Tag Archives: politics

Presidential Polling Anyone?

Future Hope, , , , ,

I was surprised recently when a good friend and sister progressive activist commented in the course of a discussion about the US Presidential campaign that polls were essentially useless. I was surprised by her statement and explained to her why I disagreed.

I have found that, historically, polling done by reputable, non-partisan companies is a good way to get the general lay of the land at particular moments in time for a competitive election race. However, I never go by any one poll, even one with a good reputation. It is important to look at a mix of them to get a pretty reliable understanding of the state of play.

Here’s a current example. Five days ago a NY Times/Sienna poll reported that the race between Harris and Trump was tied at 47-47. Two days ago a CBS poll had Harris ahead, 52-48, and an NBC poll had her ahead 49-44.

This reminded me of another NY Times poll which came out the day after Biden dropped out of the race July 21. That one had Trump ahead 49-43. Other polls had Biden down but more like by 3 or so points.

So it may be that the NY Times polls are somewhat of an outlier, too negative, for whatever reason.

And that is why it is necessary to look at more than one poll to get the most accurate view of the state of play.

Here’s where things are right now, using that methodology: averaging five reputable polls over the last week, done by CBS, NBC, NY Times, Economist and Forbes, Harris is ahead by about 3 ½ percentage points, 50-46 ½.

Of course, the winner of the national popular vote isn’t who becomes President. If we had that system Trump would never have been President. But he won in 2016 because of the anachronistic Electoral College. It is whoever wins the most of those votes who becomes the winner. That is why, this year, it’s the results in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada that will determine who wins. How do the national polls relate to that?

My understanding is that Harris would need to win the national popular vote by at least 2% to have a chance at winning enough of the battleground states to then win the election. So a 3 ½% margin with six weeks out is good, but not good enough. There’s clearly a need for all of us who get it on the great danger Trump represents to pitch in and do all we can until November 5.

What about the third party candidates?

There have been five polls over the last week and a half that have included Kennedy (still on some ballots despite his [outrageous] support of Trump), Stein, Oliver (Libertarian) and West. Averaging those polls, Kennedy is close to zero, Stein is at 1.2%, Oliver is at ½% and West is at 1.4%.

How is all of this helpful to progressive voters and activists?

One way it’s helpful is that, instead of being demobilized by understandable worry, it can give us hope of defeating Trump, which should then translate into postcard writing, phone calling and door knocking to encourage undecided voters to vote the right way and to increase those numbers. This is important because the race is still much closer than it should be. It is also important because the larger the vote for Harris, the more votes there will be down ballot for US Senate, the House and state and local elections. And progressive candidates almost always benefit from a large voter turnout.

In addition, the bigger the percentage for Harris, the more that will deflate Trump supporters and undercut MAGA’s efforts to disrupt the process leading toward a Harris inauguration on January 20.

Finally, for those whose anger at what US-supported Israel is doing in Gaza, the West Bank and now Lebanon make it hard to vote for Harris, a recent analysis by long-time labor and Black activist Bill Fletcher, Jr. really should be read and considered.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com

Harris or Trump: No Difference for Palestinians?

Future Hope, , , ,

Does it make any difference to the Palestinian people whether it is Harris or Trump who wins? I think it does, big time.

I get it on why many Palestinians, Arab Americans and strong progressives in the United States are so anguished and angry at the refusal of the Biden Administration to stop sending weapons of war to Israel, prolonging unnecessarily the agonizing suffering in Gaza. I feel the same way and express it in action every week at a local Free Palestine demonstration. But I don’t agree that, therefore, the right thing to do on November 5th, or before via early voting, is to vote for Jill Stein or Cornell West as a protest vote.

What are the likely consequences for Palestinians of Donald Trump winning?

