict. Change Research polled the state's Democratic primary voters and noticed Biden is finally beginning to collapse in South Carolina. Praise the Lord!

The Real Clear Politics polling average still shows Biden way ahead with 30.5%, compared to 17.0% for Bernie, 16.5% for Steyer and 10.5% for Elizabeth. But the new poll tells a familiar story: people get to know who Biden really is and they abandon him in droves:

The Sunday Post and Courier reported that "Biden's hold atop South Carolina Democratic primary polls has never wavered over nearly a year. But the former vice president’s lead continues to slide with the South’s first primary just under a month away. Biden, who once led by as much as 31 percentage points in South Carolina, holds a 5-point edge over Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in the latest Post and Courier-Change Research poll released Sunday. Biden sits at 25 percent to Sanders’ 20 percent.

Biden’s lead in South Carolina has diminished because his support has fallen from a high of 46 percent in May. Few political observers expected Biden to win South Carolina by the 20-point leads he held over the summer when the Democratic field boasted two dozen contenders.

His drop in S.C. support comes as the race becomes more focused with the field cut by more than half and the leading contenders consistently standing out in the early-voting states.

Sanders has taken leads in Iowa and New Hampshire with Warren and Buttigieg joining Biden to round out the top four leaders. Iowa voters head to their caucus Monday. New Hampshire holds its primary on Feb. 11.

Biden keeps a lead in South Carolina’s Feb. 29 primary thanks to black voters who account for close to two-thirds of Democratic ballots cast. 

Biden was once the choice of half the state's African-American Democratic primary voters, and that has now shrunk to less than a third. I'm going to guess that back-to-back Bernie wins in Iowa and New Hampshire (a week from now) will help close that 5% gap between himself and Biden. And if Bernie wins in Nevada on February 22, you'll see Biden's support in the Palmetto State disintegrate entirely. Want to help Bernie drive home his message in South Carolina? That's why I included the DWT Bernie thermometer on the right.

Next Big Congressional Race Is In Baltimore-- In Days 5 Days! And The DCCC Would Prefer You To Not Know It's Even Happening

Yesterday was a very good day for our congressional candidate in Baltimore, Jill Carter. The Baltimore Sun published a piece about her, Progressive groups hope to rally voters to put state Senator Jill P. Carter of Baltimore in Congress, making it very clear why she would make a great congresswoman. We'll get back to that in a moment. The other good news for Carter, came in the form of an e-mail from Marianne Williamson to her own million + supporters. "I said when my campaign ended that I hoped the ideas we stood for would find seed within the campaigns of others," wrote Williamson. "Indeed, there are congressional candidates all over the country who are standing for things that matter. It is up to us to help them get into positions of power."

One of the most stellar of those candidates is my friend, Maryland Senator Jill Carter, who is running in a special election for Congress on February 4th for Maryland's 7th Congressional District.

Jill’s track record is impressive-- from her support for reparations, to her long-standing independence from party leadership, to her track record fighting to eradicate lead, to her work to enhance school funding formulas, to her insistence on holding police accountable, to her stand for guaranteed healthcare for all. Her work in Maryland has been deeply inspiring.

I am honored to support Jill, just as she supported me with an endorsement of my presidential candidacy. She is a brave and independent thinker, and she deserves our support.

Jill has just a few days until her special election on February 4. She can win this race but she can’t do it without us. Please consider making a contribution of $100, $50, $25, or even $1 to help us put #JillOnTheHill.

If we want the best people serving in Washington, we’re going to have to work to send them there. And this is the moment when it matters most.

Yesterday's Sun piece on Jill explained why progressives from all over Maryland are behind her. "Progressive groups in Maryland," wrote Luke Broadwater, "are rallying around Jill P. Carter, 55, a 2016 Bernie Sanders delegate who shares their vision of sweeping change: a 'Green New Deal' to fight climate change, Medicare for All to help the uninsured, and ending foreign wars. She’s picked up the endorsements of notable progressives, such as 2018 gubernatorial candidate Ben Jealous. When the members of the Sanders-affiliated Our Revolution Maryland picked which of the 32 candidates in the field to back, the vote was about 88% for Carter. 'She’s clearly the most progressive candidate in the race,' said Sheila Ruth, the co-chairwoman of Our Revolution Baltimore."

Beyond her vision, there’s more to Carter’s pitch. There’s her tale of an underdog.

In the crowded campaign office, Carter told the story of her rise from a state delegate, often at odds with leadership in Annapolis and at City Hall, to an influential state senator who won widespread praise last legislative session.

“I spent many years in the House of Delegates, very difficult and painful years,” Carter says. “I was very much isolated and marginalized. ... Now, it looks like things are on the upswing. Too bad I’m going to miss it, because I’m going to be in the Congress!”

...After years of seeing certain bills important to her die in the state House, Carter had a fresh start in 2019 after winning election to the Senate. Carter’s bill calling for an end to contracts between the University of Maryland Medical System and its board members helped expose a scandal and became one of the session’s highest-profile pieces of legislation.

Carter’s concerns about the medical system helped prompt a Baltimore Sun investigation into self-dealing by UMMS, including its $500,000 in payments to Catherine Pugh, who resigned as a board member in March and as mayor in May.

Carter also successfully sponsored bills banning employers from inquiring about an ex-offender’s criminal record before a job interview-- called “Ban the Box” legislation-- and changing state law to make it easier for people convicted of minor crimes to serve on juries.

Republican Gov. Larry Hogan vetoed the “Ban the Box” legislation, but the General Assembly is expected to override the veto. She is the lead sponsor of more than 50 bills that have become law.

Carter has a record of taking positions outside Democratic orthodoxy, sometimes angering powerful figures.

Carter vocally opposed widespread arrests in Baltimore under the administration of Democratic Mayor Martin O’Malley; police arrested more than 110,000 people in 2003 alone. She upset advocates of same-sex marriage when she sought to tie passage of the legalization effort to gaining more state money for Baltimore schools.

Last session, she voted against a bill that would have eliminated a statute of limitations for civil claims related to child sexual abuse. Carter argued the law must protect the rights of the accused in civil cases, where there is a lower standard of evidence than for criminal charges.

In 2016, after Pugh won election, she appointed Carter director of the Office of Civil Rights, which Carter saw as a dream job.

