Announcing EENR Blog

I am late in announcing this. The new blog went up just as I had some health issues I had to take some time out to deal with, so it's actually been up for a couple of weeks.

I'm proud to announce the new blog from the EENR group, EENRblog.com. This has truly been a group effort, with many hands making light work. The entire EENR group contributed work to envisioning and creating the blog and providing content. Now we have a lot of great new members creating content too!

I especially want to thank Jamess and RedJet. James did most of the technical setup, although a few others, such as edgery, dk2, and I helped with that too. RedJet did the visual design for the blog. Many others have been keeping the blog running smoothly, welcoming new members, and coming up with ideas and content.

Here's the official announcement, adapted from one penned by edgery:

Introducing EENR (www.eenrblog.com) – a new home for Edwards Democrats, progressive activitists, and all interested in serious discussions to further a progressive populist agenda, with a side of fun of course!

Brought to you by many of the same folks (and several other familiar faces) who gave you EENR every night at Daily Kos and now the new EENR For Progress series on Sundays at DKos and Docudharma.

We've tried to set standards for discussion that reflect our desire for open communication, and those wonderful lessons we all learned in kindergarten, "Play Nice and Share Your Toys." There are lots of toys.

EENR has a nice unique feature, 12 subject sections located in the left side column. This gives us essentially twelve front pages, like a really big multi-sectioned newspaper.

Diarists can be Front Pagers in these sections, encouraging new talent to rise to the fore in different areas. Of course, we'll be promoting the best of these to the home page as well.

One thing EENR is not, however: it's not focused on the presidentials. That may be strange to some who are really focussed on that, and some of us still are. Just not at at this particular blog. Taking the Edwards Plan for One America as a blueprint, we are exploring the issues from that progressive and populist perspective.

That's not to say we won't look at local and state races to promote progressive candidates. We've added a weekly EENR For Progress: Candidate Endorsement series that will appear on Monday evenings at EENR as well as DKos and Docudharma. Our initial installment of this series featured Gilda Reed (LA-01), Larry Kissell (NC-08), and Barry Welsh (IN-06), and raised over $400 – not bad for a bunch of newbies.

EENR is still a work in progress in terms of design, though the essential elements are in place. At this point, we're not looking at adding ads (pretty controversial among our gang) though we may revisit the idea of free space for issue-oriented campaigns or endorsed candidates in the future.

I hope you'll stop by and take a look, maybe offer a few words of wisdom to spark a conversation. Oh, and a plug now and then won't go unappreciated. It's a big sphere out there, we're a little piece but hopefully one that can carve out a well-received niche.

What Is A Progressive?

A lot of people talk about progressive politics and supporting progressive candidates, but there is no clear definition of what progressive means. I suspect it means something a little bit different to everyone. I wanted to post some of my musings about what a progressive is and isn't. I'd like to hear other people's ideas about this too.

Let's start this discussion off with a sunflower, which always turns toward the light.



To me, progressivism is about issues and philosophy. You are a progressive because of your stance on issues and your political philosophy, not because of allegiance to a party or a personality.

To me, the following are core progressive principles:

1. Democracy - Every individual should have an equal voice in government, regardless of their race, gender, ethnicity, or class.

2. Liberty - Every individual has a right to free expression and self-determination, provided they are not infringing on the rights of others.

3. Economic Justice - Every individual has a basic right to the means of survival, a right to a fair wage for their work, and a right to a level playing field that will allow those who work hard to succeed.

It follows from this last one that health care and education are basic rights, as is the right to organize, that we should have a decent minimum wage, and that we should seek to rid the world of poverty and homelessness.

4. Access to Information - A free, but well-regulated press, an open government, and public education are some of the things that follow from this principle.

5. Living in Balance with the Earth - Respect for natural cycles, solving global warming, and creating a sustainable society are some natural results of this principle.

6. Nonviolence - Learning to deal with conflict without violence and moving toward world peace.

7. Equality - All people are equal regardless of race, gender, class, ethnicity, or creed. Each individual deserves respect.