Trump is Netanyahu’s, guy, and the MAGA Republicans are his US party. It was the Republican controlled House leadership which invited this war criminal to speak to Congress in late July. There are no Republican Congresspeople who have come out in support of a ceasefire. It was during Trump’s Presidency that the US Embassy was moved to Jerusalem. In a Reuters article on August 15th Trump is quoted as saying, “From the start, Harris has worked to tie Israel’s hand behind its back, demanding an immediate ceasefire, always demanding ceasefire,” Trump said, adding it “would only give Hamas time to regroup and launch a new October 7 style attack.”

A Trump victory will strengthen the hand of Netanyahu and his now-unpopular government, give a green light to settler and IDF violence in the West Bank and advance their explicitly racist and colonialist agenda of extending the state of Israel “from the river to the sea,” as they say.

If Harris wins, there is a basis to continue to pressure her and Democrats to make real their explicit verbal support for a ceasefire and an end to the war on Gaza by cutting off military aid, if the on-going pressure from below doesn’t achieve a ceasefire before election day. A Harris victory would allow the Free Palestine movement to build upon the massive progressive and liberal energy unleashed by her campaign and enlist additional numbers behind the demands for not just a ceasefire, the release of Israel hostages and Palestinian prisoners and massive humanitarian aid to Gaza, but also for a serious commitment to moving the ball forward as far as Palestinian self-determination. Harris has spoken a number of times in support of “Palestinian self-determination.”

In my view, bringing that self-determination demand forward, and giving it real content, would mean that there must be a Palestine-wide election to choose government leaders, not the imposition of the corrupt and unpopular Palestine Authority or any other scheme where Palestinians are unable to vote for who they want. And it seems to me that relatively soon, there should be a Palestine-wide referendum on what kind of new arrangement they support, whether a two-state solution, and what that would mean, how that would be done in a way which empowers them, or something else.

Only a Harris administration has the potential, if strongly pushed, to do all these things. Voting in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Georgia, Nevada or Arizona for anyone other than her will not advance and could even jeopardize the Palestinian cause, in my view.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com

Trump Must Go, Progressives Must Unite

Future Hope, , , ,

Overall, it was both a relief and an energizer to see Kamala Harris put Donald Trump in his place last night in the big debate. We can only hope this was a turning point in the much-needed popular shift away from the MAGA fanatics, a takedown that is not just an energizer for those who believe in democracy but a downer for those who are either hard-core racists/sexists/fascists or who have been taken in up to now by all the lies, the hype, and the appeals to the worst in the human condition.

I will personally be doing a lot over the next 55 days to help get Trump defeated and help Democrats hold onto the Senate and take back the House. After this decisive Trump debate defeat, all of those things seem possible, though by no means a certainty. I will continue to go to Pennsylvania almost every Saturday between now and election day to do door knocking and talking to voters, as well as evening phone banking 2-3 times a week. I have adjusted my life so that I can do these things, which I can do because I am retired.

But as last night’s debate unfolded I found myself feeling not just elation over Harris’ clear-cut debate victory but also the necessity of progressives across a broad range of issues, constituencies and organizations taking steps to be better connected, to unite in some kind of a way, after November 5. That is needed because the debate made clear that Harris is not running as a progressive, even though some of her positions are definitely progressive. She is running as a representative of a broad, pro-democracy united force that includes lots of people and groups on the Left but also people like Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney!!!

Trump is so bad, so retrograde, so dangerous that this truly remarkable temporary alliance has come into being.

There were a number of things Harris said and didn’t say last night that were problematic if you are a progressive:

-While opposing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and supporting a “two-state solution” and “Palestinian self-determination,” her words, she said nothing about ending, or even pausing, US weapons shipments to Israel.

-On climate she was decidedly weak. She was uncritical of fracking; she could have referenced that there are lots of landowners and community people who have been poisoned by the expansion of the fracked gas industry, but she didn’t. She never took the initiative to talk about the need for a rapid shift off of fossil fuels to renewables, battery storage, electric cars, buses and trains and electric heat pumps for heating and cooling. At one point she did say, “I am proud that as vice president over the last four years, we have invested a trillion dollars in a clean energy economy.” That was good, no question. But she added to that sentence this problematic phrase, this very problematic reality: “while we have also increased domestic gas production to historic levels.”