But Carter found herself in conflict with City Solicitor Andre Davis, who Carter believed sought too much power over a police Civilian Review Board that Carter wanted to use to hold officers accountable. At one point, Carter forwarded Davis’ emails to Pugh, saying they showed “how extremely pompous, disrespectful, unprofessional, and inappropriate Andre Davis was comfortable being in his interactions with me.”

Recently, Davis took to Facebook to criticize Carter, calling her leadership “deeply flawed” and accusing her of “making a lot of political noise" by trying to empower the board beyond its legal reach. He declined to comment for this article.

Where Davis saw a penchant for conflict, Carter’s supporters see independence and a willingness to take on the political establishment.

“She’s shown she’s not afraid to take on the tough issues,” said the Rev. Heber Brown, pastor of Pleasant Hope Baptist Church in Baltimore. “The way she stood up against illegal arrests under Martin O’Malley. No one in the Democratic Party was trying to touch that issue like Jill Carter was."

Carter has for years has been a top vote-getter in Northwest Baltimore, and has the endorsements of every delegate from the area, including centrist Democrats. Now, she believes she has a good chance to beat former national NAACP President Kweisi Mfume and former Maryland Democratic Party Chairwoman Maya Rockeymoore Cummings, who political analysts see as strong contenders.

Nina Kasniunas, an assistant political science professor at Goucher College, said Carter needs to make inroads in Baltimore County and Howard County to be successful.

“I’m not so sure how much she stands out outside of Baltimore,” Kasniunas said.

To that end, Carter and her team of volunteers have been out in force knocking on doors... She has sought to contrast herself with the records of Mfume and Rockeymoore Cummings. At a recent debate in West Baltimore, Carter criticized Mfume for supporting a 1994 crime bill signed by then-President Bill Clinton, also a Democrat. Carter called him a “champion” of fueling “mass incarceration."

She argues Rockeymoore Cummings hasn’t done enough for Baltimore residents to deserve the seat.

“If you went to the average voter in Baltimore City and said the name ‘Maya Cummings,’ nobody would know who that was,” Carter said.

Carter said she would push to create a national gun registry, end the Trump administration’s “cruel and inhumane” policies against immigrants at the southern U.S. border and support Elijah Cummings’ bill to provide $100 billion over 10 years to fight the opioid epidemic. Meanwhile, she plans to introduce state-level “Medicare for All” legislation.

Carter told her volunteers she would be a “pit bull” for the issues they care about.

“Once I get ahold of an issue, I’m not letting it go until we get it done," she said.

The Special Election To Replace Elijah Cummings Is Coming Up-- Will It Be A Progressive?

Cummings, Carter, Mfume

Maryland's 7th congressional district, represented since 1996 by Elijah Cummings, is getting ready for the February 4 special election primary (and an April 28th special election general) to replace him. The district includes central, western and much of northern Baltimore plus the suburbs and small towns to the west and to the north of the city including Ellicott City, Cooksville and Columbia. Most of the votes come from Baltimore, but with substantial amounts from both Baltimore County and Howard County. All are strongly blue and the district has a PVI of D+26. Obama won it with just over 76% both times he ran and Hillary took almost 76%. 53.3% of the residents are African American, 33.3% white, 7.1% Asian and 3.7% Latino.

Although there are two dozen Democratic candidates in the special, the three top-rated being state Senator Jill Carter, Maya Rockeymoore Cummings (the former congressman's widow) and ex-Congressman Kwesi Mfume, former president of the NAACP. Carter is the progressive in this contest.

Mfume endorsed Hillary in 2016. Carter was a Bernie delegate. Her platform is oriented towards working families (backing positions like Medicare-for-All, the Green New Deal and free state colleges); his platform is moderate, status quo and oriented towards the donor class. In the state Senate, Carter has a reputation as a strong independent voice-- something that scares establishment organizations like the DCCC-- and is known as the People's Champion.

Carter's campaign has been focused on her policy plans, particularly in regard to criminal justice and single payer healthcare, and her campaign claims to have hit more doors than every other candidate in this race combined. The're planning on engaging 500,000 potential voters via social media while contacting at least 50,000 voters at their doors and by phone before next month's special primary. Carter has been endorsed by Our Revolution Maryland, the College Democrats of Salisbury and Frostburg University, Demand Universal Healthcare Now, Baltimore City Councilman Ryan Dorsey, state Senator Anthony Muse, Baltimore City Council candidate Joe Kane, and former 41st District candidate Dr. Richard Bruno.

Yesterday, former NAACP president Ben Jealous endorsed her. A Ben Jealous endorsement would be a big deal for anyone anytime, but the fact that Jill's top opponent is another NAACP former president-- Mfume-- makes it even more significant and noteworthy. People eager to contribute to Jill's campaign, can do it here on the Congress Needs More Progressive Women Act Blue page. This is a good investment in a deep blue seat, where we'd be better off with a strong progressive than just another establishment careerist.

Trump, The Republicans And Baltimore

Rats by Nancy Ohanian

In 2016, Trump won the Republican primary in Maryland with 236,623 votes. On the same day, Hillary beat Bernie in that state, 63.0% to 33.2%... but Bernie's 281,275 second place finish was still enough to beat Trump. In Baltimore City. It was even funnier. Hillary beat Bernie by a lot-- 81,115 to 38,710, but in the GOP primary that Trump won, he only got a little more than a tenth of what Bernie got, 3,950 votes. and in the general election, Hillary crushed Trump statewide, 60.5% to 35.3% but really eviscerated him in Baltimore-- 85.4% to 10.9%. So, apparently, the feeling is mutual.

Remember when Trump promised he would help cities like Baltimore if he was elected? Maybe someone believed him... but no one I know. Yesterday, John Wagner, reporting for the Washington Post, wrote "Four years ago, in the aftermath of rioting in Baltimore, Donald Trump criticized then-President Obama for not doing enough to address problems in the city and claimed that 'I would fix it fast!' if he were president."

