Robert Kuttner: Saving Progressivism from Obama

[LongTomH]

In his latest op-ed at Huffington Post talks about 'best and worst case scenarios' for the next two years. No scenario comes out very good; both the Administration and congressional Republicans are determined to impose austerity while unemployment is high and the economy is still weak.

Kuttner quotes from articles in The NY Times and The Nation who question why the electorate was led to support a party who obviously are opposed to anything which would benefit them, like seniors voting for a party that wants to privatize both Social Security and Medicare.

This is where Kuttner's piece gets meaty:

Goldberg calls for less reliance on polling and focus groups and more reliance on "inspired intuition" to restore progressivism.

The real question is how we do this without the active collaboration of a Democratic president who is fast becoming more albatross than ally.

<snip>

If politics continues on its present course, about the best one might expect for 2012 is that the Republicans will nominate such a nut-case that Obama will stagger to re-election. But unless he is re-elected with a mandate to carry out drastically different policies, we can anticipate continued economic pain and continuing drift of the electorate to the right.

Kuttner advises against trying to mount a progressive challenge to Obama in 2012:

The closest that the progressive movement came to realizing this strategy was of course in 1968, when Lyndon Johnson decided to abdicate in the face of mass protest. But in that tumultuous year, we had a surfeit of anti-war candidates and a real movement. Even so, we ended up with Richard Nixon. This year, it is hard to think of a plausible candidate (Howard Dean? Russ Feingold?) who could unseat Obama without further weakening the Democrats in the general election.

So our task is to step into the leadership vacuum that Obama has left, and fashion a compelling narrative about who and what are destroying America. Our movement needs the passion and single mindedness of the Tea Party movement, and it helps that we have reality on our side. If we do our jobs, we can move public opinion, discredit the right, and elect progressives to office. Even Barack Obama might embrace us, if only as a last resort.

Basically he's saying: "Stop waiting for Godot!" Kuttner wants the Progressive movement to reach out to the electorate on issues they really care about and to place more real progressives in Congress.

I think we have a chance to do this. The 'Blue Dog' caucus took big hits in 2010; the Progressive caucus lost only 4 members.

[BrklynLiberal]

1. Interesting article on Obama's view of FDR...

http://www.newdeal20.org/2010/11/18/the-story-behind-obamas-remarks-on-fdr-27539/

[Hawkowl]

2. 1968 is a GOOD model

The only reason we ended up with Nixon was because RFK was assassinated. Progressives should be screaming at Obama. We must scream so loud so as to drown out the Rethuglicans. Apparently he only compromises with his political enemies and stabs his friends in the back.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Yes. Humphrey was contaminated by his association with LBJ.

He was tied to the war, and that's why he went down. Had he been able to campaign without the shadow of LBJ lingering over him, he might well have won. And he was basically an old-time liberal.

[xchrom]

3. For that to happen all the assorted left movements have

To come under one umbrella -- probably under
Economic Justice.

That means environmentalists, equal rights folk,
Peace folk laying aside their priorities for one
Narrative.

I don't see it happening yet.

[Jackpine Radical]

5. I think it could happen.

If not by 2012, then by 2016. The main things the environmentalists, peacies, equal-righters, and anti-poverty advocates have in common are their (generally speaking) common view of the nature of reality, and their humane values that place people (and the biosphere) above profits. Most people who belong to any one of these groups are at least sympathetic to the others as well.

The Reality Based Party against the Corporatists.

[Recursion]

6. How is the single most popular politician in the country an "albatross"?

He's got significantly higher approval ratings than anyone in Congress.