-Despite Trump’s repeated racist and wildly inaccurate statements about immigrants, she never called him out on that.

-There was no mention of the importance of unions for working-class people, very little about labor.

-She continued to say, as she has done repeatedly in her speeches, that is a good thing that, to paraphrase, we are spending close to $1 trillion a year dominating the world militarily. She put it this way: “I believe in what we can do together that is about sustaining America’s standing in the world and ensuring we have the respect that we so rightly deserve including respecting our military and ensuring we have the most lethal fighting force in the world.”

Is it necessary politically that Harris take these kinds of less-than-progressive positions in order to amass the votes needed to defeat Trump? Maybe. I’m sure there are those in her campaign leadership who believe this, and she clearly has bought into it.

That is why it is so necessary that after Trump and MAGA are hopefully defeated, hopefully decisively, on November 5th, progressives must find the ways to strengthen our connections and expand our support so that going into 2025 we are in a position to fight for truly progressive actions across the board. But for the next 55 days we must each do all we can for a defeat of the fascist threat. First things first.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com

Post Harris/Walz Trump, Same as the Old Trump

Future Hope, , ,

Late last night Donald Trump spoke publicly for the first time since Kamala Harris chose Tim Walz as her Vice Presidential partner. Trump for some reason spoke in non-battleground state Montana. This morning I listened to the full hour and half speech. I wanted to see what Trump was like after his many days off the campaign trail while Harris and Walz spoke to massive and joyous rally after rally, continuing the momentum since Biden stepped down that now has them slightly ahead in many national polls.

Here are my main take-aways from watching Trump’s speech:

-Trump has decided to go back to being the same kind of public speaker that he was in 2016 and 2020. He barely used the teleprompter. It was demagogue, dishonest, blowhard Trump, and it was high energy. If you are an uncritical MAGA/Trump supporter, his repeated vicious attacks with literally no regard for the truth had to be energizing and impactful.

-The Republican Party’s huge problem, however, is that it is very difficult to see how this maniacal, ultra-right-wing messaging is going to appeal to the non-MAGA Republicans and centrist Independents who they need if Trump is going to win and they are to retain the House and take back the Senate.

-The big issue that Trump repeatedly spoke about was immigration. I would estimate that about 1/6th of his speaking time was on this issue, and it was the issue with the biggest of his scores of lies: that if Harris/Walz win, “50 million illegal aliens will enter the US over the next four years.” Racist, lying Trump lumped them all into the category of “criminals and rapists.” He got big applause when he talked about his plan for mass deportation of many millions of currently undocumented immigrants.

-On the other hand, as far as big issues, there was literally no mention of abortion/women’s reproductive rights. Nothing, nada, zilch. I wonder how the “right to life” conservatives are feeling about that.

Other points made by Trump included these:

-Harris is a “bumbling communist lunatic.”

-MAGA is “the greatest movement in the history of the country,” with the support of 90-95% of the country (maybe he confusedly and astoundingly meant this as a future thing).

-He spoke about “endless wars” and how he was “anti-war,” with the implication being that it was his closeness to people like Putin and Netanyahu that would lead to that result, one not to the benefit of either Palestinians or Ukrainians.

-“Four years ago [when Covid was ravaging the US and much of the world] the United States was blazing bright.” Then Biden/Harris took over and “destroyed everything.”

-“Biden/the Democrats put good people in jail” [the only allusion to January 6th].

-In reference to what he described as all the wonderful people who have made Montana such a model state, every single category of people that he listed—like frontiersmen, settlers, homesteaders—was white people. There was not even a nod to the substantial Indigenous population in the state.

-He was explicitly anti-transgender people.

