Peter Hecht’s article in today’s Sac Bee is odd, to say the least. He argues that Democrats are “divided and dispirited” heading into today’s convention. As one of the delegates currently on the way to Sacramento for the convention, I’m not really sure wtf he is talking about. Hecht argues:
But as thousands of party delegates and guests convene in Sacramento today for their annual state convention, the party is splintering over the state budget crisis, cuts in social services and a slate of special election ballot initiatives intended to resolve the fiscal mess….
Now after a controversial budget deal Democratic lawmakers struck with Schwarzenegger and six Republican lawmakers in February to stave off a $40 billion deficit, the party’s potent coalition is coming apart.
“If the administration’s goal was to break up the coalition that defeated them in 2005, they couldn’t have done it better,” said Phil Giarrizzo, a Democratic consultant and former union leader who directed state field operations to defeat Schwarzenegger’s special election initiatives four years ago.
It’s true that the May 19 propositions have led some Dems and progressives to come down on opposite sides of the issue. And I don’t think it’s coincidental that Arnold Schwarzenegger & Co. are gleeful at the prospect of wedging apart the Democratic coalition, even if that’s not quite what’s going on here.
I’m just not seeing the kind of bitter divisions or “dispirited” attitudes that Hecht is describing. Most of us are keeping the May 19 election in perspective – it’s important, but it’s not going to solve our problems, no matter the outcome. All of us are focused on coming together on May 20, just as we did last year after the long but ultimately valuable primary battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama – ironically another moment when supposed Democratic divisions were seized upon by a press corps eager to continue the caricature of a chaotic and fractious party.
That being said, there is some truth to the argument that Democrats aren’t completely fired up going into this weekend’s convention. But that is due to our recognition of underlying problems in this state and with this party, and concern that there isn’t yet the leadership or the vision to solve those problems.
November saw major Democratic victories across the country, but though Obama won a landslide victory in California, Democrats didn’t match that performance downticket. We picked up 3 Assembly seats, but should have won 3 more. We failed to put Hannah-Beth Jackson in the State Senate and are now stuck with far-right wackjob Tony Strickland until 2012. The party’s failure to produce a candidate to challenge the very beatable Abel Maldonado was a particularly low point. There were numerous factors that led to our defeat on Prop 8, but the Democratic Party has taken persistent criticism over its perceived inability to do more. And now we face the worst economic crisis many of us have ever lived through, with a state government crippled and unable to act.
Last night I was on Angie Coiro’s show on Green960 in San Francisco to discuss Prop 1A. She asked good questions, one of which was the usual “what happens on May 20 if these propositions fail?” I laid out a progressive agenda, including the need to build a sustained campaign to demand wealth taxes and to rally Californians to push back against Republican obstruction. Coiro doubted that could come together, that progressives aren’t ready to challenge the very effective right-wing machine in this state.
“Where’s our Obama?” she asked. Skeptical that we can organize to defeat Republican obstruction without an inspirational leader who can offer the vision California needs, she seemed resigned to the belief that we had no other choice but to back the May 19 initiatives.
Her question could well be the theme of this weekend’s convention. “Where’s our Obama?” describes not just the gubernatorial race (I’m liking what I’m seeing from Gavin Newsom, though he has some work to do before he can become the kind of leader CA needs), but the state of progressive politics in the state more broadly.
We must never forget that Barack Obama was a political surfer. The wave that he rode was the product of the energy and determination of millions of Americans who were determined to produce real and fundamental change in this country. As with any surfer, if there aren’t any waves, your day is a bust. But even if the wave is there, you have to know how to ride it all the way to the end. Obama understood how to empower people, turn them into activists and organizers and agents of change. Even though Obama’s first few months in office have produced mixed results, I suspect that we have yet to see the final payoff of what he set in motion.
When we speak of “Obama” as a political phenomenon, then, we’re really talking about the kind of organizing movement motivated by an empowered sense of how to produce change, fueled by the knowledge that Republican policies had broken the nation and that Americans were ready for something new, that characterized the 2008 election season around the country.
And that’s what all of us headed to Sacramento this weekend want to produce. We’re frustrated that once again our leaders have chosen to offer flawed solutions, sold on the premise that we just can’t get anything better given Republican obstruction. We’re not unaware of that. My entire life has been lived in the shadow of successful Republican efforts to break the state, to kill our dreams, to damage my home. I’m sick of it, and so are many others.
It’s time we brought “Obama” to California. Obama the movement. WE are the ones we’ve been waiting for – the ones who know what is wrong with California, who know that our friends and family and neighbors are ready to hear a progressive alternative, who are sick of Republican obstruction. We want to fight, we want to do the work to overcome these obstacles.
What we’re doing this weekend is building the wave. And once you produce the waves, the surfers will come.
Robert, I certainly share your optimism about the future for Democrats and progressive causes in the state. And yes, of course, we must all work for more progressive taxation and to rid our state of the 2/3 budget threshold.
