Roll Call (subscription) reports that the Dems are about to roll out their modern-day counterpoint to the GOP’s Contract on America:
Among the proposals are: “real security” for America through stronger investments in U.S. armed forces and benchmarks for determining when to bring troops home from Iraq; affordable health insurance for all Americans; energy independence in 10 years; an economic package that includes an increase in the minimum wage and budget restrictions to end deficit spending; and universal college education through scholarships and grants as well as funding for the No Child Left Behind act.
Democrats will also promise to return ethical standards to Washington through bipartisan ethics oversight and tighter lobbying restrictions, increase assistance to Katrina disaster victims through Medicaid and housing vouchers, save Social Security from privatization and tighten pension laws.
It is a good idea to create a positive agenda for Democrats to campaign on, but it is a little depressing to realize that we are already half drowned in Grover’s bathtub. But, we can’t exactly campaign on massive new spending programs, while deploring the deficit spending of the GOP. Or can we? We could if we had no shame and always stayed on message. Alas, we are Democrats and that won’t happen.
When we talk about stronger investments in our armed forces, I hope that translates into more support for our troops’ training, pay, benefits, and equipment, and not to more massive spending on unneeded aircraft, anti-missile programs, and foreign expeditions.
I am particularly fond of the decision to focus on energy independence within ten years. I think Americans can understand that goal and get behind it. And I think it is probably the single best thing we can do to improve both our security and the global climate.
Universal college is an interesting concept. I suppose we will need to continue to be extremely lax in our immigration policy to fill all the jobs a nation of college grads refuses to do. And I expect immigration to be a tricky issue in the upcoming elections (for both parties).
In any case, I’m glad the Dems are putting forth a positive agenda, and that they have coalesced around a timetable (with benchmarks) for withdrawal from Iraq. Maybe the party won’t split in half after all. Maybe.
Energy independence in ten years? How the heck is that going to happen?
I’m glad they’re putting out clear policy statements though. They sure need to do that if they want to win more seats next year.
I think your comment (how the heck is that going to happen?) shows that this point, at least, was well crafted. Too often when I read people’s attempts to wrtie a Dem manifesto I glaze over. Too much generalization and vague aspirations.
But “energy independence in ten years”?! That catches your attention. You want to know more. Can this be done? How can it be done?
Also, it is something that is hard to oppose. Everyone (except crony Republicans) would like to see the U.S. be energy independent. All the Republicans can do is argue that it can’t be done, and then they can be the party of “no” for once.
Good point. I just hope the Dems have a good answer.
…and approaching it with this kind of timetable means lots of emphasis on coal and nukes, even though it would take at least eight or nine years to get the first nuke fissioning if they started the process today.
Fischer-Tropsch coal processing – assuming the environmental problems can be solved, a giant if – would cost between %500 billion and $1 trillion of investment to replace our oil consumption.
100% renewables, which MUST be our long-term goal, will take 50 years or so to achieve, even if we start today.
Well – then they might as well throw in “world peace by 2015” if they plan on sticking with a fantasy agenda.
ban cars and heat. That might do it.
I don’t know that it is a realistic goal, but making it a goal is the first step in the right direction. It’s what Bush should have said on 9/12/01.
As long as invading Canada isn’t part of the plan…
but incorporating. Your ass is ours.
Hurry! Invade now!
lots and lots of pucks…
…in 1977 (in what was concededly a flawed plan). But we’ve wasted 25 years (since Reagan) are pursuing such a plan wholeheartedly.
as far as I know, that would be the only way, coal and nuclear…of course those options are unpalatable until we really develop new technologies. (Who knows, maybe Pelosi has good research up her sleeve?)
Energy independence is THE goal. I did a series of essays on how this relates to Iraq at my blog, k/o…(yes, do check in if you’re interested…I’ve been wonkin’ out over there with tons’ of exclusive content.) Imo the single most powerful thing we can do domestically and internationally is to become energy independent and innovate the technologies to sustain that.
Finally, it IS meaningful that proposals like this are the kind the GOP just can’t do anything about. You see, it’s about how we’re different.
And how we’re going to take back the House.