-And finally, of course, he was explicitly anti-windmills and electric cars, a big supporter of “liquid gold [oil], pro-“US energy dominance,” anti-Green New Deal, a his major slogan was “drill, baby, drill.”

Trump and his committed followers are every bit a neo-fascist threat. There is no more important work over the next 87 days for those who believe in democracy and progressive change than to work to defeat them as decisively and strongly as possible.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com. 

Door-Knocking Trump Households

Future Hope, ,

It’s great what happened yesterday, in so many ways, after Biden’s stepping down announcement and then endorsement of Harris. And it’s even better that as of now it looks very unlikely that anyone of substance is going to challenge her being the Presidential nominee.

The energy and funds generated less than 24 hours after these announcements by Biden are another very good sign. This morning, watching the news, it was a small thing but of note to see the new, virtually certain, Democratic Presidential candidate walking crisply and confidently down the steps of a plane. It may be a small thing, but for many voters they want leaders who radiate strength, energy and confidence, so this has importance. Trump does this but with no regard for the truth or falsehood of what he says. Kamala Harris does this but in an opposite way as far as truth-telling.

Any day now we’ll start hearing all of the lies and half-truths and distortions of Harris’ positions on issues and personal history from the Trumpists. There will also be criticisms from both the Left and the Democratic Party Right about weaknesses and problematic, past Harris positions or actions. It’d be nice if those criticisms were more constructive than destructive given the fascist, racist, misogynistic, climate-denying alternative.

For myself, as someone who has been about independent progressive politics since 1975, I have no problem being upfront about the clearly correct tactical necessity of doing a lot of work and donating money to defeat the MAGA Republicans.

One tactical campaign idea I’ve had since the big Biden announcements yesterday afternoon is this: if it’s the case, as looks very possible, that there are going to be huge numbers of people stepping forward to volunteer for this historic campaign, some of them should, in an organized way, go door to door in neighborhoods in key battleground states that are pro-Trump areas. Probably not so much in the hardest core areas but I could see doing so in areas that went to Trump by upwards of 25% in 2020.

What would be the objective of this canvassing? While id’ing and encouraging Harris supporters would, of course, be one objective, another potentially critical one will be to raise enough questions in the minds of right-now-Trump voters that some of them will end up not voting for him when they vote this fall.

It’s important to appreciate the reality that some, at least 20% I’d say, of those who tell pollsters that they will be voting for Trump this fall are not diehard MAGA supporters. They are people who, if reached out to and spoken with over the phone or in person by well-trained canvassers, could end up deciding that they are too conflicted about Trump, and probably Harris too, such that they end up not voting for him when they vote this fall.

There’s another reason why this should be one component of a multi-faceted Harris campaign, both the official Democratic Party operation and those of more independent groups.

Whoever wins the White House, the House, the Senate and state legislatures this fall, progressives, particularly anti-racist white progressives, need to much more broadly interact with those working-class white people who support MAGA. There are a lot of bad reasons why they’re doing so but one understandable reason is past Democratic support for NAFTA and other policies that led to massive job losses over the last 50 years. Given the positive job creation numbers under the Biden/Harris administration, we have something to say about a different reality today on this, and on other, issues.

It is wrong to write off all MAGA supporters!

I live in New Jersey, an hour drive away from key battleground state Pennsylvania. I am so looking forward to going there many times over the next 3 ½ decisive months to do this kind of work. History is calling.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com. 

The Trump Shooting

Future Hope, , , ,

You don’t need to be a pacifist to regret the attempt on Trump’s life yesterday. The MAGA fascists are not going to be defeated on November 5th, as well as beyond this election, by physical attacks, with guns or otherwise.

What will defeat them? Right now I would say there are two main things:

-In the short run, over the next four months, there needs to be a coming together of a massive and broad united front to mobilize tens of millions of people to come out and vote on November 5th for Biden/Harris, particularly in the battleground states, as well as for progressive and not-so-progressive Democrats for the House and Senate in every state. The exception would be If there were any progressive independents like Bernie Sanders running for Congress who had a real chance of winning, though I don’t know of any.

