Corrupt DC Democratic Establishment Crumbling?

The entire corrupt Democratic establishment and its media lackeys went full bore against Bernie in Michigan. The final Fox poll of Michigan Democrats, released Monday, showed Hillary ahead 61-34%. MSNBC repeated Hillary's well-rehearsed ugly debate smear of Bernie regarding the auto bailout for two solid days. I thought Chris Matthews had a tape of it implanted in his parched, ancient brain. But in the end Bernie beat her 50% to 48% and it looks like he'll walk away with 65 delegates to her 58. His win will only make the corrupt Democratic establishment dig its heels in even deeper and harder. For them, it isn't about values or principles; it's about their careerist business model (power and corruption). Right after Bernie was declared the winner, Working Families Party National Director Dan Cantor issued a press release that said, "The Beltway elite may never have really understood why job-killing trade deals are such a big deal. But the people of Michigan surely do, and Bernie Sanders does too. The political revolution is only getting started. This is a movement that has baffled the political establishment from day one, and it's sure to surprise them a few more times in the months to come." By tomorrow we can all expect Hillary to solemnly swear that when she was out knocking on doors for Nixon and Goldwater, she was handing out anti-trade agreement pamphlets.

Yesterday, The Hill asked the question, Could Herr Trumpf nomination put House up for grabs? Short answer: no, not with this DCCC. No matter how bad it gets for the Republicans, the Democrats are incapable of winning. Pelosi's DCCC is corrupt and incompetent. The only thing they know how to do is lose. And lose. And lose. And lose.

The Republicans are up by 30 seats and the DSCC has recruited viable candidates in enough districts to win the House back and MOST-- the majority-- of the candidates they have recruited are unelectable losers chosen because they are wealthy enough to self-fund and because they are conservative. The DCCC started losing when they started a systemic policy of sabotaging progressives and working class Democrats. As the GOP moved further and further right, away from conservatism and into a fully reactionary stance, the DC Democratic establishment followed them further right-- into the conservatism the GOP has pretty much abandoned.

So far the DCCC is backing just two dozen candidates, including several with viable primaries, supporting, for example Val Demings in the Orlando area, Bill Golderer in Bucks County, Pennsylvania and Monica Vernon (a Republican disguised as a Democrat) in northeast Iowa running against more electable candidates (Bob Poe and Geraldine Thompson in Florida, Mary Ellen Balchunis in Pennsylvania and Pat Murphy in Iowa).

Conservatives like Wall Streeter Josh Gottheimer, 2014-defeated Texas Blue Dog Pete Gallego and Michigan drunkard Lon Johnson are exactly the wrong kinds of candidates to recruit and support if the DCCC wanted to rebuild a vibrant Democrat Party in Congress. But the DCCC doesn't. The DCCC wants tools like Demings and Johnson, who will do what they're told by party leaders and they want corrupt individuals who will be happy to play the money game that makes American politics go round and round. Instead the DCCC is building up a New Dem/Blue Dog power nexus in Congress. In district after district around the country they are undermining Democrats and trying to push their own horrible candidates.

What would a progressive-run Democratic House be able to accomplish if we were able to rid Congress of the corrupt bosses like Schumer, Hoyer, Wasserman Schultz, et al? Look no further than the budget the Congressional Progressive Caucus just proposed. Conservative Establishment Democrats from the Hillary Clinton wing of the party will join with the GOP to defeat it but if you want to see what electing candidates like the ones Blue America has endorsed, this is the place to look. Richard Kirsch from the Roosevelt Institute did a good summary today of how all those big progressive ideas would work if there were enough progressives in Congress to pass the People's Budget, which would make "major investments in creating good jobs, educating our children, stopping the disruption of our climate, changing the priorities in Pentagon spending, and restoring our democracy. It would pay for these and other public goods by turning our upside-down tax system right side up. In doing so, it would actually cut the federal budget deficit..

A core premise of the People’s Budget is that every American who wants to work should have a good job that allows them to care for and support their family. The budget aims to reach full employment and makes a $1 trillion investment in infrastructure in addition to financing for clean and renewable energy. It would also make essential investments in families, like universal pre-K, funding for every child eligible for Head Start, and building more affordable housing.

In addition to boosting wages through full employment, the People’s Budget calls for raising the minimum wage and the overtime threshold so companies can no longer avoid paying overtime to millions of workers. It would help working people care for loved ones and for themselves by guaranteeing paid sick days and by assisting states that establish insurance funds for paid family leave. And it would repeal the federal ban on Medicaid paying for abortions so that mothers who rely on that program for their health care can decide whether it’s the right time for them to have a child.

...Mindful that so much of our spending is driven by lobbyists and campaign cash, the People’s Budget would fund a small-donor matching system so candidates for Congress could compete for office without taking big money.

All that and more adds up to spending $3.4 trillion more over the next 10 years than we would under current law. Sound like a lot? Not when compared to how much revenue the People’s Budget would generate by rejecting the idea that raising taxes is unpopular. In fact, raising taxes on the wealthy and closing big corporate loopholes is hugely popular with everyone outside of the super-rich and corporate lobbyists.

By asking the wealthy and big corporations to stop shirking their responsibility to support the working families that create wealth and the public structures that enable businesses to operate, the People’s Budget would raise $8.8 trillion more than the budget that’s in place now. How? Corporations would not be able to dodge taxes by shipping their profits overseas. Too-big-to-fail banks would be taxed. A tiny tax on Wall Street trades would discourage speculation while raising $900 billion over 10 years. Corporations would no longer be able to write off multimillion-dollar CEO compensation.

The People’s Budget takes aim at climate change, too. Oil and gas companies would stop getting tax breaks for pulling more of their planet-destroying products out of the ground. A new tax on oil would finance modernizing our transportation system. More broadly, a tax on all carbon-- with most of the proceeds going to investments in renewable energy-- would power a 26 percent reduction in climate-destroying pollution. At the same time, families with low-incomes would be protected from the hike in oil and gas prices from taxing carbon.

The budget also asks those who make more to pay more. returning the income tax rate for the 2 percent of people making more than $250,000 a year to what it was under President Clinton. The budget would also lower the estate tax exemption to $2.5 million for an individual; while not exactly a daring proposal, this would still raise $231 billion.