The "progress" in progressive is progress from an old, historical feudal or class system to a sustainable society where all individuals are valued and respected. The dawning of a new age and a new model of society.

I know that we can quibble over the definitions and discuss whether or not specific political positions or people are progressive, but I think progressives share a core set of values that is to some degree similar to what I have just described.

I will add that I think that progressives value goals and issues over parties and personalities. Adhering to a particular party or loyalty to a political personality are not, in other words, what makes you a progressive. What makes you a progressive is your dedication to human progress.

Preparing the Field for 2012

At the risk of sounding like Cassandra (a prophetess who spoke the truth but was never believed) or Eeyore (a donkey who was always depressed), Democrats are not going to win the presidential election in 2008. I will celebrate if I'm wrong, but perhaps I'm making this post right now because I want to have at least bragging rights if I'm right.

There are multiple reasons why I believe I'm right about this. For one thing, we need to have a candidate that appeals to rural, southern, and red state voters. Failing to embrace this fact again and again, Democrats always seem to choose someone with solidly blue state appeal. Sadly, I also very much doubt that we have overcome sexism and racism to the point where they won't be factors in the general this time around, though on this, especially, I would like to be proven wrong.

One of the very saddest reasons that I believe the Democrats won't win, however, is that we have become so timid that we tend not to nominate candidates who stand for anything. We had a candidate this time around, John Edwards, whose ideas were so bold and progressives that he had a strong hand in setting the agenda for the other candidates. Unfortunately, he is out of the race, and now we're left with two candidates so timid and triangulating that they seem to have few ideas of their own and have adopted the mildest of his.

You might not believe Cassandra, and you might not believe polls either, but there are already polls out showing both Clinton and Obama losing to McCain, and that is before the Swift boating and cheating starts.

I'm so convinced that we won't win in 2008, that I'm already starting to think about how we win in 2012, and win with a real progressive.

It was clear from the media coverage of Edwards, or more specifically, lack thereof, that there are certain things that you cannot talk about in a presidential campaign without being marginalized by the media, and that those taboo subjects constitute some of the most fundamental reasons our democracy doesn't work. It was also clear that the media itself is a big part of this problem, and is undermining our democracy by actively trying to tell people who they can and cannot vote for.

Some of the things that Edwards talked about that got him shunned by the mainstream media, but loved by many progressives, were corporate influence on our government, lobbyists corrupting the system, campaign finance reform, election reform, and the problems with media consolidation. Edwards told us that the system is rigged, and the fact that his progressive message was so thoroughly shut out of it proves his point.

So how do we make it possible that a real progressive like Edwards could win in the future? Here are some of the things I think we need to do:

Elect progressives to positions of importance below the presidency within the Democratic Party, so that the party insiders are progressives. This means Congress and other positions (like those positions that currently are the superdelegates). Kick the DLC (the corporate wing of the party) out of the Democratic party to the extent that it's possible. Having more Democratic Party insiders who are actually on our side will create the infrastructure for a progressive win.

Demand fair, unbiased, and intelligent media coverage, and equal coverage of candidates. This takes exposing the problems with our media and maybe boycotts of bad media. It means opposing media consolidation and rolling back the media consolidation that has already happened, so that more voices are heard. It also may take developing media outlets of our own. Blogs are a small but important step.

Enact strong campaign finance and election reform. Get rid of the lobbyists, enact effective public campaign financing, and make sure election results can be verified.

All this may seem like a Catch-22. We couldn't elect a presidential candidate who talked about these things, therefore we will have trouble making these reforms. We will have trouble making these reforms, therefore it will be difficult to elect leaders who can help us. Nevertheless, this is what needs to be done.

All of the above will be exceedingly difficult, and it won't all happen before 2012. With luck and persistence, some of it will happen before 2012, increasing the likelihood of electing a real progressive president. The more progress we make on these issues, even if it's a bit at a time, the more likely it becomes that someone like John Edwards, a candidate who stands for something, could succeed.