-Day-after-day organizing must deepen and expand beyond November 5th by progressive groups, increasingly connected, all over the country, including in the rural, small town and outer suburban areas where Trump/MAGA is strongest. Door-to-door and other outreach must be stepped up on Issues that are important to most of those in that overwhelmingly white, MAGA-friendly base, like health care, affordable housing and decent-paying union jobs, but without hiding our progressive approach on issues like racism, sexism, heterosexism, the climate crisis, militarism, etc.

Already, unsurprisingly, prominent MAGA Republican leaders like Mike Johnson and JD Vance are blaming Biden and the Democrats for this shooting. Vance, very possibly about to be Trump’s Vice Presidential candidate, said yesterday after the shooting, “”Today is not just some isolated incident. The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination.” Bullshit.

This is why nonviolent tactics must be the kind of tactics we use as we unite to defeat Trump/MAGA this November and keep building afterwards. This doesn’t mean rejecting self defense. It does mean, imho, that there needs to be a widespread appreciation within our people’s progressive movement that a willingness to risk physical attacks or jail time, or worse, is part of the way we can win. Doing so keeps a focus on the issues we are taking action on, and it brings more people to our side.

Jim Crow segregation in the South would never have been defeated if not for the willingness of the young people of SNCC, SCLC, other groups, and grassroots Black working-class people to do just this. Their courage and sacrifices, their singing and spirit, were contagious and politically effective despite tremendous repression by the FBI, racists and southern power structures.

In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4th, 1967, “Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism and militarism,” and more.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com. 

The Aging Process Always Wins

Future Hope, , , ,

Joe Biden’s debate performance and the information that has come out since of other hidden-from-the-public signs of his declining cognitive condition have reminded me of a similar situation I experienced decades ago with one of the 20th century’s leading peace and justice activists, Dave Dellinger.

I had the privilege of working closely with Dave from the 70’s until the early 2000’s in the movement to end the war in Vietnam, for a mass progressive alternative to the Democrats and Republicans, for freedom for Leonard Peltier, and as part of the movement in 1992 to reject government plans to celebrate the 500th year of Christopher Columbus’ arrival in the Westen Hemisphere in 1492. In that year he and I and another dozen or so people took part in an organized People’s Fast For Justice and Peace in the Americas, a 42-day water-only fast on the steps of the US Capitol. 

The last meeting where we were together was a national “progressive dialogue” meeting I helped to organize in December of 2000, after the George Bush vs. Al Gore 2000 Presidential election. For several years in the early 2000’s there were meetings of a multi-racial, youth-and-elders cross section of leading progressive activists, convened for the explicit purpose of strengthening our connections so that we could play a more effective role in opposing two-party, corporate rule.

Dave was not himself at that meeting. He was still articulate, but he was also over the top in the way he expressed himself. I remember him demanding that people agree with his ideas as far as what we should be doing. He was not a positive force in the meeting. I had never seen him the way that he was then.

Dave was 85 at the time of this meeting, one year younger than Joe Biden will be if he is chosen next month at the Democratic Convention as their Presidential candidate, if he defeats fascist Trump and then makes it to the end of a second four year term as President.

Immediately after the June 27 debate debacle I could see no way that Biden could continue to be the Democratic Presidential candidate. But that now seems more likely after Biden’s very different performance in the George Stephanopoulus ABC TV interview last Friday, his North Carolina and Wisconsin rallies, as well as the just-expressed support for Biden by the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Bernie Sanders, AOC and others.

There’s no doubt that Vice President Kamala Harris has become a very consequential person going forward, and not just because she’s who would step in if (imho, probably when) Biden and those around him agree that he can’t make it until the end of 2028 and needs to step down.

