02. Infrastructure & Insurrection
02. Infrastructure & Insurrection
If we don't get our progressive shit together pronto, things are going to take a big turn for the worse in America when the next Congress convenes in January 2023.
It might not look like it at first glance, but last week was exactly what we needed… and far more than the legislative sausage-making and post-election finger-wagging that dominated the media narrative.
In fact, what we just witnessed was a damn master class in charceuterie, immediately followed by a large helping of lessons-that-better-be-learned.
Let's take a quick minute and smell a few roses. Don’t worry, the stench of current reality will still be there when we return.
Here is the week that was:
Our Democratic Congress just passed, and President Biden will soon sign into law, more than a trillion dollars of infrastructure investments. They are overwhelmingly popular, well-paid, union-job creating, middle- and working-class stimulating, environmentally sustaining … and poverty-reducing!
These massive public-works projects, on a scale not seen since the 1970s, will soon begin flowing into all 50 states, and will you look at that, into all 435 Congressional districts, just in time for the mid-term elections.
But wait, it gets better! A majority of sitting Republican Senators voted against the infrastructure package. So did nearly every Republican in the House of Representatives. Each one of them who is running for re-election next year will be hounded relentlessly to justify their opposition to popular job-creating programs and small business opportunities in their own districts and states. Did I mention that these programs are incredibly popular with voters of all political stripes?
For the Rs, this is like voting against mom and apple pie. They hate it. And if, a year from now, and assuming passage of a decent Build Back Better plan, Congressional Democrats do somehow manage to prevail … if we can at least keep the Senate in Democratic hands against such long historic odds … here’s who, besides the Big Dog himself, I will credit:
Hosannas to Madam Speaker …
Nancy Pelosi effectively whipped, not just the Democratic side of the House, but the Republicans’ as well, ultimately staging a denouement that even enabled six principled Democratic opposition members to cast their no votes without endangering final passage.
This, in turn, was only possible because Pelosi somehow wound up with the votes of 13 relatively-principled Republicans in her pocket, folks who were no doubt promised hellish recriminations for apostasy from their own side of the aisle, courtesy of Team Battlestar GOP.
… and Kudos to Pramila Jayapal
The Progressive Caucus under the leadership of Rep. Jayapal shrewdly demonstrated flexibility alongside adherence to principle. Stop giving them shit! They are playing the inside/outside game damn well, far better than their flat-footed moderate colleagues.
And what did our side do to celebrate this remarkable, indeed historic, legislative accomplishment?
Bitch, bitch, bitch. Blame, blame, blame. Blah. Blah. Blah. All of which was cheered on and pundited to death by our media intelligentsia, who ought to know better but just can’t seem to help themselves.
Yes, it would it have been better if the infrastructure package could have passed back in October. It would also have been better if Build Back Better hadn’t been stymied and watered down, bit by frustrating bit.
And it would really have been better if our electoral margin in the Senate was more than zero, or in this case, two zeros named Manchin and Synema.
[The BBB situation is especially worrisome; the next few weeks will decide whether Democrats end the year celebrating a unified victory, or sputtering toward an acrimonious and ominous Festivus.]
That said, and from where I sit, this blizzard of moderate Democrats blaming progressives, the Squad and the Woking Dead for the delayed passage of the infrastructure package, thus permitting an electoral defeat in Virginia, is completely bogus reasoning. Moderate Democrats and the party elite actually owe Woken Ds a big high-five. Now sit down and be friends.
Here’s why. Thanks to the “intransigence” of progressives, aka their October display of a spine, if and when a decent BBB plan is appended to the existing package — to say nothing of action on voting rights — Democrats of all stripes will legitimately be loud, proud and positively motivated going into 2022. We’ll have delivered the goods! We might actually keep control of the Senate and be able to stymie the fascists for at least two more years.
There is, of course, nothing positive about the Republican takeover of Virginia in last week's election. That said, Terry McCauliffe as a candidate was, sorry to say, a lackluster old white guy who ran a lackluster campaign. He really was, as someone said, “the last of the Clintonites.” And he did utter the single stupidest sentence into a microphone of any major US politician this season.
But here’s the bottom line: In a perenially low-turnout election year, it was the Republicans who had the most energy. You could just feel it. It was all negative energy, of course, comprising fear, insecurity, and hatred of the other, but energetic it nonetheless was. Their base was activated; ours, not so much. I actually walked precincts for the Democratic ticket in Northern Virginia on Election day, and I wasn’t enthused.
This raises a crucial question for next year: Who among Democrats is most capable of bringing to the table the kind of energy and commitment we need to be victorious in the 2022 mid-term Congressional campaigns? It’s obviously African Americans … and young climate activists. The very communities that a strong Build Back Better package will attract.
So don’t yell about wokeness, my moderate Democratic friends. Wake up yourselves. (And you, my friends on the activist left, need to be more accountable too. We can’t win without the cis straight White vote either! More on that next time.)
Just know this: If Democrats devolve in the coming year into an internecine turf war of Bread & Butter versus Race & Gender, we will be playing into the Republican’s hands … and our democracy will pay a steep price.
Our job now is to cook up a B&B+R&G combo platter, so to speak, a menu that the majority of voting Americans will find preferable in 12 short months… and that everyone on our side will at least be able to stomach. Can we do that? I don’t know, but I certainly hope so.
We have a long, intense and frustrating 12 months ahead of us politically, and there is plenty of blame and responsibility to go around. Can we please just stipulate to that and move on? Or are we really going to enact the cliche of the Democratic circular firing squad?
If we don't get our progressive shit together pronto, things will take a big turn for the worse in America when the next Congress convenes in January 2023.
The Republicans aren’t even hiding their odious plans. Or rather, they’re hiding it all in plain sight and basically getting away with it.
By next fall, we will no doubt be drowning in malevolent memes and vicious reality-type programming of questionable provenance, stirring up resentments and stoking conflicts, and appearing on all available platforms through a lavishly-funded and subterranean virtual insurrectionist network.
Is that a little dark? Sorry. But it’s not a conspiracy theory, just a close reading of the tea leaves.
The small cabal of far-right billionaire zealots who own and manage these networks, along with their cadres of financial cutouts, campaign consultants and security contractors, are already busy at work, writing budgets, drawing storyboards, crunching algorithms, and seeking collaborators for next year’s above- and below-the-belt campaigns. We had better be ready.
PS: I wonder what Steve Bannon is really up to besides building his brand and trying to keep his ass out of prison.