But I can’t agree with your decision to stand with the extremists of the California Republican Party and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association on the May 19 props (even if I wasn’t on board with the Yes campaign, which I am).
Senator Obama built a sustained campaign over a long period of time — something we need to do too. But unlike Senator Obama, May 20 will be a very harsh reality check: billions more in cuts.
It’s easy to say NO to these initiatives proposed by Democratic leaders and supported by a handful of sane Republicans that are in the Capitol because they are not the be all and the end all. What’s lacking on your side of the fence is a realistic May 20th strategy — one that avoids the billions in immediate cuts that will results and pay back our schools.
It’s all well and good to talk about waves and such, but precisely what do you plan to do immediately after May 19th (if the initiatives fail) to stop the cuts that will come there and then, and thru the following budget years? How do you plan to repay the schools, as spelled out in 1B? How will you convince YOUR allies (the California Republicans, Howard Jarvis Taxpayers) to support what you propose? What measures do you propose that will win 2/3 approval and get the Governor’s signature and voter approval in time to stave off the devastation of more cuts to schools, public safety, environmental, and health care programs?
There is a responsibility for allowing the perfect to stand in the way of good public policy. So far all I’ve heard are politically unrealistic schemes.
Leadership????? News Flash…
The State is Bankrupt!
Part of the problem with CA is that we have had a bunch of reps in Sacramento (like your Mark D) who think that introducing lots new bills is what they are elected for. This is typical tactical thinking which, in my view, has been the bane of the State Democratic Party and has contributed much to the State’s problems. What the State Democratic Party should be 100% focused on is strategic things which will go to the heart of overturning what has driven our State over the cliff, e.g.:
a) term limits – which have lowered the gene pool of the reps we have to select from (to wit the Assembly’s breathtakingly stupid staff pay raises during one of the State’s worst fiscal crisis’s when lots of people are being laid off, when Wall Street and other executive compensation is being ridiculed in D.C., and when the State Assembly itself is asking the voters to pass a bunch of ballot measure tax increases – if the ballot measures fail it will again be caused in large part by the Assembly’s self inflicted wound)…if you doubt my gene pool thought, just go to Sacramento and then go to Washington, D.C. where you can’t [but help] note the breathtaking chasm in quality of talent which separates the two…both in terms of the legislators themselves and the staff (B people tend to hire C people). Furthermore, what top educated person would want to make a career of government when they know that they will be termed out just when they are gaining the experience and expertise which makes them effective? For a State which is of the size and economic power of say Germany, to have such people is a crime in of itself and we are now reaping the results.
b) 2/3 requirement – which the Dems should be able to kill if they approached the problem with a truly coordinated campaign with strategy, messaging, war room, etc (to wit, the entirely predictable budget crisis where the Dems repeatedly compromise/cave/cede all negotiation strength and allow themselves to be held hostage by fringe Republican’s who are branded as ‘moderates who compromise’…BTW, watch this happen again in a couple of months after the ballot measures fail and the State sinks deeper in debt)…if you doubt this, I challenge anyone to show me what tangible things the Dems in Sacramento are doing to position themselves for when the ballot initiatives fail and they find themselves in the same position as they were in the Summer – do they have a war room,? Have they figured out the individual Republican’s weak spots and are they ready to exploit them?, Do they have a communication war room to win the messaging war?, Do they have proven external experts or more of the same hokey/underwhelming insiders running things?…I predict that they do not and that they will loose again (you can’t keep doing things the same way with the same people and expect different results).
C) State ballot initiatives – which allow small minorities (whether they are the LDS or Big Oil, or the Insurance Companies) to put crazy things on the ballot which tie the hands of those we elect to represent us and restrict the required flexibility to govern effectively. This could easily be done by doing away with paid signature gatherers or some other method.
Dealing with the three above things strategically would be what I would call leadership…not introducing a bunch of bills.
by Dan Walters today in the Sacramento Bee blog: Two Strategies to Change California Government. The Bay Area Council of Corporate CEO’s is working on two propositions for 2010 that would allow them to by-pass the state legislature and rewrite the state Constitution to overhaul both state and local governments. The California Forward Organization composed of “top foundations” are working on similar propositions. Has there even been a more direct threat to our democracy? Or should I say this will certainly nail down our corporatocracy. Of course Dan Walters and the wingnuts in Bee comments think this would be a grand idea. Certainly they are the dupes of the power brokers.
And that’s what a lot of people don’t get about the Obama phenomenon.
But the timing is more of an interaction than the waves producing the surfers.
What Obama did was articulate something a lot of us thought was missing, and create a space for us to get together and demand it.
And that is exactly what we haven’t seen from our political leadership, and what we need.
But ultimately it is still up to us to make it happen.
Nice analysis.
I don’t disagree with your analysis that Obama rode a wave, but I also think that he is a particularly capable person. I won’t recite all the elements, but I have not seen anyone with his clarity and cool in California. Let’s hope he/she arrives soon.