Progressives Must Claim the Political Center

By David A. Love
BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board
July 17, 2008

What’s all this talk about politicians moving to the political center?

Every four years, we hear about the need for presidential candidates to move to the center in order to appeal to the audience beyond their party’s base.

I think that Texan populist Jim Hightower said it best when he suggested that “there’s nothing in the middle of the road but yellow stripes and armadillos.”

A variation on that theme is from the late Republican Barry Goldwater, who said “extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!”

Political observers ask if Barack Obama is moving to the center. I don’t know, and it is not my concern. But I will say that the strategy of going down the middle to score points and win elections, changing one’s positions, and flip-flopping, is a time-tested failure. The political graveyard is strewn with the careers of poor souls who followed “conventional wisdom” or the advice of highly paid strategists with their poll-driven drivel. Al Gore and John Kerry - who snatched defeat from the jaws of victory by becoming wooden centrist caricatures - are two names that come to mind, Bush election stealing notwithstanding. And Hillary Clinton torpedoed her quest for the brass ring from the jump, by positioning herself as a virtual man and a warmonger in support of America’s exploits in Iraq. The “conventional wisdom” endorsed this path, but public opinion ultimately did not.

And what exactly is this conventional wisdom? In my humble opinion, it amounts to two things: First, there is the water cooler talk from a manufactured, media-driven punditocracy - “experts” who claim to know, yet possess few if any qualifications for their supposed knowledge, and make their arguments out of thin air. These are the people who will, for example, engage in a lengthy Sunday-morning television discussion on the problems facing the Black community, without a single African American (or anyone who knows a single African American) participating in the discussion. Second, there is the effort to cater to the so-called swing voters, people who are uninformed about politics and the issues, and will vote for the candidate with whom they would prefer to have a beer.

Ultimately, this talk about the fictitious center is unproductive. Rather, the center must be redefined.

We live in extreme times, and positive action of an extreme nature is needed. Capitalism once again is unraveling, as corporate greed and policies of upward wealth distribution take their toll on the common folk. Dinosaur industries such as Big Oil are rewarded for their damage to the environment and are profiting from our misery. Meanwhile, the U.S. auto industry - the people who killed the streetcars and the electric cars throughout the nation, and offered you Hummers while other nations were investing in alternative fuel technology - is repeating the 1970s, collapsing under the weight of its own arrogance and inaction. As the government bails out the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the failing Indymac Bank, where is the relief for ordinary citizens who are losing their homes and their jobs and livelihood, those who can no longer afford to live in America? Conditions suggest that with a low-wage job at Wal Mart or McDonald’s awaiting them, in a country that does little else than buy cheap foreign goods and make hamburgers, these people are not seeking modest milquetoast solutions to these crises.

Obama has been able to seize on this discontent and desire for change. Certainly, the Republican Party has revealed itself as nothing more than a vehicle for the delivery of corporate largesse - with lip service paid to religious fanatics and the Archie Bunkers of America - and is headed for a well-deserved implosion. But if the Democratic Party - also known too often for cow-towing to corporate interests, failing to seriously pursue a Bush-Cheney impeachment, and capitulating on the Iraq War and immunity for telecom companies that spied on Americans - does not seek meaningful, systemic change, then it won’t be far behind on the road to the chopping block.

Progressives find themselves with a golden opportunity to become the new center in American politics. When I say progressives, I mean independents, Greens and other third parties, the Democratic Party base, labor, and other groups. There is much hope that the pernicious Bush era will come to an end with the coming election. When that happens, then the hard work begins, as a quadrennial contest alone does not a movement make. A progressive-led coalition must create a movement that takes back the country, infuses the national dialogue with progressive values, permeates the national consciousness with progressive language, and shapes public policy in a deliberate, long-term manner. Such action will be necessary even under an Obama administration, to ensure that a progressive agenda comes to fruition and has the broad-based support to sustain itself.

Democrats do not need to run to the center, but progressives need to become the new center and lead the way.

Handgun Madness at the U.S. Supreme Court

Color of Law
By David A. Love
BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board
July 10, 2008

“I loves my gun! Loves my gun!”

-“A Brief History of the United States of America,” Bowling For Columbine (2002)

Recently, in District of Columbia v. Heller, the U.S. Supreme Court showed how extreme it can really get by overturning as unconstitutional the District of Columbia’s gun control law.

But the high court went even further by declaring for the first time that the Second Amendment right to bear arms is an individual right and not merely a collective right.

The D.C. law banned handgun possession by making it unlawful to carry an unregistered firearm, and prohibiting the registration of handguns. The law also authorized the police chief to issue 1-year licenses, and required residents to keep lawfully owned firearms unloaded and disassembled or trigger locked.

The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states that “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Perhaps to some, it reads as a vague and anachronistic eighteenth century pronouncement that does not address the problems of twenty-first century America.

