Going Forward... What's The Democratic Party Going To Be?

No one knows what's going to happen, but it would be a safe bet that Americans aren't going to have a chance to vote for a real progressive for president in a very long time, probably longer than I'll be a sentient being. Or maybe not. Maybe Biden and the Democrats will screw up so badly that the Democrats lose Congress in 2022 and then the Democrat in the White House in 2024-- whether Biden or Kamala-- loses to a Republican who also screws up. So 2028... I may still be walking around and sentient. My grandmother was at that age.

But... I still feel cheated. I so wanted one damned good great president in my life. Instead they've all be mediocre at best and, more frequently, piles of stinking, rotting garbage. I wanted to see Bernie win so badly. It wasn't in the cards-- the Democratic establishment made certain of that.

Yesterday, Washington Post reporters Robert Costa and Sean Sullivan wrote about an interview they did with Bernie on Sunday. They predicted that Bernie's DNC speech last night "will effectively close an improbable odyssey-- two bids for the White House that together formed the backbone of a new, insurgent liberal movement." Thanks in great part to Bernie, Medicare-for-all, free college tuition, the Green Anew Deal and a chastening of the nation’s financial elite have all come to the fore of a grassroots Democratic Party-- and have pulled even a horribly corrupt status quo establishment slightly to the left and, perhaps put the breaks on a corrosive drift toward more-centrist views that have been been dominant since the Clinton DLC wing of the party managed to take over and change the focus from working class to managerial and donor class.

They quoted Bernie: "Ideas that we raised in health care, in education, in the minimum wage, in climate change, in criminal justice were ideas five years ago that people perceived to be radical and extreme. Today they are mainstream, and today they are actually being implemented by states and communities around the country."

They saw the slot allotted by Biden to AOC as a kind of passing of the torch. That's OK but there's more to it than that. I think I saw just about every Velvet Underground live performance in New York. They were my favorite live band when they were first getting going. There are many claimants to this but I think Michael Stipe first said, "not that many people ever bought that first Velvets album, but everyone who did started a band." And thank God they did. And not that many people saw that first Ramones national tour-- but it was Howie Klein (not the thieves who stole it as their own) who compared them Johnny Appleseed and noted that everyone around the country who went to see them started their own punk band.

AOC isn't the only political heir of Bernie's but one who even Biden was unable to deny at least 60 seconds of speaking time during his convention. But think of all the people Bernie has inspired who are now serving or will soon be serving at every level of government and who are committed to the somewhat revolutionary approach he imbued in a whole generation of Democrats.

When David Feldman introduces me on his radio show every week, he says something to the effect of Blue America supporting progressive and socialist candidates. I often remind him that this cycle, there was just one actual socialist candidate-- Shaniyat Chowdhury, who ran for a southeast Queens district held by loathsome and corrupt party boss Gregory Meeks, a New Dem. Shan, a first time candidate, didn't win, although close to a quarter of the voters backed him in the primary. "We’re only getting started," he told me this morning. "This was just the beta as a first time candidate. Change makers persist. I’ve continued to organize post election around housing rights, anti-poverty, and foreign policy. Sometimes I forget how young I am and how young our collective movement is with Bernie Sanders. Which speaks to the level of despair of what working people are going through. We are tired of waiting for change to happen election cycle or establishment democrats telling us it’s not our moment. I wake every morning thinking Trump or not, will everyone have free healthcare? Are we ending universal poverty and unjust wars? Are Black lives going to matter beyond symbolic gestures? The answer is clear. For that, I’m not going away anytime soon. Whether it’s this election or the next, we must continue to change the tides in the sea towards a more prosperous future. I will run for Congress again because I believe it is there where we can fight for humanity throughout the world."

In 2016 then-Flagstaff city councilwoman Eva Putzova was a Bernie delegate to the convention. This cycle she ran for Congress against a reactionary Blue Dog incumbent who spent most of his political career as a Republican and still votes as a mainstream Republican. Although the full face of the establishment opposed her. Yesterday, her district's election results were finally certified by Arizona's Secretary of State and she ended the race with 41.4% of the vote, winning in the most populous county and doing exceptionally well in the southern part of the district despite DCCC and the Arizona Demmocratic Party tilting the scales in favor of the incumbent. "We ran," she told me today, "a spirited, principled campaign that showed the district is winnable by a progressive candidate. If things fall in place, it's not out of the question that I'd run for the seat again. We have learned a great deal, built an impressive infrastructure, and we wouldn't be starting from scratch." That's how progressives win-- two cycles. It took that long for Alan Grayson and it took that long for Ro Khanna and Donna Edwards, each primarying their own party's establishment choice.

One of the people I met while Hector Oseguera was running for Congress told me during the convention broadcast last night the "for the past month, Hector has focused on the future of the progressive movement. Although we've witnessed incredible strides since Bernie's first presidential run, Hector often says 'we still have such a long way to go.' Policies like Medicare for All and a Green New Deal have not yet been realized. We are in the middle of a generational shift, and Hector is taking a central role in directing that shift across North Jersey. Bernie's presidential runs paved the way for a new generation of leaders, but that door sits merely ajar. It is now up to the Millenials to throw that door open and lead our nation into a new progressive era. It is often said that the true measure of a person is how they respond in times of adversity. Given the response I've seen from Hector in the past month, I wouldn't be surprised to see him throw his hat into the ring again." Yep... I get the same feeling!

Kim Williams ran for the strongly Democratic Central Valley seat held by worthless Blue Dog Jim Costa, who Biden will likely appoint to his dream job next year-- ambassador to Portugal. Kim told us she entered her race this year because she "wanted progressive policies to become part of the conversation in a poor, rural district that needed it. Throughout my campaign, we said things out loud that others would not, and I am extraordinarily proud of what we accomplished. We started a district-wide conversation and we knocked on 20,000 doors to promote a policy platform that resonated with actual people and not the local party elite. Our efforts proved that there was demand for Medicare for All and a Green New Deal while helping Bernie, and other progressives, win primaries in the district. And our work continues. I will not run again this cycle and I won’t need to. My focus today is on tearing down barriers for progressives and combating the incredible corruption embedded into every layer of our political system. CA-16 will see another candidate carry the progressive banner forward, and I am delighted by the base of support that is rallying behind her. My friend, Yenifer Gallegos-Mejia, is jumping in as the only candidate with the backbone to stand for progressive ideals and against Fresno’s duplicitous political class. She will not only build upon early momentum and carry us over the finish line, she will inspire an emerging generation of activists that will build a more equitable America. She is the future, and I will stand behind her and every other progressive running in the district."

"Sanders-style left-wing populism," wrote Costa and Sullivan, "is gaining power throughout Europe and the Americas, at times replacing an older guard of liberals who embraced globalization. Across Western democracies, campaigns rooted in passionate emotion and grievance have won mass followings. 'I’m very proud. I am very proud of the movement that we have built,' Sanders said. 'The younger generation is overwhelmingly progressive, and they want to see their government function in a different way than in the past.' Sanders pointed to Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), two allies who recently won congressional primaries, as evidence of a healthy and competitive left flank inside the Democratic Party."

In the eyes of his core backers, Sanders came agonizingly close to seizing control of the Democratic Party with his strong showings in the initial contests of the 2016 and 2020 campaigns. There were days when they thought he would be unstoppable.

