Aldoph Reed Jr claims American Liberals have become fixated on election results, on "winning elections," rather than on pursuing their progressive long term goals of transforming society for the better. Is Reed right? I don't think so.
I think the first point I would make to Reed is that the 20th century represents, in many ways, a century of liberal--progressive victories. We had the passage of civil rights laws, Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid and a whole host of other smaller welfare programs meant to assist the middle class and the poor that were primarily due to liberal-progressive forces "winning elections" during this time. Conservatism, while never totally banished, was giving ground steadily up until 1980 when Reagan was elected. By then, however, the socialist threat of "Medicare" (Reagan called it) and other programs like Social Security were a form of socialism conservatives seemed to like...they just conveniently forgot who won that for them.
I'm not saying liberals won everything they wanted during this time and that there isn't much more work to do, there certainly is, but the forces of liberalism have truly transformed this society over the past century. And then came the election of Ronald Reagan and the nation made a bad turn. The debt exploded and the middle class began its 3 decades long decline, all while the rich got richer and more powerful on Capitol Hill. This was, of course, the product of the foolish and criminal idea that "greed is good." This has always seemed a bit ironic to me. We ended up with conservatives, many of them conservative Christians, believing in social Darwinism as an economic necessity while not believing Darwin's theories had any validity in general.
Anyway, the wheels of progress are slow, I would remind Mr. Reed, but as we've seen the wheels do turn...forward. Yes, the wheels could stop and turn backwards, though that's not likely anytime soon. With the election of Reagan it was a set back for liberals, at least economically. But we can't change this steady decline of the middle class without continually winning elections!! A big reason liberals have been stalled in making more needed changes is the lack of unity going forward. The facts of democracy are that you win elections through building coalitions. And building a winning coalition requires compromise within the party or group. American liberals, who have delivered the majority of votes in the past 5 of 6 Presidential elections, have simply been willing to compromise in order to build that coalition. It's not perfect and it's not going to be a pure liberal agenda...not if you want to win nationally...or hold that winning coalition together either.
If we want to break up the winning coalition (in the Democratic party) we can, as the Tea Party has done on the right, by pushing a "purity" agenda. In that case, you only aid the forces against you and ensure conservatives will be back in charge. The President understands this and that's why he's a pragmatic idealist. We can pursue our ideals but we have to be grounded in political reality. "Politics," Edmund Burke said, "is the art of the possible." The President and most pragmatic idealists understand we have to focus on "the possible" in a democratic society.
So I don't think American liberals have given up on building a better society. They certainly haven't "surrendered" on addressing the growing inequalities in our society. I mean Reed has heard of Obamacare? This was the biggest advancement in social welfare in decades. It may not be perfect but certainly providing access to healthcare for all Americans is something liberal--progressives can be proud of. Obamacare is certainly a big step forward toward addressing a big inequality in our society. Certainly there is much more work to do. There are more long term goals to pursue. But none of this will ever come about unless Democrats win elections.