What's Next?

It Ain't Over... and it won't be until progressive forces regain the ascendancy in American politics. Regressive forces, take note: We're coming after you!

For the great majority of us, Nov. 2 proved to be a tough, in some places bitterly, disappointing day. A notably bad President was re-elected, and the politicians hostile or indifferent to working families strengthened their hold on the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

For AFSCME and its allies, however, there is only one sensible response to those events: Fight back, fight on; fight harder than ever for the laws and policies and attitudes among political leaders that are vital to our members. To do otherwise would not only abandon our ideals and ideas. It would also betray them, and we will never do that.

But fighting should not mean fighting blindly or in the same ways. Our side arguably made mistakes during the 2004 campaign. They were made, however, for the best of causes: the welfare of our members and their families.

Let the re-assessment begin! In order to triumph four years from now — and in the congressional elections of 2006 — we need some new strategies and tactics, perhaps new priorities and coalitions as well. In that spirit, Public Employee asked nine prominent elected officials and private citizens for their views on progressive priorities in the years just ahead.

U.S. Senator-elect Barack Obama 
Illinois

During the next six years, one of my top priorities as a U.S. Senator will be to advocate for legislation that helps create jobs in Illinois, and to fight to reverse policies that have hurt working people. One such practice that has cost Illinois and the United States countless jobs is outsourcing. Currently, our tax code actually gives tax breaks to companies that move jobs abroad.

I think we should be doing exactly the opposite. In the Senate, I will fight to deny tax benefits to companies that reincorporate offshore just to avoid paying their taxes, and instead will support rewarding companies that create high-quality jobs here at home.

I will also work to ensure that our foreign agreements encourage fair, not just free, trade. I will do so by fighting to enforce trade agreements that are already on the books and by making sure that any new trade agreements have real, tangible benefits for American businesses and workers.

A lot of politicians talk about their commitment to working families, but my record proves it. As an Illinois state senator, I was the chief sponsor of a bill that exempts Illinois workers from the Bush administration's unfair federal overtime rules. I was also the chief sponsor of a bill that expands the Children's Health Insurance Program to more low-income families, and I voted to raise the minimum wage to $6.50 an hour.

Gov. Jennifer Granholm 
Michigan

As a wife and the mother of three children, the values and issues I cherish are the same ones that already top the list for progressives — values and issues that I'm confident are important to those of you who work, raise a family and call the United States home.

Our values match those that our brothers and sisters in organized labor have always believed in: the value of a hard day's work; of taking care of our families and the most vulnerable members of our society; of sacrifice and duty to country.

We especially value our American work ethic, and we respect the workers who toil in our factories and offices. Our country was built on the strapping backs of laborers and production workers. So we are angry when loyal U.S. workers lose their jobs because of unfair competition ... on a slow boat to China, a fast track to Mexico or the Internet to India.

We must continue to fight for those things that matter most to us as a people, as families — high-quality education for all children, access to health care for every American, and equality in the workplace and among individuals — because those are the right things to do.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. 
Founder & President, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition

Democrats cannot be successful nationally until we are a 50-state party, rather than a 17-state, electoral-college organization. We cannot win the values debate without articulating and fighting for our own values. We cannot win in an increasingly multi-cultural America by continuing to focus so heavily on undecided, white, elderly swing voters.

And we have to take on the GOP "values" with our own pro-American and pro-Christian values. Empire is un-American. Lying to the nation is un-American. Bigotry is un-American. Tolerance is both an American and a Christian value. How we treat "the least of these" is a Christian value.

We have a vision of the Union, but we need to develop our own ballot initiatives targeted to our voter base — living wages, the right to health care, defending our right to vote, the right to organize. We must motivate our base not just with our Presidential ticket, but also with ballot initiatives that provide the ticket to a better life.

We need a vision of the future that can inspire a national voting majority: a vision of a peaceful nation with health care for all, a good public school system, a clean environment, tolerance and diversity, an end to the jail-industrial complex, a living wage for working families, a fair tax system, an end to poverty in the richest nation in the history of the world.

U.S. Senator-elect Ken Salazar
Colorado

America is in the unique position to lead the world toward realizing the potential of humankind. After the recent closely divided election, we can begin that process. We can work together to forge new relationships on both sides of the political aisle for the common good.

Now is the time to apply fresh thinking to some of the biggest challenges we face: for example, in health care, by allowing the re-importation of cheaper prescription drugs from Canada, and making health care insurance more affordable and accessible to all; in energy, reducing our dependence on foreign countries by investing in safe and reliable renewable energy sources. Clearly, we also need creative solutions to the nation's employment needs, and more fiscal and tax responsibility on the part of the federal government.

In the immediate future, our number-one priority must be to reform our intelligence system. Keeping our citizens safe is the primary duty of the federal government. With the benefit of hindsight, we know that our intelligence agencies have twice failed the nation in recent years. We must reform our intelligence-gathering ability based on the bipartisan recommendations of the 9/11 Commission — so that the mistakes are not repeated. Reforms must be implemented that remove communication barriers and end the turf battles between agencies, including enhancing cooperation with state and local governments.