In the court’s intellectually deficient majority opinion, Justice Antonin Scalia demonstrated that if you want a particular outcome in a case, all you have to do is make up the reasons for coming to that conclusion out of thin air, or out of any other location of your choosing. Scalia decided to ignore the introductory portion of the amendment regarding “A well regulated Militia,” or at the very least deny its importance, and conclude that “bear arms” applies to everyone, not just military purposes. “We start therefore with a strong presumption that the Second Amendment right is exercised individually and belongs to all Americans,” Scalia wrote.

For all of the talk from conservatives decrying liberal activist judges who legislate from the bench, Scalia’s decision is a prime example of rightwing activism of an unreasonable variety.

In his dissenting opinion, Justice Stevens, joined by Justices Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer, took note of the court’s longstanding position in United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939), that the Second Amendment “protects the right to keep and bear arms for certain military purposes, but that it does not curtail the Legislature’s power to regulate the nonmilitary use and ownership of weapons.” Stevens added that Scalia’s opinion failed to present any evidence that the amendment was intended to limit the power of Congress to regulate civilian use of guns:

The Second Amendment was adopted to protect the right of the people of each of the several States to maintain a well-regulated militia. It was a response to concerns raised during the ratification of the Constitution that the power of Congress to disarm the state militias and create a national standing army posed an intolerable threat to the sovereignty of the several States. Neither the text of the Amendment nor the arguments advanced by its proponents evidenced the slightest interest in limiting any legislature’s authority to regulate private civilian uses of firearms. Specifically, there is no indication that the Framers of the Amendment intended to enshrine the common-law right of self-defense in the Constitution.

-Justice Stevens’ dissent, pp. 1-2.

In his dissent, Justice Breyer noted that the D.C. law did not violate the Second Amendment, but rather protected an important interest - dealing with the life-threatening presence of firearms in our cities. He invoked the sobering statistics on handgun-related crimes, deaths and accidents in the District and in the nation as a whole, statistics which the D.C. council took into consideration when they enacted the law. (Once the law was enacted, according to one public health study, the city witnessed a decrease in gun-related deaths.) Breyer feared that this decision would open make gun control laws throughout the nation susceptible to constitutional challenges:

At the same time the majority ignores a more important question: Given the purposes for which the Framers enacted the Second Amendment, how should it be applied to modern-day circumstances that they could not have anticipated? Assume, for argument’s sake, that the Framers did intend the Amendment to offer a degree of self-defense protection. Does that mean that the Framers also intended to guarantee a right to possess a loaded gun near swimming pools, parks, and playgrounds? That they would not have cared about the children who might pick up a loaded gun on their parents’ bedside table? That they (who certainly showed concern for the risk of fire…) would have lacked concern for the risk of accidental deaths or suicides that readily accessible loaded handguns in urban areas might bring? Unless we believe that they intended future generations to ignore such matters, answering questions such as the questions in this case requires judgment - judicial judgment exercised within a framework for constitutional analysis that guides that judgment and which makes its exercise transparent.

…Far more important are the unfortunate consequences that today’s decision is likely to spawn. Not least of these, as I have said, is the fact that the decision threatens to throw into doubt the constitutionality of gun laws throughout the United States. I can find no sound legal basis for launching the courts on so formidable and potentially dangerous a mission. In my view, there simply is no untouchable constitutional right guaranteed by the Second Amendment to keep loaded handguns in the house in crime-ridden urban areas.

-Justice Breyer’s dissent, pp. 43-44.

Gun violence is a serious American problem. In previous Color of Law commentaries, I have discussed this country’s longstanding love affair with the gun (see ”Those Who Live By The Gun…”, April 26, 2007), with particular attention paid to my city of Philadelphia, where handgun violence has taken a heavy toll in terms of loss of life (see “Black Men are Dying in Philly,” September 6, 2007, and ”Philly’s 10,000 Men Must Join a Broader Movement for Social Justice,” October 25, 2007). Common sense and decency dictate that the level of gun violence in the U.S. is incompatible with a stable, safe and healthy society. And certainly America’s gun proliferation flies in the face of international human rights standards.

In a country such as the U.S. - with its long history of the gun as a tool of violence, oppression and genocide against African Americans and Native Americans, against women as victims of domestic violence who had few rights as far as the law and their husbands were concerned, and against defenseless children at home and in unjust wars of aggression abroad - the continued fascination with and accessibility of guns is troubling. This, in a nation with entrenched deprivation and poverty, a dearth of career opportunities yet a surplus of idle time for millions of young men, and widespread cases of mental illness that go undiagnosed and untreated. Consider that over half of the nation’s 30,000 annual gun deaths are suicides, according to the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention. Ninety percent of gun-related suicides are successful, as opposed to 2 percent of drug overdoses. And when guns are in the home, there is a much greater likelihood that someone in the home will die of a homicide (three times, according to the New England Journal of Medicine) or suicide (five times, according to the Journal of Trauma).