I haven’t been much of a fan of Harris, based mainly on her performance during the 2019-2020 Democratic Presidential primary campaign. But I have been noticing that she seems more confident, more forceful and clear over the last month or so. And according to Michael Moore, “for over 8 months, it has been reported that Kamala Harris has pushed for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.” This squares up with comments she made about Gaza and the war this March in Selma, Alabama.

For me and clearly others, a Biden/Harris slate in which Harris plays a visible and public role, showing us and the country, I hope, that she is prepared to step in if Biden falters and he realizes it’s time to step aside—that seems to me like a potential winning ticket.

For me, for Biden, for all of us, it’s 100% certain that if we make it into our retirement years, we can expect to experience the slings and arrows of the aging process, no doubt about it. When we start to experience bad days, poor performances, memory lapses, at an increasing rate, adjustments will be necessary to match what we want to do with what we can do. Those close to Biden have a responsibility not to deny reality but to help him adjust accordingly when it’s clear it’s his time to retire.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com. 

Is Gaza Disqualifying for Biden?

Future Hope, , , ,

Several days ago I received an email from a good friend who had just come back from the West Bank in Palestine. My friend has been connected with Palestinians and active in the movement against Israel’s brutal occupation for a very long time.

One line of her email gave me pause: “When you think of voting for Biden, remember that this horror is of his making.”

I have been active since last October in the US movement demanding an end to US support of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, an end to Israel’s decades-long occupation, and for self-determination and justice for the Palestinian people. I’ve participated in weekly Friday street vigils in a nearby town every week that I am home. I’ve written about this issue. I’ve made phone calls to elected officials demanding they call for an immediate ceasefire and massive humanitarian aid for Gaza. But I think to encourage people not to vote for Biden/the Democratic candidate on the basis of this issue is very problematic for two reasons.

1–The next US President is going to be either Trump or whoever the Democrats eventually nominate. As problematic as the Biden Administration’s positions and actions have been for most of the last nine months since October 7, it is a fact that, because of the widespread popular revulsion against Israel’s actions in Gaza, the massive activist movement demonstrating in the streets and the constant pressure brought from within the Democratic Party by its progressive wing, the Biden team a couple of months ago finally began to use its leverage over the Netanyahu regime to demand that they change their tactics, with some success.

Does anyone think that Trump and the Republicans would be a better alternative when it comes to Palestine? Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, with Trump’s support, is bringing Netanyahu to the US to speak publicly from the floor of the House in late July!

2–In general, I don’t think a candidate’s position on any one issue alone should be how progressives decide who to vote for, especially in this Presidential election. I think it is important to look at both the overall program and the past actions on all the major issues by candidates, as well as whether or not a candidate has any chance of winning, or perhaps not winning but generating such a big vote that the progressive mass movement will be advanced despite a loss.

On issue after issue Biden and the Democrats, despite their ties to big money and corporate power, are better than Trump and the Republicans: the climate emergency, women’s rights, abortion rights, voting rights, racial justice, lgbtq+ rights, labor rights, democratic rights and the right to organize and demonstrate, to name just some of the huge differences.

Of course, there are two Presidential candidates whose positions have been strong on the Gaza war and on these other issues, Cornel West and Jill Stein. But neither of them will win the Presidential election or draw very many votes, as reflected in Stein’s past voting results and current, month-after-month polling results. The primary, immediate practical result of their campaigns will be to draw votes away from the Democratic candidate and increase the odds that Trump wins.

There is one thing they could do which would change this inevitable result. They could publicly call for their supporters to vote their conscience, at least, if not for them to vote for the Democratic nominee, in the battleground states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada and Arizona. They could acknowledge the existential threat posed by the MAGA movement. So far this hasn’t happened.

For the planet, for the people, for our rights, for democracy, Trump and MAGA must be defeated at the ballot box on November 5th.

Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com. 

The Problems with Purism and Reformism (not reforms)

Future Hope, , , ,

Over 20 years ago I wrote one of these columns examining the issue of “purism” versus “pragmatism” when it comes to organizing for systemic and desperately needed change in this world. I wrote about two essential ingredients that are sometimes in conflict.

