An issue-based approach for Democrats and progressives

Wake Up and Vote for Democrats poster

Mainstream Democratic and progressive voters don’t agree on everything, but they all seemed to agree on one thing after last Tuesday’s elections: the Democratic Party let them down. Democratic officeholders and candidates running for election ran away from President Obama and his agenda. One example was Alison Lundergan Grimes, the Democratic challenger to U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Grimes not only refused to assert that she had voted for President Obama, she was reluctant to tout the stunning success of the Affordable Care Act in Kentucky (known as Kynect), and instead began most answers by naming problems with the ACA that need fixing.

Running away from the President’s record in 2014 made no sense for Democrats, as President Obama’s agenda literally was the Democrats’ agenda. Every law that President Obama signed, from the Stimulus to the Affordable Care Act, was something that a majority in Congress, and certainly a majority of Democrats in Congress, first had to pass. Perhaps some Democrats need to go back and read their Constitution, or watch Schoolhouse Rock.

Running from President Obama’s accomplishments was also irrational for Democratic candidates, because those accomplishments were so numerous, if only someone besides President Obama would have touted them. These include:

• Lowering unemployment from 7.8 percent when Obama took office to 5.9 percent by Election Day 2014 (down further to 5.8 percent as of November 8).
• Creating 10.6 million private sector jobs over a record 56 consecutive (and counting) months of job growth, including employment gains of over 200,000 jobs per month for nine straight months, a feat that has not been accomplished since 1994.
• Drastically lowering the deficit to $483 billion, after having been handed a whopping $1.4 trillion deficit for fiscal year 2009 from George W. Bush.
• Stopping the Bush Great Recession and turning it into positive economic growth.
• Killing Osama bin Laden.
• Rescuing the U.S. auto industry.
• Covering 10.3 million more people with healthcare.
• More than doubling the stock market and sending it into record territory, which fattens the IRA and 401k accounts of millions of Americans; and
• Lowering gasoline prices below $3 per gallon in part due to increased domestic production and more clean energy use, incentives for hybrid and electric cars, etc.

Rank-and-file Democrats and progressives are rightfully angry that the Democratic Party abandoned this impressive record and failed to go on offense. Indeed, the Democratic Party did not appear to stand FOR anything in this election. Instead, Democrats kept asking hard-working Americans for money with the negative sales pitch that Republicans were bad and were backed by the Koch Brothers. It’s clear that the Democratic Party system failed in this election, and that Democrats and progressives need a new political paradigm on which to focus their energy, their time and their money.

We suggest an approach where the focus is on individual issues of importance, and where politicians would only receive voter support where they demonstrate a commitment to those issues. This would be a bottom-up system of voter support, rather than a top-down system based on a tone-deaf, cowardly Democratic party infrastructure. This isn’t some radical new approach; it’s more like a shift in focus.

Democratic and progressive voters have plenty of issues that they can push. The list might include, for example:

• Climate change.
• Food labeling.
• Keeping American jobs in America.
• Fixing America’s roads and bridges.
• Fighting for women, including safe, legal abortions when necessary, and wage equality.
• Net neutrality.
• Battling voter suppression efforts.
• Out-of-control police violence.
• Marijuana legalization.
• Marriage equality — since the issue is still uncertain given the recent 6th Circuit Court of Appeals decision — and LGBT rights.
• Raising the minimum wage.
• Gun safety laws, including mandatory universal background checks.
• Affordable college education, and robust public education instead of more privatization.
• Universal affordable healthcare, including the progressive Single Payer position.
• Clean Air and Water standards vigorously enforced by the EPA and equivalent state agencies.
• Shrinking the Military Industrial Complex which benefits from permanent U.S. wars.
• Saving Social Security, including significantly raising the income base subject to the Social Security tax, which currently stands at only $117,000.
• Saving Medicare and Medicaid.
• Fiscal responsibility, including not adding to America’s debt with massive wars or other expenditures that aren’t paid for.
• Regulation of financial markets and practices.
• Saving the U.S. Postal Service in the face of Republican attempts to destroy it.
• Fighting for labor unions as a bulwark against unchecked corporate power and slave wages.

Issues-based voters can also give their attention, support and funding to issue-oriented advocacy groups instead of directly to politicians or parties. These groups, such as the Human Rights Campaign (LGBT rights), Everytown for Gun Safety (gun safety legislation), Union of Concerned Scientists (global warming) and many others, are easily identifiable and can amplify support for critical issues in order to grab the attention of politicians and parties. Voters could then choose to identify less with old party institutions like the Democratic National Committee, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee which took in so much supporter money in 2014 and squandered it so spectacularly.

The purpose of such an issues-based focus is to get away from the idea of the political party as the structure that dictates voter behavior from the top down. Candidates who receive the bulk of their money from corporate CEOs might try to ignore such issues-based voters, but there aren’t that many CEOs out there to vote. Candidates who see their support drying up from voters who feel their concerns aren’t being met might have to respond to such voters. Likewise, the Democratic Party might be pressured next time into creating a positive unifying agenda on which to run, in order to attract issues-based voters. If Democratic candidates or the Democratic Party fails to do so, the worst case scenario is that they will lose their seats to Republicans. How is that different from what happened last Tuesday? At least this process could lead to a new crop of candidates that know the value of a giant bloc of voters, and will pursue such voters instead of the other way around.

Most importantly, such an issues-based focus could generate enthusiasm among younger voters, who, while they did not vote in large numbers last Tuesday, have shown great interest in particular issues such as climate change and marriage equality. Obviously, low voter turnout was a huge problem in the 2014 mid-term elections (more of a problem for the Democrats, since they have more registered voters than Republicans and thus are more likely to win in a higher-turnout election), and something needs to be done in order to get out the vote more effectively next time. In this case, the future success of Democrats and progressives might well depend on America’s youth, and that may be the most hopeful sign yet.

Image by Mike Licht, used under Creative Commons license. http://is.gd/bn7Dut