Written and edited by Norm Scott:
EDUCATE! ORGANIZE!! MOBILIZE!!!
Three pillars of The Resistance – providing information on current ed issues, organizing activities around fighting for public education in NYC and beyond and exposing the motives behind the education deformers. We link up with bands of resisters. Nothing will change unless WE ALL GET INVOLVED IN THE STRUGGLE!
EDUCATE, ORGANIZE, MOBILIZE -- IN THAT ORDER --- EdNotes Mantra
Sunday, July 3 -- Only 59 days till September
The first step - EDUCATE. I don't mean that in an arrogant manner like I have info to shove down your throat but I am learning stuff I want to share. You can't organize people based on misinformation of weak analysis. Logical dialogue can move people in your direction.
I heard him on Sam Seder Majority Report - links below.
People confuse today's poltiical liberals with classic economic liberals (Adam Smith) and current market works/govt doesn't neo-libs.
It's worth studying the evolution of the terms which started out meaning freedom from kings who controlled govt then - economic and political freedom -- this was pre-capitalist - and capitalism was a freeing from those mercantile controls- a good thing initially.
But then capitalism ran amuck and the New Deal brought it under modified control which the post 60s Republican Party and the late 70s Dem Party have decimated. Neo-liberalism has been a process of releasing those controls - which also included tariffs and controls on trade - and sold globalism as the ultimate freedom -- for a few. Carter (de-regulate everything to fight inflation), Clinton and Obama escalated. Biden actually gets some credit for moving away because it no longer plays politically.
The actual good thing about the Trump election and the Bernie campaigns was dagger to the heart of neoliberalism which so decimated workers in so many economies. The party is actually split between Neo-libs and anti-globalist proto-fascist element.
The anti- neo liberals on both sides of the right and left line up very differently but when I argue with Trumpise we actually do find areas of agreement.
My crowd is supposedly trying to organize NYC teachers -- and our union leadership is neo-liberal - you'd best have a good explanation on how and why that is.
Just as important is this analysis by Robert Kuttner -- a progressive Dem for 50 years but not hard left. He does this deep dive on The Intercept podcast: Deconstructed.
Both MR and Intercept are not hard left -- let's say Social Democracy leaning. In other words they may be highly critical of capitalism but don't necessarily call for it's downfall -- even if they think it may be in such danger as to fall on its own. But fall where and what takes its place? I'd say a form of fascism before socialism.
Both podcasts go hand in hand with an analysis of FDR years and how the New Deal began to be undermined almost immediately in the late 40s with the Taft-Hartley anti labor act - and the beginning of the Dem Party separation from Labor. Kuttner emphasizes that the Dem party was closest to a Labor Party -- even with the racist southerners.
I was brought up a Democrat by my mom's immigrant family. My aunt told me when I was very young that only the Dems were on our side. By the early 70s's, after she moved to South Miami, she had become a right wing racist -- if she lived she would have marched in Jan. 6.
So that coalition did not have as tight a bonds as Kuttner makes it out to seem. I loved that he agrees with me that John Fetterman if healthy should be the Dem Pres candidate in 2024.
How the Democrats Forgot the New Deal and Paved the Way for Trumpism
Author Robert Kuttner on how Biden can keep American fascism at bay.
In Robert Kuttner’s new book, “Going
Big: FDR’s Legacy, Biden’s New Deal, and the Struggle to Save
Democracy,” he explains how we got to our present political inflection
point, how high the stakes are,
and what comes next. Kuttner — who co-founded the Economic Policy
Institute as well as The American Prospect — joins Jon Schwarz to
discuss.
I love Sam's show and listen every day at noon for almost 3 hours. Sam brings a POV you don't get on the left -- not off the wall and I agree with 75%.