U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky
Illinois

First, we must organize a "No Mandate" campaign. This President has no mandate for an agenda that includes privatizing Social Security, cutting education funds, privatizing Medicare or feeding corporate greed. The American people are with us on all those issues. They constitute not a Democratic agenda, but an American agenda.

We have to prepare now for the very important 2006 elections — to put a brake on the Bush program. Reality will be coming home to roost. As more people understand that the Bush administration controls everything, the pottery store doctrine — "You break it; you own it" — will apply. The Republicans will be forced to take responsibility for their actions.

We need a clear and aggressive challenge to this administration on its morality. This is a corrupt Congress and a corrupt leadership. The Republicans' first act in the House was lowering their ethics standards to protect a leader [Texas Republican Tom DeLay] who already has been admonished four times by our Ethics Committee.

The administration will attack any centers of power that oppose it: for example, the anti-war movement and the labor movement. We'll see efforts to enact "paycheck protection" — in order to hurt unions' ability to organize and to participate in politics. We must strengthen our coalitions and keep mobilized.

Gov. Bill Richardson 
New Mexico

Too often state, county and municipal workers are asked to put their lives on the line but leave their rights at the door. Those inequities and others like them did not disappear on Nov 3. American workers in general still face lower wages, fewer rights, canceled health care plans, disappearing pensions and unfair competition from jobs corporations are sending overseas.

It is more important than ever before to stand up for the rights of all American workers to organize, to have adequate health care plans for their families, to fight job discrimination and to join with progressives to protect our most fundamental freedoms. The principles we have fought for were not defeated in the election.

We in New Mexico revived our law authorizing collective bargaining for public employees. They should have collective bargaining, as a basic right, in every state. Workers in general need a substantial increase in the prevailing minimum wage. And we all need to combat the anti-worker, anti-working family attitude that characterized the first administration of George W. Bush and can be expected to characterize the second one, too.

Above all, progressives should not be on the defensive. We must continue to build coalitions, honor our diversity, and focus on our basic rights and our firm belief in equal opportunity.

Harold Meyerson
Editor at Large, The American Prospect; and columnist, The Washington Post

The voter mobilization programs undertaken this year by the Kerry campaign, the unions and the various "527" organizations were a clear and stunning success. But Kerry's campaign never clearly put forth its economic agenda as a statement of values and security — which is precisely the way to make the case for progressive economics.

Democrats do need to get back to values: justice, equity, dignity for all. Bush has no mandate to dismantle retirement and health care security, and the Democrats should call him on it — while proposing reforms of their own. Nor is there a mandate or a mass movement for outsourcing and downscaling jobs, and the Democrats need a stronger response to those challenges.

The party also must acknowledge that radical Islam is a threat, to which the United States needs a serious response — a military response when needed but also, more commonly, an ideological one. And the Democrats need candidates who can win a hearing from voters who have traditional cultural values but are economically progressive. The party can win a majority back in 2008, and it has to fight like hell to do that.

Donna Brazile 
At-large member of the Democratic National Committee and author of Cooking with Grease: Stirring the Pots in American Politics

With the strong leadership of AFSCME members, organized labor performed brilliantly in 2004 with respect to its campaign investment and grassroots movement. What was missing was a compelling message to expand the grand coalition of which labor is an important part.

The election was a wake-up call to develop a unified national message for working families. Without question, labor played an active role in inspiring millions of union-household members to vote; but now its leaders must refocus their efforts to block destructive initiatives that undermine working families.

Labor needs to continue to speak with a single, strong voice and have enough confidence in common policy goals to passionately campaign for those goals, giving less credence to polls and focus groups that can switch overnight. For example, leaders must strongly combat President Bush's efforts to reduce overtime eligibility for workers and slash the federal workforce. Leaders must also urge their allies to press Congress to curtail overseas outsourcing and make it easier for workers to organize via card check.

Most Americans dislike President Bush's policies in several areas: his economic stewardship; his judicial nominations; his disastrous positions on health care. On these issues and many others, labor can lead an effective opposition.

Joan Blades
Co-Founder of MoveOn — "catalyst for grassroots involvement through online activism"

The day after the election, we at MoveOn were deluged with e-mails saying, "What we did was great. What next?" There was no sense of hopelessness. Our members are saying, "We strongly believe in the issues we were fighting for, and we are ready to engage even more fully." As people become more involved and look at the issues, their values become better defined, and their reasons for participation deepen. So in the long run, I'm very optimistic.

Our dream is to have hundreds of independent organizations with tens of millions of online activists. We're happy when people take our ideas.

We need to strengthen the integrity of our voting process. If someone's standing in line seven hours to vote, that's a poll tax; it means a day off from work. That's neither fair nor reasonable. And we strongly advocate a paper ballot as a backup to electronic voting. Technology is wonderful, but machines can have problems. Voters have no recourse when there is no paper trail.

MoveOn will continue to support senators who oppose extremist judicial nominees. That will be even more important with the Supreme Court positions that are likely to become vacant during Bush's second term.