A public option would, in effect, quickly turn Obamacare into Medicare-For-All and negotiated prices for drugs may upset Big Pharma and their lobbyists but it will bring the costs of health care down significantly for all Americans.

Last year when the Progressive Caucus' budget was defeated in the House, many of today's worst Senate candidates, the establishment and Wall Street shills Schumer is pushing, voted with the Republicans against it-- like Patrick Murphy (FL), Tammy Duckworth (IL), Chris Van Hollen (MD) and Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ). Voting matters-- and so does supporting candidates who are willing to stand and fight.

As Usual, Conservatives Want The Election To Be About Anything But Economic Policies

Demagoguery, particularly when it comes to stirring up war fever, xenophobia and naked bigotry, have been tried and true methods conservatives use to get voters to think about something other than the economic agenda that's enslaving them and their families. It works well. Republicans and conservative Democrats would much prefer to demonize a tiny, pathetic handful of Syrian refugees than discuss... oh, say... reinstating Glass Steagall or raising the minimum wage or reforming a tax system that allows the wealthiest-- who just happen to be the funders of the politicians' SuperPACs-- to get away without paying their fair share of taxes. Funny how that works.

Tuesday the Roosevelt Institute's Richard Kirsch looked at why the Democrats have been largely unable to wipe the Republicans off the face of the electoral map despite the GOP economic agenda. "The failure of Democrats," he explained, "to tell a bigger story about the economy is a major reason that, while voters largely agree with Democrats on specific issues like raising the minimum wage, limiting prescription drug prices, or regulating Wall Street, they still cast their votes for Republicans who champion lower taxes and deregulation of business as the key to economic growth. Polling consistently shows that the Republican economic message does well with a majority of voters. Democrats regularly challenge Republican economic policies on grounds of fairness but fail to provide an explanation of how to move the economy forward and create prosperity. Fairness is not enough for voters worried about losing jobs or how the economy is going to provide economic opportunity for their children." At the last Democratic debate, Bernie did that with a great degree of success. The Establishment Democrat in the race... well, she's better than a Republican, but Republicans don't see it that way.

When Sanders was asked about whether a $15 minimum wage would cause job loss, he made both the moral and the economic case for raising the minimum wage to $15 “over the next few years.”

The moral argument is compelling, and it’s where most Americans start. As Sanders said, “It is not a radical idea to say that if somebody works 40 hours a week that person should not be living in poverty. It is not a radical idea to say that a single mom should be earning enough money to take care of her kids.”

But when their moral values are challenged by the job-killing argument, many people begin to worry that policies that raise costs for business could backfire. Which is why Sanders explained, “When we put money into the hands of working people they’re gonna go out for our goods. They’re gonna go out for our services. And they are gonna create jobs in doing that. That is the kind of economy I believe [in], put money in the hands of working people, raise the minimum wage to $15.00 an hour.”

...Unfortunately, we did not hear such clarity from Hillary Clinton, who offered the tepid statement that raising the minimum wage “doesn’t result in job loss.”

Clinton is known as a policy wonk, but that’s not what we need from a president. Her husband, known as “the great explainer,” has the gift of translating public policy into simple concepts that get people nodding their heads in agreement. This ability marks the great presidential communicators, FDR and Reagan being the leading examples.

The idea that people with good, family-sustaining jobs boost the economy is one of those simple ideas that get people’s heads nodding. It’s one we need the next Democratic candidate for president to believe, and then to explain to the country.

Explaining why reinstating Glass-Steagall, as all progressives want to do and which is adamantly opposed by Wall Street and the politicians they own-- basically all the Republicans, all the New Dems and, of course, Hillary Clinton-- is not as simple, although Elizabeth Warren, Sherrod Brown and Bernie have all done a decent job at it. Tuesday, Richard Eskow enumerated the reasons why Hillary and the Republicans are wrong on Glass-Steagall and why Bernie and Elizabeth Warren are correct. Glass-Steagall 101 and 102... take it away Proffesor Eskow...

1. Too-big-to-fail banks are bigger, riskier and more ungovernable than ever

America’s largest banking institutions are even larger now than they were before the 2008 financial crisis. The nation’s six largest banks issue more than two-thirds of all credit cards and more than a third of all mortgages. They control 95 percent of all derivatives and hold more than 40 percent of all U.S. bank deposits.

Simon Johnson, former chief economist for the International Monetary Fund, points out that Glass-Steagall is needed as part of a broad effort to make these banks “simpler and more transparent.” Johnson also observes that:

“In the run-up to the 2008 crisis, the largest U.S. banks had around 4% equity relative to their assets. This was not enough to withstand the storm … Now, under the most generous possible calculation, the surviving megabanks have on average about 5% equity … that is, they are 95% financed with debt.”

As Johnson makes clear, these banks continue to pose a grave risk to the economy. He also notes that they have continued to engage in sanctions violations and money laundering-- behavior that suggests that they are still out of control.

2. The argument that the absence of Glass-Steagall didn’t cause the 2008 financial crisis is wrong.

Hillary Clinton told the Des Moines Register that “a lot of what caused the risk that led to the collapse came from institutions that were not big banks.” This is part of a longstanding pattern, in which she largely absolves the big banks from culpability for the 2008 crisis while emphasizing “shadow banking” in her own Wall Street plan.

Secretary Clinton returned to that theme during Saturday’s debate, pointing an accusing finger at non-bank entities like AIG and Lehman Brothers while giving a pass to Wall Street’s biggest banks for their role in the crisis.

Robert Reich, Bill Clinton’s former labor secretary, summarized the anti-Glass-Steagall argument as follows (without naming Hillary Clinton specifically):

“To this day some Wall Street apologists argue Glass-Steagall wouldn’t have prevented the 2008 crisis because the real culprits were nonbanks like Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns.”

He follows that with a one-word response: “Baloney.”

Reich makes an important point: Yes, “shadow banks” like AIG and Lehman, which largely function outside the normal bank regulatory system, are a major problem. But the 2008 financial crisis became a systemic threat specifically because too-big-to-fail banks were underwriting the risky bets these companies made. And why were the big banks able to do that?

Because Glass-Steagall had been repealed.