…unfortunately, coal would have be used in huge quantities to make us “energy independent” in 20 years – that target MIGHT be doable, but 10 years is laughable. And, while I am a great fan of the Apollo Alliance, a “Manhattan Project” type of push on energy innovations won’t do it in 10 years either. But, at least the Dem leadership has put an energy plan on the front burner for the first time in 25 years. THAT is a good thing.
Energy independence in 10 years is an absurd and undoable goal that will ultimately be destructive to Dem credibility.
Even postulating such an idea is irresponsible because it’s an emotion-based assertion rooted in deception and complete denial of reality. Tricking people into thinking such a thing is possible is the same kind of rhetorical cruelty the Repubs have been perpetrating on us relentlessly for the last decade.
I can almost hear the rightwing propaganda machine’s cacophany of ridicule of whoever the hapless Dem is who gets the job of stating this goal in front of a camera and microphone. (Mind you all; repub smearing is not a reason to not put forward a plan, but it has to be a possible plan, and this one is not).
We’re annexing Alberta – Bwahahahaha
Who did the House Dems work with on this project? Who had input? Who did the framing? What is the plan and who crafted the plan to sell the agenda? Who amongst us netactivists were invited to get involved and have input and buy-in on this?
I hope like hell they got this right but right now I am very frightened of what they likely have come up with.
This is a sales document – in draft at that. It has to reach the necessary voters and help to brand the Democrats as something besides just Not-Republicans.
If your issue(s) can’t be attached to one of the items on the list, it can still be acted on separately. This is just about saying who we are, not limiting what we can attempt.
I’d like to see added a promise to investigate war profiteering and increased government oversight, but I won’t cry if it isn’t there.
Frankly I don’t much care what they promise. I just want the Republicans out, and if we have to promise a chicken pot pie in every pot, then go for it. There’s going to be feedback from the voters, and that is what will set the actual priorities. This document, when it comes out in final copy, is still just the first step in a dialog with the voters.
We have been screaming at them for some time to develop a plan and LEAD. Now apparently they are going to try. Since I consider myself a Democrat, I’m not going to criticize this effort before it is out there for public consumption. I am going to give them the benefit of the doubt.
…two things above all: 1) a really spicy name; 2) not more than a dozen items.
You can see how well the framing/branding worked for the GOP since we’re still referencing the Dem proposal by calling it the Democratic version of the Contract with America.
The last time something like this was attempted, the party wound up with 61 items on the list.
is definitely a bad idea. Aping a bunch of public relations-centric incompetents is not what the Democratic Party needs to do. I fear that the Presidential candidate in ’08 will be making speeches with adoring supporters in the background hanging on every word – flanked by American flags, of course.
…saying the party doesn’t need a name for its program or that it shouldn’t continue to connect it with the “contract.” I share your concern about imitation – including the Nuremberg-Bush rally approach to the party’s public events – but I do think the Democratic program needs good PR. First of all, obviously, it needs solid, doable, believable content that stands in sharp contrast to the past 25 years of GOP BS.
As I’ve said elsewhere on this thread, that content shouldn’t include pie-in-the-sky impossibles. Universal health care in 10 years we can do, “energy independence” in 10 years – without massive dislocations of the economy – can’t be done.
Not to mention that the Gingrich “Contract…” by and large failed America.
the Democrats to come up with concrete ideas…and now that they do, we’re still slamming them.
I, for one, would prefer elimination or vast modification of No Child Left Untested, and would like to see vocational training included for those students who really aren’t interested in a four-year college degree (after all, where are our future auto mechanics, plumbers, and bus drivers going to come from?), but I’m willing to take a wait and see attitude and give them credit for beginning to give voters a clear alternative to the Republican screw-the-middle-class program…
and now that they do, we’re still slamming them.
Not “slamming” – just “criticizing”. There’s a subtle difference. 🙂
The clearest problem with NCLB is that the feds mandated it and didn’t fund it. They are highlighting the Republican failure.
They don’t need to say that it will be changed. It will be. That is too complicated for this kind of document.
Funding is hot-button. Changing is high-wonk.
Push the hot-button, hide the high-wonk.
Only the wonks will be unhappy and compl… criticize. There aren’t that many wonks.