But it didn’t pan out four years ago, as Hillary Clinton scooped up victories and support from superdelegates-- and as Sanders grew furious with the Democratic National Committee. Nor did it work out earlier this year when former South Bend, Ind., mayor Pete Buttigieg muddied Sanders’s plans for a clean-cut victory in the Iowa caucuses and a politically hobbled Biden suddenly revived his campaign in South Carolina, in part because of alarm in corners of the party about a Sanders nomination.

Sanders and his supporters are trying to learn from his success during the 2020 primary campaign in courting young voters in Iowa and Latino voters in Nevada-- and from his stumbles, particularly with Black voters who rallied around Biden in March.

Exit polls showed that the struggles Sanders experienced among Black voters four years ago against Clinton largely continued. Sanders’s fervent push to broaden the electorate with new voters was never realized.

Sanders’s supporters argue that campaigns come and go but that ideas move glacially. And history has precedent for movement campaigns having a long-term impact. In 1964, conservative Barry Goldwater lost the presidential election in a landslide. But his campaign laid the ideological groundwork for his supporter Ronald Reagan to win the White House 16 years later.

If the United States eventually moves toward democratic socialism in the coming years, Sanders will deserve significant credit for mounting campaigns that pulled the Democrats to the left, said Abdul El-Sayed, a Michigan-based liberal organizer.

“He didn’t only take on the establishment but the governing consensus in America that markets are the answer,” El-Sayed said. “He drove the conversation that we are all having. He lost two elections, but he won the future in the sense that the party is now a lot browner, blacker and younger and sounds like Bernie Sanders.”

Faiz Shakir, who served as Sanders’s campaign manager in 2020, said the defeats were not rejections of the senator’s ideas but a product of a “party in transition.”

“There is no question the kinetic energy and dynamism in the Democratic Party is with progressives. But the party is in transition,” generationally and politically, Shakir said, “and you’re going to have fits and starts.”

...Biden, who once fashioned his candidacy as a vessel to restore political norms and bolster institutions, has started sketching out a more transformational-style presidency that would seek to marshal a sweeping response to the coronavirus pandemic, a severe economic crisis and racial upheaval.

“What we’re seeing is more than lip service,” said Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), who served as a national co-chair on the Sanders campaign. “The Biden team has been very intentional about listening to not just Bernie Sanders but a lot of his key policy advisers.”

Some Sanders activists have refused to join with the senator in offering the former vice president their unequivocal support, underscoring the importance of Sanders’s pitch for unity on the convention’s opening night.

In a column for the socialist magazine Jacobin, former Sanders adviser David Sirota mocked the task-force rollout as “an SNL skit.”

“They are a mix of party dinosaurs, corporate zombies and some terrific progressive voices,” Sirota wrote of the group members.

Over the weekend, Tlaib said she voted against the Democrats’ platform and cast her delegate ballot for Sanders, expressing outrage about her party’s refusal to upend what she called a “for-profit system that is leaving people to suffer and die just because they cannot afford health care.”

The Sanders political operation has labored to keep things calm, asking some supporters he picked to represent him at the convention to sign agreements barring attacks on other candidates or party leaders, combative confrontations on social media or talking to reporters without approval.

The move, which carried a threat of being removed as a delegate, has the effect of blunting one of the most powerful if divisive tools of the Sanders support network-- its unrestrained online presence and tendency to stoke controversy through social media, which has at times spiraled into abuse of his opponents.

...“It’s not about looking back,” [Bernie] said. “It’s about looking forward.”

Rachel Ventura is on the Will County board and primaries a garden variety Illinois New Dem this cycle. Yesterday she told me that "Bernie is right, it’s about looking forward. Currently, the corporate Democrats continue to ignore the people, whether it’s the call of free college, Medicare for all, the green new deal, or even legalizing marijuana. The hope and change we are looking for does not rest in the present, but in the future. We need to take control of our own future and run our own candidates. We need more bartenders, teachers, community activists, nurses and blue-collar workers taking the reins of power from the elitists who currently govern for the wealthy few. We see candidates like Marie Newman and Cori Bush win on their second time running. How many progressive candidates who ran this year will run again in 2022? I know I’m leaning that way and with an army of supporters already pressuring me to run coupled with national organizations biting at the bit to endorse our campaign again, there’s definitely a compelling argument to run. While taking home 42% of the vote after being outspent 17 to 1 is impressive, it isn’t a win. The win will come from continuing to champion the people’s voice."

Rachel continued: "Today and every day until the 2022 election, we need every person to drown out the false media voice and demand better representation, Medicare for All, and The Green New Deal. We need people to have political conversations with their friends and neighbors about how both democrats and republicans have failed the people in a time of COVID and economic uncertainty but pulled no punches to protect their corporate donors. It isn’t enough to call for our politicians to be anti-corrupt; we must throw them out and elect people who will truly represent common sense solutions. Our government, via the politicians, for too long have told us what we deserve and don’t deserve but it is ‘we the people’ that need to tell them what it is we need and demand. Now is not the time of polite negotiations, now is the time for impatience and bold action. Regardless of who wins the Presidential Election, the people must rise up and demand better policies. We cannot allow them to control the messaging, whether at the pulpit or on the news stations. That fight continues from everything Bernie has fought for, from the things MLK fought for, even all the way back to Henry Wallace. Our fight won’t be over in 2020 and it certainly won’t be over in 2022. But it is the time to stop pulling punches. To stop the DNC or RNC from gaslighting us. We all, collectively need to call them out. I’m excited for the future and have already begun collaborative talks with the 2020 congressional candidates like Eva Putzova, Morgan Harper, Melanie D’Arrigo, Robert Emmons, and so many more. Join us in the continued fight!"

Dorothy Reik is widely considered one of California's most visionary progressive leaders is the president of the Progressive Democrats of the Santa Monica Mountains and an elected member of the Los Angeles County Democratic Party Central Committee-- elected by the largest majority of anyone else in the county-- and is a member of the California Democratic Party Executive Board. This morning, she told me that "Looking forward without looking back is how we got where we are today. We cannot really move forward until we understand how we got where we are right now and until we conquer the forces that led us here, from corporate greed to racism and everything in between. As I write this at least 850 delegates have refused to support the platform because it does not include Medicare for All. What evil brought us to the point where we confuse 'insurance' with 'care'? Yes, Bernie has moved us forward in many ways but we cannot progress further until we admit to who we are and where we have been.

Tuesday Could Be A Big Day For Progressives In New York-- Maybe Bigger Than Anyone Imagines

Through a Politico prism, the grassroots effort to elect Jamaal Bowman to Congress is a twisted power grab by "the left." Holly Otterbein wrote that "Desperate for victory after watching the presidential nomination slip through their fingers, progressives have found a new cause to rally around. Across the country, they’re channeling their grief, volunteer muscle and small-dollar donations into Jamaal Bowman, a left-wing candidate in New York trying to oust decades-long incumbent Congressman Eliot Engel... [T]heir efforts have also exposed party fissures, spurring Democratic establishment powerhouses such as Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi and Jim Clyburn to throw their support behind Engel," while Bowman has been endorsed by Bernie, Elizabeth Warren, AOC, Ayanna Pressley and virtually every credible progressive political group in America.