But what does Señor Trumpanzee even know about Baltimore? Anything at all? Well... maybe. It turns out that Kushner-in-law is a slumlord there, reviled for mismanagement. Ellen Cranley reported that Kushner "has continued ownership of several Baltimore-area housing complexes that have been so embroiled in housing violations and mismanagement that Kushner has been called a 'slumlord.'nA 2017 investigation by ProPublica and the New York Times called The Beleaguered Tenants of Kushnerville detailed how a subsidiary of the real-estate firm Kushner Companies functioned and the poor living conditions that plagued residents in complexes bought under Kushner's oversight. The investigation reported decrepit conditions including leaking ceilings, maggots in living-room carpet, and raw human sewage coming from a kitchen sink. The report also includes mention of multiple retaliatory lawsuits against tenants who tried to move out. Residents said in lawsuits they noticed near-constant but largely unexplained fees that would end up aiding their eviction if they weren't paid. The cases are ongoing, as Kushner Companies switched the suit to state court after a federal judge ordered the company to reveal the identity of mysterious company investors."

Whether Trump is aware of the complexes where it seems "no human being would want to live" or not, the housing troubles tied to Kushner haven't gone unnoticed by the city.

Baltimore County officials took notice of Kushner's powerful status while announcing in 2017 that he was to be fined for more than 200 code violations in apartments owned by Kushner Companies.

"We expect all landlords to comply with the code requirements that protect the health and safety of their tenants," county officials said in a statement at the time, "even if the landlord's father-in-law is president of the United States."

The Post Greg Sargent noted that whenever Trumpanzee "unleashes one of his racist attacks, the political world tends to go through a now-predictable cycle. We are first told Republicans think Trump’s latest racist display is brilliant politics, a view often pushed by Trump himself. Then gullible pundits echo that claim. And then persistent digging by reporters shows that Republicans are actually worried that his racism poses a serious problem for the party, unmasking the initial confidence as false bravado." Yesterday two other Post writers, Mike DeBonis and Paul Kane, reported that Republicans might not agree with Trumpanzee's assessment of Baltimore. "House Republicans have scheduled their yearly policy retreat for a downtown Baltimore hotel in September… That could present an uncomfortable situation for Trump, as sitting presidents customarily speak each year at their party’s House retreat." Who will play Winston in the Trump reenactment of Room 101 for the convention. I'm sure he would have loved to have gotten Justin Amash. House Republicans with the lowest Trump adhesion score so far this year are Will Hurd (R-TX), John Katko (R-NY), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), Fred Upton (R-MI)...

Steny Hoyer Draws A Credible Primary Opponent

The best thing about my Memorial Day weekend was meeting a young woman in Maryland who's decided to take on Steny Hoyer. Briana Urbina was born in AOC's district in the Bronx. Replacing Hoyer will be even more difficult than it was replacing Crowley but after spending some time speaking with Briana, I'm convinced she's got the makings of another great congresswoman, like Alexandria. She wrote on her campaign website that "as both a lawyer and a teacher Briana witnessed the impact of failed policies at the state, local and federal level. As a mother and a caregiver she has experienced the failure of our federal government to provide for people with disabilities. As a Black Latina woman raising an African American child, she is constantly made aware of the impacts of systemic discrimination on communities of color. As a woman with 14 years sober, she has a unique understanding of the addiction crisis facing our country. And as a member of the LGBT community, she is inspired by the progress achieved over the last decade while acknowledging that progress is not permanent if it is not protected. Briana wants to represent [her district] in Congress because she is connected to community and has the energy to take on the challenges of the 21st century. Briana is eager to put forth new ideas, propose new initiatives and amplify the voices of the people in our community."

She supports the kinds of cutting edge progressive legislation Hoyer wants nothing to do with, from Medicare for All and the Green New Deal to meaningful criminal justice reform and meaningful campaign finance reform.

Briana authored her first Letter to the Editor at age 12, about the bigotry of low expectations by the teachers at her alma matter elementary school and actively participated in political activities throughout her youth. This is an open letter to Steny Hoyer she sent me last night:


Dear Congressman,

I am a proud Marylander. As a millennial with massive student loan debt and a middle-income salary, I was blessed to find a home 9 miles from the center of Washington, DC and just 30 miles from the beaches of Calvert County. My 9-mile commute to work is accessible by metro or by car. The train is definitely a more practical way to commute into DC. You don't have to worry about parking, and you can read the Express newspaper along the way. However, any DMV commuter will tell you that practical does not mean reliable. On a good day, my metro ride is about 45 minutes. But on a normal day it can take an hour. When WMATA came up with their motto "Back to Good," I could not help but laugh that the goal was to upgrade to mediocre.

Driving, however, is a different story. On a good day, my drive is about an hour during rush hour. But if there is even one event in DC, you can plan for a 90-minute drive. Traveling nine miles should not take an hour. Ask any DMV resident and they will tell you that traffic and time spent commuting shapes their lives. This is one of many reasonsI support the Green New Deal.

The Green New Deal calls for the "overhauling" of our transportation systems in order to remove pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector. It calls for, "(i) zero-emission vehicle infrastructure and manufacturing; (ii) clean, affordable, and accessible public transit; and (iii) high-speed rail." This could include projects like fixing the metro, expanding MARC rail service to Waldorf, connecting Montgomery and Prince George's counties by constructing the Purple Line, and providing rail access to Ocean City!

Congressman Hoyer, you are a fellow DMV commuter. You live in Mechanicsville, MD. You have been known to "go hard" for what you believe in. You spent the better part of this winter attacking progressive members of our caucus. You were one of the first Democrats to announce that you didn't think the House would move to impeach before reading the full Mueller report. You are certainly a man who speaks his mind, and over the course of your 52-year career in elected office, you have not been known to mince words.

So naturally, I would expect that you would support a bill that not only aims to save the planet from excess greenhouse emissions, but at minimum, could help our respective commutes. Nah. In fact, you actually worked to limit the legislative and subpoena powers from the new Select Committee on the Climate Crisis. Could this have anything to do with the $409,470 in campaign contributions from PACs and individuals affiliated with the oil and gas industry you accepted over the course of your career? Or the $43,750 you received in the 2018 election? Your top donor in the 2018 election was Exelon, a massive energy company that operates dozens of fossil fuel plants. You've also been complicit on helping Calvert County fight against the dangerous LNG plant near Cove Point. However, you are not alone. None of the top 25 Democratic recipients of fossil fuel linked contributions in the last election cycle are among those co-sponsoring the Green New Deal.

