Our United States, and our world, is in crisis.
This is a crisis of rapaciousness and unchecked greed whereby money that should have gone to pandemic preparedness and public policy expertise is sitting idly in the coffers of more billionaires than any of us can count.
It’s a crisis of science and sound public policy versus ignorance, racism and tired conservative shibboleths. In this, we all know that it’s not only Covid-19 that we need to fight, but also an emerging climate threat that will certainly make this pandemic seem mild.
And here in the United States there is a crisis for us, for Democrats. We are a political party that (when viewed through the most generous lens) has been valiantly trying to play baseball by the house rules while the Republican Party has run roughshod over all the rules, the traditions, the game, the stadium and morality itself in a voracious quest to appease their autocrat, Trump, and keep a hold onto power.
On that note, today we witnessed a GOP majority Supreme Court sitting in splendid isolation voting on party lines to send Wisconsin voters to the polls in the face of a deadly pandemic.
This action by the Roberts Court is disgusting, and foul, and sits shoulder to shoulder with the worst Supreme Court decisions in history.
It goes against our most basic and fundamental notions that some remote, powerful officials might enact a deadly double standard on everyday citizens from the safety of their enclaves, and all for partisan gain.
In our tradition, government earns its power by the consent of the governed.
And that is where we are, politically, tonight.
As a taxpayer, as a citizen, as a parent, as a Democrat and, finally, as a human person with a conscience, what am I to do faced with GOP run institutions that are KILLING my countrymen via greed, ignorance and the baleful will to power?
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The answer, to my mind, without embracing any given particular, is that Democrats must decisively end politics as usual.
The polite baseball game is over.
There will be new rules and we will make them because we have to.
Some current Democratic officials, in states where it is safe, should resign and make way for new younger voices. The sooner the better. We need an A-team.
Our Governors, fighting hard to protect their citizens against Coronavirus, must transfer that political capital into a grassroots assault on the Washington status quo that brought us to this point.
The House and the Senate caucuses need to be remade and reformed for a massive legislative push.
We need to stop thinking of who in particular will be our presidential candidate, and more about the team that we are building to make massive, needed, root-and-branch change.
The left/center debate between the Sanders/Warren wing and the Biden/Buttigieg/Klobuchar aisle will seem quaint when we are done.
The Democratic agenda for the next decade must be massive, bold, decisive and protect the lives and well being of Americans with science and progressive public policy.
We must not stop till we have remade our laws and our democracy so that we are never again left unprepared after experts warned us, and so that we are never again subject to the partisan whims of Roberts, McConnell and Trump and their like.
Democrats need to put our collective foot down and start throwing punches.
And when people see Democrats fighting, and standing up for ALL of us, they will know that this is a train that they want to be on.
This spring, prior to Covid-19, like many of you, I worked hard and volunteered and donated to make this a successful year for Democrats in races big and small.
That’s changed now.
We are in a fight for our collective lives and it’s clear that we must reshape this Party and this nation to meet the test handed to us by this moment.
The particulars will come, the tactics will evolve, and new leaders will emerge.
But now is a time to leave nothing to chance. Now it is our time to unite.
We must fight with all we have, and bring as many fresh millions with us as we can.