“Hi everybody. Let me start by saying the obvious – these aren’t normal times. As we all manage our way through a pandemic unlike anything we’ve seen in a century, Michelle and I hope that you and your families are safe and well. If you’ve lost somebody to this virus, or if someone in your life is sick, or if you’re one of the millions suffering economic hardship, please know that you’re in our prayers. Please know that you’re not alone. Because now’s the time for all of us to help where we can and to be there for each other, as neighbors, as coworkers, and as fellow citizens.
President Barack Obama salutes while walking down the steps of Air Force One as he arrives in Youngstown, Ohio, to attend a roundtable event with auto workers at the GM Lordstown Assembly Plant, Sept. 15, 2009. The Lordstown plant was closed March 6, 2019 after 52 years of operation.
As a kid growing up in Cleveland, I was aware, even hyper-aware, of any UAW strikes against the automakers. Maybe it was because we got the newspaper delivered everyday, and it was hard to miss the updates. Maybe it was a Midwestern thing and the proximity to so many auto plants. Or perhaps it was because my mother’s cousin worked at the Lordstown plant and was loud and proud in his support of the UAW. Whatever the reason, a strike was a big deal, and the strikes were seen, heard, and discussed whenever they happened. I no longer feel like that’s the case. Even here in Michigan, it doesn’t seem like the current strike against GM is garnering much attention except in UAW families. That’s probably a statement about the decline of auto manufacturing in the state, as well as the decline of unions in general. But this is an important strike, with the very real possibility of being of historical importance. So today it’s going to be seen, heard, and maybe even discussed.
Barbara Jordan was a Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives from the state of Texas and the first African-American elected to her state’s senate.
Rep. Barbara Jordan was not only a trailblazer but a great American and a great advocate for both small d and big D Democratic principles.
Speeches can contain words to live by, words that call us to action for an important cause and words that connect to our deepest feelings about fairness and compassion.
Former President Barack Obama spoke at the University of Illinois on Friday, accepting the Paul H. Douglas Award for Ethics in Government from the U. of I. system’s Institute of Government and Public Affairs – and announcing his entry into the midterm election fray.
I’m here today because this is one of those pivotal moments when every one of us as citizens of the United States need to determine just who it is that we are. Just what it is that we stand for. And as a fellow citizen — not as an ex-president, but as a fellow citizen — I’m here to deliver a simple message, and that is that you need to vote because our democracy depends on it. […]
Look at this crop of Democratic candidates running for Congress and governor, running for the state legislature, running for district attorney, running for school board. It is a movement of citizens who happen to be younger and more diverse and more female than ever before, and that’s really useful. We need more women in charge. But we have first-time candidates. We have veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. Record numbers of women. Americans who have previously maybe didn’t have an interest in politics as a career but laced up their shoes and rolled up their sleeves and grabbed a clipboard because they, too, believe this time’s different. This moment’s too important to sit out.
And if you listen to what these candidates are talking about in individual races across the country, you’ll find they’re not just running against something, they’re running for something. They’re running to expand opportunity and running to restore the honor to public service. And speaking as a Democrat, that’s when the Democratic party has always made the biggest difference in the lives of the American people. When we led with conviction and principle and bold new ideas. The antidote to a government controlled by a powerful few, a government that divides is a government by the organized, energized, inclusive many. That’s what this moment’s about. That has to be the answer.
Father Time Overcome by Love, Hope, and Beauty (1627, oil on canvas)
Today’s inspiration came from this song by Vienna Teng about a nascent activist, as well as Rebecca Solnit’s book Hope in the Darkness: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities.
So what is this “hope” of which I speak? Solnit says it best:
It’s important to say what hope is not: it is not the belief that everything was, is, or will be fine. The evidence is all around us of tremendous suffering and tremendous destruction. The hope I’m interested in is about broad perspectives with specific possibilities, ones that invite or demand that we act. It’s also not a sunny everything-is-getting-better narrative, though it may be a counter to the everything-is-getting-worse narrative. You could call it an account of complexities and uncertainties, with openings. “Critical thinking without hope is cynicism, but hope without critical thinking is naivete,” the Bulgarian writer Maria Popova recently remarked. And Patrisse Cullors, one of the founders of Black Lives Matter, early on described the movement’s mission as to “Provide hope and inspiration for collective action to build collective power to achieve collective transformation, rooted in grief and rage but pointed towards vision and dreams.” It’s a statement that acknowledges that grief and hope can coexist. Source:Hope in the Dark by Rebecca Solnit, pp. xiii-xiv
Grief and rage when I see this:
SERIOUSLY? WTH?
“The Democrats are not making any of this easy. They’ve decided it’s more fun to be the resistance than to do their job and help us govern the country.”
Mitch McConnell, who spent 8 years obstructing Obama and blocked Merrick Garland pic.twitter.com/fHBysL3z9T
— Indivisible Network (@IndivisibleNet) June 10, 2018
Set your hope on fire/action item
Call your senators, particularly if you have D senators, and encourage them to vote against cloture on all of 45*s judges; Senate comity has been abused (blue slips, anyone?) by the Republicans, and it’s long past time to fight back with all the tools we have.
Grief and rage when I see this:
The Trump administrating is arguing in court that the ACA’s requirement to cover people with pre-existing conditions should be thrown out. This would be a return to pre-ACA insurance practices. Here are some reminders of how that worked.
Set your hope on fire/action item
Call your House member and senators, and let them know that this is a deal breaker; demand that they make a public statement, so that voters will know their position. Supporting a D candidate for the House or Senate? Contact them, and demand that they address this issue loudly and proudly.