How can you explain neo-liberalism? One of the clearest explanations I've heard:
Sam and Emma host Gary Gerstle, Professor of American History at the University of Cambridge, to discuss his recent book The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order: America and the World in the Free Market Era. First,
Emma and Sam dive into the continued rise of mass shootings over this
weekend, the Uvalde Police’s continually changing story, Dr. Oz’s
victory in the PA GOP Senate Primary, and Elon suddenly scrapping his
Twitter deal after finding out about Twitter BOTS, but definitely not
his crashing Tesla stock. They’re then joined by Professor Gerstle as
they work through the concept of political orders as these prolonged
eras of dominant ideologies, with the two that he largely covers being
the New Deal political order, lasting from FDR’s reign up until the ‘60s
or so, and the Neoliberal Order, burgeoning in the ‘70s and lasting up
until the end of Obama’s presidency, looking at these two orders in
contrast, with the former compelling the right to assimilate into a
democratic socialist ideology, and the latter seeing a Clinton-lead
democratic party assimilating into corporate liberalism and
deregulation. Next, they get into the factors that drive the emergence
of new orders, starting as a modest movement of political organizations
and actors, before networks of donors, constituents, think tanks, and
policy networks and political actors arise around it as it proves itself
as a viable political system. They then look to the crises that left
the vacuum for these orders to step in, with the 1930s Great Depression
marking the largest capitalist crisis in US History, and the ‘70s
recession occurring alongside rising racial tensions, US imperialism,
and a reemergence of international industrial competitors seeing US
Capital suddenly threatened from all sides. Sam, Emma, and Professor
Gerstle then walk through the evolution of political orders and how one
took issue and influence from its priors, first looking to FDR’s desire
to create a new form of liberalism, one that puts everyday Americans in a
position to actually enjoy their freedom, before Freidman and Hayek
come around and reject his appropriation of liberalism, but still
looking to government as a corporate facilitator, particularly with the
role of the military in ensuring the safety and freedom of markets
worldwide. After covering the role of the fall of the USSR and Clinton’s
assimilation to neoliberalism, Sam, Emma, and Professor Gerstle walk
through our contemporary moment as the neoliberal order stalls, and the
difference between a fight between a far-right and a progressive left
and the single-camp transitions of previous orders.
And in the Fun Half: Sam and Emma discuss Dr. Jill Biden’s unveiling
of a new Nancy Pelosi stamp, just as pride month starts, in an
unfortunate moment of institutional fetishization, Dave Rubin obsesses
over Elon Musk fighting to get his workers back to work, before
inquiring about who died and left COVID in charge. Sam and Emma discuss
the original rise of TERFism in England, cover the Ohio GOP’s new bill
requiring genital inspections of young girl athletes, a Wisconsin high
school gets bomb threats for trying to teach their students to respect
queer people, Miles from LI talks the evolution of “based,” and Louie
Gohmert comes to the defense of the Right’s right to lie right to the
Government. Plus, your calls and IMs!
As the campaign wound down, Democratic heavy hitters flocked to the
district, as the race, rightly or wrongly, was cast a re-litigation of
their party’s 2016 presidential primary.... Brown ran better in most suburban communities, and held Turner to just a
narrow edge in Cleveland proper -- Brown was especially strong in
Beachwood, which has a high Jewish population.
Though it doesn’t account for much of the district, Turner narrowly
carried OH-11’s portion of Summit County.... Sabato's Crystal Ball
Thursday, August 5
I reported on the much talked about Nina Turner loss twice yesterday:
So yesterday I followed a lot to commentary on the outcome. The right center Dems on Morning Joe gloating and attacking the left, with Sharpton leading the way. Below I posted the NYT article and the Sabato report on the race. Speaking of which, did the black vote abandon Nina because she is too radical and anti-Biden with her comment about eating a bowl of shit when she voted for him? or how about the fact that she didn't support Hillary in 2016 and voted for Jill Stein (most likely, though she didn't say? These anti-Dem comments were used to great effect - plus the Israel thing.
Plus the open primary may have brought in Republicans:
Progressives (including Nina Turner) pushed hard for open primaries and this analysis finds strong evidence of a significant number of people who typically vote Republican choosing a Dem ballot to oppose Turner over Israel https://dansdeals.com/more/dans-comm
The district has lots of whites and Jews -- so Nina lost those badly, which means that counter to early reporting, she actually didn't do badly with the black vote. Her biggest problem was turnout -- low. And the fact that her black base was younger and they just don't vote as much as older.
Ryan Grim on The Hill had an interview with Brianha Joy Taylor -- worth finding it if you can -- I can't seem to.
Some of the best stuff was Sam Seder's analysis (my daily watch from noon to 2:30 which often kills my day) on Majority Report where he took some shots at the progressives who engage in rhetorical flourishes that come back to bite them when they have to gather support beyond their base to win an election. Sam points out that the purpose of running is to win and the purpose of winning is to make changes.
The Nina discussion starts around 1 hour and 12 minutes and goes on until 2:02 -- long but a lesson for the left from Sam, who is often attacked for not being left enough -- but I like reality based leftists.
Sam strikes back at the Ultra left dum dums who criticize Cori Bush for "performative" politics. Sam and Emma take them to task for their attacks on those who actually run in the Dem Party to win and not search for the mythical left cannon unicorn of the Labor-Green-People Party where they can get ten votes or just enough to let Republican right wingers win. Ahhh purity. Sam points out that if Cori Bush were some civilian instead of a formerly homeless Congresswoman, her sleep-in would have been laughed at.
Here is the NY Times article which features the despicable corp shill Hakeem Jeffries who I pray will be primaried and even if it's a losing battle I will be giving money to whomever.
In String of Wins, ‘Biden Democrats’ See a Reality Check for the Left
Progressives
are holding their own with moderates in fights over policy. But
off-year elections suggest they need a new strategy for critiquing
President Biden without seeming disloyal.