Otterbein quoted a local ex-candidate, Andom Ghebreghiorgis, who ran, briefly as a progressive, got no traction, dropped out, and endorsed Bowman: "What is that left phrase? We just need a win. People are investing a lot emotionally in this race because they see it as a down-ballot race where the policies of a Bernie, for example, which weren’t able to achieve victory on a national level, can at least be achieved on a congressional level."

Otterbein: "The clash between heavyweights like Clinton and Sanders has made New York’s 16th District race one of the most-watched primaries of the cycle-- and one of the most telling."

I think Blue America was one of the first national groups to endorse Jamaal and we did it nearly a year ago, long before any of the big name political leaders jumped into the race-- Jamaal Bowman-- The Bronx Could Wind Up With The Most Great Members Of Congress Anywhere In America. Although we noted that "Eliot Engel is a New Dem in a district that is far more progressive than he is," the endorsement post is all about Jamaal, with no further mentions of Engel.

Engel isn't the same kind of corrupt villain that Joe Crowley is, nor the same kind of villain that Dan Lipinski is. The best critique of him is that he's absent and no longer a part of his consistency and that his interests are more conjoined with those of Benjamin Netanyahu than with the struggling working families of Westchester and the Bronx. But the reason for Jamaal's traction-- irregardless of the typical Beltway-centric version-- is all about Jamaal. Engel is rated a gentleman's "C" by progressive punch-- not an "F" or even a "D." But there is no reason that NY-16 shouldn't be represented by someone with an "A," which is exactly what Bowman's platform adds up to. New York has 7 members of Congress (out of 21 Democrats) with "A" scores-- AOC, of course, and members like Jerry Nadler, Adriano Espaillat, Yvette Clarke, Nydia Velazquez, José Serrano, even Hakeem Jeffries! New Yorkers should expect no less... especially not in districts, like NY-16 with a PVI of D+24 and where Trump attracted just 22.5% of the vote.

Engel has a huge establishment push working for him now-- and a bipartisan one at that. Republicans know they can't ever win in NY-16 so they're supporting the less progressive contender, Eliot Engel. On Tuesday, Ryan Grim and Akela Lacy reported how Republican money, through a GOP SuperPAC, Americans for Tomorrow’s Future, is flowing into the effort to keep Engel in Congress. The blatantly Republican Americans for Tomorrow’s Future PAC has been funneling money into the Engels campaign through the anti-Bernie/anti-progressive Democratic establishment PAC, Democratic Majority for Israel (an arm of AIPAC). Republicans maxing out to Trump and also putting money through these operations into defeating Bowman. "Engel," wrote Grim and Lacy, "is on the receiving end of nearly $1 million of outside big money and counting, including funding from two other dark-money groups that can’t be traced but who only support anti-progressive candidates.

Despite Engel's big financial advantage-- as of June 3, he raised $1,997,944 to Bowman's $965,857-- the only public polling in the race show's Bowman leading with double digits. Asked this week if they would vote for Bowman or Engel voters picked Bowman over Engel 41-31 with 27% undecided. When the undecided voters were asked who they are leaning towards, Bowman had an even bigger advantage: 40-18%.

East of Scarsdale, north of Rye, north and west of Ardsley and north of Hastings-on-Hudson, you can walk out of Engel's district and into NY-17, where Nita Lowey is retiring and a hot, crowded primary is underway in another sure-thing blue district (D+7), where Trump got 38.4% of the vote in 2016. Seven Democrats are in contention-- including one extreme right Blue Dog-type, state Senator David Carlucci, a bunch of rich people (one of whom, Adam Schleifer, a big PhRMA guy, has self-funded $4 million of his own into the race) and one viable progressive, Mondaire Jones. A new poll of likely primary voters by PPP, released yesterday, shows Mondaire leading significantly:

• Mondaire Jones- 25%
• Adam Schleifer- 14%
• Evelyn Farkas- 14%
• David Carlucci- 11%
• David Buchwald- 8%
• Asha Castleberry-Hernandez- 3%
• Allison Fine-2%

Jamaal Bowman and Mondaire Jones-- not to mention Charles Booker, the Senate candidate in Kentucky-- are the candidates who are getting the most attention in the progressive blogosphere right now and we are feeling increasingly confident about all three. But there's another candidate we're extremely excited about in New York too, Shan Chowdhury, the Democratic Socialist taking on the city's most corrupt politician, Greg Meeks. Meeks has been trying to keep the primary under the radar-- and that could be his downfall. Shan is young, progressive and is being drastically outspent. If he wins, he's going to be Congress' most shake-it-up member. Despite the finance disparity and with just six days left, things have changed for Shan's race. His campaign has worked, for 14 months, to expand the size of the electorate in New York's 5th Congressional district. His campaign has sent over 750,000 texts, made over 100,000 phone calls and is running advertising on almost 10 different platforms in just the last month alone (print and digital). Chowdhury's aggressive strategy to expand the electorate is a problem for Meeks. In NY-05, voter turnout is abysmal. Despite there being over half a million registered voters, Congressional primary turnout in 2016 was only 8,635. That is barely 1% turnout. Meeks has never faced a real primary challenge and as a result his machine has been able to solidify a small base that turns out. That is why expanding the electorate has been an effective strategy for Shan. I just got word that, based upon internal numbers and absentee ballots tracked, Shaniyat is very likely going to upset Rep. Meeks and win next Tuesday.

Despite being widely overlooked, due to a lack of institutional support, his chances of winning are higher than almost any other campaign in New York City. According to the BOE, only 15,000 absentee ballots have been requested in the district. That is lower than any other district in the City. Taking into account Shan's campaign's incredible outreach-- having already seny over a million texts-- and the work his team has done expanding the electorate, this means they are going into election day with better odds of winning then even the incumbent! If their internal numbers reinforce the reality that on June 23rd, they are going to shock the political world-- even louder than Bowman, Jones and Booker will.

Even being so close to election day, contributions are vital to Chowdhury's ability to pull this off. They are going to need a tremendous amount of money in order to properly execute their get out the vote strategy. They plan to distribute 100,000 pieces of literature, flyers and posters between today and election day. They are also going to need the resources to send a broadcast election reminder text to everyone in the district (400,000 people). Let me be clear, contributions today will allow them to secure this victory and change-- perhaps forever-- what is thought possible in electoral politics. The Blue America 2020 congressional thermometer on the right is how you can contribute to Shan Chowdhury, Jamaal Bowman and Mondaire Jones in one fell swoop. And, by the way, those who wonder how last minute money gets to the campaigns on time-- Act Blue wires the contributions daily.

Asking For A Friend: How Much Do You Trust Obama?

Shan Chowdhury is a championship international rugby team captain who worked as a legislative assistance for the New York state Assembly before deciding to challenge one of the most corrupt Democrats in Congress, sleaze ball New Dem Greg Meeks, the Queens Democratic Party machine boss, a position he took over when AOC defeated Joe Crowley, a close ally of Meeks'. It's a real uphill climb for Chowdhury, who has raised just $46,571.18 as of March 31 to Meek's $1,241,618.71 haul from corporate PACs and slimy Wall Street operators eager for his continued assistance from his perch on the House Financial Services Committee.