I am writing this in hopes that you change your mind and decide to lead alongside young innovative, non-corporate funded representatives, like Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez. I know you have the capacity to speak out for the things you find important, since you were more than willing to join the Republicans at AIPAC in attacking the first woman to wear a hijab in Congress. Were you just trying to secure another $106,000 in Pro-Israel PAC money to fund your next election?

I support the Green New Deal for moral and practical reasons. I plan to be around for another 50+ years, and I would like to have clean air to breathe, clean water to drink, and access to public transit. My son is 11 years old, and I hope for a better future for him. Coastal communities and many other parts of our country are in jeopardy of lethal storms due to environmental issues associated with climate change. Congressman, I know you have grandchildren; don't you want the same for them? Aren't you tired of sitting in traffic? Aren't you worried about our coastlines, the welfare of Puerto Rico, or the fire ravaged communities of California? Doesn't your title require that you lead our party instead of micro-managing it? Leadership requires the courage to act, its not a title, it's a calling.

Sincerely,

The Progressive Choice for Congress from the Maryland 5th district, Briana Urbina

Supreme Court Asks "How Much Gerrymandering Is Too Much Gerrymandering?"

Leaving alone state legislatures, the most corruptely gerrymandered states in the Union are North Carolina, Texas, Wisconsin, Ohio, Maryland, Kentucky, Louisiana, Virginia, Illinois, Utah, West Virginia, Michigan and Arkansas. Pennsylvania would be in there if the state Supreme Court hadn't put a stop to it and redrawn the congressional districts. The state legislative districts are still a joke that should be addressed.

Ohio, for example, is a 50/50 state that Obama won in 2012 and Trump won in 2016. There's a Democratic senator and a Republican senator. In theory, the state's 16 congressional seats should yield 8 Republicans and 8 Democrats. But the magic gerrymandering gives Congress 12 Republicans and just 4 Democrats. Neither Steve Chabot's Cincinnati seat more Bob Latta's seat in the northwest corner of the state is a legitimate district and both should be Democratic districts except for extreme partisan gerrymandering by the legislature. North Carolina is worse. Obama won it once and lost it once-- both times very narrowly and the state has a Democratic governor. Yet the Republican legislature managed to create a map that yields 10 Republican seats and just 3 Democratic seats instead of 7 Republican seats and 6 Democratic seats. There's no way George Holding, Richard Hudson and Todd Budd should be congressmen. Their districts are absurdly contrived.

On Wednesday the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case in which Republicans are bitching about the unfair Democrats in Maryland.

Republicans who sued to overturn the congressional district lines that Maryland implemented after the 2010 census map found allies in the court’s four liberal justices, who expressed sympathy for their claims during oral arguments.

What’s less clear is whether those four can recruit another justice to their side-- the most likely targets would be Chief Justice John Roberts or Justice Anthony Kennedy, typically the high court’s swing vote on election law cases. Both asked tough questions, but neither tipped his hand.

At issue was Maryland’s 6th Congressional District, represented for 20 years by a Republican. After the 2010 census, Democrats in the state legislature and the then-Democratic governor redrew the district lines to move large numbers of Democratic voters into the district. Democratic Rep. John Delaney won the seat in 2012 and was reelected twice after.

A ruling against the map could fundamentally alter the redistricting process in the 37 states where the legislature draws the lines, limiting the parties’ ability to create maps to their advantage. But even if the court strikes down the map, the justices on Wednesday made clear they are still wrestling with whether the case could result in clear guidelines for partisan gerrymandering in the future.

Justice Elena Kagan said the court doesn’t need to dictate firm standards for redistricting to know that “this case is too much”-- in other words, that Maryland’s map goes too far in partisan gerrymandering. She pointed to statements from then-Gov. Martin O’Malley and other Democrats that the sole purpose in drawing the districts the way they were configured was to increase the party’s advantage in the congressional delegation.

“From the governor to Congressman [Steny] Hoyer, people were very clear about what they were trying to do here, which is to create another Democratic district,” said Kagan.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor agreed. Questioning Maryland Solicitor General Steven Sullivan, she said the Republican plaintiffs had presented “some pretty damning” evidence to suggest lawmakers were driven by politics.

“You have your own governor saying that he felt ‘duty-bound’ to make sure that his party won,” she said.

And Justice Stephen Breyer said the map “seems like a pretty clear violation of the Constitution-- in some form.” He asked whether there was “a practical remedy” for fixing it but suggested the court should do something about what he repeatedly called “extreme gerrymandering.”

The court’s conservative justices, on the other hand, appeared unwilling to strike down the Maryland map.

“I really don’t see how any legislature will ever be able to redistrict” if the Republican plaintiffs are successful, Justice Samuel Alito told Michael Kimberly, the plaintiffs’ attorney. “This court said time and again that you can’t take all partisan advantage out of redistricting.”

And Justice Neil Gorsuch pointed out during the hourlong hearing that Maryland voters approved the map in a referendum at the ballot box. Ballot Question 5 in 2012 passed with more than 64 percent of the vote.

So what's Gorsuch's problem? A related case, Gill v. Whitford-- Wisconsin, another 50/50 swing state that Obama won twice and Trump won (narrowly). But... gerrymandered up so badly the Republicans lost the statewide legislative elections but still won almost two-thirds of the districts! A lower court has already struck down the map that Wisconsin Republicans had devised to maximize their control of the state. That case is just hanging with no clear settlement.

The Maryland challengers object to only one district's design, while the Wisconsin challengers object to the whole state's redistricting. That said, drawing new lines for one district would, of necessity, have ripple effects, changing the lines in others.

Another difference is the major legal argument. The Wisconsin challengers argue that extreme gerrymandering deprived Democratic Party voters of the equal protection of the law guaranteed by the Constitution, while the Maryland challengers contend that the gerrymander there deprives Republicans of their First Amendment rights by making their speech, their votes, less valuable. But each of these arguments feeds into the other. And statistical analyses suggest that each argument, if adopted, would produce pretty much the same results.

The First Amendment argument, however, appeals, in particular, to the justice whose vote is likely to decide the case, Justice Anthony Kennedy. In 2004, he provided the fifth vote for the court staying out of partisan gerrymandering cases, but he made it clear that he remained open to finding a way to measure what is unconstitutional gerrymandering based on party, and he specifically mentioned the First Amendment notion that government action cannot punish people based on partisan affiliation.