Nina Turner, the hard-punching Bernie Sanders ally who lost a special election
for Congress in Ohio this week, had unique political flaws from the
start. A far-left former state legislator, Ms. Turner declined to
endorse Hillary Clinton over Donald J. Trump in 2016. Last year, she
described voting for President Biden as a grossly unpalatable option.
There were obvious reasons Democratic voters might view her with distrust.
Yet
Ms. Turner’s unexpectedly wide defeat on Tuesday marked more than the
demise of a social-media flamethrower who had hurled one belittling
insult too many. Instead, it was an exclamation mark in a season of
electoral setbacks for the left and victories for traditional Democratic
Party leaders.
In the most important
elections of 2021, the center-left Democratic establishment has enjoyed
an unbroken string of triumphs, besting the party’s activist wing from
New York to New Orleans and from the Virginia coastline to the banks of
the Cuyahoga River in Ohio. It is a winning streak that has shown the
institutional Democratic Party to be more united than at any other point
since the end of the Obama administration — and bonded tightly with the
bulk of its electoral base.
These
more moderate Democrats have mobilized an increasingly confident
alliance of senior Black and Hispanic politicians, moderate older
voters, white centrists and labor unions, in many ways mirroring the
coalition Mr. Biden assembled in 2020.
In
Ohio, it was a coalition strong enough to fell Ms. Turner, who entered
the race to succeed Marcia Fudge, the federal housing secretary, in
Congress as a well-known, well-funded favorite
with a huge lead in the polls. She drew ferocious opposition from local
and national Democrats, including leaders of the Congressional Black
Caucus who campaigned for her opponent, Shontel Brown, and a pro-Israel
super PAC that ran advertisements reminding voters about Ms. Turner’s
hostility toward Mr. Biden.
Representative
Hakeem Jeffries of New York, a top member of House leadership, said in
an interview Wednesday that Democratic voters were clearly rejecting
candidates from the party’s most strident and ideological flank.
Where
some primary voters welcomed an angrier message during the Trump years,
Mr. Jeffries said, there is less appetite now for revolutionary
rhetoric casting the Democratic Party as a broken institution.
“The
extreme left is obsessed with talking trash about mainstream Democrats
on Twitter, when the majority of the electorate constitute mainstream
Democrats at the polls,” Mr. Jeffries said. “In the post-Trump era, the
anti-establishment line of attack is lame — when President Biden and
Democratic legislators are delivering millions of good-paying jobs, the
fastest-growing economy in 40 years and a massive child tax cut.”
Learn more about the Crystal Ball and find out how to contact us here.
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Use caution with Sabato's Crystal Ball, and remember: "He who lives by the Crystal Ball ends up eating ground glass!"
OH-11
Wins for Clinton and Trump?
In two special elections last night, Ohio voters in two congressional districts went to the polls to cast ballots in primaries. Though there were four primaries overall, the results in the the two most watched contests were, to some degree or another, unexpected.
In the Cleveland area’s OH-11, County Councilwoman Shontel Brown upset former state Sen. Nina Turner in the Democratic primary. Turner, who had superior name recognition, built a fundraising advantage and was seen as a clear, but not prohibitive, favorite for much of the campaign. Though Turner represented part of the area in the legislature from 2008 to 2014, she was most known for her work on Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) presidential campaigns. Brown, who was initially elected to the Cuyahoga Council in 2014, positioned herself as a mainstream Democrat.
As the campaign wound down, Democratic heavy hitters flocked to the district, as the race, rightly or wrongly, was cast a re-litigation of their party’s 2016 presidential primary. In the closing week, Sanders stumped for Turner while House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D, SC-6), a major figure in the Congressional Black Caucus, made a visit on Brown’s behalf -- Hillary Clinton endorsed Brown earlier on.
Despite Turner’s apparent advantages, Brown prevailed by a 50%-45% margin (there were almost a dozen minor candidates who split up the balance). While Turner’s association with Sanders undoubtedly seemed to help raise her profile, her association with the Vermont senator may ultimately not have been much of an asset in OH-11: in the 2016 primary, it was Clinton’s best district in the state, giving her a nearly 40-point advantage over Sanders.
Roughly 90% of OH-11’s votes come from Cleveland’s Cuyahoga County, where Brown did slightly better than her districtwide showing, but there were some interesting local patterns. Brown ran better in most suburban communities, and held Turner to just a narrow edge in Cleveland proper -- Brown was especially strong in Beachwood, which has a high Jewish population.
Though it doesn’t account for much of the district, Turner narrowly carried OH-11’s portion of Summit County. An interactive map from our friends at RRH Elections gives a detailed breakdown: Brown carried many of the white-majority areas while Turner ran better in the heavily Black precincts that make up Akron proper.