Plus, according to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, gun violence, which claims 80 lives each day and wounds another 200, costs the U.S. $100 billion each year in medical costs, mental health treatment and rehabilitation, loss of productivity, and legal and judicial costs. Meanwhile, firearms are the second leading cause of death for young people 19 and under in America, after auto accidents. In 2005, 81 percent of murder victims between the ages of 12 and 24 years were killed with a gun. 3,027 young people were killed by firearms in the U.S.-- 1,972 were murdered, 822 committed suicide, and 173 died in unintentional shootings.

And that year, according to data from the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, guns were responsible for 52 percent of injury deaths for Black teens, 29 percent for Latino teens, 22 percent for Native American teens, 19 percent for Asian teens, and 17 percent for White teens.

One point which the justices failed to mention is that this madness continues thanks to the undue influence of the gun lobby and the arms manufacturers in U.S. politics, most prominently represented by the National Rifle Association (NRA). And already, the gun lobby has been emboldened by this regressive Supreme Court decision. Gun advocates are suing for the right to carry guns at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, the world’s busiest airport with 89 million passengers annually. This comes after the city of Atlanta declared the airport a “gun-free zone”, following the passage of a Georgia state law allowing licensed gun owners with background checks to carry concealed weapons on public transportation, in parks and recreation areas and restaurants that serve alcohol. To the reasonable observer, the words “gun,” “alcohol” and “Georgia” in the same sentence are problematic, given the track record.

More shocking is a law passed by the Florida legislature in 2008 which allows people with concealed weapons permits to lock their guns in their cars at work. Once again, reasonable minds should agree that guns at the workplace are a potentially deadly combination, particularly when those workplaces are resorts and amusement parks which thousands of families visit at a given time. Walt Disney World maintains that the law does not apply to their 60,000 employees, leading to immediate action by the NRA, which called Disney a “prime offender when it comes to firing employees for exercising Second Amendment rights.” The Florida business community is challenging the state law, and they should: 77 percent of workplace homicides are gun related, as the Brady Campaign reports. Murder is the leading cause of injury-related deaths of women in the workplace, and workplaces where guns are permitted are 5 to 7 times more likely to experience workplace homicide.

If guns don’t kill people, then certainly extremist laws and court decisions do. All of this should remind us that, the corrupting influence of money in politics notwithstanding, elections do matter. We get whatever we voted or didn’t vote for, and the next president has the potential to change the ideological balance of the Supreme Court.

World is awaiting leadership change

By David A. Love
Progressive Media Project
July 2, 2008

The results of the presidential election could go a long way toward improving America's image around the world.

Tragically, the Bush administration tarnished our reputation and squandered the global goodwill that came our way after Sept. 11.

Since then, President Bush has displayed a cavalier attitude toward the rest of the world. He has waged a senseless war against a nation that did not harm the United States, and has cost tens of thousands of innocent lives.

And in the name of keeping Americans free, Bush has run roughshod over the U.S. Constitution and international law, brazenly spying on Americans and torturing detainees.

As he subverted the rule of law, he undermined America's self-made image as a beacon of international human rights.

Consequently, even among America's closest allies in Western Europe, we receive a low favorability rating, according to a recent report by the Pew Global Attitudes Project.

For example, only 30 percent of people in Germany have favorable views of the United States, as do 34 percent in Spain and 39 percent in France. Britain is the only Western European country where a majority of respondents - 53 percent - thinks favorably of the United States.

America's favorability rating among another two of its closest allies, Japan and Mexico, has declined significantly in the past year, by 11 percentage points and 9 percentage points, respectively.

In much of the Muslim world, our reputation is near rock bottom. Less than one-quarter of people in predominantly Muslim nations such as Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt and Jordan have positive views of the United States. And in Pakistan and Turkey, large majorities view America as "more of an enemy" than "more of a friend." What is perhaps most compelling about the Pew study is that the world has its eyes - and hopes - on the U.S. presidential election.

About two-thirds of the people polled in France, Germany, South Africa and Spain believe that U.S. foreign relations will improve once Bush is out of office.

Across the board, people overseas express more confidence in Sen. Barack Obama over his rival, Sen. John McCain, regarding international affairs. For example, while 84 percent of people in France are confident in Obama, only 33 percent feel that way about McCain. In Australia, 81 percent trust Obama, while only 40 percent trust McCain.

So, why should Americans care about what the rest of the world thinks? Well, we're in a pickle now due to Bush's refusal to consider world opinion. And the next president will need better relations with other nations if we are to solve our global challenges together.

While McCain refuses to negotiate with adversaries of the United States, and gives little indication that he would veer from the catastrophic foreign policy of Bush, Obama believes in vigorous diplomacy - engaging America's allies and enemies alike. He also rejects Bush's system of secret and harsh offshore prisons and tribunals.

Obama's approach, as the Pew study suggests, resonates around the world.

Some of us may feel a hunger for change here at home. That hunger is also gnawing away at people in other countries.