Election expert Rick Hasen, of the University of California, Irvine, said that Justice Kennedy, 81, knows he will not be on the court forever.

"It's put-up-or-shut-up time," Hasen said. "Either he's going to say, 'We've got to start policing this' or he has to recognize that what is going to happen in the next round in 2020 is going to look a lot worse than in this round, that it's going to be no-holds-barred, squeeze out whatever you can, in favor of your party and against the other party."

What Ben Jealous Understands

As you know, Blue America's priority is taking back the House and helping to fill it with genuine progressives. This is our main ActBlue page and it's filled with stalwart progressives running for the House, like Randy Bryce (WI), Doug Applegate (CA), Jenny Marshall (NC), Dan Canon (IN), David Gill (IL), etc. But we also help raise funds for Senate candidates, for incumbents, for candidates in districts Trump won, for state legislative candidates... and for candidates for governor. So far we've only endorsed 3 gubernatorial candidates; Tom Wakely in Texas, Daniel Biss in Illinois and Ben Jealous in Maryland. All three are fully-vetted progressives and all three have tough up-hill battles against much better-funded establishment insiders.

But one of them, Ben Jealous, just got a powerful endorsement from the most trusted and popular political leader in the country, Bernie Sanders. Please give it a read and if you agree and want to help elect Ben, consider tapping the brand new Blue America ActBlue gubernatorial thermometer on the right. Ben, like Tom and Dan, is running a grassroots campaign and talking to small dollar contributors, so... if you feel like contributing $10 or $20 isn't manful-- just forget that. These are the candidates who put campaigns together not based on PACs from special interests or from wealthy donors, but from lots of small contributors, like us. Bernie:

These are, to say the least, unusual and unprecedented times for our country. We have a president who is unfit to hold his office, and whose policies are the most anti-working class in the modern history of America.

One of the ways we can most effectively oppose Trump’s right-wing extremism is with strong progressive leadership at the local and state level.

Former NAACP President Ben Jealous is one of the great progressive leaders in the United States of America. He endorsed our campaign when it was difficult. He joined our political revolution at the very moment the political and financial establishment in this country was fighting back hardest against us.

Now he’s running for governor of Maryland and it’s our turn to be there for him.

...Ben has always been a very powerful ally of our movement, and he needs our support. Please help him.

Ben Jealous knows a truth that we don’t see too much of on the television. And that is that there is an enormous amount of pain in this country. He understands that there are millions and millions of people right now who are hurting.

Ben understands that people are not making it on $10 an hour and that we’re going to raise the minimum wage to a living wage-- $15 an hour.

Ben understands that in the year 2017, it is unacceptable that women are making 80 cents on the dollar and that we need pay equity.

Ben understands that in a highly competitive global economy, we need the best educated workforce in the world and that it is insane that people cannot afford to go to college or are leaving school deeply in debt.

Ben understands, and this has been his life’s work as one of the great leaders of the American civil rights movement, that there is something profoundly wrong when the United States has more people in jail than any other country on earth, and that disproportionately those prisoners are black, Latino and Native American. He has spent decades fighting for real criminal justice reform.

Ben understands, unlike President Trump, that climate change is not a hoax, and as governor of a state that is uniquely threatened by rising sea levels, he is going to work with many of us to transform our energy system to energy efficiency and sustainable energy.

And Ben understands that in the richest country in the history of the world, it is long past time that we join the rest of the industrialized world in ensuring that health care is a right for every single man, woman, and child. That is why he is a strong advocate of a Medicare-for-all, single-payer system.

Lastly, let me say this: I am asking you to donate to Ben’s campaign because we want to elect him governor of Maryland. But I am also asking you to donate to his campaign because our participation and Ben’s victory will send a very powerful message to candidates all across the country.

And that message is that when you stand up and authentically fight for the working class in this country, when you fight for people of all backgrounds, they will stand up and fight with you. That is how we elect progressives to Congress, to governors' mansions, and to state legislatures across the country.

Ben Jealous has always been with us-- please join me and be there for him today. He needs us.

Electing a leader like Ben Jealous would be a tremendous victory not just for our political revolution, but it would demonstrate that our values are on the march everywhere in this nation. That’s why your donation means so much.

In solidarity,

Bernie Sanders

Will Economic Populism Work In Western Maryland? Meet Andrew Duck

Maryland's 6th congressional district used to be Republican territory. Maryland Democrats are as prone towards partisan gerrymandering as the GOP sleaze bags in North Carolina, Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania. In 2011, the 6th got a big chunk of blue Montgomery County and suddenly the 6th was less like West Virginia and more like the DC suburbs. The following year crooked multimillionaire Democrat, John Delaney, ousted longtime moderate GOP incumbent, Roscoe Bartlett. Obama won the district by over 10 points both times he ran and even Hillary managed to beat Trump in the district, 55.3% to 40.2%. Delaney has been one of the most overtly anti-progressive Democrats in Congress. One of his Democratic colleagues once told me, after reading a Delaney OpEd in favor of chained CPI, that Delaney "is my poster child for what's wrong with the Democratic Party. Recruiting clueless, rich people who have no real values is almost always a failure."

Good news: the reactionary avatar of greed and selfishness is probably leaving Congress. He wants to run for governor, where he would be unlikely to beat either progressive hero Benjamin Jealous or moderate GOP incumbent Larry Hogan. But even if Delaney backs out of running for governor, he already has 3 primary challengers-- Aruna Miller, state House Majority Leader Bill Frick and local activist Andrew Duck-- with 2 more prepared to jump in: state Senator Roger Manno and multimillionaire beer distributor David Trone, a right-of-center, self-absorbed mini-Trump who just got crushed after spending more of his own money than any other candidate running for a House seat-- $13,414,225-- in history. Trone's mansion, of course, is nowhere near the district.

Andrew Duck, who was a Bernie activist in 2016 served in the U.S. Army (with multiple tours of duty in Bosnia and Iraq) for 20 years after enlisting as a teenager. For the past four years, he's been working as the director of operations for a green energy start-up company and has studied economics at the graduate level. He makes a good case for himself as the polar opposite of New Dem John Delaney; Duck is an economic progressive. I asked him to introduce himself to DWT readers.


