Chris Bowers recently posted Think Big: Choosing the fights that build progressive power. He posited:
We have to win elections in which people believe the outcome was determined by popular support for progressive policies, and a backlash against those who opposed them. …A wide array of pundits, candidates and political professionals must believe that opposition to progressive policies was the primary reason an elected official was removed from office. That is the only way we are going to start convincing people that opposing progressive legislation is truly bad idea for someone's political career. As such, it's also the only way we're going to start getting progressive legislation passed on a regular basis.
He cited the Ned Lamont/Joe Lieberman contest as the race that presented the best prospect for the spin that we need in the mix. In doing so, he made me wish I had joined just about everyone whose opinion I valued and sent a buck or two to Connecticut. He opined that the best possibilities now presented are the Wisconsin State Senate recall elections and elections very clearly focused on [right-wing social-engineering to undermine] Medicare or Social Security.
A few days ago I posted kind of a lengthy list of what looked like good 2012 races to invest in. In short, that list was a function of my strategy of investing in swing-United-States-House-of-Representatives races in swing-Electoral-College-states in the belief that giving in those races is a better way to help the Democratic Presidential nominee with voter registration and get-out-the-vote where it matters most than is giving to the Democratic Presidential nominee directly (and has the side benefit of advancing Democratic chances vis a vis the United States House of Representatives). I stand by that post and by that mundane, passionless approach. But I want to timely acknowledge that it would have been a far stronger analysis had it also and co-equally endorsed the set of ideas Bowers outlined.
I have utilized a strategy much like the strategy I outlined earlier in the last two election cycles, and have been frustrated by how challenging it is to try to make that strategy into something that advances progressivism, i.e., the set of policies favored by the Democratic Party wing of the Democratic Party. Having been active in Democratic campaigns since 1964, I am in a good position to acknowledge the dead-bang accuracy of Bowers’ point that winning elections in which people believe the outcome was determined by popular support for progressive policies (and a backlash against those who opposed them) is essential to re-framing the views of candidates and operatives whose lives are filled with the concrete experience of standing for office and making it part of their consciousness that appealing to the left will not cause you to lose elections.
I have tempered my swing-state, swing-Congressional-race strategy by trying to hit some progressives in primaries (i.e., Donna Edwards), trying to hit all Congressional Progressive Caucus Members facing serious challenges (regardless of where they live), or trying to give twice as much to candidates I perceived to be truly exciting as I did to candidates who were less edgy Democrats (i.e., twice as much to Carol Shea-Porter as to Paul Hodes). I also gave to challengers in races in other-than swing states, where the choice was exceptionally clear (i.e., Colleen Hanabusa and Cedric Richmond).
Identifying and helping in elections where a wide array of pundits, candidates and political professionals believe that opposition to progressive policies would be the primary reason were an elected official to be removed from office would be an outstanding partner to a swing-state, swing-Congressional-race strategy. Even if that means giving to a half-dozen State Senate candidates in Wisconsin. Even if that means making get-out-the-vote calls for a United States Senate candidate in Connecticut.
I just thought Bowers’ analysis was outstanding.