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| Maybe this book is as important as when I started reading it |
Will progressives and moderates feud while America burns?
Or will these natural allies take advantage of a historic opportunity to strengthen American democracy and defeat an increasingly radical form of conservatism?
The choice in our politics is that stark. This book is offered in a spirit of hope, but with a sense of alarm.
E.J. Dionne, Jr., Code Red: How Progressives & Moderates Can Unite to Save Our Country
As I write this review on 11 March 2020, it appears that perhaps the battle royal that seemed to be brewing in the Democrat Party will be put on hold, at least until after the defeat of Donald Trump. Perhaps. But things have certainly changed even from when I began to read this book at the beginning of March when Sanders appeared to have a lead in the race for the nomination, and Biden had only a win (albeit big) in South Carolina. Today, after results from yesterday in the five states that voted, including Michigan, where Biden scored a very impressive win, and Washington, where Biden trails by a whisker with about two-thirds of precincts reporting, Biden is now has changed his position. Biden now is on track to receive the nomination (but in this world, trains can come off the track). So can we signal the all-clear sirens? Not quite yet.
Sanders isn't prepared to jump on the Joe bandwagon yet, but I've heard conjecture that he will come on board at a reasonable time and not try to damage Joe in his remaining campaign. Supporters? Well, we hope. But back to Dionne.
Even if the nomination is all but over, the message Dionne preaches is one that all Democrats need to heed through the election and beyond. In short, so-called progressives and so-called moderates need each other. Indeed, all Democrats who seriously contended for the nomination this year were progressives, all of them to the left of even Barack Obama. But Democrats, like almost any group, love to bicker about the smallest differences. When the goal is affordable health care for all, then "Medicare-for-All" versus upgraded Obamacare is a difference in the path, not the goal. Ditto with reducing inequality, climate change, access to education, treatment of immigrants and minorities, and so on. All Democrats stand in stark contrast the Party of Trump (no more "GOP"). We might use the analogy of an athletic team: the coach (voters in the primaries and caucuses) seem to have decided on the starting line-up (Biden), but Sanders and his supporters can still be a part of the team. (Although it would be nice if Sanders became a full-time Democrat, wouldn't it?) One hopes (and I believe) that Bernie won't quit the team out of anger and frustration and that most of his supporters won't either. Bernie, if trends continue, will have been licked fair and square, so any claim of a fix or unfair fight (which seemed to have lingered after Clinton defeated him) will clearly prove to be nothing more than sour grapes.
But there will be--we hope--a Democrat president and a Democrat Congress after the election. And we will need moderates, or as I prefer to say, the "the pragmatists," to work with "the visionaries," those who want to go beyond where the American electorate is prepared to go. Indeed, I agree that great changes in our political and economic systems. And I don't differ much in my diagnosis from those wanting politically-mandated change. But I believe that most of the change will need to come from the bottom up and not imposed from the top down. It will be a combination of both. But pushing too hard from the top (politically) down onto the electorate would likely cause a severe backlash. And Dionne, who's an astute student of American political history, recognizes the necessary synergy needed between the visionaries and the pragmatists to foster change. FDR, for instance, was a political leader who walked this tight-rope successfully. Did FDR accomplish everything he and his visionary supporters would have liked? No. But he did enact change that shaped American life and politics for more than a half-century? Yes. Would the civil rights movement (visionary) have prevailed without the ultimate pragmatic politician, Lyndon Johnson? Likely not, or at least not when they did make great gains in the late 50s through the mid-60s. Like the positive and negative poles of a battery, the visionaries and the pragmatists need each other. Or as great American democratic socialist, Michael Harrington, quoted by Dionne, put it, "the left-wing of the possible" needs to practice "visionary gradualism."
Much of what I've written above channels what Dionne writes about in his book. I've long been a fan of his work: he's a student of high-brow political thought (Francis Fukuyama, Mark Lilla, and Michael Harrington get mentioned and discussed), he pays attention to the insights from contemporary electoral research, and he performs shoe-leather reporting that tries to access what non-elites are thinking, all of which makes for first-rate reporting and analysis. Also--and this should probably be first on my list--Dionne holds a set of values and perspective that I find myself in close agreement with, one that seeks that perfect balance between vision and pragmatism. (Of course, maybe just a little of my high regard for Dionne is based on the fact that he had the tremendous insight to quote our older daughter and her friend in a column he wrote way back in 2000. Our daughter had introduced Bill Bradley at a campaign event. Of course, almost every politically active Iowan should expect some political reporter to quote them at some point during the caucus season.) Anyway, once again I find myself in agreement with Dionne and appreciative of his insights. So while the game isn't over, we should soon expect to have our starting line-up. I hope that everybody who cares about defeating our opponent gets involved and helps us pull together toward a resounding win.