Guest Post
-by Andrew Duck

Years have passed since the economic collapse of 2008, but our economy remains mired down with slow growth, stagnant wages, and increasing inequality. While parts of our country are improving, our economic recovery continues to be uneven.  While the stock market is at a record high, workers are earning less now, adjusted for inflation, than before the recession. It feels like the system is rigged against working people. That is because the system is rigged against working people.

We need progressive economic policies that will put us back on a path to growth that benefits working people. Increasing the minimum wage is a first step toward addressing wage stagnation and inequality, so we need to support the Fight for $15. Health care costs continue to rise, and we need to move to the only health care system that works, a single payer system like MEDICARE for All. The current incumbent does not support these policies.

We will also have to address the systemic issues which have rigged the system against working families to advantage the top one percent. We need to address our tax policies, which allow millionaires like Mitt Romney to pay a lower tax rate than almost anyone in the country. We will also need to address the rigged financial system by strengthening and enforcing the Dodd-Frank Act. Congressman Delaney has voted multiple times to weaken the Dodd-Frank Act.(H.R.992 2013, H.R. 83 2014) This is movement in the wrong direction. We should be passing a new Glass-Stegall Act, not rolling back the progress we have made.

But we have not made as much progress as we should have. Dodd-Frank has not been fully implemented, with 20% of the rules not proposed as of 2016. The banking system has stabilized, but that stability masks the underlying weaknesses that continue to exist. We need to take action now if we want to ensure we do not have another collapse like the one we saw in 2008.

We need to start with breaking up the big banks. Any bank which is “too big to fail” is too big to continue to exist. When we have a system where if a bank takes risks, they get a “heads the bank wins, tails the taxpayer loses” deal, it is inevitable that we will have another economic collapse. All of the incentive is for the bank to assume more and more risk, because they get all the gain and none of the loss. Eventually, the banks will assume so much risk that they will collapse. But because they know they are “too big to fail” they know they will be bailed out, and not take the loss themselves.

We also need to address the mechanics of our financial markets. We need to ensure that we can identify and prevent “front-running” of trades. The big financial companies have built a system where their transactions will be processed before the small investor’s, rigging the game. We need more vigorous enforcement to address this issue.

High Frequency Trading has also added volatility to the market, resulting in wide swings in market value. These swings are not a normal response to supply and demand. The machines doing the trading not only shave some value off of the transaction of regular small investors, they also push the market to extremes rapidly, because they can make even more money both on the way up and the way down. A small tax per transaction would make this technique less profitable, and reduce the volatility that we are seeing today.

The best way to make these fundamental reforms would be to pass a new Glass-Steagall Act. This would force a bank to do banking, and not run a hedge fund. If you want to be a hedge fund, you can be, but you cannot be a bank, with federal insurance, at the same time. While Dodd-Frank has provisions which could be used to break up a large bank, the process is cumbersome and requires extensive review and approval by the Federal Reserve. A new Glass-Steagall Act would go further and mandate the breaking up of the big banks. To do this, we will need some new people in Congress.

I am running for Congress in Maryland’s Sixth District, to take the seat now held by Congressman Delaney. But Congressman Delaney, who does not even live in MD-06, is exploring other options, and may not run for re-election. Also looking at running for MD-06 is another multi-millionaire, David Trone, owner of a large wine and beer distributor. David Trone also does not live in MD-06, but having spent $14 Million to lose in his district, he now has his eyes set on the district I live in. We cannot have millionaires treat our government like their play-thing.

We need representatives in Congress who will fight for the economic policies that will work to bring jobs and wage growth back to the working people of this country. I spent 20 years fighting for this country around the world. I am ready to fight just as hard here at home to get a government that will serve the people, not just the top one percent.

Maryland's Increasingly Messy Democratic Party Politics-- Delaney, Trone And... "The Stud Of The Statehouse"

Bernie with Ben Jealous-- the best news in this post about Maryland politics

Maryland Congressman John Delaney is barely a Democrat. Or, to be fair, he's the archetype member of the Republican wing of the Democratic Party. A conservative multimillionaire serving the interests of the very rich, he's passionately anti-progressive and that's very much reflected in his atrocious voting record. ProgressivePunch rates him an "F" and this cycle Delaney's crucial vote score is an abysmal 45.83, not just the lowest of any Maryland Democrat, but way down at the bottom of the barrel among all House Democrats, tied, for example, with right-wing Blue Dogs Lou Correa and Cheri Bustos. The Five Thirty Eight new project that measures congressmembers' adherence to the Trump agenda shows him voting with Trump 19.4% of the time. (Hillary beat Trump in Delaney's district 55.3-40.2%.) Delaney is expected to announce that he's running for governor of Maryland later this month. The good news is that he'll be gone from Congress-- and likely to lose the gubernatorial bid.

First off, Marylanders are pretty happy with their Republican governor, Larry Hogan, who has one of the highest approval ratings of any governor in America. But before Delaney can even deal with Hogan, he has to face a crowded primary field, a field that includes former NAACP head Ben Jealous, who is rallying progressives and who was just endorsed by Bernie Sanders and by Our Revolution. Others in-- or likely to get into-- the race include Prince George's County Exec Rushern Baker, Baltimore Count Exec Kevin Kamenetz, former state Attorney General Douglas Gansler, tech entrepreneur Alec Rosss, attorney Jim Shea and state Senator Richard Madaleno.

As for Delaney's seat, Andrew Duck, an Iraq War vet and anti-Choice political "centrist" who ran for this seat in 2006, 2008 and 2010, Aruna Miller and state House Majority Leader (and stud of the statehouse) Bill Frick have already pulled papers and are soliciting campaign contributions. Although he hasn't officially declared yet, state Senator Roger Manno, is also running for Delaney seat. But the funniest candidate planning to run is another worthless right-of-center Democrat, multimillionaire beer distributor David Trone who recently made a fool of himself running for the MD-08 seat. Trone has the distinction of having spent more of his own money than any other candidate running for a House seat-- $13,414,225-- in history... only to lose the primary to progressive champion Jamie Raskin. Trone's millions bought him 27.1% of the primary vote, 35,400 votes or around $380 per vote. Maybe Trone thinks the more conservative 6th district will be a better match for his rich people agenda, but he also seems to think if he just spends a little more money... Yep he's already been bragging to the media that he's willing to spend a million and a half more of his fortune in MD-06-- $15 million-- than he wasted in MD-08. Trone has a long history of arrests and criminal behavior involved with building his beer and wine empire and I can't think of a better way the the Democrats to further tarnish their brand than by embracing someone like David Trone as a congressional candidate. On the other hand, Trone has written many hundreds of thousands of dollars in checks to the Democratic Party and has regularly contributed large sums to sleazy-- and influential-- Maryland Democrat Chris Van Hollen. He could be a role model for the Orange County lottery winner, who is currently working hard to buy endorsements from easily-bribed Democratic elected officials.