3. Repeal of Glass-Steagall has not worked as promised.

Given the risks associated with the repeal of Glass-Steagall, what about the benefits? Turns out there aren’t many.

We were told that repealing Glass-Steagall would lead to more efficiency and lower costs, but neither of these promises has come true. No less an expert than John Reed, former CEO of Citigroup, now says those claims were wrong. Reed wrote in a recent op-ed (behind a firewall) that “there are very few cost efficiencies that come from the merger of functions-- indeed, there may be none at all.”

In fact, says Reed, it is possible that this combination of functions actually makes banking services more expensive.

4. The repeal of Glass-Steagall is further corrupting the culture of banking-- if such a thing is possible.

Sanders was right when he said on Saturday night that “the business model of Wall Street is fraud.” The traditional practice of what Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) calls “boring” banking-- opening savings accounts, reviewing loans and providing other customer services-- has largely been supplanted by high-risk gambling and the aggressive hustling of dubious investments to unwary clients.

The level of fraud unearthed since the 2008 crisis is nothing short of breathtaking. (The fact that no senior banking executive has gone to prison for that fraud is, if anything, even more breathtaking.) How did that happen?

Citigroup’s Reed wrote that the repeal of Glass-Steagall led to the “very serious” problem of “mixing incompatible cultures”-- which, he said, “makes the entire banking industry more fragile.” He discussed the relationship-based, sociable culture of traditional banking, emphasizing its incompatibility with the risk-seeking, “short termist” mentality of investment bankers who seek “immediate rewards.”

Reed makes a very important point-- although he’s being overly kind about it. Yes, traditional bankers tend to be risk-averse and customer-focused. That’s very different from the high-stakes gambling mentality of investment banking.

But what Reed fails to note-- or is too polite to mention-- is the extent to which today’s culture of investment banking is predicated on outright fraud. That’s reflected in polling of the banking community itself, as well as in the industry’s appalling record of documented illegality. It is this mentality, which is present in banks from the “C” suite on down, which has given rise to Wall Street’s tsunami of misdeeds.

This greed-driven fraud mentality is like a virus, consuming too-big-to-fail banks even as they exert ever-greater control over our economy-- and our political system.

5. Too-big-to-fail banks are a threat to our democracy.

These megabanks aren’t just a “systemic threat” to our economy. Through their enormous wealth, and because of the ruthlessness with which they’re willing to wield their influence, they are also a systemic threat to democracy itself.

That threat can be seen in the workings of last year’s Congress, which saw the successful insertion of a lobbyist-drafted “Citigroup amendment” into a last-minute budget bill.

It can be seen in a political climate where the Republican head of a congressional committee can say that “Washington and the regulators are here to serve the banks.”

It can be seen in Wall Street political contributions that flow to powerful and familiar names, Republican or Democratic.

Banks have acquired too much power. They must be broken up vertically (by line of business) and horizontally (by size), even as their corrupting influence over our government is ended through a system of fundamental election reform.

In today’s environment, reinstating Glass-Steagall is not just the right policy-- although it is certainly that. It’s also an excellent litmus test for politicians who say they’re willing to take on Wall Street.

Hillary says she'll take on Wall Street but if you believe that, you might as well believe Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell will too. All three of them are being paid off by the say crooked banksters. The woman on the right of the screen is Elizabeth Warren. The woman on the left of the screen is not exactly Hillary Clinton. And the gentleman on the left of the screen a bit later on is just a garden variety CNBC bankster shill.



You can help Bernie and the congressional candidates who have endorsed him on this page. And, if you can, you should. Because otherwise... there can be no good outcome in 2016... unless you're a greedy, selfish multimillionaire.

Is Tom Steyer Asking California Democrats To Buy A Pig In A Poke?

Very expensive photo shoot

California progressives were delighted yesterday when neoliberal corporate whore Gavin Newsom took himself out of consideration for the Senate seat being opened by Barbara Boxer's 2016 retirement plans. He'll have to be dealt with when he runs for governor but at least Cory Booker won't be getting a doppelgabger on Capitol Hill-- or will he? Newson claimed "unfinished work" in California. Maybe he's building tree house; he's certainly not allowed to do anything that involves Jerry Brown's Administration. Brown sees him as a shallow-- albeit ambitious-- worm and has all but banned him from the administration. If I had to bet on someone as a successor to Brown, though, it would be the clean-cut and dedicated Eric Garcetti, not the greasy, self-serving Newsom.

As for the Senate seat. That still leaves over two dozen contenders contending. Kamala Harris, who threw her hat into the ring this morning, is now considered the front-runner, although my guess is that most Californians don't have any idea who she is or what she stands for. She's hardly alone there. Few of the professional politicians clamoring to run are known outside of narrow political circles. And most of them are pretty terrible... like Blue Dog and warmonger Jane Harman, her New Dem mini-me, Ellen Tauscher, and the third in this triumvirate of aggressive mediocrity, Loretta Sanchez, a not very bright Orange County Blue Dog. Just as ad as the ladies is the male counterpart-- Blue Dog, New Dem, warmonger, mediocre all rolled up in one: Adam Schiff. The other congressman plotting a run isn't as bad as those 4, but he's basically an uncourageous centrist who isn't going to help anything important ever happen if he gets into the Senate: John Garamendi. Worse: two more DC backbenchers, Eric Swalwell and Raul Ruiz, both insipid moderates with no leadership potential.

Progressives are trying to persuade House Democratic Conference Chairman Xavier Becerra-- who sees himself as a future House Speaker-- to run for the Senate seat instead. He's the best possibility among likely contenders-- if he'll even do it. Congresswoman Jackie Speier is relatively progressive-- not that unlike Boxer-- and I could see her or Karen Bass getting a lot of progressive support if Becerra decides to take a pass. I could just as easily see both of them hop aboard the Kamala Harris train.

Antonio Villaraigosa says he's running. He was a solid progressive when he was Assembly Speaker but its been pretty much downhill since then... and that was a long time ago. He didn't impress anyone when he was Mayor of L.A. and he's some kind of an advocate for Charter Schools, which means he's part of a clique that defines the worst kind of corruption in American politics. Damn! He used to be a nice guy. And there are worst mayor types who want to get in, namely San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo and Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson.

And then there's the big rich wild card, billionaire hedge fund manager turned environmental activist Tom Steyer, who spent a fortune on congressional races last year, often helping Democrats with mediocre environmental records. He certainly helped corrupt conservative Terry McAuliffe get elected governor-- just to watch McAuliffe immediately begin her term by joining a coalition of right-wing anti-environment governors.

No one knows what Steyer stands for and what he's passionate about other than the environment. I'm sure he's pro-Choice and pro-gay but what about the core economic issues working families and billionaires don't usually see eye to eye on? Maybe he'll tell people what he thinks they want to hear. The big piece in Sunday's Chronicle reads like it was done by a couple of talented third graders and offers no insights into what Steyer's all about politically. I wonder if the "reporters" every wondered. Probably not... too busy with their reality show:

The former hedge fund titan has been huddling with advisors, polling California voters, buying website addresses and meeting with political and labor leaders as he weighs a bid, the sources said.

..."Steyer has the greatest incentive to plant his flag early," said Dan Schnur, head of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at USC. He "has the capacity to scare other people out of the race."

But California has a political graveyard full of neophyte millionaires and billionaires who spent large chunks of their fortunes only to be rejected by voters. Among them: former business executives Meg Whitman, Carly Fiorina, Al Checchi, Michael Huffington and Bill Simon.

"There's a first time for everything. But California voters have not historically looked very kindly on first-time self-financing candidates," said Democratic operative Garry South, who led former Gov. Gray Davis to victory over Checchi in the Democratic primary in 1998, and over Simon in the general election in 2002.

South said wealthy but inexperienced candidates tended to have three critical flaws-- free-spending but unfocused campaigns, large and undisciplined staffs and a lack of respect for people with professional experience in politics.

"They think that because they're worth a billion dollars, they're basically better than everybody else in the political system," South said. "Their disdain for people in the process is just obvious, and it makes them make a lot of mistakes."

...Steyer left Farallon Capital Management, the hedge fund he ran, in 2012, saying he wanted to focus his work on alternative energy. As he became increasingly engaged in politics, his business record has come under growing scrutiny.

News reports detailed his longtime investments in coal and other fossil fuels, for example, and the slow pace at which he shed those investments.

Farallon Capital Management pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into companies running coal mines and coal-fired power plants overseas, the New York Times reported. The fund was profiting from mining companies that produced more coal each year than the entire amount of coal consumed annually by Britain.

The inquiries would surely magnify if he launched a Senate run; opponents would scour his two-decade hedge-fund history for vulnerabilities to exploit. Deals that seem routine in the world of finance can be poisonous in politics. GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney was portrayed as a corporate scoundrel in 2012.

Steyer's polling, conducted in late December, found another obstacle-- few people had heard of him. But that could be easily remedied with advertising.

In addition to veteran Democratic pollster Paul Maslin, Steyer is also working with Jim Margolis, who was President Obama's media strategist, and Chris Lehane, a longtime adviser to President Clinton.

Steyer has begun purchasing "Steyer for Senate" websites and planned to meet with advisors at his home this weekend.

Steyer's moves are expected to narrow the window for other candidates to make their own announcements, given that anyone hoping to compete with him needs to start raising funds immediately.

That whole billionaire centurion thing kind of stepped right into the glop of Chris Van Hollen's long-overdue message yesterday about how the Democrats are going to rediscover their pre-Wall Street roots as a party representing working families. As the Roosevelt Institute's Richard Kirsch pointed out on the think tank's blog yesterday, "By forcing Republicans to admit their support for Wall Street over working families, Van Hollen's proposal opens the economic debate the Democrats need." So how does Tom Steyer fit in there. I keep reading he's being "recruited" by "liberals." All the actual liberals I know are working on getting Becerra to run. Money-grubbing professional "liberals" who want a piece of Steyer's fortune for their worthwhile liberal projects are the only ones excited about Steyer.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen’s (D-MD) proposal to tax Wall Street speculators and CEO millionaires to put money in the pockets of working families and the middle class, the engines of our economy, is a political and economic home run. It allows Democrats to focus on economic growth and fairness at the same time, sharply defining the debate on the key question voters ask: “Which side are you on?”

Leading politicians from both parties are all expressing sympathy for the stagnant prospects of the middle class. If you need evidence, here is Jeb Bush sounding like Elizabeth Warren: “Millions of our fellow citizens across the broad middle class feel as if the American Dream is now out of their reach … that the playing field is no longer fair or level.”

Where the two parties split-- and where the core debate that will define the next two years and the 2016 election lies-- is on who is to blame and what to do about it.

Americans believe we need economic growth, but they are more likely to place the blame for stagnant wages on the super-rich and powerful who game the system at their expense. That is why they told pollsters they prefer “an economy that works for all of us, not just the wealthy” over “growing the economy” by 22 points.

Van Hollen claims both grounds-- growth and fairness. As he says, “What our country needs is a growing economy that works for all Americans, not just the wealthy few.”

The heart of the plan is providing a $1,000 tax credit for workers, phased out as income rises, along with an additional $250 tax credit when workers save. He would pay for that by taxing Wall Street speculation (with a tiny financial transactions tax) and closing loopholes that allow millionaires to pay lower taxes than average people.

It’s clear that this is great politics: taxing Wall Street gambling and the super-rich to put more money in the pockets of working families and the middle class.

...Van Hollen adds another proposal, which is also brilliant politics and sharp economics. He would not allow corporations to get tax breaks for million-dollar executive pay unless they shared the rewards of soaring corporate profits with their workers. Van Hollen accomplishes this by proposing to end corporate tax deductions for executive compensation of over $1 million, unless the corporation’s wages are raised enough to keep up with worker productivity and the cost of living. Another way that corporations could deduct higher executive pay is by providing employees with ownership and profit-sharing opportunities.

With this proposal, Van Hollen puts the focus squarely on the corporate behavior that has driven down wages and crushed middle-class aspirations. His proposal would boost worker income, which drives the economy forward. When Republicans oppose this, the choice will again be clear to Americans: CEO millionaires or working families.

As Van Hollen recognizes, his proposal is not the complete solution to creating an economy of broadly shared, sustainable prosperity. He recognizes the need to raise wages and job standards, which directly turn today’s low-wage, economy busting jobs into economy boosting jobs. He reinforces the necessity of investment in infrastructure, research and education.

It will be important to do all these things. We need to raise wage standards and strengthen the ability of workers to organize, to make sure that every job pays enough to care and support a family in dignity. It is essential that we make huge investments in transportation, clean energy, communications, and research to build a powerful economic foundation for the future. That investment will take revenues, which can be raised from closing corporate loopholes, raising tax rates on the wealthy, or other progressive tax measures. We can also discuss whether some of the revenues Van Hollen raises would be better spent on infrastructure rather than tax breaks for upper-middle income people.

Simplicity is key to political communication. In its simplest terms, Van Hollen is saying that we drive the economy forward by putting money in the pockets of working families and the middle-class, not Wall Street and the super wealthy. And then his proposal invites Americans to ask their elected officials: “which side are you on?”

If Democrats around the country are willing to stand up to their big campaign contributors and ask that question with such a powerful proposal in 2016, they will triumph. And in triumphing, they will move the country toward an America that works for all of us, not just the wealthy.

A Badge Of Courage: "We Have Earned The Hatred Of Entrenched Greed"... But Not For Today's DC Dems

Early Monday morning we took a look at an inspiring address FDR made to Congress in January, 1936, after his historic landslide win against the Republican Party, a landslide that decimated the GOP in both Houses of Congress as well, leaving them with just 16 Senate seats and 88 House seats. There was no question in the minds of the voters who was on their side and who was standing with Wall Street. Those were the glory days of the Democratic Partry. It's been all downhill since then due, primarily, to confusion over the degree of support the DC Democrats still offer working families and how close they have become with the enemies FDR successfully lambasted and, at least in part, tamed. Roosevelt admitted to Congress that the Democrats "have invited battle. We have earned the hatred of entrenched greed. The very nature of the problem that we faced made it necessary to drive some people from power and strictly to regulate others. I made that plain when I took the oath of office in March, 1933. I spoke of the practices of the unscrupulous money-changers who stood indicted in the court of public opinion. I spoke of the rulers of the exchanges of mankind's goods, who failed through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence. I said that they had admitted their failure and had abdicated."

Abdicated? Yes, in 1933, but now with the passing of danger they forget their damaging admissions and withdraw their abdication.

They seek the restoration of their selfish power. They offer to lead us back round the same old corner into the same old dreary street.

Yes, there are still determined groups that are intent upon that very thing. Rigorously held up to popular examination, their true character presents itself. They steal the livery of great national constitutional ideals to serve discredited special interests. As guardians and trustees for great groups of individual stockholders they wrongfully seek to carry the property and the interests entrusted to them into the arena of partisan politics. They seek-this minority in business and industry-- to control and often do control and use for their own purposes legitimate and highly honored business associations; they engage in vast propaganda to spread fear and discord among the people-- they would "gang up" against the people's liberties.

The principle that they would instill into government if they succeed in seizing power is well shown by the principles which many of them have instilled into their own affairs: autocracy toward labor, toward stockholders, toward consumers, toward public sentiment. Autocrats in smaller things, they seek autocracy in bigger things. "By their fruits ye shall know them."

...[T]he challenge faced by this Congress is more menacing than merely a return to the past-- bad as that would be. Our resplendent economic autocracy does not want to return to that individualism of which they prate, even though the advantages under that system went to the ruthless and the strong. They realize that in thirty-four months we have built up new instruments of public power. In the hands of a people's Government this power is wholesome and proper. But in the hands of political puppets of an economic autocracy such power would provide shackles for the liberties of the people. Give them their way and they will take the course of every autocracy of the past-- power for themselves, enslavement for the public.

Their weapon is the weapon of fear. I have said, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." That is as true today as it was in 1933. But such fear as they instill today is not a natural fear, a normal fear; it is a synthetic, manufactured, poisonous fear that is being spread subtly, expensively and cleverly by the same people who cried in those other days, "Save us, save us, lest we perish."

1936 is a long time ago, right? Sure, but standing up for working families is pretty timeless and by chasing after the Big Business and Wall Street money FDR reviled, the Democratic Party Establishment has twisted itself into an unrecognizable mush-- unrecognizable and barely supportable. At the same time on Monday we were looking at FDR's address, the Roosevelt Institute's Richard Kirsch, singling out Chuck Schumer, was expounding on their blog that a populist message won't be enough to save the Democratic Party if its leaders continue to serve Wall Street. He wrote that 2 weeks before "Schumer once again delivered for Wall Street with the omnibus budget deal, he gave a major speech in which he sounded like a progressive champion. Schumer offered a stirring defense of government as the only force that can stand up to the private sector’s attack on the middle class, and argued that for Democrats to 'roll to victory in 2016... First, we must convince Americans that government can be on their side and is not just a tool of special interests.'"

Unfortunately, Schumer embodies the contradictions that will tear the Democratic Party apart over the next two years. He understands the need to embrace a populist, progressive narrative and program, but his ties to Wall Street and big money lead him to blunt any real moves by Democrats to take a bold stand for working people against corporate power.

The budget proposal to allow more government bailouts of banks that gamble with their depositors’ money was a huge lost opportunity for Democrats to paint Republicans as being on the side of the big banks that wrecked the economy. That opportunity was negated by President Obama’s pushing for the budget and Senator Schumer’s stealth maneuvers (widely known in Congress) to keep the Wall Street deal intact. As a result, the leaders of both parties demonstrated, as they’ve done before, that government is in fact on the side of the rich and powerful.

...Schumer highlights the same key economic fact that progressives emphasize: wages have not kept up with productivity. But it is in his explanation of what is behind stagnant wages that he departs from progressives. For Schumer, “it can be described in one word-- technology. Technology allows capital to garner [a] far greater share of increases.” He goes on to note globalization as another factor.

Schumer leaves out the powerful political forces that drove down wages. The biggest omission is his total failure to discuss the role of Wall Street in wrecking the economy and, more broadly, in driving down wages at the expense of corporate profits. Schumer, who as much as anyone in government is responsible for unleashing Wall Street is incapable of making that case. Schumer, a leading champion of banking deregulation, has collected more than $20 million in campaign contributions from the financial sector, more than any other senator who hasn’t run for president.

