#34: Republican Leaders Let the Sideshow Become the Show

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Dear Republican Member of Congress,

Undoubtedly, you are tired of getting pursued by citizens who are very worried about Donald Trump’s diminishment of our country and its democratic ideals. There are a lot of us out here. Maybe to you it is sounding like we are all speaking with one loud voice, but we have millions of distinct, individual voices and we are not going away. We are certain that Donald Trump represents a grave danger, and we remind you that the extent the Republican Party has claimed him and abetted him is now a huge part of the hazard our nation faces.

Internationally, his assault on global institutions is shameful. Our country’s previous worldwide leadership is in freefall. Worse, he could lead us into nuclear war. Your political party that once called for international strength backs a man who has yielded our international leadership position to the Chinese, and openly admires a Russian dictator. He openly taunts and disrespects nations whose soldiers have died for the ideals that our nation treasures.

His domestic policies are grounded in contempt for others. While you have quietly hoped that he would bring us together, he has split us apart, then lied about what he said, and then split us apart again, and then lied again.

At first, when he would tweet something that was untrue or bizarre, you would find yourself annoyed. You might say that it was “unhelpful,” or try to distract attention from it. Now, when he says something that eighteen months ago would have shocked you, you find yourself incapable of such shock. What you hoped would become the sideshow has since become the show.

Have you met a single member of the House or the Senate who is less knowledgeable about the workings of American government than is this man? Is there a single member of the House and the Senate who is less able to articulate the policy alternatives that are before him and the Congress on any major issue? Is there anyone who reads less, or who is less curious, or is less truthful?

Every day you look to yourself or your colleagues for reassurance. Even if you wish Lindsay Graham hadn’t confirmed that Trump referred to shithole countries, or if you thought Bob Corker’s comment about White House staff doing daycare was inappropriate, you are glad they are out there. Sometimes you allow yourself your own critical comment to a constituent or to a colleague though your practice is to be careful.

All of this makes you less of a Republican, in the context of how you have always defined Republicanism. In the context of how Donald Trump is leading you and “branding” your party to the country, you know that your party has been hijacked.

The issue for you and your party is what to do about that. You have thought about it a lot. You not only have talked to your political colleagues about it, you have talked to those you love and those you trust. You have decided that you can do more for your country and your party and your own political career by staying allied with Donald Trump than you can do by leaving him. It hasn’t escaped you that this is an enormous moral dilemma. So, you have carefully enumerated the issues where his position is not that distant from yours, and you have tried to ignore his offenses against the country and the Constitution. You have clung to moral relativism, telling yourself that other ideas and parties and proposals have no lock on goodness. To this point, you have decided not to walk away.

When you can’t sleep at night, don't you worry that you have made the wrong choice, that you have failed the ultimate test of leadership, that you haven’t done the right thing on the most critical challenge of the day when you always thought you would? That’s the case. For 228 years, the glorious, imperfect American experiment in self-government, this opportunity made from the sacrifice of patriots, has been a beacon for the freedom loving people of the world. If in February, 2018 you think it would be the hardest thing in the world for you to separate yourself from the terrible deal that you and your party have struck, it’s time for you to do the hardest thing.
Here are three things you can do right now to attend to the turning of the tide:

1) Communicate With Askew Republicans
	Polls demonstrate an increased number of disaffected Republicans and Independents and early retirements reveal angst-beset Republican lawmakers. It’s a great time to be a flame-fanner. You could look for places to share or send the above open letter, or write a similar one expressing your personal sentiments. Pick a Republican member of Congress and send it to her or him, or send to the Republican state legislator who lives closest to you. Post on Facebook or other social media, turn it into a letter to the editor, or otherwise extend this sentiment. Do whatever you can to get people talking more often about the unmet moral obligations of Republican elected officials.
2) See if We Can’t Sneak Away With a Seat
	The House Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has had an odd position on special elections. They have been reluctant to aggressively contest special elections in districts where Trump had a significant margin in 2016. Since none of these districts have been in the top 50 of those we are most likely to take back, they are afraid that contesting and losing will create a negative narrative for the November 2018 elections. That’s the wrong way to think about it. In the special election in Pennsylvania’s 18th District to be held on March 13, strong candidate and former prosecutor Conor Lamb will either win or come close enough to send a signal. It’s time to send the coffee money.
3) Become Fully Educated on the Russian Rending of Our Democracy
	To prepare for the swirl of indictments by Mueller and Congressional actions and political ramifications, we must make ourselves more fully informed. Let’s start by reading Thomas Friedman’s hugely important Code Red. Then, let’s compel our own selves to understand all of the specific Mueller charges against the Russians.

There’s a lot of good work to be doing right now. No falling away is permitted. Too bad we didn’t all make a tape of our dispirited selves that awful morning after the 2016 election, to provide the most vivid reminder of our pledge to never let this happen again. On the other hand, Donald Trump gives us daily reminders of what has befallen our country. It shouldn’t be difficult to summon our best.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#33: This Denigration of The Constitution Has Definitely Got to Stop

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By now you will have heard the arguments that the polls are narrowing, and that we should not be as sure of ourselves as we might have been a couple of weeks ago. Comfortingly, the Trump approval ratings are still awful. For all the talk about his loyal base, at least 20% of the people who voted for him (and maybe more) have deserted him. Even in the face of the Nunes-driven flurry, the employment gains of the Obama and now the Trump presidencies, if the fall Congressional elections were held today, we would win well more than the necessary 24 seats to take back the House.

But the election isn’t being held today, and the results of November 2016 are still fresh enough that we know that people will sometimes do things that we find incomprehensible. Given that what is at stake --- the future of the great democratic experiment --- is at risk, how can we not take our own personal political adventures to an all new level?

We are talking about each and every one of us here. There is no free pass related to “I don’t even know people who support the President” (You do!), and no free pass for “I am not happy with the organizing skill of Democrats” (Good for you!), and no free pass for “I find this all exhausting and I am so weary that I have to get on with my life and leave this aside for a bit” (But, we can’t!) and certainly, above all, absolutely no free pass for “I don’t know what I can do to support this effort.”