I think that the most important thing is that when the official platform comes out, people pull together and support it. I’m afraid that every single person will have some complaint that his or her individual issue didn’t make it into the platform the way they wanted it to, and as a result, we’ll undercut the effort to actually use the platform to get elected.
Hopefully people will figure this out and support whatever it is that Pelosi and company come up with. I’m doubtful, though…
Based on the responses I’m reading below to a proposal that we haven’t seen yet…
NO.
We’re just too damned determined to be smarter than everybody else to accept any plan that’s proposed to us. It’s got to do EVERYTHING I SAY EXACTLY THE WAY I SAY IT OR IT IS ALREADY A FAILURE. sigh
(Just hit my head on the table.)
Biodegradeable only! (I’m into those ecological burials after seeing Six Feet Under. (Seriously.))
That’s so funny. Thanks for a big giggle, MB. It can’t happen. It can’t. No. No way. Oy.
“close” only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades and nuclear weapons.
I think I have a concussion…my desk is HARD!
If it’s not pure bullshit, my interest in the Democratic Party notched up a few percentage points. The Dems score two it’s-about-goddamn-time points with me here:
Energy independence goes without saying, at least if we’re talking clean energy. If we’re talking wall-to-wall nuclear plants and coal, that’s another matter.
We need to get our K-12 school system to work rather than focusing on universal college. Lot’s of people already getting into college can’t even read, comprehend or do simple math, and besides not everyone wants college.
We need to create a set of “trades and technology curriculae” and implement them in an educational program that is an adjunct and an extension to primary K-12 education. (And free, just like public school). Access to higher ed should be available to everyone who wants it and who can demonstrate at least a basic skill in reading and math, but our biggest problem is in primary education and technology, not university.
While you are correct, that is a state function. Feds should be limited to measuring results and finding NCLB.
I’m curious to see how we’ll do universal college education AND end deficit spending in the short term, but I sure like the direction it’s taking.
As for concerns about energy independence in 10 years – I know we’re super smart here, but how about taking a look at the proposal before we blow it off? When JFK said we’d land on the moon by the end of the decade, there was no freaking way in hell we could pull that off. But we did, and that’s history now.
Hi, Switzer! Give us the URL to your new Wash. state blog.
http://www.washblog.com
It’s called Washblog, and it’s YOUR new Washington state blog. (Seriously, we want you to post there. Your name comes up constantly…)
First let me give the party a round of applause as this is potentially very good strategic news. Good Democrats! More with the campaigning smartness!
Now, let me ask, is there anything in there about civil rights? Specifically I’m wondering about the party’s committment or lack thereof to queer equality laws, but I am of course deeply concerned about their overall stance on all civil rights laws and issues.
(And I am sorry to ask instead of do my own research as usual, but I’m transitioning computers right now and don’t have my new one together enough to dig around very well. Thanks in advance to anyone who’s willing to check this out and let me know.)
California, sigh, used to have free college tuition. Back in the good ol’ days.
Do-able or not, these are issues that everyday, un-politicized citizens want addressed. We can quibble over the policy, timing, etc., but this starts a discussion that meets the needs of people.
And the universal college idea makes my heart sing…
No kidding. I might just go back and get another degree.
Maybe I can start thinking about that third degee… 🙂
Booman, you said that the infighting between the DLC and net-roots liberals would drag down the Democrats this coming year, and that unity was unlikely.
Frankly, I think that this document will be a major force for unity. The Democrats are working to nationalize the election, something that demands the unity to work. Look at who is involved in this:
I understand that Dean just restructured the DNC also, but I have not found any details. I suspect it is coordinated with this, and all is based on the incompetence shown in the Hurricane responses.
Looks like the Republicans are drowning, and the Democrats are preparing anchors to throw to them.
In any case, I’m glad the Dems are putting forth a positive agenda, and that they have coalesced around a timetable (with benchmarks) for withdrawal from Iraq. Maybe the party won’t split in half after all. Maybe.
Why take baby steps when Americans want the Dems to get up and start running?
If “Pull out NOW!” is not their battle cry than they remain a republican light version of “stay the course” on the #1 issue that Americans want representation on. That is not the message people want to hear.
So? How about universal healthcare? Americans want that too…