Given the working class nature of the Akron
area, perhaps Brown’s relative moderation played better with white
voters. A few months ago, a similar dynamic was at play in Louisiana’s
2nd District: in an April special election, now-Rep. Troy Carter (D,
LA-2), who was tagged with the “establishment” label, beat out state
Sen. Karen Carter Peterson in an intraparty runoff. Peterson’s posture
as an “unapologetic progressive” sold well in gentrifying white
neighborhoods in New Orleans, but Carter racked up healthy majorities in
the district’s white -- and non-white -- working class pockets.
Both the LA-2 result and the New York City
Democratic mayoral primary, where Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams
was seen as a moderate choice, represent, to some degree or
another, disappointments for progressives. Now, with a loss in Ohio,
progressives find themselves looking for a high profile win.
Biden admin will go to the mat for Neera but not for minimum wage as payback to the Clinton corp machine. Do the Clinton's' have dirty pictures?
People on the left love to beat up on Biden appointee budget czar Neera Tanden, one of the most despised Hillary acolytes and former tweet queen. A noted Bernie hater, the irony is he is chairing the committee that has to approve her. Here two left commentators call for her to be rejected. And Krystal Ball and Nomiki Konst are not always lined up in the same place on the left. A Republican senator hounds her and reminds Bernie of some of the things Neera called him. Krystal does deep into her corporate shill history and Nomiki recalls Tanden personal attacks on her. I know my old fans would rather me talk about Mulgrew and the Del Ass but James is handing all that. [LIVE BLOGGING FROM REMOTE FEBRUARY DELEGATE ASSEMBLY].
The only thing I can say about the UFT is that they and the AFT are lined up with the Tanden wing of the Dem Party and she exhibits all the bad things about the party that brought us Trump.
Krystal Ball: NO ONE Should Vote For Neera Tanden, Hillary's Corrupt Hatchet Woman
Two socialists walk into a flower shop... this is not a Henny Youngman joke.If DSA gets a strong toehold in the Council whomever is the next mayor will face
some serious opposition that is very different than Corey Johnson. .. As a DSA member I have received notice of numerous organizing efforts around the tax the rich campaign.
I've been tracking the work of the Democratic Socialists (DSA) here in NYC and am in fact a member, attending a few meetings of the South Brooklyn branch and also touching base with the Queens and the Labor groups (there are at least 8 branches in NYC).
I'm told there is a southeast Queens group that would include Rockaway so I'm looking forward to working with them. DSA, which has grown from something like 5000 to almost 100,000 members nationally since Trump's election, has its fingers in many pies housing, health care, climate) but the key for me is the electoral strategy of challenging the Democratic Party machines at the grassroots level.
The AOC victory in 2018 was a key factor in pushing the strategy. Note also the number of teachers and educators getting involved. Jamaal Bowman was not a DSA endorsement I believe but a Justice Democrat recruit. Featured below is Jabari Brisport who was a middle school teacher in Crown Heights in Brooklyn and I believe a MORE member though not when I was still involved (until two years ago). Note that MORE is a heavy DSA outpost and wouldn't it be interesting if the MORE DSA people could actually bring a similar grassroots operation to the UFT elections, echoing the broader left/central battles in the Dem Party.
The DSA operation is impressive and they pick their battles and have beaten the Dem party machine in many of those battles. More will be coming up this year as they focus on the City Council. In some place DSa will also come into conflict with the UFT political machine with some juicy battles coming up - which I will report on. If DSA gets a strong toehold in the Council the next mayor will face some interesting opposition that is very different than Corey Johnson.
DSA is the most serious challenge to the Dem Party machine but only in select areas of the city. So how that will impact the mayoral race is left to be determined. My sense is they are not there yet and there is no current candidate they would conceivably report. But if they jump in with their resources in the primary for a candidate they could have a major impact due to the usual low turnout. Their ground game in impressive.
As a side note, Krystal Ball on Rising today had a story about a DSA challenge in the Dem primary for governor of Virginia. Krystal often points out that Virginia is dominated by Dems but ranks last in workers rights - what does that tell you about Dem Party central?
Check out her report:
This article in The Nation focuses on the battle with Cuomo, which should be delicious.
The Socialists vs. Andrew Cuomo
Newly
elected DSA members in the New York legislature will work with
grassroots organizers to force the governor to tax the rich. Will their
inside/outside strategy work?