Because, we all do know that this is a major occupation for us this year. We know that, with all other Trump initiatives, the wholesale, cynical attacks on the FBI will be exposed in all of their tawdriness very soon. We know that Robert Mueller is out there methodically assembling evidence that will use Michael Flynn or Reince Priebus or Steve Bannon or Hope Hicks to expose Trump’s congenital aversion to truth. Obstruction of justice will be clear, since Trump contributes to those charges every week. Whether or not Donald Trump has a provable role in collusion between his campaign and the Russian government, all of this will not go well for him. Don’t despair in his tweets, eagerly await them. It is unlikely that he will ever escape the protection of his aides and lawyers to impeach himself, but he is so used to the lie that if he could, he would.

Because Mueller is out there, and very notably because Mueller is rightly being protected by Trey Gowdy and Lindsay Graham and Richard Burr and even the Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles Grassley, who is by no means a renegade, 2018 will be a good year for Democrats. To make it an even greater year, a few million people in the resistance must keep doing what they already are doing, but just a bit more of it, and just a little bit better.

The elements are simple. First, we put the right races in play, including at least a few that are longer shots but offer candidates who are irresistible. Second, we occupy ourselves with doing the right thing in those specific races and we do not allow ourselves to be distracted. Third, we attend to the underlying conditions under which these elections will be held. Who is going to be registered to vote? Whose vote might be suppressed? And most importantly, how can we maintain the enthusiasm and get out the vote mechanisms that will assure that we vote in the necessary numbers, like we did in Virginia in November of 2017? If each of us isn’t doing each of these three things, now is the time to start:

1) If You Haven’t Narrowed Your Field, Do it Now
	Perhaps you live in a Congressional District where there is an incumbent whose performance you like, but they are in a safe seat. You want them to be in the majority much more often, so you decide to focus your attention on one or more potentially close races in other districts. Which to choose? There have been a startling number of Republican retirements in swing districts, where incumbents were not looking forward to this election year.  The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s first list of targeted races lists 59 seats. The Daily Kos has identified as many as 80. There are all sorts of resources to help with figuring this out, as described in previous missives. With 6000 local groups, Indivisible is helpfully focused on every district. Swing Left, which drew some suspicions from political veterans at the outset, is an excellent source for identifying districts in play and understanding why those districts are targeted. They are entirely focused on taking back the House. The heavily data-driven Flippable is doing good work, including focusing on state legislative races. All these organizations have more spark right now than the Democratic Party itself, which is not entirely a bad thing, because it makes this a much larger and more spirited movement. Go beyond all this help and teach yourself to understand a race. If a Republican member of Congress has retired, is there a Republican heir apparent, or are conservative and “moderate” forces clashing? These disputes make a district more attractive for Democrats, because the loss for one faction in the Republican primary can dampen turnout in the general election. If there are four or five Democratic candidates in a swing district, start by understanding their views, their motivation for running, and their background. Check to see who is already well organized and is raising money early. If someone is way ahead on all of those fronts, that will be a sign that they are getting strong support from traditional Democratic constituencies. Several states have their primaries this spring. If there are four or more candidates, fewer than 30% of the votes can select the candidate. Remember that the total received in the Democratic primary of all the Democratic candidates is a huge issue. If a single Republican gets 48% and four Democrats split 52%, we are in play for November, as long as we remember to come back together. We will remember that, no?
2) Be Strategic In How You Deploy Your Money
	Your favorite Senator or Congressperson will ask you for a donation whether she or he needs it. Eventually if they decide they have surplus funds they can send it to the Democratic party, but that is too circuitous for your donation to count. The best way to give money to a candidate is to do it directly. You can donate through their campaign website. The best time to give money is now, as your favorite candidates are getting their grounding. Inventively, Swing Left has pioneered “district funds”, in which you can give money to an account in a swing district before the Democrats select their nominee. District funds will help candidates who deplete their resources in the primary to get a good head start on their general election campaign. Now there are two terrific additional ideas. First, Swing Left has created the opportunity for activists to have their own personal fundraising page to gather resources in a selected swing district.  This allows you to personalize your activism, keep track of your success, and gather your friends around one candidate. Second, in case you are hankering to find special efforts to get millennials enthusiastic about this fall, Future Forum is a political action committee made up of 26 of the youngest Members of Congress that has already visited 30 cities.
3) Remember Increased Voter Registration Works to Our Advantage
	At this point, Rock the Vote is doing the best national work to increase the presently discouraging rate of registration and voting by those under 35. The range of their strategies is what most distinguishes them, including some corporate partnerships. New voters should get special emphasis nationwide. A great initiative would be evaluating your local four year college or community college to see what voter registration efforts are already planned, and to make certain campuses aren’t waiting until fall to get going on these matters. The Campus Voting Project has created a student voting registration guide for each state, with special attention to the way some states and localities discourage student registration. You can make certain this guide gets in the right hands, or even gather a circle of friends to take on student registration as a group project.

The early work of campaigns is happening now. Every call, meeting, project, donation, and rally carries extra significance, because it is right now when momentum is being built for the fall. Let’s not wait until spring and find ourselves wishing in October that we had started earlier. Let’s treat every self-aggrandizing, truth-challenging tweet as a personal signal that this denigration of the Constitution has definitely got to stop.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#32: What Wonders Will Emerge on November 6

Thank you for continuing to share these messages with your friends, if you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, A Path Forward to November 3, 2020, every two weeks, which means there will be a total of 100 missives before the Presidential election of 2020, in which our country will select a whole new course.

Long before Donald Trump came into our world via escalator, political compromise was referred to by its practitioners as an “art”. Two or more sides would recognize and resolve an impasse. Each would give up something, and get something. Neither would be entirely comfortable with the resolution, and both would be able to claim that they achieved an outcome that prior to the compromise seemed highly unlikely.