Still, the idea of getting Delaney out of Congress, will be worth every cent of David Trone's $15,000,000 in wasted self-funding. As for Ben Jealous... well, this is what Our Revolution president Nina Turner had to say in herr endorsement statement this morning:

Maryland deserves a leader who understands that social, racial, economic, and environmental justice are essential to building a better future for the next generation. It is imperative that we elect a bold, progressive governor who will fight on behalf of middle and working class families. Ben Jealous has spent his career fighting on behalf of communities who don’t have a seat at a table by working to strengthen voting rights and raise the minimum wage, advocating for an end to mass incarceration and the death penalty, and fighting to ensure health care as a human right. Ben has proven that he’s ready to roll up his sleeves and get to work for the people of Maryland.

Ben Jealous has been a dedicated civil rights leader since college, where he served local NAACP chapters in New York and Mississippi. After writing for and directing a variety of historically black newspapers, he went on to become the president and CEO of the NAACP from 2008 to 2012 where he was credited for reviving the organization by developing strong coalitions, implementing extensive voter mobilization efforts, and working tirelessly as a human rights advocate. In 2014, he became a senior partner at Kapor Capital, a firm that works to fuel progressive change through the tech industry. Jealous was one of the founding Our Revolution Board Members and an active surrogate for Sen. Bernie Sanders 2016 presidential campaign.

Now is the time to elect unapologetic progressive voices across the country. Our Revolution is proud to support Ben Jealous in his run for governor.

More On The Republican Wing Of The Democratic Party

Executive Vice President sounds so much better than "lobbyist sleaze bag"

At the very end of February, we ran an exhaustive piece on the dangers of electing Kathleen Matthews, Chris Matthews lobbyist wife, chair of the state Democratic Party. Short version: the Democratic Party needs fewer vile millionaire elitists running the party, not more. A few days later the vile millionaire elitist was selected to be interim party chair. She's already running for a full 4 year term, which will be voted on in a couple of months. She admits that party bosses Steny Hoyer, Chris Van Hollen and Ben Cardin asked her to run.

Her appointment was criticized by former Montgomery County Council member Valerie Ervin (D), who said the process smacked of insiderism. The state party “missed an opportunity to open up the space for a new and different kind of leadership,” said Ervin, who is the first African American woman to be elected to the council.

Yesterday Robert Woodruff, in posting a Hal Ginsberg piece at ProgressiveMaryland.org, wrote about "Democrats slip-sliding back in the centrist, old-boy direction that has brought us Larry Hogan [and asks] where will progressives go instead?" Ginsberg:

Appearances to the contrary, Maryland’s Progressive Democrats have little to cheer about. While over 60% of Marylanders are registered Democrats, Republican Governor Larry Hogan is enjoying “sky-high popularity.” Despite Maryland’s high cost of living, the intransigence of some Democratic legislators and executives has stymied efforts in Baltimore City, Montgomery County, and Prince George’s County to raise the minimum wage to $15. Maryland’s traditionally excellent public schools are struggling to accommodate influxes of immigrants and increasing numbers of students from poor families.

The latest blow to progressives came March 1 courtesy of the Maryland Democratic Party’s eight-member Executive Committee when it elected Kathleen Matthews to be interim chair... The State Central Committee will decide in May whether to elect Matthews, who says she will run, to a full term as Chairperson. She is also promising an open and transparent process. Nevertheless, by installing Matthews as interim chair two months before the election, rather than appointing a current member of the Executive Committee, top party officials have made clear that she is their choice to lead the party over the next four years.

Matthews is a consummate Washington insider. Her duties at Marriott, where her annual salary comfortably exceeded $1 million, included overseeing “a political action committee that contributed over $1 million to House and Senate candidates.” She counts as friends and allies many establishment politicos from both parties who were generous financers of her unsuccessful Congressional bid.

...The Matthews pick exposes the obliviousness of Maryland’s top Democrats to the winds of change buffeting the party both nationally and at home. In the Presidential primaries, self-proclaimed democratic socialist Bernie Sanders inspired millions of young people and independents and nearly upset overwhelming favorite Hillary Clinton. When Sanders withdrew from the race, much of the excitement on the Democratic side left too.

In 2014, Maryland’s Lieutenant Governor Anthony Brown ran a singularly uninspiring race and lost. He had campaigned as a reasonable centrist standing between Marylanders and the allegedly right-wing Larry Hogan. Two years later, Jamie Raskin beat Matthews with an unabashedly progressive message and Bernie Sanders’ endorsement.

...As the state struggles with sky-high housing costs, stagnant wages, and overcrowded public schools, Maryland progressives must look beyond the Democrats for political leadership. A party that values so highly a multi-millionaire news personality and corporate lobbyist with no commitment to progressive economic populism does not share our values.

Boo! This isn't a Maryland problem. There are power-mongering elitists like Hoyer and Van Hollen everywhere in America, incongruously, embedded in the Democratic Party. Just look at Charles Peters' new book, We Do Our Part-- Toward A Fairer And More Equal America. A Washington Monthly Peters protege, Paul Glastris, the magazine's editor-in-chief, wrote an appreciation of the book, Recapturing the Soul of the Democratic Party. "We Do Our Part," he wrote, "is a history of how American political culture evolved from the communitarian patriotic liberalism of Peters’s New Deal youth to a get-mine conservatism in which someone like Donald Trump could be elected president."

In the standard telling, the decline of big government liberalism begins sometime around the Tet Offensive and the assassination of Bobby Kennedy. Peters fixes the date much earlier: 1946. That’s the year a number of senior advisers to the recently deceased FDR, people like Thurman Arnold and Abe Fortas, decided to become lobbyists. Few New Dealers had done this before, so the connections and insider knowledge these men possessed were rare and valuable. Arnold and Fortas grew rich and powerful-- the advance guard of what would become a vast Washington industry.