Two socialists emerged from a flower shop in Astoria, Queens, with a
bouquet of red roses. Jabari Brisport, 33, a newly elected state senator
from Brooklyn, sported a red Democratic Socialists of America hoodie
while Zohran Mamdani, 29, a newly elected assemblyman from Queens, wore a
red-and-black checked Arsenal jersey—an item he’d just purchased and
later characterized as “this ridiculous shirt” yet was plainly excited
to show off. NYC-DSA endorsed both this year, and the pair spent the
overcast November weekend surprising each of the organization’s freshly
endorsed City Council candidates at home with a rose. (The color red has
represented socialism and communism at least since the 1840s, while the
red rose, now the symbol of the Democratic Socialists of America, has
been associated with socialist and social democratic movements and
parties since the 1880s.) “I’d like to point out that he didn’t pay [for
the flowers]. That’s the problem with socialism,” Mamdani ribbed
Brisport, impersonating a conservative. “Eventually you run out of other
people’s money.”
The two were part of a slate
of five candidates for state government endorsed by NYC-DSA this
election cycle. The others were Julia Salazar, the sole incumbent,
representing North Brooklyn in the state Senate; and Assembly
challengers (both tenant organizers) Peruvian-born Marcela Mitaynes in
Sunset Park and Phara Souffrant Forrest
of Crown Heights, a nurse and daughter of Haitian immigrants. All five
won their races, in a huge show of power for an organization that has
only been a significant force in New York electoral politics for two
years. Through a retreat in October, weekly Zoom calls with fellow
NYC-DSA members, and other meetings and texts, the socialist five have
been getting to know one another and planning their Albany strategy. I’m
an NYC-DSA member; I live in Brisport and Forrest’s districts, and
volunteered on their campaigns as well as Salazar’s. I can’t wait to see
what happens next.
Mamdani was kidding about running out of “other people’s money,”
but it’s an important joke. Everything the socialists want to achieve in
office—eviction relief and other urgent assistance; full funding for
transit, schools, and health care; a Green New Deal for New York—costs
money. The first item on their legislative agenda, then, is the one that
could make everything else possible: taxing the rich.
Ninety
percent of New Yorkers favor increasing taxes on millionaires and
billionaires. In a deadly pandemic and a devastating recession, the
needs are obvious, with lines for food pantries spanning blocks. Still,
the policy won’t be decided on its moral rightness or even its
popularity but by a power struggle. On the socialists’ side is an
organized movement and a receptive public. Against them, most likely,
will be Governor Andrew Cuomo and the ruling class he represents.
Cuomo, Salazar told me, “is practically a Republican.” Taking shelter
under a temporary pandemic lean-to outside a bar on Wyckoff Avenue in
Brooklyn’s Bushwick neighborhood, on a cold, rainy evening last month,
Salazar sipped a hot toddy and explained how power is organized in
Albany. “The way the budget process is constitutionally designed gives
outsized power to the governor,” she said, explaining that the
legislature isn’t empowered to add items to the budget without the
governor’s consent. This makes progressive legislation especially tough,
since Cuomo, she said, “is a fiscal conservative, proudly committed to
austerity.” He’s a crucial part of the reason New York state has a
budget shortfall, despite having at least a million millionaires and 118 billionaires.
But Salazar observed that the winds around Cuomo were shifting, with
even moderate legislators now calling for taxing the rich. Senate
majority leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, who represents wealthy
Westchester County, said this summer that raising taxes was unlikely
despite the state’s looming budget crises. Yet as soon as all the
absentee ballots were counted and all five members of the DSA slate
declared victory, Salazar said, the Democratic leadership in the
legislature released a public statement saying the state government
needed to raise revenues. “That was very telling, to me, of what was to
come in January.” The presence of more socialists in Albany, Salazar
emphasized, “will really make a difference.”
In fact, the socialist victories over longtime incumbents should
serve as a warning. NYC-DSA cochair Chi Anunwa put it this way: “Hey,
you know, if you don’t want to raise revenue and provide housing and
health care to all, that’s fine. But don’t be surprised if you
experience our primary challenge.”
Before 2018 Cuomo mostly got his way. A cadre of Democrats in the
state Senate who caucused with the Republicans made progressive
legislation almost impossible. In 2018, a grassroots campaign defeated
nearly all of those conservative Democrats, replacing them with
progressives. It was then that DSA made its first foray into state
politics, electing Salazar to the state Senate. Salazar, DSA, and a
coalition of tenants’ rights groups seized the moment, expanding
protection for renters in New York State for the first time in 40 years.
The real estate industry is one of the most powerful interest groups in
the state, and most political observers both inside and outside DSA
were shocked that it could be defeated by grassroots organizing. “The
governor could have vetoed it,” said Michael Kinnucan of the Brooklyn
DSA Electoral Working Group. “I would have thought the rent laws would
be the last thing he’d want to compromise on.”
Cuomo is known as a vengeful bully, and a great deal of New York
politics is explained by the fact that people know that if they cross
the governor, they may face punishment. Cuomo’s also skilled at
resisting policy moves from the left, while retaining something
resembling heartthrob status to the party’s liberal base. In the early
days of the pandemic, many incorporated his briefings into their daily
routines and wore “Cuomosexual” T-shirts. But this mystique around the
governor’s political power, said Kinnucan, though not unfounded, has
often served to let the legislature off the hook. Now that Cuomo’s power
is increasingly challenged, New Yorkers are learning that he’s not the
only decision-maker in Albany. When Cuomo’s real estate industry cronies
called him to ask him to stop the pro-tenant legislation from passing
last year, he told them to call their legislators.
It’s too early to say whether this story will be repeated in the
fight for progressive taxation. Last summer, Cuomo argued that taxing
New York’s wealthy would mean “you’d have no more billionaires,” as if, New York Times
columnist Ginia Bellafante quipped, “someone had proposed killing off
the warblers of the Adirondacks.” Recently, however, Cuomo seems to have
tacked to the left on the matter. In late November he warned that New
York would need to raise taxes on the wealthy if no pandemic-related aid
were forthcoming from Washington, which depends partly on the outcome
of next month’s Georgia Senate runoffs. In early December, Cuomo went
further, suggesting that such tax increases were likely regardless of
what happens in Georgia or Washington. He’s perhaps conceding in advance
to the politically inevitable, hoping to take credit for a popular
policy he initially opposed (as he’s done before)—or preparing the
ground for a small, watered-down tax increase that will appear
responsive while making everyone to his left look like Ho Chi Minh (as
he’s also done before).
How will the elected socialists, DSA, and their allies prevail?
Through an “inside/outside” strategy, Anunwa explained, with the new
officials organizing their colleagues, while the rest of DSA, in turn,
organizes the grassroots to pressure Albany.
The grassroots campaign launched in early December, with phone
banking and leafletting urging New Yorkers to pressure their legislators
to support legislation taxing the rich. About 785 volunteers
participated in the campaign in the first week, making more than 105,000
calls and hanging flyers on some 60,000 doors (no canvassing yet due to
Covid-19). On the phones, volunteers found tremendous enthusiasm for
the campaign; the phone bank technology allows the volunteer to put the
constituents through to their legislator’s office right that minute to
tell them to support the bills, and DSA volunteers have been especially
struck by how many people (968 in the first week) chose this option. It
was the most successful launch of any single-issue campaign in NYC-DSA’s
history.
NYC-DSA is not the only powerful organization fighting to tax New
York’s rich. A coalition called New York Budget Justice—which, along
with NYC-DSA, includes Alliance for Quality Education, Indivisible
Harlem, and more than a dozen other groups—has formed solely around this
demand. In mid-December, the week after NYC-DSA launched its Tax the
Rich campaign, 10 labor unions plus the New York State AFL-CIO publicly
joined the call, with the union that represents transit workers, Local
100 TWU, organizing a rally in mid-December with DSA and other labor
unions.
Sitting in Astoria’s Socrates Sculpture Garden, Brisport
and his chief of staff, Kara Clark, who was active in DSA’s Defund the
Police campaign, talked about building relationships in Albany, where
they have a growing number of progressive and even fellow socialist
allies. But the slate is working on their more moderate future
colleagues, too. Brisport, a middle school math teacher about to become
the first openly gay Black person in the New York State legislature, has
befriended Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the first Black woman to be the
state senate’s majority leader. Brisport helped her out in the fall with
the fight to keep a Democratic majority in the legislature,
volunteering on campaigns in swing districts where Democratic seats were
threatened by Republicans. (Now that all the absentee ballots have been
counted, the Democrats have a veto-proof supermajority.) Asked if the
majority leader is receptive to the socialist agenda, Brisport paused
and answered, “She’s receptive to me as a person, so that’s good.” This
means more than many working outside government might suppose. Mamdani
observed that how legislators vote or what bills they sign onto is often
not ideological but “because their friends asked them to.”
The next day, I met Brisport and Mamdani
in Brooklyn. Brisport wore the same red hoodie as the previous day,
while Mamdani, who was born in Kampala, Uganda, repped the Nigerian
national soccer team with a black-and-white checked jersey almost as
loud as the previous day’s choice. Neither were dressed quite warmly
enough for the chilly day. This time Brisport paid for the roses. One of
the City Council candidates we visited, Brandon West, a community
organizer, answered his door warily. He seemed relieved when Mamdani and
Brisport presented him with a rose, admitting sheepishly, “I thought I
was getting hazed.” NYC-DSA is no fraternity; West’s new comrades came
only in solidarity and left extra flowers for his roommates. But the
socialists are indeed about to be hazed by the state’s political
establishment. In any case, they’re getting ready.
Obama care fixed none of this.
On a regular basis the NYT publishes an article on the testing fiasco and points out the reason is that the government doesn't set prices which is why our medical system costs double anywhere else. Yet the articles never nake the connection to the major issue in the Democratic debates - medicare for all - single payer. By not making that connection, the NYT is making an editorial decision to bury the lede.
these differences aren’t about quality. In all likelihood, the expensive M.R.I.s and the cheap M.R.I.s are done on the same machine. Instead, they reflect different insurers’ market clout. A large insurer with many members can demand lower prices, while small insurers have less negotiating leverage.
Because health prices in the United States are so opaque, some researchers have turned to their own medical bills to understand this type of price variation. Two health researchers who gave birth at the same hospital with the same insurance compared notes afterward. They found that one received a surprise $1,600 bill while the other one didn’t.
The difference? One woman happened to give birth while an out-of-network anesthesiologist was staffing the maternity ward; the other received her epidural from an in-network provider.
BERNIE WAS RIGHT!!!!!! I want to see this the next time there is an article like this - but don't hold your breath - the Dem Party Center wants to see this continue - along with Obama care which obviously did nothing to curb this yet they defend it to the max - yes, I mean Biden.
By the way - note how the cultural left is focused on taking down statues and also buries the lede. They should be marching for medicare for all and universal income. But more of that in future posts - examining the fault lines between the cultural and economic populist left.
It is so logical to support single payer - where we can reduce costs in half - that the only thing that makes sense in terms of Dem Central resistance is the money coming in from the health industrial complex. (The same with support for defense budget - military industrial complex money to Dems.) And by the way - our own union (AFT/UFT) also oppose single payer and line up perfectly with the Dem Party- and yes, on defense spending too. They can close schools and cut budgets but the AFT/UFT will NEVER call for moving money from defense to schools.
How can a simple coronavirus test cost $100 in one lab and 2,200 percent more in another? It comes back to a fundamental fact about the American health care system: The government does not regulate health care prices.
This tends to have two major outcomes that health policy experts have seen before, and are seeing again with coronavirus testing.
The first is high prices over all. Most medical care in the United States costs double or triple what it would in a peer country. An appendectomy, for example, costs $3,050 in Britain and $6,710 in New Zealand, two countries that regulate health prices. In the United States, the average price is $13,020.
The second outcome is huge price variation, as each doctor’s office and hospital sets its own charges for care. One 2012 study found that hospitals in California charge between $1,529 and $182,955 for uncomplicated appendectomies.
“It’s not unheard-of that one hospital can charge 100 times the price of another for the same thing,” said Dr. Renee Hsia, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco, and an author of the appendectomy study. “There is no other market I can think of where that happens except health care.”
There is little evidence that higher prices correlate with better care. What’s different about the more expensive providers is that they’ve set higher prices for their services.
But American patients will eventually bear the costs of these expensive tests in the form of higher insurance premiums. In some cases, they are paying for additional tests, for flu and other respiratory diseases, that doctors tack onto coronavirus orders. Those charges are not exempt from co-payments and can fall into a patient’s deductible.
Those kinds of bills could make patients wary of seeking care or testing in the future, which could enable the further spread of coronavirus. In an April poll, the Kaiser Family Foundation found that most Americans were worried they wouldn’t be able to afford coronavirus testing or treatment if they needed it.
While progressives celebrate the narrow victory of Tiffany Cabán in
the Queens DA race, it was a shock and awe moment for the Queens Dem
Party machine and allies (yes, to the UFT). But hope springs eternal and they are holding out hope
that the absentee ballots will give Katz the victory.
Katz and her supporters remain optimistic that the approximately
3,400 absentee ballots, which remained uncounted as of earlier this
week, could still tip the polls in her favor. .... The WAVE, June 28,
2019, www.rockawave.com
The WAVE took no formal position in the race other than "anyone but Tiffany." Yes, I write for a publication that doesn't quite align with me politically but they do give me space.
I'm sure people are sick of my reports on this election:
The implications locally and nationally are so deep and
complicated. The AOC/DSA/Justice Democrats showed they could pull out
more votes for their candidate than the Democratic Party machine plus
the UFT (they donated $36,000 to Katz), the real estate interests, etc
couldn't muster the turnout for Katz.
This election mimics the Bernie/Hillary split in the Democratic Party. One candidate,
Deputy Attorney General Mina Malik, told a crowd in Southeast Queens on the Thursday evening before election day that “Bernie Sanders is the reason we have Trump in the White House.”
The articles I quote below have all the elements of this split, including black leaders' support for the regular Democrats and slams at the left.
Katz,
who was running for her sixth elected office in New York in 25 years,
had support from former congressman and former Queens County Democratic
Party Chair Crowley, Gov. Andrew Cuomo, along with New York
Congressional Reps. Gregory Meeks, Tom Suozzi, Carolyn Maloney, and
Adriano Espaillat, and a host of local and state unions.
Meeks, despite a key vote on Capitol Hill Tuesday, was at Katz’s
election night party. Earlier, he slammed Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.,
and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., for endorsing Cabán without consulting
leaders of the machine. The move, he said, was “arrogant” and
“patronizing.”
Our own UFT lines up firmly against the left and will do so every time. The number of UFT failures in its endorsement policy continues the trend. In other words, whoever they endorse for president should view it as a kiss of death.
A year ago, the party establishment could claim — whether it was true or not — to have been caught off guard by Ocasio-Cortez. That rationale is absent in Tuesday’s race. The eyes of the country were on Queens, and the machine was as prepared as it could be. It simply couldn’t muscle out the vote... The Intercept
There's a lot packed into this comment -- DSA vs Dem Machine. But also ignores that the number of candidates who were not progressive splintered the vote. If it was Katz against Cabán head to head this would be a different story.
Tiffany Cabán Stuns Queens Machine, Holds Solid Lead in Race for Queens District Attorney... progressive groups coalesced around Cabán
Cabán’s apparent victory is a show of force in New York for the local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, which worked hard for Cabán early, as well as for the Working Families Party and Real Justice PAC. Larry Krasner, the Philadelphia district attorney elected with the help of Real Justice on a similarly radical platform, was in attendance at Cabán’s election night party. The most significant endorsement, however, likely came from Bronx and Queens Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. ....The Intercept
The Intercept called this victory more significant in some sense than AOC's defeat of Joe Crowley - who by the way still runs the Queens regular Democratic Party despite the fact that my own Congressman, Greg Meeks is the chair. Meeks is black and all the black elected officials came out for Katz with slams at the left.
I love how publications interpret events from their own point of view. The WAVE, which I write for, took a basic Anyone But Tiffany position and was critical of outsiders coming in to support her. Look at the map of the voting below -- my neighborhood went all blue for Greg Lasak, a retired Supreme Court Justice, who is associated mostly with the old regime. He had 12,377 votes -14.5 percent. While the progressive celebrate, consider that if you combine the Lasak and Katz votes, Tiffany gets swamped. Look at that sea of green for Katz and sea of yellow for Tiffany. Pick a color and you can see the racial divide plus the white progressive in Astoria, Long Island City and Jackson Heights -- their vote pulling efforts were impressive.
There's still the election...
Given
that Queens leans heavily Democratic, Cabán is all but assured a
general election victory, provided she survives whatever challenges
Katz files. That election will take place on November 5, 2019.
But there is still a chance for a conservative/right wing/Reg Democrat alliance. Melinda Katz's ex, right winger Curtis Sliwa who fathered two children with Katz was on Bernie and Sid this morning pointing out that Katz had no chance to win and would probably be given a judgeship, the usual way the graft works, saying all non-progressives, Republican and Democrats, should all gather together and back Lasik against Tiffany in the November election.
Just two months after the Democratic National Committee (DNC) was celebrated by environmentalists for banning donations from fossil fuel companies, it voted 30-2 on Friday to adopt a resolution from Chair Tom Perez that critics said effectively reverses the ban and represents "an absolute failure by the DNC."... Common Dreams
A good chunk of the socialist left despises the Democratic Party and believes working within the party is a dead end. Stories like this helps them make a case. I have been tilting back and forth myself -- paint me confused -- which is why I am reading all sides and posting various points of view --- I just don't want to be trapped in a left bubble.
Whenever you think it's safe to jump back into the fight for the Democratic Party you read a story like this. I still think there are not currently any realistic alternatives than to put leftward pressure on the party from below. But despite tilting left, the center is strong with money being a major factor. Changing the party at the top will not be easy -- but from below, maybe. Right now electoral politics is the game and will a blue wave sweep the party and if so how does that play in the nation as a whole?
Oh -- NY Times columnist David Brooks just said on Meet the Press "How will the Democrats manage to screw it up this time because they always do?" Then he said as long as they don't swing too far left -- and he says other than a few places, they haven't. [More about this soon where the NY Times columnist Michelle Goldberg makes the opposite case - that the left is making important inroads.]
Is this a screw up or a smart move? I think making the left enraged will not help the Dems. I mean they can try to snare the more progressive Republicans but this is a short term solution. I just don't see how to bridge the distance between so many disparate points of view even if the uniting factor is despising Trump.
On the other hand, the DNC is claiming it is not a reversal so is this a bit of distorted reporting?
DNC Passes Perez Resolution Reversing Ban on Donations From Fossil Fuel PACs
from DNC epic: “After hearing concerns from Labor that this was an attack on workers, this resolution acknowledges the generous contributions of workers, including those in energy, who organize and donate to Democratic candidates.”
But the resolution opens the door donations from fossil fuel “employers’ political action committees" and nods to “forward-looking employers” that are “powering America’s all-of-the-above energy economy."