This still happens in our nation’s capital, every week and on issues large and small. And for the most part, it should happen. However, the differences between what transpired in the recent budget discussions and what is commonplace when compromises are sought are even more striking:

• When the price of resolution includes avoiding a governmental shutdown the debate will no longer be limited to the issues that were initially under review, which were DACA and border security. Instead the debate reached a wider, more complicating sphere related to the broader infliction of pain on the government and country as the consequence of failing to act on DACA. It was not unwise for Senator Schumer and the Senate Democrats to initially refuse to supply the votes necessary to keep the government open, because they traded their inevitable wounds for a clearer path to the conceivable creation of a future for Dreamers. Once the Republicans had already acceded to the six-year extension of the Children’s Health Insurance Program within the budget resolution, the high pain/gain ratio for Democrats of shutting down the government even temporarily was predictable. The politics were messy and a bit disappointing, but it was worth it. There will be no ongoing damage, and tactical lessons have been learned.

• In typical negotiations that lead to political compromise, everyone comes into the room with a similar body of knowledge. On the issues before them, Democratic and Republican Senators had varying interpretations on the current effectiveness of border security, or different value judgements on injustices faced by the Dreamers. But, each and every one of them had a deeper understanding of these matters than did Donald Trump. When it looked for a moment like Trump would agree with Republican Lindsay Graham and Democrat Dick Durbin on a “clean” DACA bill, aide Steven Miller marshalled the Fox forces. Because Trump can veto bills, Mitch McConnell has to treat his views as consequential. The combination of Trump not being any kind of a learner and Fox having his ear is very difficult to deal with. With Trump, any deal will become in-artful.

So, none of these upcoming negotiations will easily fit the pattern that Senators had utilized before the present political affliction of the past year. Throughout 2018, Trump and McConnell are going to need 60 votes in the Senate. All year long they will have to come to the table with 51 or fewer votes, and with Chuck Schumer sitting there demanding things. It behooves all of us who see ourselves as a part of the resistance to know which of these circumstances will endanger us and which will advantage us, and how to make more of the latter and less of the former.

The first question is how badly does each side want its objective in a sought compromise? Republicans know how fervently most Democrats want to do the right thing for the Dreamers, while many Republicans would be comfortable with no DACA at all. That’s why what once seemed unthinkable may well come to pass, where Democrats will trade Dreamer protection for the votes Trump needs to get a major section of the wall funded. (Democrats also know that they will have much improved ability to block wall spending after they take back the House in November. Like Rome, walls aren’t built in a day.) Similarly, if the Republicans had needed 60 votes for the bad tax bill in the Senate, Schumer would have been able to extract major concessions, because he would have been fine if discussions fell apart and there was no bill at all.

The second question is does the objective have to be passed, or just blocked? If Trump ever proposes an infrastructure bill, it will require McConnell and him to make major concessions with Schumer and Senate Democrats, because he would need all new legislation, and 60 votes to cut off debate. There is no national groundswell convincing Schumer that he would be in peril if he disagrees with Trump’s approach.

The third question is to what extent is there common ground between the parties? The requirement that 60 votes are necessary in the Senate to cut off debate changes the role of Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski and Jeff Flake and Lindsay Graham from providing a key necessary NO vote (which they did rarely to be sure). Now to be successful they must bring Republicans into a “moderate” coalition, a role which they will find much more enjoyable. This will also enhance the role of the more centrist Democratic Senators, which was described in missive #31.

Here are three things we can do to make sure the resistance isn’t compromised by compromises in Congress:

1) Promote the Promise of the Common-Sense Coalition
	Any time a group of Senators from both parties labels itself a Common-Sense Coalition, it’s time to be wary. The danger of any centrist coalition is that it can blunt necessary advocacy and substitute half a loaf when a loaf is needed. But in 2018 the emergence of this coalition will prove more valuable to Democrats than Republicans. That’s because the Democrats are in the minority, and thus are that much more in need in terms of coalition building. Three weeks from now we will be enveloped in a DACA debate, with all of the complications of the budget resolution set aside. For at least a day, attention will be paid to the substance --- who would be deported if DACA doesn’t survive in a meaningful form; the contributions they make to America; and the injustices that will be visited upon them. By participating in the recent meetings of the Common-Sense coalition, certain Republican Senators have revealed themselves as possible supporters of a DACA bill. They need a note from you thanking them for working across the aisle and looking for solutions. Give them some positive re-enforcement, even though the real work is yet to be done. Choose any or all of these three, who are definitely not used to getting such notes: Mike Rounds of South Dakota Cory Gardner of Colorado Lamar Alexander of Tennessee
2) Delay the Usual Internecine Democratic Warfare
	There always will be and always should be a place within the Democratic Party for Democrats to battle Democrats. Fighting passionately over what you stand for is how you end up standing for something. So, the disappointment of some that Schumer and colleagues agreed to end the shutdown could easily end up within the normal bounds of discourse. However, let’s get the situation clear in our minds. Schumer got something that was meaningful, and he was not in a position that DACA gains were going to emerge in full bloom with each successive day of a shutdown. Further, the moderate Democrats who were eager to have the shutdown be over all stood tall by Schumer’s side through all of the Affordable Care Act votes and all of the votes on tax “reform”. Under considerable pressure and from states who strongly supported Trump over Clinton, they will continue to be strong members of the Democratic caucus. We can all be monitors of this internal debate, to make certain that our resistance has both standards and a big tent. Or we can seek to eviscerate our own. Stephanie Taylor of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee wrote: "Today's cave is also a wake up call for the Democratic Party. Today's cave was led by weak-kneed, right-of-center Democrats who buckled as soon as the fight was on. Senator Schumer voted with Republicans and called this a good path forward. This is exactly why voters don't know what Democrats stand for. Weak Democrats muddy the party brand -- and today, they made it harder to inspire voters and win elections everywhere in 2018." Write Stephanie Taylor at info@boldprogressives.org and tell her what she already knows --- Schumer is not a “weak kneed right of center Democrat”. Schumer ultimately told Joe Manchin and Claire McCaskill that he didn’t need them in the effort to withhold 40 votes, which helped them in their home states where they are seeking re-election in November. He ultimately decided he did not have an immediate path to DACA victory. That’s what you want a Democratic caucus chair to do.
3) Help the Coalition for the American Dream and United We Dream Get Momentum
	Even though battle lines are now well drawn, it’s not too late to get a little bit more momentum behind the forces that are working to protect Dreamers. One of the communities of interest that has been surprisingly helpful (within their own self-interest) is America’s corporate, labor and trade association leaders. Figure out a way to get attention for their efforts. Write to a corporate, labor or trade association leader you know and ask them to join the growing ranks. Send their letter to Congress to your own member of Congress with an attached note. Or, get behind the spirited, intensive lobbying effort of the largest group of immigrant youth in the country. Click to donate here.