"Slavery is a crime against humanity," Chowdhury mentioned today when he was talking about an online interview he's doing with Marianne Williamson on Sunday evening. "The path to restorative justice begins with the United States acknowledging our past crimes against Americans of African descent, whose ancestors were transported here against their will and enslaved. Meaningful and transformative reparations begins with implementing a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). I believe prioritizing access for African Americans to services, fully-funding Black institutions such as Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCU), Community Banks, and Black Owned Businesses, central to racial, social, and economic justice."

Shan is a young activist-- a next generation leader who the Democratic Party should be hoping stays inside the party. But, whoever wins the NY-05 congressional race, Meeks is not the future of the Democratic Party, at least not a remotely viable one. And Shan will certainly be active in civic affairs. He's the kind of person Obama was writing about yesterday when he wrote about-- if a bit ingenuously (since it was Obama who organized Biden's Super Tuesday win)-- how to make this moment the turning point for real change. Unless we're talking about change for the worse, Biden is no more a part of that change than Meeks or Trump are.

People, he wrote, are asking him "how we can sustain momentum to bring about real change" as people have taken to the streets after the George Floyd murder. And he responded that "Ultimately, it’s going to be up to a new generation of activists to shape strategies that best fit the times. That would be people like Shaniyat Chowdhury, not establishment careerist hacks like Gregory Meeks and Joe Biden.

Being, Obama, of course, he wants to share "some basic lessons to draw from past efforts that are worth remembering."

First, the waves of protests across the country represent a genuine and legitimate frustration over a decades-long failure to reform police practices and the broader criminal justice system in the United States. The overwhelming majority of participants have been peaceful, courageous, responsible, and inspiring. They deserve our respect and support, not condemnation-- something that police in cities like Camden and Flint have commendably understood.

On the other hand, the small minority of folks who’ve resorted to violence in various forms, whether out of genuine anger or mere opportunism, are putting innocent people at risk, compounding the destruction of neighborhoods that are often already short on services and investment and detracting from the larger cause. I saw an elderly black woman being interviewed today in tears because the only grocery store in her neighborhood had been trashed. If history is any guide, that store may take years to come back. So let’s not excuse violence, or rationalize it, or participate in it. If we want our criminal justice system, and American society at large, to operate on a higher ethical code, then we have to model that code ourselves.

Second, I’ve heard some suggest that the recurrent problem of racial bias in our criminal justice system proves that only protests and direct action can bring about change, and that voting and participation in electoral politics is a waste of time. I couldn’t disagree more. The point of protest is to raise public awareness, to put a spotlight on injustice, and to make the powers that be uncomfortable; in fact, throughout American history, it’s often only been in response to protests and civil disobedience that the political system has even paid attention to marginalized communities. But eventually, aspirations have to be translated into specific laws and institutional practices-- and in a democracy, that only happens when we elect government officials who are responsive to our demands.

Moreover, it’s important for us to understand which levels of government have the biggest impact on our criminal justice system and police practices. When we think about politics, a lot of us focus only on the presidency and the federal government. And yes, we should be fighting to make sure that we have a president, a Congress, a U.S. Justice Department, and a federal judiciary that actually recognize the ongoing, corrosive role that racism plays in our society and want to do something about it. But the elected officials who matter most in reforming police departments and the criminal justice system work at the state and local levels.

It’s mayors and county executives that appoint most police chiefs and negotiate collective bargaining agreements with police unions. It’s district attorneys and state’s attorneys that decide whether or not to investigate and ultimately charge those involved in police misconduct. Those are all elected positions. In some places, police review boards with the power to monitor police conduct are elected as well. Unfortunately, voter turnout in these local races is usually pitifully low, especially among young people-- which makes no sense given the direct impact these offices have on social justice issues, not to mention the fact that who wins and who loses those seats is often determined by just a few thousand, or even a few hundred, votes.

So the bottom line is this: if we want to bring about real change, then the choice isn’t between protest and politics. We have to do both. We have to mobilize to raise awareness, and we have to organize and cast our ballots to make sure that we elect candidates who will act on reform.

Finally, the more specific we can make demands for criminal justice and police reform, the harder it will be for elected officials to just offer lip service to the cause and then fall back into business as usual once protests have gone away. The content of that reform agenda will be different for various communities. A big city may need one set of reforms; a rural community may need another. Some agencies will require wholesale rehabilitation; others should make minor improvements. Every law enforcement agency should have clear policies, including an independent body that conducts investigations of alleged misconduct. Tailoring reforms for each community will require local activists and organizations to do their research and educate fellow citizens in their community on what strategies work best.

But as a starting point, here’s a report and toolkit developed by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and based on the work of the Task Force on 21st Century Policing that I formed when I was in the White House. And if you’re interested in taking concrete action, we’ve also created a dedicated site at the Obama Foundation to aggregate and direct you to useful resources and organizations who’ve been fighting the good fight at the local and national levels for years.

I recognize that these past few months have been hard and dispiriting-- that the fear, sorrow, uncertainty, and hardship of a pandemic have been compounded by tragic reminders that prejudice and inequality still shape so much of American life. But watching the heightened activism of young people in recent weeks, of every race and every station, makes me hopeful. If, going forward, we can channel our justifiable anger into peaceful, sustained, and effective action, then this moment can be a real turning point in our nation’s long journey to live up to our highest ideals.

He ended with "Let’s get to work." Let us get to work. Us? Elites who have reached the pinnacles and are integral parts of the establishment... like Obama, Biden and Meeks? Or all of us-- including the young activists who the DNC, DSCC and DCCC are constantly attempting to silence and derail and marginalize?

Marianne Williamson Has A Weeklong Summit Starting Tonight With Congressional Candidates

Starting tonight at 9 PM (ET)-- so 6 PM on the West Coast-- Marianne Williamson will be hosting a week-long summit for progressive Congressional candidates on her Facebook page-- one candidate each night. Her first guest, someone she has already shared a stage with in Iowa, is J.D. Scholten, the progressive Democrat who nearly beat neo-fascist and racist Iowa Republican Steve King, in 2018. That was a race sabotaged by the DCCC but so much momentum was built up by Scholten's grassroots campaign that this year not even progressive-hating DCCC chair Cheri Bustos will be able to stop J.D.

Monroe County, NY progressive Robin Wilt will be on with Marianne on Saturday. Today she told me that "At the heart of Marianne Williamson’s run for the Presidency was a commitment to humanitarianism that was lacking from many of the corporate, establishment-based candidates in the race. I am proud to be among the down-ballot candidates that Marianne Williamson has endorsed, because we share the fundamental belief that we can only make progress if we center the needs of those most directly impacted by the deleterious policies that have created the inequities that we witness. As Marianne will be the first to tell you, the ideas at the center of her platform are not novel. They are supported by a majority of everyday Americans who recognize that the vast wealth and income inequality that plagues our nation is not sustainable, and that we need representatives at all level of government who are willing to prioritize the needs of the people over those of corporate elites that have been disproportionately and unfairly benefiting from government largesse at our expense."

We need expanded and improved Medicare for All, not only because it is inhumane for 45,000 Americans to die each year from a lack of access to health care, but also because our for-profit, atomized health care landscape fails to address the many social determinants of health that are the root causes of preventable diseases.

We need a Green New Deal, not only because it is inhumane for communities like Flint, MI and Newark, NJ to have poisoned air and water, but also because we need a solution to the current crisis that recognizes the scale of the threat to civilization and transitions to a green economy that ensures that those communities that have been disproportionately impacted by polluters receive the support they need to equitably share in the economic opportunities of a green economy.