One essential is conscious political organization motivated by principles and a genuine desire and plan for improving the lives of the disenfranchised and downtrodden, ending militarism and war, and stopping and reversing environmental devastation. But this alone won’t bring about change.

As a once-great revolutionary once said, “the masses make history.” It is only when large numbers of people identify with a movement for fundamental change and support it, verbally or actively, that we have any hope of winning political power and transforming society. In the USA that means not tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands, or even millions, but tens of millions of people.

Is this possible? Yes. One big example is the 15 million votes independent socialist Bernie Sanders got in 2016. Another is the NY Times report that 16-25 million people all over the country took demonstrative action in the spring of 2021 after George Floyd was murdered.

We need to go about our organizing work in a way which doesn’t undercut either, which avoids the temptation to be so committed to being principled that one becomes purist and narrow, on the one hand, or to be so committed to being with and interacting with “the masses” that problematic positions are taken and political relationships are built that end up deflecting energies into reformist and dead-end approaches to change. We need reforms, yes, but our broader objective must be to build upon successful struggles for major reforms in a way that leads to truly revolutionary, justice-grounded, social and economic transformation.

Purism versus reformism—the twin dangers of serious efforts to bring about the kind of change that is so, so needed today.

What can be done to lessen these dangers, to increase the possibilities that more of us will keep our eyes, minds and hearts on the prize?

One is the building of independent and progressive organizations that are truly democratic in the fullest sense of the term. As difficult as the process of democracy sometimes is, it is also a way to keep the group as a whole and the individuals within it centered on the stated objectives. Democratic process, sooner or later, frustrates individual power plays on the part of any person in leadership who lets power go to his/her/their head and who becomes either purist or reformist as a result. These things have happened much too much historically, but in this third decade of the 21st century, there is a growing consciousness of this danger increasingly expressed in how more and more of us are going about our organization-building.

Another necessity is an explicit commitment to the testing out of theories and ideas in practice and a process of constant evaluation based upon input from the people the ideas are being tried out on. If an independent candidate is running for office, for example, and has what they think is a great platform but the vote totals are very low, perhaps the problem is that the issues being addressed, or the way they’re being expressed, don’t connect with peoples’ understandings. Since just about any issue can be addressed from a progressive standpoint, a much better approach is to identify what the issues are to speak about because of day-to-day listening to and communicating with working-class people and people of the global majority.

The same with forms of direct action. It may feel good and righteous to some to stand up to the police during an action, but if that is done in a way which makes it easier for the government and the corporate-dominated press to call us violent, that will not generate sympathy for our cause among the wider public. Expressing our sense of urgency and anger is a good thing, if done wisely. Expressing it without political consideration of an action’s impacts is not a good thing.

Ultimately, our ability as a movement to navigate between the dangers of purism and reformism comes down to how each of us live our lives. Do we live in such a way that, on a day to day basis, we are in touch with working class people, regular folks, those in need of change? Do those of us who are white ensure that, in some way, we have regular communication and interaction with people of color so that we are constantly reminded about racism and its pernicious effects? Do we make time for meditation, allow our conscience to make itself heard over the daily demands on our time and energies? Do we interact with others in a way which prioritizes listening and objective consideration? Do we struggle to keep from responding defensively when others make constructive, or not so constructive, criticisms of us?

In the words of the late Rev. Paul Mayer, “What history is calling for is nothing less than the creation of a new human being. We must literally reinvent ourselves through the alchemy of the Spirit or perish. We are being divinely summoned to climb another rung on the evolutionary ladder, to another level of human consciousness.”

 Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com. 

Living to Fight Another Day

Future Hope, , , ,

“UE rarely makes endorsements within the two-party system, and we are not endorsing Biden. Instead, our hope for the future lies in a politically independent labor movement, and in those politicians in Congress and at the state and local level who are willing to put the working class first, not the Democratic Party. We encourage working people not to be completely distracted by the Presidential horse-race, and to pay close attention to their Congressional and state races.