Because of the need for the bills to get 60 votes in the Senate, we’re heading toward a year where compromises will always be at the table. Since Donald Trump always has Fox TV tuned in and since he has almost no knowledge of policy issues, he will never be a presidential negotiator even at the lower end, represented by the days of James Buchanan and Warren G. Harding. That will make things a bit more tumultuous. We will have to expect our elected officials to pick their way through carefully, and we will have to get beyond the declared wisdom of one paragraph posts.

Through it all, with determination and confidence and energy and hope, we are working toward the wonders that can emerge on November 6, 2018.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#31: No Forgetting the Strength and Grace of Barrack Obama

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To the extent that people in political mass movements are capable of collective wisdom, now would be a very good time to achieve some. As fascinating as is Fire and Fury, Michael Wulff's exposé of a petulant, distracted, uninformed, dishonorable president, we can't permit ourselves to dwell at the scene of that crime.

Steve Bannon's comments regarding treason, Trump Jr. and Manafort are delicious, of course. But, collusion in inviting the Russians into the presidential election, and/or obstruction of justice are matters before Robert Mueller, and thus are already in good hands. There aren't a lot of countries where the government can investigate a sitting president, but we are definitely one of them, as Richard Nixon was dismayed to learn.

Beyond being very concerned about Mueller, and he is, Trump is worried about the permanent de-legitimization of his presidency. He would, and has, lied regularly to try to avoid this outcome. It is this fear of Trump's that has put Jeff Sessions on the Tom Price-like slippery slope, even though Jeff Sessions was the first Senator to endorse Trump's candidacy, and for a long time the only one.

It also why Trump has recruited a motley collection of House Republicans who have forgotten they always loved the FBI and are now seeking to eviscerate the FBI. Most of all, it is why Steve Bannon must be made an outcast, even as he retracts and apologizes. If Donald Trump could get away with it, he would have Sean Hannity interview him and then insist that he never met Steve Bannon, except once in a large meeting of junior staff and interns.

In the midst of it all, we must keep our focus. Doing 2018 the right way (both in terms of the legislative process and the 2018 elections) will give us the opportunity to begin to reverse in 2019 what happened in 2017. As we tackle 2018 in our massive and growing movement, we must continue to adjust our efforts to take advantage of new conditions.

Paramount among these new conditions is that 60 is the new 50. Mitch McConnell is out of the actions that require only 50 votes in the Senate due to those actions being advanced under the budget reconciliation process. Getting to 60 will push him back to the center. That's why he and his colleagues wanted the awful tax bill so badly. It was their last night at the saloon before reporting for active duty.

Because of their influence on committees and their willingness to talk to Democrats, Susan Collins, Bob Corker, John McCain, Lisa Murkowski, and Jeff Flake will still be important. However, we will need a new tact - we will want to quickly improve our communication with selected Democratic Senators from states Trump won by a wide margin and who are up for re-election in 2018. There are several who were elected to their six-year terms in 2012, when Barack Obama was re-elected. These include Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Claire McCaskill of Missouri, Jon Tester of Montana, Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, and Sherrod Brown of Ohio. Now that Doug Jones has been seated, we are at 49. Getting to 51 (requiring the re-election of these Senators) could generate innumerable rewards, including improved defense against future Trump Supreme Court nominees.

The trick will be to find an approach to the budget, DACA (Deferral of Childhood Arrivals), infrastructure investment and other legislative challenges that keep these vulnerable Senators comfortably within their own party.

This is more possible because fashioning a workable Democratic caucus position while attending to needs of individual Senators is Minority Leader Charles Schumer's specialty. And it's even more possible than that because Trump’s growing unpopularity has reached these states, making it far easier for these Senators to oppose him.

The resistance does not need to demand that every Democratic Senator think alike. It has never been so. Depending on the issue, the position and politics of centrist Democrats must be honored and even celebrated. It's a party with progressive goals but a big tent.

So, by all means let’s participate in compromises to keep the government going and people served. But remember always the standards --- no participation in international bullying, no blessing of planet poisoning executive orders, no pretending that Trump has ended airplane fatalities, no thinking for even a second that a wall is related to our security, no disregard of international institutions, no conflating growth in the stock market with giving a boost to those in need, no throwing people off their health care insurance, no denigrating the media, no comforting the comfortable while afflicting the afflicted, and no forgetting the strength and grace of Barrack Obama.

With those standards in mind here are three things we can do to help our bruised nation get off to a strong start in 2018.

