Notes from the Left Coast

Drummond Pike’s Blog

Like most people who have a moral sense of the world, I have rejoiced in the remarkable outcome of the year-long saga of Healthcare Reform in the Congress, despite the failure of the public option and the necessary capitulation to a mostly male group of hold-outs who almost derailed the entire thing in the interests of making sure that not a single federal dollar could find its way to supporting a woman seeking an abortion. These two shortcomings aside, history was made and I’m glad of it.

There was, however, an ironic twist of fate in the whole event, for it kept in the shadows a long-planned march for Immigration Reform that brought over 200,000 people to the Mall to bring home the necessity of fixing the very broken system, as President Obama promised to do on the campaign trail. Normally, 200,000 folks showing up in Washington warrants the notice of the press and the Congress, and hopefully would have reminded both of the remarkable outpouring of people into the streets several years ago. Sadly, though, a piece of legislation that pointedly excludes undocumented residents from its benefits, diverted our attention – something that has happened regularly for decades to undocumented immigrants seeking a path to citizenship. The problem, however, is far from going away.

Some 3 percent of our population lives without proper documentation. 12 million hard-working, tax-paying folks, many of whom arrived as infants or children of those seeking work or freedom. These poor souls, unfortunately, face a remarkably bleak future as they complete school, with virtually no ability to receive loans to support graduate school, and many jobs off limits since they can’t even obtain a driver’s license in most states. So each day, tens of thousands of people who have known no other home since before they can remember, are consigned to the shadows of the cash economy. On top of Sunday’s irony, there is the remarkable fact that by excluding this population from the reforms, we continue a system where millions are left out of normal care only to have their afflictions deteriorate from lack of attention and wind up in the Emergency Room where we all get to pay for the care – almost always more expensive than it would have been otherwise.

So I hope that this morning, when there will be many celebrations in the White House about signing Healthcare Reform, there will also be awareness that moving forward on Immigration Reform is the next big one to tackle. Right now, continuing deportations at a pace exceeding even the Bush years is no solution no matter how many shadows you try to hide it in. As important, this is an issue that truly should not fall into the partisan morass that is Washington these days. We should all agree that bringing people into the system, making them participants in both democracy and taxation, has advantages for us all.

The one thing certain about elected public servants in Washington is that they really, really want to stay there. Regardless of party, the incentives to continue to inhabit the corridors of political power are deep and abiding. The problem for most of them, though, is that they spend too much time walking those corridors and not enough listening to the folks that sent them there. The perks, the deference, the hushed conversations with lobbyists for huge financial interests — they all converge to create a moss-like insulation from the sentiments of the voters. And, surprise, surprise, the voters don’t like that.

Of course, there are those holding safe seats like Sen. Shelby from Alabama who can place a “hold” on every Administration appointment in order to force the Pentagon to alter its bidding specs for a huge new contract for those planes that fuel other planes in mid-air. Turns out his state (Alabama) hosts a partner of European giant Airbus that would assemble some parts of the plane and throw off a few local jobs. This, despite the fact that US manufacturer Boeing would, without Shelby’s tweaks, likely get the entire manufacturing job and employ thousands of American workers. His narrow interest may prevail, courtesy of outdated Senate traditions, as such “holds” are a function of the filibuster rule. Just makes you want to wonder if he is aware that we are in the middle of an economic crisis where sometimes narrow self-interest might yield to broader collective outcomes.

But what’s really frustrating is that issues that really matter to millions, and about which there is broad public opinion support, can’t seem to gain visibility. Take Comprehensive Immigration Reform. Polling suggests that 80% of the electorate supports an initiative that would require our millions of undocumented immigrants to register, pay taxes, and get on the path to citizenship. Even more support the Dream Act which would allow undocumented kids, most of whom have grown up in the US, to also get on the path to citizenship upon graduating from high school by either entering the military or college.

These initiatives are simply waiting to be brought forward for a vote. But even feel-good legislation that has meaning, like the Dream Act, has fallen into the trenches of partisan warfare where the minority party has decided that the best thing they can do is say no to everything. As dismaying as that tactic may be, it is effective in the context of the country’s current mood. But, for all those incumbents on both sides of the aisle who are just hankering to return to DC after this fall’s elections, be fair warned that doing nothing may do you in.

Increasingly, the remarkable possibility is being discussed where Republicans may again assert themselves as majority in one or both houses of Congress. One can be sure that getting things done in Washington will be as hard as it was after the same thing happened in 1994 with Gingrich’s ascension as House Speaker. One remembers his “Contract for America” not for what it accomplished legislatively, but for the toxic atmosphere it created in Washington that continues to this day.

There are rumblings that a huge march for Immigration Reform is being discussed for the spring. Will it remind the DC do-nothing-until-we-have-to folks, that “no” is not an option?

I sit here watching two high performance sailboats getting ready to race on this crystal clear day in San Francisco. It’s a wonderful time of year in the late summer, when the fog retreats and the people come out to the shore. Absolutely glorious. But me? I’m hunkered down in front of my screen trying to sort through my opening remarks for Momentum, our fourth conference highlighting the best of new ideas to advance progressive public policy.

Don Hazen, the character who conceived of and has built AlterNet, the wonderful aggregator of progressive news and commentary, has asked me a couple of provocative questions about Momentum. Several revolved around the idea that progressives are confused about how to speak to the new Administration. Are we supporters or critics? Have we already been so burned by the healthcare debate that we are ready to turn on the new team, or what? He wanted to know if our conference, very nearly sold out, much to our surprise in this most difficult of years, was going to answer some of these questions.

As I told him in response, that’s not really our role. First, the progressive community is larger — much larger — than the 300 plus folks who will assemble on Monday afternoon at the W (SF). One would have to be seriously delusional to think we might speak for the entire progressive community, although to hear Glenn Beck talk about us, well maybe we do! However, I digress.

News people, like Hazen, want a story, and they are very good at getting them. At Momentum, though, we are looking for what might become a story in the future. All good political stories begin with ideas that somehow take flight, get traction, and sometimes become policies, or at least political fights about policy, that really are newsworthy. At Momentum, we concentrate on the ideas. Last year, for instance, Jacob Hacker held forth on the transition from our current broken healthcare system and argued brilliantly for an approach that saw a "public option" as a pivotal tool that would help move the chances for change forward. Little did he know that his "compromise" position might so quickly have become the lightning rod for the debate we see this year.

One voice on this year’s program that should be galvanizing is Sony Kapoor from Europe. He will be talking in very direct and compelling ways about the critical need for international financial reform, picking up from last year’s speaker Rob Johnson who sharply depicted an "oligopoly" comprised of 6 firms that traded derivatives among themselves while telling all it was a "marketplace." Some of us, of course, wish we’d paid just a tad more attention to Johnson. We could have avoided much of the meltdown, but that’s another story. Kapoor, who worked in the belly of the beast, will describe how the problem is really much bigger than the U.S. Solving it, needless to say, will take more than reforms in Washington. And speaking of that fair city, we’ll also be hearing from Laura Quinn about Catalist, one of the most important new tools for progressive advocacy and voter engagement groups in a generation. Then, early Wednesday, we’re delighted to have John Kao (author of Innovation Nation) talk about what is needed to truly foster imagination and innovation in society. It’s all going to be quite a ride.

So, this all is probably not a very good answer to Mr. Hazen, but what I can assure him is that if he spends a couple of days next week with us, he will likely take away more than a few ideas that he probably hasn’t heard before. For change really to happen, isn’t that where it all begins?