And it’s not just Wall Street that Schumer leaves out of the story. It is also the corporate attack on labor unions and on labor standards.  He makes no mention of the slashing of taxes on unearned income, so that the rich pay lower taxes than the rest of us, or of the gutting of corporate tax collection. Where are the corporate villains-- abetted by both political parties-- who have enriched themselves at the expense of American families while driving down taxes and government investment in the public structures that are foundations of a powerful economy?

Schumer emphasizes that Democrats need a policy program to go along with their message of being on the side of the middle class, but he punts on what ideas they should propose, saying, “In the coming weeks and months we will have this debate within the Democratic Party.” Still, he declares that the Democratic program must be “attainable and effective, which means they must work politically.” That’s a recipe for more small-bore ideas, which will neither meet the big challenges facing the country nor inspire people.

Don't expect to ever hear Chuck Schumer telling an audience that, like FDR, he had "earned the hatred of entrenched greed." He hasn't. Instead he has earned $20,721,989 from the Finance Sector, more than anyone else in history other than presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, John McCain, George W. Bush, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama.

The alternative to FDR Democrats: Wall Street Democrats like Rahm & Chuck

Will The Center Hold?

No, not a character from a Harry Turtledove alternative history novel

The go-along-to-get-along crowd-- the 2 transpartisan Beltway party establishments-- were happy enough how the Cromnibus vote went down Thursday night. But those with actual political-- rather than transactional or careerist-- agendas are frustrated. Below is a Friday morning quote from GOP neo-Nazi extremist Bryan Fischer; nothing short of impeachment and the reinstitution of slavery would make him and his ilk happy.

Author Richard Kirsch is a Senior Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute and his Friday post at the Next New Deal was a lot more coherent than Fischer's dark, deranged tweet. Like a number of optimistic progressives-- many of whom weren't the least bit surprised to see Obama, once again, abandon Democratic values and principles to carry water for Wall Street-- Kirsch sees the uprising Thursday-- remember 139 Democrats broke with Obama and opposed the Wall Street travesty; only 57 went with him, even less than the 70 who backed an identical stand-alone proposal in October 2013-- as a "first skirmish in the war for the soul of the Democratic Party."

I hope Kirsch and his DC pals will keep that in mind when the congressional leaders of yesterday's betrayal-- Steny Hoyer, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Joe Crowley, Jim Clyburn, Jim Himes-- make their move for control of the Democratic House caucus. Right now there is nothing but an increasingly fragile Pelosi and the overwhelming disunity of rank and file Democrats standing in their way.

Democrats had the leverage to nix a deal that opens the door to more Wall Street bailouts, but they caved in to Republican blackmail.

Progressives lost the battle over the budget last night because President Obama and a minority of Democrats took the side of Wall Street. It is the first of many losses we will see in the next two years as Republicans relentlessly pursue their corporate agenda. The bigger question is whether progressives will lose the war in the Democratic Party.

Blowing up this budget deal should have been easy for Democrats. They were handed a perfect message: the Republicans are willing to shut down the government so they can bail out Wall Street the next time it wrecks the economy.

Democratic votes were needed because a group of 67 right-wing Republicans opposed the bill on the grounds that it did not go far enough in opposing the president’s executive order on immigration. The Republican split gave Democrats the leverage to demand that the bank bail-out provision be stripped from the bill.

But with President Obama twisting enough Democratic arms (57 in total) to give in to the Wall Street-engineered Republican blackmail, that powerful, winning message was diluted.

Democratic negotiators also agreed to the deal to repeal a provision of the Dodd-Frank law that prevents government bailouts of banks who engage in a form of risky trading. Their argument was “Republicans made us do it; it’s the best we could do.” But of course, with all the Wall Street money going to Democrats, that’s a convenient excuse. They can turn around and wink at the lobbyists who deliver Wall Street campaign contributions, playing a game in which the dupes are the American people.

The bailout of banks and Wall Street speculators remains deeply and broadly unpopular. It is an issue that generates anger among grassroots activists on the left and the right. For Americans who see Wall Street billionaires getting richer by gaming the system while families struggle to meet the basics, there could be no clearer contrast.

Progressive Democrats fought back. In a rapid-fire display of the energy and nimbleness of progressive organizations and champions in Congress, the deal was quickly exposed.

Senator Elizabeth Warren laid it out clearly on the Senate floor: “We put this rule in place because people of all political persuasions were disgusted at the idea of future bailouts… Republicans in the House of Representatives are threatening to shut down the government if they don’t get a chance to repeal it.”

In the House, progressive Democrats joined the call. California Rep. Maxine Waters, the senior Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, said, “We don't like lobbying that is being done by the president or anybody else that would allow us to support a bill that ... would give a big gift to Wall Street and the bankers who caused this country to almost go into a depression.”

The vigorous pushback from progressive groups and their allies in Congress convinced Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to break with the White House. Pelosi said that they were being “blackmailed” to vote for the bill, which she called “a moral hazard.” Still, Pelosi did not use her considerable powers of persuasion to get fellow Democrats to vote no.

For the next two years we will see Republicans do everything they can to deliver for corporate America at the expense of the American people. The only question is whether Democrats will enable them. Will President Obama continue to make compromise after compromise? Will Democrats in the Senate use the filibuster to block the Republican attack on working families? Will enough Democrats in the House keep coming to the rescue of a divided Republican Party?

We will see the same fight in the Democratic primary for president. Will Hillary Clinton break from the Wall Street wing of the party with which she aligned as a senator from New York? Will her challengers make the same sharp contrast that Senator Warren did, when she began her speech on the Senate floor by asking, “Who does Congress work for? Does it work for the millionaires, the billionaires, the giant companies with their armies of lobbyists or lawyers? Or does it work for all the people?”

As I wrote after the election last month, Democrats who used a populist economic message-- who named the corporate villains and declared that “we all do better when we all do better”-- won. Democrats who ran to the mushy middle lost.

But this is not just a fight for the soul of the Democratic Party, it’s a fight for our very democracy. As Justice Louis Brandeis said almost a century ago, “We may have a democracy or we may have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both.”

Americans are yearning for champions who stand up for them. If we have any hope of changing the direction of our economy from enriching the rich at the expense of the rest of us and of recapturing our democracy from the CEO campaign contributors and Wall Street bag men, it will be because progressive forces and elected champions stand up not just to Republicans but to President Obama and any Democrat who takes the side of Wall Street against America’s working families.

It is clear that progressives and the American people will lose battle after battle in Congress over the next two years. The real question is whether we will lose the war. 

And the far right saw what happened-- albeit for completely different reasons-- as just as much a betrayal of their values as progressives did. Despite pleas, blandishments and threats from Boehnerland, 67 from the fringe went their own way-- and not just the usual suspects-- both the deranged and the principled-- like Louie Gohmert (TX), Justin Amash (MI), Tom Massie (KY), Paul Gosar (AZ), Tim Huelskamp (KS), Paul Broun (GA), Michele Bachmann (MN), Mo Brooks (AL), Walter Jones (NC), Matt Salmon (AZ) and Steve King (IA)-- but also serious conservatives with an eye on taking over the party apparatus-- Scott Garrett (NJ), Mike Conaway (TX), Marsha Blackburn (TX), Jim Sensenbrenner (WI), Bill Posey (FL), James Lankford (OK), Randy Neugebauer (TX), Tom Cotton (AR), Ted Poe (TX), and John Fleming (LA). Seung Min Kim and Lauren French were out bright and early with a far right rage against the machine post at Politico. "[T]hey’re ending the year frustrated at their own party’s leaders, who they think cut them out of the funding process and fumbled a chance to pick apart Obama’s immigration actions as soon as they were announced by not using the must-pass funding bill to undo it."

Republican Reps. Steve King of Iowa and Michele Bachmann of Minnesota said they devised a plan and presented it to Boehner: a 60-day continuing resolution for all government agencies with language that would undo Obama’s immigration actions. They didn’t get their way.

“We almost brought the rule down,” Bachmann said Thursday. “We almost won. But then you heard the bones breaking, with the arms that were twisted. But we almost won.”

...The rash of conservative complaints about the so-called cromnibus ran the gamut. One common grumble was that they didn’t have enough time to read what turned out to be a fat, 1,603-page bill. Conservatives also failed to include a rider that may have allowed corporations to duck Obama’s contraceptive coverage rules, and they felt they weren’t consulted early enough in the process.

But it was the fight over immigration that left conservatives most exasperated.

Yes, with the Republican Party it will always come down to whose priorities bio first, Big Buisness or the racists. The racists lost this round. The lobbyists won:

The Class Of Rahm-- Why Not Move Beyond That Kind Of Disastrous Politics

Wall Street owned centrists, Rahm Emanuel and Jim Himes, New Dems

This week a congressman called to ask me where the DCCC had gone wrong. I suggested he read one of the dozen posts-- like this one or this one-- I had written about it sinceTuesday but he made it clear he wanted to discuss it. Since he's a member of Pelosi's leadership team, I gave it a shot. But he didn't really want to listen; he was just doing some kind of bizarre due diligence and couldn't have cared less about the substance of what I had to say, especially when it was about anything relating to anything that happened before he was elected.

I tried telling him how New Dems (Rahm) and Blue Dogs (Israel) have a long history of forcing progressives out of primaries to make room for conservatives like themselves. And I started telling him the story of how Rahm and Steny Hoyer forced a local Florida activist, union member and progressive out of the race against Mark Foley, who Rahm knew was molesting underage male pages and has every intention of making sure voters were aware of that as well-- after it was too late for the Republicans to get Foley's name off the ballot. But Rahm and Hoyer didn't want some free-thinking liberal like Lutrin in Congress. They had a conservative Republican in mind, Tim Mahoney, who they got to switch his party registration and run as a Democrat. Mahoney won and immediately did three things we can expect from conservatives: he joined the Blue Dogs; he started voting consistently with the Republicans; and he started illicit sexual shenanigans that led to his own defeat after one scandal-plagued term.

I would have been happy to tell my congressional caller dozens of stories like this about how the DCCC twists the definition of recruiting the "best" candidates regardless of ideology. But he doesn't have much patience or attention span and clearly called for an other reason aside from listening to me answer his question.

In yesterday's Washington Post Phillip Bump never mentioned Rahm's name-- or even the DCCC-- when he remarked on how only 7 of the 30 Democrats in 2006's "Class of Rahm" are still serving in the House (although 3, Blue Dogs Kirsten Gillibrand and Joe Donnelly plus Chris Murphy, are currently in the Senate). Many of the worst of Rahm's Blue Dogs and New Dems were defeated in the Great Blue Dog Apocalypse of 2010-- or forced to resign rather than face certain defeat at the polls:

• Harry Mitchell (Blue Dog-AZ)
• Tim Mahoney (Blue Dog-FL)
• Baron Hill (Blue Dog-IN)
• Brad Ellsworth (Blue Dog-IN)
• Nancy Boyda (Blue Dog applicant-KS)
• Michael Arcuri (Blue Dog-NY)
• Heath Shumer (Blue Dog-NC)
• Zack Space (Blue Dog-OH)
• Jason Altmire (Blue Dog-PA)
• Patrick Murphy (Blue Dog-PA)
• Chris Carney (Blue Dog-PA)
• Nick Lampson (Blue Dog-TX)

Voting with the GOP didn't help this dozen from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party escape their fates. And even more Blue Dogs (and New Dems) were obliterated in 2012 and last Tuesday. In his NY Times column yesterday, Nate Cohn speculated that the Republicans might hold the House for eternity.

Whatever doubts existed about the Republican grip on the House should now be gone.

By picking up at least a dozen House seats in the elections last Tuesday, the Republicans cemented a nearly unassailable majority that could last for a generation, or as long as today’s political divides between North and South, urban and rural, young and old, and white and nonwhite endure.

Democrats might well reclaim the Senate and hold the presidency in 2016. But any Democratic hopes of enacting progressive policies on issues like climate change and inequality will face the reality of a House dominated by conservative Republicans. The odds that the Republicans will hold the Senate and seize the presidency are better than the odds that Democrats will win the House, giving the Republicans a better chance than Democrats of enacting their agenda.

He doesn't think the Democrats can flip the 32 House seats needed to take back control. He's wrong. Pelosi has taken Steve Israel out of the equation; if she replaces him with a competent and determined DCCC leader like Donna Edwards-- who won't spend the cycle taking bribes and writing a third-rate novella on an iPhone-- the Democrats can either take back the House in 2016 or get most of the way there. Cohn's analysis is all argle-bargle sleight-of-hand numbers disguised as science, and devoid of any of the realities of politics. I found Richard Kirsch's essay for the Roosevelt Institute, Progressives Have A Winning Economic Narrative-- And Democrats Who Used It Won, far more useful. "Democrats can connect with voters," he posited, "by telling a story about how they'll make the economy work for all of us."

[Progressive Jeff] Merkley won and so did [neo-fascist Republican Joni] Ernst. The explanation, according to progressive pundits, is that Democrats like Merkley who used a populist message-- which means they connected people’s economic concerns to the rich and powerful who are responsible-- were successful while Dems who ran away from that message lost. As someone who has been leading the Progressive Economic Narrative (PEN) project, I really wanted to believe that. But as it seemed too easy, I decided to look at some campaigns and see whether it was spin or the truth. It turns out to be the truth.

The first case I looked at was Minnesota Democrat Al Franken’s campaign. After eking out a victory in the great Democratic year of 2008, Franken won handily this year, even as Republicans took over the Minnesota House of Representatives. Imagine my smile when I quickly found Franken ads based on the key value statement in our Progressive Economic Narrative, “We all do better when we all do better.” This was also a key theme of Minnesota’s great progressive senator, Paul Wellstone.

Franken’s progressive populism makes a key distinction when he uses the key word in that values phrase, “all.” As he says in another ad, “I work for all Minnesotans. Wall Street wasn’t happy about that. But I don’t work for Wall Street. I work for you.”

The name of our Progressive Economic Narrative is “An America that works for all of us,” which is central to the aspirational power of our story. However, what is needed for that message to win is to make it clear who is not included in “all of us” (i.e., the wealthy). A poll of voters last spring found that voters preferred “growing the economy” over “an economy that works for all of us” by 10 percentage points. By contrast, voters chose “an economy that works for all of us, not just the wealthy” over “growing the economy” by 22 points! Merkley was also sure to name the villains of the economic story throughout his campaign, as in the Wall Street ad mentioned above.

So what about those Democrats who lost in purple states? I would have thought Iowa Democratic Rep. Bruce Braley, who founded the populist caucus when he got to Congress in 2007, would have run a populist campaign. Instead, Braley ran on working across the aisle to get things done in Iowa and not “letting the extremists from either party get in the way.” Because voters are skeptical about anything getting done for them in Washington, his message fell flat.

Braley listed progressive issues, but without a narrative to link them together. His only villains were the “Koch brothers and their extreme agenda,” but he didn’t say what made their agenda extreme. Contrast that with how Merkley described “the billionaire Koch brothers,” who want to give “more tax breaks to millionaires and reward companies that ship jobs overseas.”

What about Mark Udall in Colorado, another Democrat who lost in a purple state that Obama carried? Udall built his campaign narrative around a war on women by his opponent Rep. Corey Gardner. He, like Braley, ticked off a list of progressive issues-- from minimum wage to pay equity to protecting Social Security-- without providing any framing story to link them together. He left out who the villains are in the story.

Udall also committed the ultimate narrative sin: delivering your opponent’s story. Here’s the closing line of a Udall ad: “I’m Mark Udall. No one-- not government, not Washington-- should have the power to take those rights and freedoms away.” Voters who wanted the anti-government candidate chose the real thing!

Udall would have had a much broader audience for his “war on women” message if he framed it as part of a broader war on American families by the rich and powerful. It is easy to make opposition to pay equity or a woman’s right to make her own decisions part of this broader story, which speaks to Americans’ deep concerns about their families.

One part of the story I didn’t see in the candidate ads was how Democrats should address Luntz’s “blame government” narrative. The answer, as Hart Research pollster Guy Molyneaux explains in the New York Times, quoting almost verbatim from the Progressive Economic Narrative, is that “the important question facing America today is not how big government should be so much as who government should work for: corporations and the wealthy, or all Americans?

As Molyneaux points out, “That is a debate Democrats can and will win.”

What even progressive Democrats need to do better is tell a story about how to create that economy that works for everyone, not just the wealthy. This is a matter of both clear narrative and bold policy.

The core of our economic theory is, as we say in the Progressive Economic Narrative, “working people and the middle class are the engines of the economy.” Another version of this, popularized by the Center for American Progress, is “we build the economy from the middle-out, not trickle-down.”

The story we are telling is that people are the job creators, not businesses. That raising the minimum wage is not just about fairness, but about creating economy-boosting jobs that put money in people’s pockets to spend in their communities. “We all do better when we all do better” is not just a statement of values; it’s the progressive belief about how the economy works.

Our narrative connects to policy with the phrase “we build a strong middle class by decisions we make together.” Democrats need to step up with bold policies, many of which are already out there, waiting to be championed. Here are just three:

1.     A massive public investment to dramatically increase the use of clean energy-- which would at the same time tackle the challenge of climate disruption-- with a requirement that all the jobs created pay wages that can support a family.

2.     A $15/hr minimum wage that grows with productivity, so that workers get their fare share of the wealth they create.

3.     A robust system of public financing that would allow candidates to win office without taking big campaign contributions from anyone, addressing the public’s belief that the rich call the shots.

One thing Democrats had better not say is “Oh, what’s the narrative? What do we say about the economy?” Progressives have a powerful narrative and bold solutions to create an America and an economy that works for all of us, not just the wealthy. Candidates who run on this have won and will win. And an America that runs on these policies will do to what too many Americans no longer believe is possible: provide a better life for our children.

A Wall Street shill and New Dem vice-chair like Jim Himes, a Steve Israel mini-me, has no way to relate to any of this and won't even try. If Pelosi names him DCCC chair, she'll be locking our party into Cohn's vision-- and the GOP's-- not Kirsch's hopeful prognosis.