1) Get Back the Senate Majority
	For most of this past year, the resistance to Donald Trump has concentrated on taking back the House of Representatives in 2018. The work of Indivisible and Swing Left has preceded and surpassed the work of the Democratic Party on this front, although the parties efforts have increased to date. With Doug Jones' victory in Alabama, the Senate is still a longer shot, but it is within reach. The formula would be to hold onto the vulnerable Democratic seats enumerated above, pick up the Republican seats held by Dean Heller of Nevada and the retiring apostate Jeff Flake of Arizona, and work for an upset with good candidates in such states as Tennessee and Texas, where a win by Representative Beto O'Rourke over Senator Ted Cruz would be delicious. It's time for activists to get to know a vulnerable Democratic Senator who is working hard and who is up for re-election in a state where every other major elected official is a Republican. Why not start with Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota? She is a stolid Democrat, served two terms as attorney general, and eschewed running for Governor to run again for the Senate. Whether or not you are ready to make a small contribution to her campaign, now is an excellent time to sign up to start learning about her.
2) Standing with Patagonia to Protect Public Lands
	It's time to notice that one company has put themselves forward to oppose the Trump/Zinke destruction of public lands. As previously discussed in Missive #29 the action cutting Bear's Ears National Monument by over 2 million acres is only the beginning of the administration's efforts to put conservation last.  The outdoor gear company Patagonia has objected, brought other companies and conservation organizations to their side, and taken a leadership role in this effort. They have paid for some very effective television ads which have made interior secretary Ryan Zinke very angry. Click here to join and participate in their campaign to preserve public lands.
3) Get to Work Fighting Gerrymandering
	As we know, long before votes are cast in an election, initial critical steps are taken. Progressives battle against state legislative proposals that make registering to vote more difficult or otherwise seek to suppress voting. Activists register potential voters, seek to increase the intensity of their interest, and set up systems to convince people to vote and get them to the polls. For years, looming over all of these efforts has been the extra level of difficulty in winning gerrymandered districts, whose proponents use demographic analysis to create disproportionate advantage of one party over another, over and above what would be the likely or common political distribution within that geographical area. This turns swing districts (in which political choice is magnified) into safe districts (in which only one viewpoint is entertained). Both parties have been guilty of gerrymandering in the past. The federal courts have taken notice, and there have been important legal efforts to stop the most egregious practices, especially those that constitute racial discrimination. Every ten years, the completion of the census puts state legislatures into the position of needing to redraw the boundaries of state legislative and congressional districts to adjust to population shifts. In the fall of 2010, Republicans pulled off huge gains in state legislative races. Subsequently, they used their legislative majorities in several states (notably in Wisconsin and Virginia) to creatively re-draw district lines to gain significantly more seats than their overall vote total would have predicted. For instance, North Carolina has an almost even number of Democratic voters, but its Congressional delegation has 12 Republicans and 3 Democrats. Eric Holder, the Attorney General under Barrack Obama, has persuaded Democrats to take on this issue with all new energy and a fresh understanding about how the worst excesses of gerrymandering can be countered. His National Democratic Redistricting Committee is behind strategies to make certain Democrats don't make the same mistakes in 2020 as they did in 2010.

There's nothing wrong with admitting to ourselves that political America has become wearying. The daily Trumpian approach to life, to our nation, and to the world is soul-sapping. As an antidote, you could look at the newspaper (remember those?) and see the evidence every single day that our resistance is growing. And there's some other evidence that can restore the soul as well. Nicholas Kristof says 2017 was the best year in human history. Last year, over 300 million people in this world got their first access to electricity and to clean water, and 250 million boosted themselves or were lifted from the worst levels of poverty.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#30: How Could the World Not Be Watching Us With Trepidation?

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Well, at least you can appreciate Donald Trump’s sense of history, since his tax bill has revived the medieval practice of selling indulgences to the rich. It is an awful new law, revealing the emptiness of past Republican protests about deficits. Its underlying philosophy boils down to this - get while the getting is good. If you are Paul Ryan, it is an additional bonus that you have created new pressures on Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare spending.

Did any of us even need this new motivation? Our resistance was continuing to grow either way, spurred by the excellent results first in Virginia and now in Alabama. The electoral lessons in November and then in December couldn’t have been clearer. In those states, our enthusiasm and commitment and relentlessness increased registrations and promoted turnout. We swept away Ed Gillespie, the Republican candidate for Governor in Virginia even though he got 300,000 votes more than the Republican candidate from four years before. Because of the focus on getting people energized and getting them to the polls, the Democrat Ralph Northam got 600,000 more votes than the Democrat from four years before and won by a wide margin.

We could get used to this. What we are doing is working. The level of our own personal motivation matters, hugely. Certainly, one great force inspiring the resistance is Trump himself. He has insisted that a massive transfer of riches to the wealthy from funds we must borrow (for our children and grandchildren to pay back) is a middle-class tax cut. So, now that we know that he will say anything and do anything, we don’t have to worry about being distracted by some positive action Trump might take. But with or without Trump’s tweets and Trump’s headlines, we will grow our resistance every week and every month until November 6, 2018. There are scores of ways to accelerate. If we haven’t found local friends or associates to work with, groups linked to Indivisible, Swing Left, and several other national organizing efforts are everywhere.

There are years in American history that are critical to understanding who we are as a people. In 1776, ragtag revolutionaries declared our independence. In 1865, we ended a war amongst ourselves and the institution of slavery that begat that war. In 1963 we passed the Civil Rights Act, an indispensable but insufficient tool to fight discrimination, and in 1968 we lost Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy and almost unraveled as a nation.

Do we now understand that 2018 could be a year of that level of consequence? Don’t we know that we are a part of a great resurgence, an effort to restore the never fully realized promise of a great democratic experiment? Do we realize that we are on the verge of doing something unprecedented, something that will send a signal to the people of an entire planet?

How could those people of the world not be watching us now with trepidation, as our own United Nations Ambassador steps forth and insults the world? She says their country’s vote in the World’s General Assembly should be for sale to us? She says that the $26 billion we provide in foreign aid to make sure the hungry are fed and disease is eradicated is less important than this anti-democratic stance of a country that purports to be the greatest democracy of all?

And our own elected officials and our own news media fell silent. Either they were distracted by the tax bill or numbed by other daily offenses. It’s time for each of us to attend to these matters of our place in the world by doing these three things.