Grief and rage when I see this:
top Trump economist Hassett refers to Trump pledge not to touch Social Security and Medicare as a “short-term” commitment to “prioritize” cutting taxes
New reports show that Trump’s deep tax cuts haven’t just failed to deliver on any growth – they’re depleting funds for Medicare and Social Security even faster https://t.co/66innW4s8Ppic.twitter.com/A3Uh2J2Mwa
Set your hope on fire/action item
See that tweet above? Those are your beginning talking points. Now get on the phone, and let your righteous anger loose.
Grief and rage when I see this:
A U.S. Senator asked for a tour of an immigration detention facility in Texas. Then the police showed up. pic.twitter.com/hxITQImiBL
Southwest Key Programs has issued a statement saying the organization regrets turning away Senator @JeffMerkley who attempted to tour the facility in Brownsville on Sunday. https://t.co/eTfBOfaGLJ
— Senator Jeff Merkley (@SenJeffMerkley) June 7, 2018
Set your hope on fire/action item
“I’m also pressing for a simple one-sentence law that says it is the policy of the United States not to separate children from their parents,” Merkley said. (Southwest Key Programs regrets denying Sen. Merkley entry ) Your action item in one sentence.
Grief and rage when I see this:
Canada is slapping tariffs on $12.8 billion of US goods — here are the states that stand to lose the most https://t.co/dKzz83l0fJ
They’ll be getting bargain basement prices. I’m wonder if there’s an accessible registry of LLC’s that have been doing the buying on the foreclosures? And how many are Trump shell companies? https://t.co/E0mWOL9Jchhttps://t.co/E0mWOL9Jch
Set your hope on fire/action item
Given the botched and frankly, inhumane, response to the crisis in Puerto Rico, a foreclosure moratorium should be the minimal response. #CanceltheDebt is another ask, as is a repeal of the provisions of the Merchant Marine Act of 1920 (the “Jones Act”) which place such a burden on Puerto Rico.
With the rampaging destruction being carried on by the Republicans, this diary could be never-ending. But while we’re all helping in some form or another to make the Blue Wave happen in November, I wanted to illustrate that hope isn’t a state of being; it’s a series of actions that we take today. Preparing for November is, sadly, not enough. We must be working the phones, educating our friends and neighbors, and committing to act now. While no one person can do all of the work, together we create the ripples which will lead to the wave.
Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-MA) speaking from Fall River, Massachusetts gives the Democratic Party response to the State of the Union Address:
Many have spent the past year anxious, angry, afraid. We all feel the fault lines of a fractured country. We hear the voices of Americans who feel forgotten and forsaken.
And [we have that] nagging, sinking feeling, no matter your political beliefs: this is not right. This is not who we are.[…]
This administration isn’t just targeting the laws that protect us – they are targeting the very idea that we are all worthy of protection.
For them, dignity isn’t something you’re born with but something you measure.
By your net worth, your celebrity, your headlines, your crowd size.
Not to mention, the gender of your spouse. The country of your birth. The color of your skin. The God of your prayers.
Their record is a rebuke of our highest American ideal: the belief that we are all worthy, we are all equal and we all count. In the eyes of our law and our leaders, our God and our government.
That is the American promise. […]
Bullies may land a punch. They might leave a mark. But they have never, not once, in the history of our United States, managed to match the strength and spirit of a people united in defense of their future.
Politicians can be cheered for the promises they make. Our country will be judged by the promises we keep.
THAT is the measure of our character. That’s who we are.
Out of many. One.
Ladies and gentlemen, have faith: The state of our union is hopeful, resilient, enduring.
By slowking4 (Own work) [GFDL 1.2 (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/fdl-1.2.html)], via Wikimedia Commons
Inspired by a comment made by bfitzinAR and the encouragement of WYGalinCA, today’s post is all about Maxine Waters (CA-43), one of the leaders of the ReSisterhood. She’s 79 today, and as a self-described “strong black woman,” she’s been controversial, contentious, courageous, and a clarion of truth.
BEFORE ANYTHING, CALL YOUR SENATORS TODAY! DEM OR REPUBLICAN, THEY NEED TO HEAR FROM US.
1- HUGE week for TrumpCare. I know it feels like that’s every week – like this legislation has 9 lives. BUT THIS IS IT. The time is meow. pic.twitter.com/ETBv7xFmAY
I’m continuing my look at the healthcare planks of both the Democratic and Republican Party platforms, despite the fluid events in the news about the status of BCRA[p] and the ever-changing Republican plans to destroy the ACA. We need to know just what the Republican positions are, not matter how unworkable, because if we know anything, it’s that they don’t quit. And if by some miracle a chance for bipartisan fixes to the ACA comes about, we need to know what fixes, additions, and changes Democrats might have in mind; Medicare for All is still unlikely, even if a push to work together somehow comes about.
Senator McCain’s surgery and his as-of-yet unknown date of return to the Senate; a BCRA(p) bill that must be passed under the FY17 budget resolution, using the reconciliation process (thus preserving a FY18 budget resolution/reconciliation process for tax reform); senators announcing they are no votes on the MTP for widely-varying reasons; and a squabbling Republican caucus that is being “enticed” by McConnell in any way possible have combined to create a perfect storm for the Resistance. Every delay enables us to make more calls and create more pressure, and every delay brings us closer to the end of FY17, the adoption of a FY18 budget resolution, and the resulting loss of the ability to use FY17 reconciliation for the repeal and replacement of the ACA. In the event you’re starting to feel the Resistance Burnout Blues, today I’m comparing and contrasting the Democratic and Republican platform planks related to healthcare. Because of the timeliness, detail, and complexity of the topic, I will be covering healthcare in two separate posts, today and on Thursday.