Peters’s concern isn’t just with how lobbying corrupted the political process, though it certainly did that-- Fortas, for instance, was denied the job of chief justice of the Supreme Court thanks to shady payments from a client-connected foundation-- but more broadly with how it corrupted the incentives and worldview of those who came to Washington. Men like Fortas, a brilliant Yale Law School grad from a modest background who owned multiple homes and Rolls-Royces, set a new lifestyle standard in Washington. As more staffers and ex-congressmen followed the lobbying path, those still in government began to see their salaries, which they once considered comfortable, as penurious. (Eventually they became so, as all the high incomes bid up real estate prices and the local cost of living.)

This acquisitiveness was connected to another rising sin: snobbery, specifically the practice of signaling superiority to the hoi polloi through one’s purchases and discriminating tastes in food, drink, and culture. JFK himself, despite his war heroism and inspiring call to service, embodied the trend by marrying the high-born, fashionable Jacqueline Bouvier and surrounding himself with celebrities.

The twin viruses of greed and snobbery are not, to say the least, conducive to a focused and sympathetic concern for average Americans. But Peters reminds us that these behaviors were not widespread among educated people in Washington or throughout America in the 1950s and ’60s. The postwar prosperity and compression of incomes continued, the draft was still nearly universal-- even baseball greats served their two years-- and the federal government continued to deliver impressive new national projects, from interstate highways to Medicare, that the vast majority of Americans appreciated.

...The viruses of snobbery and selfishness spread wildly over the course of the 1970s and ’80s. Graduates from top colleges flocked to high-paying jobs at law firms and investment banks rather than to public service, and the caliber of the civil service accordingly declined. Magazines that catered to consumer chic and cultural signaling, like New York, Vanity Fair, and Washingtonian, grew fat with advertisers and subscribers. On PBS, the TV home of the educated elite, Louis Rukeyser’s Wall Street Week became the number one show.

“Money had become a major and open interest of the meritocratic class,” writes Peters, in a way it simply hadn’t been from the 1930s through the ’60s. As a consequence, “the cause of lower taxes and of conservatism in general flourished, as shown by the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980.” Even elites who didn’t support Reagan were sympathetic to the growing idea that the market should deliver more “shareholder value.” So they didn’t protest (some even cheered) when corporations closed plants, busted unions, and spent their cash on stock buyback schemes rather than on new products and services. To the extent that they expressed their public spiritedness, it was by supporting causes-- gay rights, the environment-- that weren’t the central concerns of most middle- and working-class voters, whose incomes were stagnating while the meritocrats’ were soaring.

The result was greater and greater resentment of the educated elite. The Rush Limbaughs and Roger Aileses of the world fed off that resentment to boost their ratings and advance a conservative movement that didn’t, in the end, improve their audiences’ economic situation-- a fact that Trump exploited by running against establishment conservatives as well as liberal elites.

Peters credits Bill Clinton with being the only Democratic president or candidate in decades who managed, through his policies and gift for empathy, to bridge the gap between the meritocrats and the white middle and working classes. And he sees evidence that Democrats have awakened to the problems of greed, snobbery, and elite detachment, including “the radical increase in awareness of income inequality” and “some meritocrats overcoming their snobbery to make a serious effort to understand the Trump vote.” He also sees signs “that people are beginning to question their relentless pursuit of money, or at least some of the reasons why they think they have to make a lot of money.”

More concretely, he is heartened by examples of elites returning to government service. These include the investment banker Steve Rattner, who joined the Obama administration and helped save the auto industry, and the top Silicon Valley talent Obama personally recruited to the new U.S. Digital Service after the disastrous rollout of the health care exchange website. Peters makes a plea for more Americans, especially liberals, to run for office at the local, state, and national levels-- something that, in the months since his book went to press, actually seems to be happening.

If anything, I think Peters underestimates the degree to which Americans are hungry to serve. What confounds his call for more of the best and brightest to join government is a lack of opportunity. The problem is political. There are eight applicants for every slot in AmeriCorps, the national service program founded by Bill Clinton. But Democrats’ attempts to expand the program have been consistently checked by Republicans. Trump’s budget office has drawn up plans to eliminate it altogether. More broadly, the federal workforce, at 2.8 million employees, is the same size it was in the 1960s when Peters was part of it, even though the U.S. population since then has more than doubled and the federal budget has quadrupled in real terms. Lawmakers control the federal head count and don’t want to be seen as “growing the bureaucracy.” The most Democrats in Congress have been willing to do is beat back repeated Republican efforts to further decimate the federal workforce.

To make up for the inadequate number of staff, the government increasingly relies on contractors. Peters bemoans this trend, citing numerous examples of how it has hurt government’s performance. He’s right. But he doesn’t call for the obvious solution: boost the number of federal employees so more of the work can be done in house. This would require hiring a million new federal workers, according to University of Pennsylvania political science professor John DiIulio, and boosting their pay as well.

That is also the key to curbing the power of lobbyists, which won’t happen merely by inveighing against their greed. Lobbyists’ power comes mainly from their control of information-- about the industries they represent, about the ways government programs work-- that congressional staffers, many of them young and inexperienced, often lack. The way to neutralize that power is to strengthen government’s capacity to get that information independently, by hiring more staffers and researchers and paying them more so they can make a decent living without having to join the private sector.

Of course, a politician who called for hiring a million more federal workers, and raising their salaries, might appear suicidal in the current political climate. But if Peters is correct-- and I think he is-- that a key to bridging the class gap is for more Americans, especially the elite, to serve in government, a political way has to be found. The same bilious anti-government fever that gave America Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich has now given us Trump. Peters reminds us that government service was once a broadly shared and elite experience and value. To cure the fever, today’s liberals must figure out how to make it so again.

I hope you see Kathleen (and Chris) Matthews in this description. And Rahm Emanuel, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, (alas) Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer... the New Dems, the Republicans like Charlie Crist, Tom O'Hallaran and others being recruited into the House Democratic caucus (where they invariably vote with their old comrades across the aisle). Next time you hear some shit-eating New Dem scum bag, whining about the evils of political "purity," kick him in the balls and drop me a note so I can salute you.