1) Become an Advocate for Nations Working Together
	The management of the United Nations has been fraught with problems for decades now. Paraphrasing the adage about democracy, the United Nations is the worst way for nations across the world to get together, except for all others. The U.N.’s Millennial Development Goals established by the world community in 2000 provided the grounding for extraordinary progress in poverty alleviation and disease eradication. The U.N. has provided the underlying structure that lead to the Paris Climate Accords. However limited its success has been in preventing conflict, it’s a place that the quest for peace finds a home. All nations use the United Nations to advance national self-interest and well as identify and pursue collective global interest. Unfortunately, the President of the United States has stressed the former all out of proportion to the latter. Since the United Nations was founded in 1948, there has been an organization for Americans to go to provide active support for the United Nations, sending a signal to the world that we intend to be a part of the world community. That’s the United Nations Association of the United States. You can utilize it as a way to support advocacy that can protect the U.N., educate yourself about what is happening in the world community, and learn ways to involve yourself in the international health and welfare agenda. UNA-US is a vigorous opponent of the U.N. budget cuts that Donald Trump and Nikki Haley have proposed.
2) Get Behind the Bi-Partisan Consensus on Foreign Aid
	During the debate in the U.N. General Assembly over the United States action recognizing Jerusalem as the Israeli capital, Nikki Haley said that she was “taking names” of nations who would “disrespect” the United States and that this vote would be remembered when the United States allocates foreign aid. If another nation had said anything of the sort, the United States would be outraged. Embarrassingly, we were lectured to by the far less democratic Turkey about our “blackmailing” behavior, and only nine countries voted with us --- Israel, Guatemala, Honduras, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau and Togo.   In February, Republican Senators Lindsay Graham of South Carolina and John McCain of Arizona successfully defended foreign aid as the exercise of “soft power” essential to America’s role in the world. Perhaps the bipartisan consensus in Congress that is against direct ties between the granting of aid and General Assembly votes will hold. We must help make it so. In the House, the relevant appropriations subcommittee is State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs. Their views on the Haley threats will become much clearer by mid-January. Please call subcommittee chair Hal Rogers of Kentucky (Republican) and ranking minority member Nita Lowey of New York (Democrat) and indicate how much it matters to you that the Congress send a bi-partisan signal that aid will be protected from the administration’s disorderly conduct. Call the office of Representative Hal Rogers at 202-225-4601 Call the office of Representative Nita Lowey at 202-225-6506
3) Don’t Forget to Show Your Lack of Love For the Wall
	Democrats and some Republicans have hopes of re-enacting DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) in some form as a part of a mid-January bi-partisan budget deal. Because of this excellent prospect we have a fresh risk that someone will think it is a good idea to give Donald Trump his wall as a part of the complex give and take of negotiations. This cannot be allowed. Donald Trump wants the wall because it sends a global signal, with levels of meaning going way beyond the significance of the structure itself. For exactly the same reason, we cannot accept the building of the wall. The wall would be an emblem for the world of the failing of America. If you haven’t communicated with your own members of Congress on this, you should do so in the next week. And, you should boost an unlikely player. The more high-quality advocacy organizations battling the wall, the better. The Sierra Club’s borderlands project is concentrating the environmental arguments against the wall, opening up an all new political front. This is the rationale: “Walls and barriers have already been constructed across more than 650 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border. These barriers block wildlife migration, cause flooding, and damage pristine wild lands, including wildlife refuges, wilderness areas and national forests." Here is where to learn about and donate to the borderlands project.

The New Year awaits. In Congress, the Senate has nearly exhausted the ways that they can use the rules of budget reconciliation to pass measures with 50 votes. Instead, the need for Trump and McConnell to get 60 votes will put Charles Schumer and Democratic leadership in play in all new ways. It will also provide some new chances for fresh, would-be presidential candidates who also happen to be Democratic Senators to put themselves forward, such as Cory Booker, Kamela Harris, Kirsten Gillibrand, Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren, and Chris Murphy. It’s a good discussion to start having. Let’s see who among these and others have the dreams, the staying power and the strength of character to help rebuild a democracy.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#29 A Party Launches A Search For Its Soul

Thank you for continuing to share these messages with your friends, if you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, A Path Forward to November 3, 2020, every two weeks, which means there will be a total of 100 missives before the Presidential election of 2020, in which our country will select a whole new course.

Unbelievably, this is all going to get even more bizarre and even more complex. There are three separate swirls that are robbing the Capitol and White House of all equilibrium.

First, Donald Trump’s most abiding desire is to be seen as a legitimate President. Perhaps there will never be sufficient evidence that there was collusion to swing the election between Trump and the Russians, but Trump understands that the indictment of his aides and the allegations of collusion is de-legitimizing his presidency. This de-legitimization will have electoral consequences in November 2018. In addition, the future action special prosecutor Robert Mueller takes means it will be more difficult to get any legislative victories after this awful tax bill is completed, signed and trumpeted. Most important to Trump, successfully calling into question the way he won changes his place in history, and not at all in favorable ways. The stain is permanent.

Second, Trump’s henchman, Steve Bannon, has wanted to break down the Republican Party since long before he found Trump to front the effort. Where once Republican Senators like Jacob Javits, Charles Percy and Hugh Scott stood tall in the Senate and advanced civil rights and social welfare reform and shaped new environmental laws, leading Republican Senators Mitch McConnell, John Thune and John Cronyn stand less tall and advocate positions far to the right of their predecessors. Not far enough for Bannon. There were wars for the soul of that party when Reagan was president, and Reagan allies dumped the “moderates”, state after state. That was nothing compared to what will now ensue. The election of Doug Jones in Alabama signals an all-out war among Republicans, to be fought state by state. Bannon bet big in the most Republican state in the country, taking down Luther Strange just to see if he could. Even before the storm over Roy Moore and teenage girls, Bannon knew that Moore was hugely flawed as a public figure, and he didn’t care. The loss will put McConnell and others back on offense against Bannon, leaving one to ask, “This was once the party of Lincoln. What and where is the soul of the party they will be trying to defend?”

Third, after the passage of the tax bill, Republicans will be almost out of ways to use the budget reconciliation process to gain passage of bills with only 50 votes in the Senate. Return to the “regular order” that John McCain treasures will force McConnell and the White House to regularly engage with Charles Schumer and Senate Democratic leadership to get to the 60 votes that close debate. Because Republicans thus need Democratic votes to increase defense spending, and will need Democrats on several other issues going forward, the dreamers will end up being protected. Whether it happens as a part of a late December bi-partisan budget deal, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) ultimately will be reworked in a bipartisan deal, and Trump will pretend that he was working for that outcome all along.