We need publicly-funded, freely available pre-K through 16 education because it is inhumane for one’s educational opportunity to be determined by one’s zip code.

Most importantly, we need bold, new representatives in Congress that will unabashedly support these policy positions on behalf of the people that they represent, because our current leadership has not been up to the task.

"Slavery is a crime against humanity," said Shan Chowdhury, who is running for a seat in Queens held by corrupt New Dem Greg Meeks and Marianne's Sunday guest. "The path to restorative justice begins with the United States acknowledging our past crimes against Americans of African descent, whose ancestors were transported here against their will and enslaved. Meaningful and transformative reparations begins with implementing a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). I believe prioritizing access for African Americans to services, fully-funding Black institutions such as Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU), Community Banks, and Black Owned Businesses, central to racial, social, and economic justice."





Shahid Buttar, the attorney and community organizer who is taking on Nancy Pelosi, will be joining Marianne on Friday. This morning he told me that "One of the overarching themes that unite our campaigns is our shared recognition of social justice as an extension of mutual concern and compassion. That, in turn, drives our shared commitment to universal healthcare, as well as ending police violence and ensuring that black lives matter-- not just to We to the People, but also the government that answers to us. We’re excited to get into the issues and explore why change is so desperately needed!"

This is the whole schedule-- at least for week 1:

• J.D. Scholten- Tuesday, June 2
• Andrew Romanoff- Wednesday, June 3
• Hector Oseguera- Thursday, June 4
• Shahid Buttar- Friday, June 5
• Robin Wilt- Saturday, June 6
• Shan Chowdhury- Sunday, June 7
• Jen Perelman- Monday, June 8

You can contribute to any of the Marianne-endorsed candidates by clicking on the ActBlue thermometer. Whether Trump is re-elected (or gets away with stealing the election) or Biden is elected, one thing we are going to need in Congress is more progressives to work with the handful of members-- like AOC (D-NY), Ro Khanna (D-CA), Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Ted Lieu (D-CA), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Jamie Raskin (D-MD), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Andy Levin (D-MI), Barbara Lee (D-CA), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)...-- trying to move a progressive agenda forward and trying to move the Democratic Party in a progressive agenda and away from corporatism, careerism and corruption.

Can America Evolve Towards A Country With A Humanitarian Bottom Line Rather Than Just A Financial Bottom Line?

I was on the phone with Marianne Williamson this morning and she was talking to me about how we have to change our country's priorities and the need to go from an economic bottom line to a humanitarian bottom line. During her presidential campaign she said that "The first pillar of a season of moral repair has to do with economic justice-- has to do with recognizing that we have created a wealth inequality greater than anytime since 1929, we have decimated America's middle class, and we must take immediate action to fix this. We should repeal the 2017 $2 trillion tax cut, which gave 83 cents of every dollar to the very richest individuals and corporations; although, we should put back in the middle class tax cut."

She went on to advocate specific programs:

We should stop all the corporate subsidies, such as $26 billion that we gave to oil and gas alone last year. For what reason?

We also need to make the United States government able to negotiate with huge pharmaceutical companies to lower drug prices. The US government cannot negotiate for lower drug prices, even though we have people in the United States even today who are dying because they cannot afford their insulin.

‍We should also say to those who have a billion dollars in assets that 3 percent tax on those assets is reasonable and 2 percent for those who have over $50 million-- that is reasonable as well.

As she said, "We have near 93 million people who live near poverty in the United States today. That means million upon millions of people, tens of millions of people who live, every single day, in chronic tension and economic anxiety, not knowing really what will happen if they get sick, not knowing what will happen if one of their children get sick, not knowing how they will send their children to college or not knowing how they themselves will get out from under the burden of their college loan. We need to change this. Bad public policy created all this and good public policy will make it right."





After Marianne ended her presidential campaign she decided to do what she could to help progressive congressional candidates who are running on platforms that she feels are about creating that good and reparative public policy. You may have noticed that this week centrist Democrat Amy Klobuchar, a top contender to be Biden's VP pick, followed Marianne's lead and announced that she is trying to help down-ballot candidates, what Politico referred to as kicking off her next act. The effort to raise funds, the snazzily dubbed "Win Big Project," began Friday by endorsing a slate of a dozen House and Senate candidates. All of them are centrists or candidates from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, like reactionary Blue Dogs Anthony Brindisi (D-NY) and Xochitl Torres Small (D-NM).

Klobuchar's are the kinds of candidates who have worked hand-in-hand with the Republicans to create the bad public policy Marianne has steadfastly derailed. And none of Klobuchar's endorsed candidates are anything like the dedicated progressives Marianne is helping raise funds for-- the list of which you can see by clicking on the thermometer on the right. I asked several of those candidates what makes their own campaigns different from the campaigns of conservative Democrats being supported by the corporate and political establishment.

The first response was from Liam O'Mara, a progressive congressional candidate in Riverside County who won his primary and is challenging right-wing crook and Trump enabler Ken Calvert. "Marianne is right to say that we need a moral renaissance in this country," he said. "All our great religious and philosophical traditions give us a sense of right and wrong which is rooted in justice and compassion for others. None of them could be used to justify the neofeudal outcome of Republican tax policy. The GOP claims the mantle of liberty while it strips that liberty from Americans by steadily lowering our living standards and reducing us to virtual paupers, dependent on the largesse of powerful special interests and the billionaire class. Americans should not have to live on their knees, begging for crumbs from the table of the super-rich. Our Founders fought a revolution motivated by the Enlightenment ideal that all human beings were born free and equal in dignity and rights. It is well past time we realised the promise of that revolution, and of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which is also the law of the land."

Mark Gamba's all-mail primary is 2 weeks from Tuesday. He told us he couldn’t agree more with Marianne on this. "I have long advocated that we should measure America’s success on a Gross National Happiness Index rather then the GDP which only measures outcomes for the wealthiest and has little relevance to the rest of us and certainly doesn’t measure economic justice. Concepts like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal which look to invest in the vast majority of people and the health of the nation, rather than the wealth of the 1% are exactly what we need to enact to bring our country out of the economic tragedy millions are suffering due to the pandemic. It will require a significant change in Congress however to make that a reality. The neo-liberals will use this crisis to further their agenda of concentrating wealth and power at the top. Everyone below the top 10% have been getting poorer, relative to the cost of living, since the Reagan era. It is critical that we raise the minimum wage to a living wage and tie it to the cost of housing so that it never stagnates again. It is beyond time to tax capital gains at the same rate we tax other income; to increase the tax rate on anyone making more than $10 million a year to at least 50% and to close the loopholes that allow companies like Amazon to pay nothing in taxes while creating another instant billionaire who treats his employees poorly. According to The Guardian: 'Some of the richest people in the U.S. (Bezos in particular) have been at the front of the queue as the government has handed out trillions of dollars to prop up an economy it shuttered amid the coronavirus pandemic. At the same time, the billionaire class has added $308 billion to its wealth in four weeks-- even as a record 26 million people lost their jobs.' This is why all the candidates in this post need the support of every American who hopes for progressive change, I for one do not take a penny of corporate money so that I can be free to fight for the changes Marianne and I have outlined."

Julie Oliver is the progressive Democrat running against a Trumpist crook in central Texas, Roger Williams. "Our economy was already in a slow-motion crisis that the coronavirus has hit the fast-forward button on so we must rebuild that economy to ensure that it prioritizes people first," she told me. "Rebuilding the American economy for the long term is going to take a massive WWII-style mobilization. We need to repeal the GOP tax cuts for multinational corporations, tax the rich and corporations, and invest in world-class, high quality healthcare, education, and clean energy infrastructure."

"As a country we need courageous leaders who can't be bought and who will put people first, not corporate interests. Marianne, wrote Arizona progressive Eva Putzova, "has been such a leader, which is evident from her dedication to help elect a brand-new Congress. Poverty in the United States is deep and widespread. People are living paycheck to paycheck, always one crisis away from a total financial collapse. In my congressional district, it is impossible to not focus on the tragic consequences of our government’s official policies of the past toward Native Americans: first policies of annihilation, then displacement and assimilation. To this day we treat Native lands as a national sacrifice area by enabling resource extraction that comes with environmental degradation and water contamination and neglect to invest in basic infrastructure that would be unacceptable elsewhere. We are talking about running water and paved roads. Our priorities must shift and this is why I’m challenging the incumbent whose timid leadership fails to address the greatest challenges of our times and to uplift the most vulnerable among us."

Tomas Ramos, the best of the candidates to to represent the open South Bronx seat that Jose Serrano is giving up, reminded us that "It's easy to blame Trump for the economic crisis that we're in but these series of events unfolded in the 1980s under Reagan. There was a redistribution of income from the have-nots to the haves. The Bush II administration made some enhancements, and under Tump we're continuing to see a redistribution of American capitalism, which has exhausted its ability to reproduce itself through tax cuts. The trickle down analogy is a farce, because all it did was the opposite, it manipulated the effect of wealth which rose to the top 0.1 percent. When Reagan applied this tax cut policy, the American economy was operating with the premise of global profits and surpluses. This helped fuel the demand for international exports, ultimately these surpluses helped spur on subsets such as the derivative economy. After 2008 recession it was clear that the American economy can no longer support these subsets economies. If these catastrophic economic policies continue, then it will further stagnate the incomes of the middle class and the working class. The COVID-19 crisis is a clear indication that we must reinvest in the human capital and not the on the future value of an economic indicator."

Michael Broihier is a progressive Democrat Marianne has endorsed for the Kentucky Senate seat held by Mitch McConnell. Mike told me that "Marianne is spot on; the great tragedy of this pandemic, after the loss of life, will be a rush back to the comfort of business as usual. As a farmer, I know how little a roaring stock market means to rural voters. In a state with the nation’s fifth worst economy and double the national average of people working at the minimum wage, the health of the Dow-Jones or S&P means little. And, the failure of a health care system tied to employment is self-evident when 30-million Americans become unemployed in a manner of weeks." He elaborated:

Sadly, those people who routinely had to chose between rationing their prescriptions or paying the rent were invisible to career politicians of both parties until Washington career politicians began to fear the Senate gym being looted for hand-sanitizer and toilet paper. But even with a mounting death toll their first instinct was to bail out their rich and corporate donors and that tone deafness is not lost on working America. Even the paltry, one-time payment to citizens smacks of desperation-- not leadership-- as they fail to grasp the enormity of the challenges ahead.

In my race, I face the DNC’s handpicked candidate, who has refashioned herself as a pro-Trump moderate who thinks the Senate Majority Leader is stopping the president from draining the swamp. A candidate who said she would have voted to elevate Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. This is what Washington establishment Dems think is what is needed-- another a get-along Democrat absent of vision or the moral courage to lead the country towards a more just and equitable future.

Queens progressive Shan Chowdhury is exactly the kind of young, working class leader who would make Congress a vehicle for the aspirations of American families rather than for sleazy corporate interests. This morning he said that "My race is critical in having to choose what is economically feasible vs. what moral is morally feasible. My opponent, Gregory Meeks is a corrupt corporate Democrat from the Republican wing of the party. He is the chair of subcommittee for House Financial Services of Consumer Protection and Financial Institutions. Time and time again since he’s even in office, he’s bailed out the big banks when working people needed help the most. I on the other hand, am fighting for progressive policies built on moral imperatives to protect working people from corporate harm. Homes and jobs should not be lost because of how irresponsible my opponent’s donors are with handling money."

Robin Wilt, a former Bernie DNC delegate, is fighting for a better Rochester and Monroe County. She and Marianne see eye to eye on shifting societal priorities and this morning shared that "Our campaign is all about elevating the voices of and empowering the 99%. For far too long, the establishment has cynically ignored anyone who wasn’t a corporate donor or political elite, and developed policies that cater to the interests of the monied few, as opposed to the interests of all of the people that they serve. As a result, our society was left vulnerable to collapse amid the current crisis. My opponent, as part of the neoliberal power structure in Albany for over thirty years, has not only been complicit, he has been an architect of these failed policies."

By contrast, the policy centerpieces and priorities of our campaign are those issues that have been far too long subverted by lickspittle corporate appeasers-- like my opponent-- who do not have the backbone to fight on behalf of the communities they represent: We proudly support healthcare and housing as human rights and champion Expanded and Improved Medicare for All, regardless of immigration status, and a Federal Homes Guarantee. We recognize that our existence on this planet is at grave risk and will fight for a Green New Deal that centers the communities that have been at the mercy of polluters and promises a future free from carbon dependence while bolstering our economy. We understand that everyone deserves a quality education, regardless of their zip code, and we support tripling Title I funding, tuition-free pre K- 16 public education, and eliminating student debt. We support a path toward citizenship for the millions of undocumented residents of our country, restoration of DACA, and economic justice for migrant and farm workers. We recognize that endless war, mass incarceration, and mass detention are all sustainable symptoms of our prison and military industrial complex, and will dismantle the systems that engender this injustice. We understand that there is an electoral industrial complex that disenfranchises our most vulnerable communities and will champion a new Voting Rights Act that ensures equal access to the ballot box, and we will remove money from politics by overturning Citizens United.

In short, we are running a people-centered campaign that recognizes that we are only as strong as our most vulnerable communities and that there is no moving forward when we continue to leave people behind.

Many Democrats Are Freaking Out When Anyone Calls Status Quo Joe The Lesser Of Two Evils

And he wasn't ever really a liberal on civil rights and civil liberties either

I really liked the two Jeff Sharlet books I read, The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power and C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat to American Democracy and his Netflix series, The Family (based on the two books). Between Ken, Gaius and I, there are a dozen posts that feature him, the most recent of which, Most Religions And Many Governments Feed The Poor-- But Not All... And Millions Of Elderly Americans Are Literally Starving, was last year.

Last week Sharlet published a piece on his Facebook page explaining why he is not just voting for Biden, but contributing money to his campaign. It's a good post and I agree with his analysis, albeit not his conclusion, at least not to me personally. Read it if you have a minute or two:

It may feel like too soon, but the hour is already late. I'm sending my first donation to the Biden campaign. I've despised Biden as long as I've known about him. Sure, he's done some good things. But he has been a loyal servant of empire and corporation, there are allegations of sexual assault (I haven't examined them, but I'm troubled by those Biden supporters who attacking his accuser using the same misogynist playbook as Harvey Weinstein), he is constitutionally dishonest, his vanity pales only next to Trump's, and he is woefully mismatched to the hour. My first choice was Warren by an inch; Bernie better matched my politics, and I still believe he would have had the better shot at beating Trump.

I supported his campaign, but his campaign is over, and even absent pandemic we would we be facing full meltdown. Is Biden the answer? Hell no. He is part of the problem. But he won't actively try to kill us. I know what Biden is; it's dispiriting. And I've reported on Trump in 2016 and this campaign close up; he's worse than horrifying because he's not even as bad as it could be. He's not full fascism, because he's too self-involved; but he is the door, and it's open, and it's pouring in.

So with respect for those who can't do it, I'm asking fellow Bernie and Warren supporters planning to sit it out now that Biden's the only option to swallow the bitterness-- and it will be bitter-- and vote for Biden. I'm donating, modestly, even though it feels like paying protection money, because I know firsthand from reporting on Trump how astonishing his fundraising is. If you haven't been paying attention, he's been by far outraising every Democrat. Before I gave money to Bernie and Warren, so I knew what their fundraising was like-- I got all the emails, all the texts. Sloppy, compared to Trump's operation. You may look at him and see a fool and at his followers and see only racism or delusion, but the machine around him? The people who are profiting from his authoritarianism? They're no dummies.

The people around Biden, meanwhile? I kind of think they're maybe not keeping up with the program. They can't believe it's not 2008 anymore. They believe the center will hold. They don't understand that their neoliberalism, their corporate coziness, let any idea of "center" slouch so far rightward that Trumpism is now the center. He's not an aberration. He is our horrifying new normal. So a return to normalcy isn't an option. the old normal wasn't so grand. The hope is to build anew--and Biden won't do that. I'm not suggesting we pretend Biden is anything other than what he is: a means of buying time. Voting for him isn't a moral choice; it's a very temporary survival mechanism. I keep thinking of the campaign slogan associated with the utterly corrupt Democratic Louisiana governor Edwin Edwards, running against actual Klansman David Duke: "Vote for the crook."

Same deal here: Vote for the hack. Then maybe we can fight like hell for what comes after.

The post from Wednesday on my own blog, Will Deeply Committed Progressives Vote For Status Quo Joe In November-- The Lesser Of Two Evils Play? caused hysteria on my Facebook page. I only unfriended the nastiest commenters, none of whom I know or had ever heard of (and have no idea how they became my "friends," but some former colleagues from work went right up to the line in their denunciations of me-- or anyone else-- who refuses to vote for Biden. I wonder how they would receive Sharlet's Biden endorsement.

I don't disrespect or look down on anyone who decides they want to vote for the lesser evil. Many express-- like Sharlet-- excellent and reasonable arguments to do so. But I vote for candidates who I want to see in office, not because the opponent is worse. My hatred for the Democratic Party, which has used the lesser-of-two evils strategy to turn the party into a neoliberal corporate hellhole, is, as my grandfather taught me when I wasn't even a teenager, less than my hatred for the Republican Party... just not by much. I'm a progressive, not a Democrat.

Rebecca Parson, who is challenging the head of the Wall Street owned and operated New Dems in Washington state, is also a dedicated progressive. "Voters in my district," she told me yesterday, "are excited to turn their energy to local elections like mine. We've all heard of NY-14, but I am bringing that populist leftist message to a working-class rural district, and  volunteers from Bernie's campaign are coming over to mine after he dropped out. My opponent isn't well known nationally but he's been getting away with taking millions of dollars of corporate PAC and lobbyist money and he's the chair of the conservative New Democrat Coalition. But there are other reasons voters care about my campaign: my district is on the coast and has a beautiful national forest, so issues impacting the environment are on voters' minds, and yet my opponent doesn't support the GND. Our district also has some of the highest rising rents in the country, so voters in Washington's 6th are ready for a candidate like me who is making affordable housing a top priority with nationalized rent control and a Homes Guarantee. Trump is a symptom of greater problems within our political system; those problems existed before he came into office and they will persist afterward if other down-ballot candidates don't step up."

Yep, godspeed, to all the people putting their hearts and souls into electing Biden and other conservatives who call themselves Democrats. I'm putting mine into progressives like Rebecca. And Shan Chowdhury, running in the southeast Queens district where that hospital you keep hearing about with all the deaths-- Elmhurst-- is. "It’s clearly disappointing that Bernie is not the Democratic nominee," he told me. "So many working people put their money and time into seeing him win. Now all there’s left is anger, and rightfully so. I’m reminded more than ever now how critical down ballot races like mine are. I’m taking on one of most corrupt members in Congress. I am his first serious challenger in over 20 years, and I’m doing it completely 100% people funded, turning out new voters with a mission to fight for progressive change. This is how we will win! The movement does not end with Bernie."

I heard a similar message from the Blue America-endorsed candidate in the suburbs north of Indianapolis, Jennifer Christie. "Until a month ago, we were out knocking doors every day. Now we are phone-banking and people are home. I’ve talked with thousands of Indiana voters. People are sick of politics and want real leadership. Hoosiers are interesting. We are considered a 'red' state, yet we elect Democrats throughout the state at all levels.  The average voter here regularly crosses the ballot. Indiana voters care deeply about authenticIty. Bernie won my district in 2016, and he won the state. We have always had wonderful volunteers in our campaign. In the last couple of months, our team had been growing immensely with new volunteers joining us every day. Why are voters enthusiastic about our campaign? Real change and genuine leadership. We have Democrats, Independents, and even a few Republicans who support our campaign because we are willing to take a positions and leadership on the issues. I am the only candidate in the race to support Medicare For All, a Green New Deal, and other important progressive policies. I am also the only scientist in the race, which, especially during the pandemic, people appreciate as a much needed voice in policy-making. We find over and over again that most Hoosiers support these policies, even across party lines. I believe that voters are especially enthusiastic now because  we have an opportunity to flip a seat with a true progressive. We know that our best shot for passing our policies is to fill the House and Senate with progressives.  Much of our support comes from Bernie and Warren supporters who understand that, while Biden is not a progressive, if we get a Medicare For All or Green New Deal bill to his desk, he will sign it. Since I am running for an open and flippable seat, we can make a big difference toward making that happen."

She's more hopeful than I am about getting Biden to sign a Medicare for All bill-- or anything progressive by twenty-first Century standards. But electing candidates like Jennifer Christie, Heather Parson and Shan Chowdhury is the way to move and get the country out of the ditch Trump and corporate conservatives have shoved us into. Please consider contributing to all three campaigns by clicking on the Blue America thermometer above.

And, by the way, AOC staffers and Team Biden have been discussing how to get progressive enthusiasm up for Biden: policies. She's asking Biden to more in a more progressive direction in terms of healthcare climate change, immigration and federal treatment of Puerto Rico.

On the subject of Biden’s health care proposals, Ocasio-Cortez said his support for lowering Medicare’s eligibility age to 60 is not “going to be enough for us,” adding that the party is “going to have to pursue a much more ambitious health care policy.”

Ocasio-Cortez also elaborated on Biden’s stance toward climate change, characterizing his preferred methods for combating the threat from rising global temperatures as inadequate.

“I don’t think that the vice president has a climate change policy that is sufficient right now,” she said, “and I’d like to see us really work on that.”

The congresswoman also offered advice on the most important decision Biden will make in the coming weeks, casting his choice of vice presidential nominee as another litmus test of the candidate’s progressive credentials.

Although Ocasio-Cortez said she was heartened by Biden’s pledge to name a female running mate and his openness to a woman of color being on the Democratic ticket, she argued that “what’s really important is not only just that woman’s identity, in terms of gender and cultural terms, but... who that woman is and [what] her stance is.”

Why Do Trump And The GOP Oppose Vote By Mail-- Even During A Deadly Pandemic?

That was a Tweet from Señor Trumpanzee yesterday. It would be paranoid to say he opposes vote by mail because the GOP has put so much effort into being able to rig electronic voting machines. But paranoia doesn't always mean you're wrong, does it? I asked some of the progressive candidates we've been talking with how they felt about Trump's attempts to vilify and block vote by mail proposals. I start with the two progressives in the Kentucky primary that will determine who takes on Trump's most repulsive enabler in the Senate, Mitch McConnell.

Charles Booker, endorsed by Blue America, was the first candidate to respond. "The Republican position against vote-by-mail-- even in the midst of this pandemic-- is galling," he told me. "To force people to choose between their health and exercising the right to vote is horrifying. But it isn't surprising. " But he went on from there:

I'm black, and I'm a Type 1 diabetic--- two groups of people who have been shown to be more likely to die from the coronavirus. Republican leaders who stand against vote-by-mail in this pandemic are telling me I have a choice: participate in our democracy, or drop dead.

In Kentucky, I have long fought for increased access to the ballot box by breaking down barriers to voting. I've sponsored legislation to automatically restore voting rights to people who have completed their sentences for felony convictions; I've supported our Governor as he has made that policy law with an executive order. And I've railed against Republican efforts to suppress the vote, most recently with a photo voter ID bill that our Governor vetoed just days ago. And I have called on our leaders in Washington to support states in implementing vote-by-mail for all 2020 elections.

When I was a little boy, my granddad told me about being forced to guess the number of beans in a jar before he was allowed to vote. That was 30 years ago. I spent a lot of my adult life thinking things had gotten better, and that such blatant voter suppression was in America's past. Now, in 2020, I know better, as the President and Republicans across the country tell people like me that we can vote, but we might die. Our choice.

Moments later, Mike Broihier, who was endorsed by Marianne Williamson yesterday, weighed in as well. Like Charles, Kentucky Democrats know how fast and loose McConnell's GOP plays with election security. "I used to agree with the saying that Democracy isn't a suicide pact, but seeing the lines of Wisconsin voters sent out  en masse during the pandemic by conservative state and US Supreme courts makes me wonder. The right's vision of voter suppression as a path to success was later made clearer in a presidential tweet, when, as usual, President Trump was unable to focus on a single message, even for 280 characters. If he'd just stuck with the canard that mail-in voting is rife with fraud-- it isn't-- he might have successfully dog-whistled his base. But he had to add "...and for whatever reason, (it)doesn't work out well for Republicans. Exactly, if you don't suppress the vote and disenfranchise people the arc of history bends more quickly towards justice and that is what entrenched politicians fear. Trump even previewed this thinking last week, speaking about the House COVID19 relief bill, saying, 'They had things, levels of voting that if you’d ever agreed to it, you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.' The take away, for me, is that this is the time to double down on voter registration efforts and grassroots turn-out-the-vote operations. Here in Kentucky in 2019 the work of Indivisible and other organizations flipped several solid red counties and moved the needle far enough to eject a cretinous Republican governor. On the ground, from what I have seen in my campaign, those same people, having tasted their influence, are not resting on their laurels but are ready to continue the fight, mail in ballots or not."

I also spoke to several House candidates who still have primaries coming up against Republican-lite fake Democrats. Milwaukie Mayor Mark Gamba is running for the Oregon seat occupied by GOP-friendly Blue Dog Kurt Schrader. "It's amazing how easy it is to make Republicans afraid of a thing," he told me soon after Trump's tweet. "Now they are going to be afraid of the mail. What the wealthy puppet masters fear is an actual democracy, where the person who represents the actual people, the person with the better ideas, the person with the proven track record of causing positive change gets elected, rather than the person who has the most wealthy supporters. The great American experiment is collapsing under the weight of all of that wealth. We watched it play out this morning in the democratic primary, no thinking person can imagine that Joe Biden will make a better president, a better leader, a better inspirer to greatness than Bernie Sanders will.  But Joe will kowtow to the rich, Joe will maintain the status quo that is killing our democracy and our very future on this planet.  But he won't tax the rich, by god. He won't stop the fossil fuel industry from continuing this headlong suicide cult they have created and maintained. It is now more critical than ever that we replace every bad senator and congressperson we can with a thinking, progressive champion for the people and the planet."

Boston progressive Brianna Wu is running for a seat occupied by anti-healthcare reactionary Stephen Lynch. Today she asked "What is Trump talking about? The problem is, and continues to be, that even he doesn’t know. What 'voter fraud' is he speaking of? None. Of course he doesn’t support voting by mail. If more people were able to vote, he would lose, and he knows it. And more importantly, it’s sickening that he is more concerned with perpetuating lies for his own political purposes than coordinating a real federal response to COVID-19, which is killing thousands of Americans. We need voting by mail, and we need to save lives."

Tom Guild is running for the Oklahoma City seat occupied by another Blue Dog, Kendra Horn, who's even further right than Schrader. He told me that Senor Trumpanzee fights every battle "with a view towards what’s good for him, but not necessarily for most Americans. In the current national emergency, people may literally be risking their lives to go to the polls on election day, so it makes sense to have prudent alternatives, where ordinary Americans can both exercise the right to vote and also remain healthy and alive. Several states have relied mainly or exclusively on mailed ballots for some time now and have not only increased participation, but have had few, if any, reports of fraud or abuse. As in many areas of law and public policy, we may have to bring the current POTUS kicking and screaming into the current century. When it comes to the fundamental right to vote, while maintaining the health and safety of voters, mailed ballots are a promising way to protect and preserve both. Come on Mr. President, don’t lead from behind!"

Arizona progressive Eva Putzova is also taking on a reactionary Blue Dog, Tom O'Halleran, this one an "ex"-Republican legislator with a horrifying conservative record. O'Halleran may not recognize what a liar Trump is, but Eva sure does. "There is no voter fraud connected to mail-in ballots or in-person voting anywhere in the country," she told me, "and numerous studies show that. Trump, and his Republican enablers, want to suppress the vote generally, and with youth and people of color in particular. Trump himself said high levels of voting hurt Republicans. So, DEMOCRACY hurts Republicans according to the leader of the Republican Party. We need to carry on the fight to expand democracy and the right to vote at every level in this country. This is the fight of our lifetime. If we lose, and voting becomes a privilege rather than a right, we will live in a quasi-fascist society where rights are not inherent but accrue only to those favored few. I will oppose such an outcome with every breath in my body."

Queens progressive Shaniyat Chowdhury-- replying to Trump's lies-- summed it up for virtually all the candidates Blue America has endorsed: "Voter fraud is when you work with Cambridge Analytics to manipulate emotions of voters without their knowledge. He should know all about it. We should be able to vote without any suppression. It’s a guaranteed right but also a privilege that many tax paying Americans do not have."