“Nonetheless, we have to be honest about the dilemma that faces labor and working people in the short term. The issue that makes Biden the lesser evil for us is the fact that the labor movement, and especially UE, has been making some real gains in organizing new workers under Biden’s economic policies and NLRB. A second Trump presidency would make it far more difficult to organize — and to build the labor party we need and deserve.

“Given who will be on the ballot in November, we urge all working people to hold their nose and vote for Biden, in order to live to fight another day — the cost of re-electing Trump would be too high.”

-from “The Stakes of the 2024 Election,” issued by the United Electrical Workers Union: https://www.ueunion.org/political-action/2024/the-stakes-of-the-2024-election


Way back in the 70’s when I first became involved in organized efforts to form an alternative to the Democrats and Republicans, I had many meetings in the headquarters of the national UE. At the time, before their move to Pittsburgh, those headquarters were in midtown Manhattan, right across from St. Patrick’s Cathedral in a building that, I believe, used to be owned by the Vanderbilt family.

The UE describes itself as “the USA’s only national, independent, membership-run union (since 1936), representing thousands of workers in the private and public sectors.” As is true today, back in the 70’s they believed that working people in the USA need an alternative to the Dems and Reps, which then and now they describe as a “labor party.”

I had this privilege of meeting in their building because their General Counsel was Bob Lewis, and Bob was a leader of a group initiated by civil rights lawyer Arthur Kinoy in 1974, the Mass Party Organizing Committee. When I became involved with MPOC in 1975 and moved to NYC to work in its national office, we would often have evening meetings in Bob’s office.

So when I saw the UE’s statement on the Presidential elections a few days ago, I read it closely, respecting them as I do.

I pretty much agree with their conclusion, quoted above, that all working people should vote for Biden and also pay close attention to Congressional and state races. At the same time, given that it is the electoral college which determines who wins the Presidency, I think it is strategically key to emphasize the absolute importance of this happening in the battleground states: Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona and Nevada. In the vast majority of the other states, the likely winner is pretty much known based on past voting history.

The UE statement criticizes Biden for his unwillingness to take on corporations, for not doing enough “to rein in the power of the oil and gas industry,” for not taking action “to address the broken criminal justice system,” for not dealing with the underlying causes of immigration, the “failed economic and military policies toward Latin America,” and his failure to halt “Israel’s attack on the Palestinian people”  and the “stoking of a ‘new cold war” with Russia and China.

They go on to critique Trump, not a hard thing to do, referring to “his rhetoric taking on an increasingly fascist tone” and using the language of “vermin,” “human scum” and “poisoning the blood of our country” as far as immigrants.

I liked the phrase they used to conclude their statement: “vote for Biden in order to live to fight another day.”

Political dynamics in a country, definitely in the USA, are not stagnant. There is a rise and fall as far as movements around issues and movements for major political change. One current example is the difference between this Presidential election and the ones in 2016 and 2020. In both those years there were strong and visible progressive challenges via the Bernie Sanders, and then Sanders and Warren, campaigns. Sanders got 15 million votes in the 2016 Democratic primary, helping to generate a progressive political upsurge that has not gone away, even if there is no mass-based challenger to corporatist Biden this year either from within the Democratic Party or from a “third party.”

On the issues I agree much more with Presidential candidates like Jill Stein and Cornell West, but they are stuck in the very low single digits in all polls. The biggest impact they could have on the Presidential race is to help elect Trump. True!

What will happen after November 5 if Biden/Harris win? Almost certainly, the independent progressive forces will feel strengthened and revitalized, in a position to build upon that victory going forward.

But first things first: the defeat of Trump by voting for Biden. He’s a lesser evil, but he’s not a racist, misogynist, narcissistic fascist. Trump and MAGA Must Be Defeated.

 Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com.