The weeks going forward will make past abnormal weeks of 2017 seem normal in comparison. Trump’s tweets on media coverage regarding Mueller, Russia and collusion will become even more frequent and desperate, as he fears charges against Jared Kushner or one or both of his sons are imminent. In short order, he will blame Richard Shelby and other Republican Senators for Doug Jones’ victory, rather than blaming Roy Moore and Bannon.

How can our resistance take advantage of all this turmoil? We can continue do all of the early support for the elections in November of 2018 that we have been doing, and up that ante month by month. It should have reached obsession level for each of us when the campaigns are running full tilt. If at this point a Trump resister doesn’t know what targeted races interest her or him most, personal adjustments must be immediate.

In addition, we can and must expect more from Democrats in developing and delivering a coherent message than the little we have seen so far. On that score, we can take heart that Democratic factions are working together on adjustments to the Democratic presidential nominating process, including reducing the role of super-delegates.

We can energize ourselves with despair over the Trump induced decline in the vitality of our democracy at home, or our despair over the dimming of the beacons through which our nation sought (however problematically) to brighten the world. But the better way to propel ourselves is to see the lights ahead of us and to work our way toward them.

Today, we need to attend to the numerous and hugely consequential Congressional matters still in play between now and the end of the year:

1) Dealing With Democrats on the Budget
	In the Senate, Mitch McConnell needs 60 votes to pass the increases in the Defense budget. Democratic Minority Leader Charles Schumer is willing to provide those votes, depending on budgeted levels for such programs as CHIP (children’s health care), opioid treatment, funding for State Department positions and relief for Puerto Rico.   The complication is that no one wants to shut the government down if talks reach an impasse, and if there is even the hint of a shutdown, neither party wants to be assigned the blame. In the face of this, 44 Democratic Senators have said that they will not vote for a budget that fails to include domestic spending increases, which would deny McConnell the 60 votes he needs. This is a bad time to blink. Charles Schumer and Nancy Pelosi have done well when McConnell and Ryan have needed their votes, and we must expect that again. We all call and write Republicans Senators a lot. It is time to write Democratic Senators underscoring these views: no budget agreement without significant attention to the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and other domestic needs no budget agreement without movement to continue Dreamer protection now provided by Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) no wall, not now, not ever Write to all (1 or 2) of the Democratic Senators your state has. Because you are in-state, you will be able to use their on-line email form. Then, be sure to be counted by calling the main number at your Senator’s DC office. If there is no Democratic Senator in your state, pick one from nearby.
2) Focusing on Susan Collins
	Susan Collins is in a bind. She provided the key vote to deny Republicans their destruction of the Affordable Care Act. Then, trying to stay within her party, she provided Republicans their key vote to pass the Senate’s version of the tax bill. She continues to maintain that unless Mitch McConnell and President Trump follow through with various promises they made to her, that she will vote against final passage of the bill after the Conference Committee's reconciliation of the House and Senate version. Among other things, she wants Affordable Care Act insurance markets shored up, because the tax bill is likely to eliminate the individual mandate. It is okay to recognize Susan Collins for trying harder than every other Republican Senator to support health care for Americans in the face of dangerous political forces. She will have a little more leverage when the Democratic minority grows to 49 votes when Doug Jones is seated. It is also okay to let Susan Collins know that we are all a force too. Please write her aide Steve Abbott, Chief of Staff and tell him that Susan Collins must insist that health care be fully protected in the tax bill and the effort to eliminate the individual mandate be jettisoned. Tell her that only then will she be true to her past refusal to be a part of denying care to many millions of Americans. Then call Susan Collins’ office in Portland, Maine at 207-780-3575 and deliver the same message.
3) Fighting Over Bears Ears
	Donald Trump went to Salt Lake City recently to announce the slashing of Bears Ears National Monument from 1.5 million acres to 230,000 acres, an action strongly urged by the fossil fuel industry. This is a major first battle over the integrity of the national monument system and other preserved lands. This battle is not over. With regard to the Bears Ears action, there are five lawsuits pending. In a key lawsuit, the Hopi, Navajo, Ute Mountain, Zuni and Ute Tribes are arguing that Trump and Interior Secretary Zinke do not have the power under the Antiquities Act to decommission a National Monument. You can track this effort, add your name to an online petition and support this lawsuit today.

The Republican leadership of the House and Senate are fully aware of Donald Trump’s dysfunctions -- the bullying, incuriosity, falsehoods and lack of any kind of core values and compass. Certainly, it is a difficult choice for an elected official to walk away from her or his own party. However, when you signed up for the job and took your oath you said that you would put your country first.

These leaders also know that all of us are battling back. They know that we are out there in great numbers. The Virginia results in the November elections and the news from Alabama have already demonstrated to them that their turning a blind eye to Trump’s innumerable and daily dysfunctions is not working. We have within our power from now to next November to make that even more abundantly clear.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#28 The More Intense the Resistance, the Shorter the Nightmare

Thank you for continuing to share these messages with your friends, if you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, A Path Forward to November 3, 2020, every two weeks, which means there will be a total of 100 missives before the Presidential election of 2020, in which our country will select a whole new course.

There are all sorts of adjectives to use to describe this bizarre presidency. It would be disappointing enough to have a President who all the time is bragging about things that he has done, but it is monumentally disappointing to have a president who also makes up virtually all the things he brags about.

Well, at least Donald Trump is resolving the argument about American exceptionalism! For all of our country’s flaws, one otherwise might have been inclined to take some special pride from our freedoms and protections under the Bill of Rights, or our orderly transfer of power after elections. And there are other ways that our country is a world leader - just fewer with each month. Ironically, it is Syria signing the climate change agreement that leaves us alone among nations.

If Congress passes a tax bill, it is already guaranteed that it will be an awful piece of legislation. Either version will benefit the rich at the hands of the middle class, and wound people with lower incomes. Either will unnecessarily and dangerously expand the deficit. Given these findings are well documented the reason why the bill’s passage is still likely is the calculation that virtually all Republicans in Congress have made. They know the bill will be unpopular with the public, but they believe that their cause (and their re-election chances) will suffer even greater or more certain or more lasting damage if they pass nothing at all.

