This is an open letter to the DNC (Democratic National Committee) about their failure to confront Trump effectively. I haven’t sent it yet and welcome feedback.
Putin makes his mark
Dear Democratic National Committee and Surrogates:
They say any publicity is good publicity and by that standard the DNC is doing a world of good for Donald Trump. Every fund request I get tells of another blunder or outrage, acts that do little to upset his base.
What I don’t hear is what the Democratic Party offers as an alternative. That means zero publicity for what really matters: a radically different vision for an America we can once again recognize as our own.
You lost the election, on multiple levels. Put your house in order and invite us in.
Address, at the very least:
Will you revitalize and pursue the Democratic platform devised at last year’s convention and use it as a building block to the future?
What will you do to return us to a Post-Enlightenment (17th century on) world that understands how science freed us from myth, superstition and folly? The Republicans have opted for a medieval system of belief that denies scientific evidence in favor of blind faith and willful ignorance. How will you make clear the difference, especially among those susceptible to a system the nurtures unverified claims and demagogic appeals?
When will you stop pretending the working class does not exist, or is populated with undesirables? Factory workers are not members of the middle class as President Obama seemed to believe. They earn wages not salaries and have much less security, just for a start. Saving the middle class, the sub-title of Elizabeth Warren’s new book, ignores those whose future stands in yet starker jeopardy. When will you speak to and for a core constituency you have overlooked and sometimes disdained?
How will you stop corporations and rich individuals for shirking their responsibility to pay taxes? We may have a high corporate tax rate but it is a fiction, obviously so when companies like Apple can shelter vast amounts of profit in foreign nations, untaxed.
When can Medicare be gradually extended downward to become a universal health care system? How will you handle the vested, private interests that turn health into a profit center?
How can we acknowledge the difficult status quo of semi-legal and illegal immigrants and offer a path to citizenship as well as a well-coordinated plan to limit illegal entry in the future?
What tangible steps and new legislation will secure equal rights for all genders and sexual orientations as well as all ethnic and religious groups?
How will you acknowledge the fear, resentment and even hatred expressed by some whites who can no longer take their historical racial or gender privileges for granted? How can the sense of an all-inclusive American People can be restored?
What concrete steps do you propose to counter terrorism by building democratic institutions, especially in countries that lack democratic traditions? What texts should be read in schools, what role can local and regional governments play, how can citizens make their voices heard and respected, when can tribal leaders and warlords have their power reduced? Isn’t it time to step back from endorsing monarchs, oligarchs, patriarchs and illiberal ultra-nationalists who refuse to find a way to accommodate and respect minority groups of all kinds? We say we want to bring democracy to others but more other bring little more than death and destruction. What will you do to change this?
Why do I not hear about action, real action, in these directions?
I can vote against someone, but I also want to ACT FOR something.
This are hard questions but without answers the Democratic Party will remain a party of the past.
Bill Nichols 