Ron Daniels is a long-time leader in the Black struggle who was executive director of Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition and a presidential candidate of the Peace and Freedom Party in 1992 and has run on other 3rd party tickets from time to time. In other words, he operates on the "inside-outside" basis of the Progressives for Obama camp.
However, Obama's performance has made it difficult for such folks to put forward the kind of "New New Deal" rhetoric that you heard in 2008. In fact, Daniels has 2 articles posted in a 3 part series on ZNnet that at first blush look like he is breaking once and for all with the Democrats. The first is titled "Implications for the Progressive Movement" (http://www.zcommunications.org/implications-for-the-progressive-movement-by-ron-daniels) that catalogs all of Obama's flaws: "Rather than responding to the misery of the millions of unemployed by articulating the rationale for additional stimulus, Obama and the Democrats have cowered in the face of the Conservative’s demand for draconian cuts in government spending. Obama is blithely touring the country visiting businesses he believes illustrate how jobs will be generated in a retooled economy in the future." Part two is titled "Beyond Obama and the Democrats" (http://www.zcommunications.org/beyond-obama-and-the-democrats-part-ii-by-ron-daniels) and--based on that title--would lead you to believe that Daniels has washed his hands of the Democrats. The first sentence, however, tips you off: "In my most recent article, I argued that the progressive movement must devise a strategy that looks beyond Obama and the Democrats but includes supporting the President's reelection in 2012." It is filled with the kind of circumlocutions you get from Bill Fletcher Jr., Carl Davidson and many other veteran "inside-outside" operatives. But I wonder if either of those two guys would have come up with this: "The centennial of the birthday of the late Vice-President Hubert H. Humphrey, one of the great liberals of the 20thCentury, passed with hardly a mention." As NYT's readers might know, Hubert H. Humphrey received the same glowing treatment from Rick Perlstein, a highly celebrated liberal historian, in an op-ed piece a couple of months ago. You also might know that Todd Gitlin, the odious "decent leftist" who backed the war in Afghanistan, has never forgiven 60s radicals for not backing Hubert Humphrey against Nixon in 1968. At least with Humphrey, you were getting a continuation of LBJ's Great Society, with all its flaws. With Obama you are getting neither a commitment to domestic progressive change or peace. In fact, what you are getting with Obama is Richard Nixon. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