It’s hard to be delighted at the dilemma they are in, since they are diminishing our economic future at the same time that they are endangering their political future. Their story seems even more unseemly when you realize that they have bought into the same Republican tax orthodoxy that has failed in the past, most recently in the fiscal near collapse of Kansas. To make the bad story worse, they have done it all at the urging of their donors, who will benefit the most.

The gift just keeps on not giving. The House version wipes out education benefits for students, teachers and institutions. The Senate seeks to do whatever they can to wreck the Affordable Care Act by eliminating the individual mandate. The House version eliminates the estate tax.

The odds are high that the Senate will pass a version of the bill by early next week, feeling that they must. Mitch McConnell will bestow extra blessings to get votes. Lisa Murkowski will receive drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Ron Johnson will get more favorable treatment for small business. James Lankford will get future promises of debt reduction. The beleaguered Susan Collins (not quite ready to flee her party, unfortunately) will be pushed by Republican leadership to decide which of her colleague’s injustices to redress, and will seek to save the estate tax, at least for estates above $20 million. That leaves three retiring deficit hawks - Bob Corker, Jeff Flake and John McCain.

As contemptuous as they have been of Trump, this is a battle the three would like to avoid. If they duck it, they will join their Republican colleagues in arguing that (overoptimistic) projected growth in the gross national product will wipe out the increases in the deficit. They are still Republicans. Other than McCain’s opposition to the “skinny” version of health care repeal, their votes against Trump have been selected or timed to be inconsequential.

There is a glimmer of hope for our opposition. It is one thing for McConnell to get votes in the Senate for the Senate bill, and yet another to get the votes in the Senate for a conference committee report or other vehicle containing additional compromises with the House. This leaves us with two reasons to generate all the activity we can.

First, we can try to create the opportunity for three Senators to do the right thing on the tax bill (or on a subsequent conference report or compromise with the House) like Murkowski, Collins and McCain did in opposing the Affordable Care Act. If this happens, the primary issue for the possible dissenting Senators (in this case Corker, McCain, Flake, Murkowski and Collins) will be that the bill hugely expands the budget deficit. Second, if we try and fail, we will still be generating strong support for our position from the general public, which will help us build for November 6, 2018, which we can make a great day in our nation’s history.

Let’s do these three things right away:

1) Make a Final Run at the Senate
	Write or call any or all of these Senators, emphasizing the argument that is most likely to sway them, if they are to be swayed at all, or which could strengthen their resolve in a dispute with the House. Bob Corker of Tennessee - He said all along he wasn’t willing to increase the deficit by a dollar. Tell him that the country’s leading economists are united that the Republican expectations of growth that will be generated by the tax bill are fanciful. He was right all along about not increasing the deficit, and they have failed to meet his test. (202) 224-3344 John McCain - Emphasize that this is a backdoor attempt to eliminate the Affordable Care Act, using the same lack of “regular order” he already deplored. David Bennett, Legislative Aide david_bennett@mccain.senate.gov (202) 224-2235 Jeff Flake - Say that the country needs him to stand behind his courageous and eloquent address about Donald Trump. (202) 224-4521 Susan Collins - Thank her for efforts on the estate tax and tell her the bill as a whole rejects the principles of fairness and equity that she stands for. Steve Abbott, Chief of Staff steve_abbott@collins.senate.gov (202) 224-2523 Lisa Murkowski - Tell her that in allowing the repeal of the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act she will be aiding in the eventual elimination of health care protection for millions of women who she has fought so hard to defend. (202) 224-6665
2) Defend American Education
	The most inexplicable part of the bill that passed the House is its assault on students, teachers and colleges. Teachers would lose the Educational Expense Deduction of $250, though the House has been quick to save any number of business expense deductions for corporations. Students would no longer be able to deduct interest paid on student loans. Graduate students would no longer find their research assistantships tax deductible, reducing their net income by 20% or more in a generation beset by student debt. A number of private colleges and universities would have their endowments taxed, even though these funds underpin student scholarships. Write the Republican Congressmen who lives closest to you and say how disappointed you are that they have singled out education for cuts while finding multiple ways to give extra advantage to high income taxpayers. At the best, the groundswell on this issue may soften the House in its negotiation with the Senate, whose education provisions are less draconian. Even without that outcome, the response to you might help underscore the vulnerability of that member of Congress come next November.
3) Get Our Country Some Better Members of the House and Senate
	The biggest problem with the Senate and the House of Representatives is that a not inconsiderable number of people who have been elected should not be there in the first place. Some are there because Democrats let down their guard, failing to generate the enthusiasm in off year elections that is a must when you are seeking to maintain a majority. Doug Jones’s effort to beat Roy Moore is huge. On December 12, we could gain a 49th Democratic vote in the Senate. At minimum, it will significantly increase the ability of Susan Collins and others to block Trump excesses. The Alabama race is flooded with money, but it will end up being very close, since leading Republicans have abandoned Moore. Here’s where you would send a check.  There is also a way to stand right now against the House tax bill and for taking back the House next year. Among the organizations bent upon taking back the house are Indivisible, which now has 6,000 local groups. Flippable has joined the fray and is focusing in part on taking back state legislatures. Sister Districts is also focused on “down ballot” races and matches up groups of people in safe districts with a targeted race in another part of the country. With the help of the donation system Act Blue, Swing Left has become an important pipeline to support emerging candidates in the sixty Congressional districts we have the best chance of taking back. You can now split your donation equally among opponents to House members who voted for the tax bill, thus letting your electoral displeasure be direct and immediate.

And on it goes. Some people have intentionally separated themselves from Trump’s daily assault on humanity. They aren’t prepared to tell you about wildly inappropriate remarks to Navajo codebreakers, bizarre self-aggrandizing exchanges with the father of a UCLA basketball player, or even a verbal assault on Jeff Flake. That’s an understandable defense mechanism, since in the world outside Trump there is love to be sought and given, dreams to be nurtured, the environment to be stewarded, and people in need to be served.

Whatever choice is made about the distance from the battle, we must not wait too long to re-engage. The more people we have in this country who in the course of every week show that they are resisting, the shorter our country’s nightmare will be.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington