By Bill Bianchi, PDA Chicago Chapter Leader

After just six years, Progressive Democrats of America (PDA) has established itself as the predominant grassroots organizations affiliated with the Democratic Party. It has done this by advocating and working for progressive principles, adhering to a clear strategy and building a grassroots base. As a result PDA has become one of the few progressive organizations, according to John Nichols of The Nation, “that gets it”, that doesn’t just fold its principles and its base on command into the Democratic Party’s tent. Our leaders and membership have much to be proud of.

But much has changed since PDA’s founding. Then Republicans ruled the political roost, and most liberal Democrats, progressives and even the old left were united in their opposition to Bush’s right wing, war-based policies. Now with Democrats controlling the White House and the legislature by wide margins, things are different and those changes are testing PDA, its vision, goals and strategy.

Our goal and strategies are stated at the PDA web site as: “extend the victory of November 2008 into a permanent, progressive majority. By working inside the Democratic Party and outside in movements for peace and justice, PDA seeks to build a party and government controlled by citizens, not corporate elites—with policies that serve the broad public interest, not just private interests”.

From its beginnings, PDA’s founders and activists fully recognized that the battle for a progressive majority couldn’t be won by simply replacing Republicans with Democrats. They recognized that the Democratic Party has drifted far from its working and middle class base and needs a complete house cleaning. Reading from the website:

For over two decades, the party declined as its leadership listened more to the voices of corporations than those of Americans. PDA strives to rebuild the Democratic Party from the bottom up—from every congressional district to statewide party structures to the corridors of power in Washington, where we work arm in arm with the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

Now six years after our founding and 20 months after the historic Democratic electoral victories of 2008, it is time ask, how are we doing with those stirring goals stated at our website? How should we evaluate our efforts to advance our progressive agenda and elect that progressive majority? Moreover, we need to ask, are the goals and strategy stated above sufficient to carry us successfully past the challenges facing us between now and elections of 2010, 2012 and beyond?

Fortunately, we have the time now to take a breath, discuss and review our vision, strategy and tactics. And to revise or rebuild them if that’s required.
Following the elections of 2008, PDA and many other progressive and left organizations expressed optimism that by today, we would be engaged in an epic battle between people-power and corporate power. We weren’t naïve. Most PDA activists I’m sure had strong concerns about the Party’s increasing embrace of corporate allies and Obama’s weak record as a Progressive.

Some, perhaps wearing special glasses, saw in Obama deep progressive longings. Most, however, were skeptical and said that it would take a broad and determine popular movement to make Obama do the progressive things we seek. Yet, back then, many of us did assume that by this point, some segment of the Democratic Party and the Obama Administration would be fighting on the people’s side against pervasive corporate control, or at least supporting them with resources and moral support.

Unfortunately, after a year and a half in office, President Obama and the ruling Democratic Party have shown no interest in creating the progressive majority that we seek. They have opposed most attempts to create a “government controlled by citizens rather than corporate elites.” We’ve seen Obama and the Party leaders embrace corporate agendas in foreign policy, the economy, health care, energy, and trade. Labor has received little reward for its massive support in 2008. There’s been a disturbing tendency to continue Bush era policies with regard to military spending, spying and torture.

Especially discouraging to PDA, we’ve seen our allies in Congress, the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) exercise little influence with Party leaders and refuse to act in unison on issues of principle or even on issues they have supported. Most galling PDA advisory board member and CPC co-chair, Lynn Woolsey, declined to support the courageous congressional campaign of PDA member Marcy Winograd. Instead, Woolsey conducted a brazen fund raising effort for Blue Dog incumbent, Jane Harmon. How can we challenge the Party’s corporate embrace when one of our board members, the co-chair of the CPC, works for the corporate Democrats?

Based on their words and actions so far, an impartial observer might describe the Democratic Party as a center-right political party with overtones of conservative values similar to those of the previous Bush administration. We shouldn’t be surprised. The record clearly shows, that over the past 6 years at least, the Party has consistently worked to elect conservative, Blue Dog Democrats and to defeat progressive candidates. Even when a progressive Democrat mounts a credible challenge to a Republican in the general elections, Party leaders provide little or no support apparently preferring comfortable old shoe Republicans to a new progressive who may build an independent base of support. There are numerous examples of this behavior from all over the country.

As for Obama, in the on-going battle between people and corporations, he has acted more as a diplomat than a leader, occasionally talking eloquently for the people’s side, and then soon after swearing loyalty to corporate interests. As he told CNBC, “I’m a free-market guy. I believe in the market.”

Since taking office, Obama has appointed few progressives and those few have been given positions far from the policy making centers. Further, when right wing media thugs attack Obama’s progressive appointees, Obama has been slow to defend and quick to dismiss. Most disheartening are the gathering threats to the hallmark accomplishments of Roosevelt and Johnson years. Obama has packed his Debt Commission—the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, dubbed the cat-food commission–with advocates for cutting and even privatizing both Social Security and Medicare, as William Grieder and Jane Hamsher and others have been warning us recently.

It’s becoming clear, that Obama and the Democratic Party leaders won’t be leading the charge for a “government controlled by citizens” and probably will try to block the formation of a permanent Progressive majority in Congress that we seek. As a result, the progressive movement that helped elect the Democrats and Obama is off balance and divided.

Some insist we must focus only on winning victories for the President and the Democrats in order to prevent the Republicans from regaining power. Others including PDA assert that much more is required; we must actually reform the system that for decades has been crushing our democracy and under cutting our standard of living regardless of which party holds power.

For PDA it’s crucial that we step-back and ask ourselves, is our organization strong enough, and is our vision broad enough to carry us through the battles that will take place within the Democratic Party? Will our strategy and tactics as stated and practiced so far enable us to gather the strength we need to build a party and government by the people, of the people and for the people?

It’s crucial that we begin discussing these questions now so we can strengthen our organization at its foundation. To that end, several of us in Chicago offer the following ideas:

1) Expand our strategic vision. Let’s discuss making PDA the political arm of the progressive movement inside and outside the Party. Continue to work inside the Democratic Party and demand accountability. As Amy Dean said in her book, The New New Deal, accountability starts by making clear that merely promising to support our issues once in office is not enough. We need champions at the local, state and national levels who will carry the progressive flag during elections and into office.

But where no progressive Democrats are running or where they refuse to run on a progressive agenda, we should recruit progressive independents to run. Let the Party leaders know that they can not take progressive support for granted, that they will have to earn it. That’s key to gaining accountability from Party candidates and office holders.

2) Create an action-oriented research arm that can build deep understanding of corporate power and how it is exercised. The research will help us identify and frame key issues, find the best electoral and issue opportunities, wage stronger campaigns, and identify fertile fund raising sources.

3) Sharpen our appeal to middle and working class America. The key to building a broad progressive movement is to mobilize those who are suffering most from corporate domination and exploitation. We can better mobilize popular support for our progressive agenda and progressive candidates by giving priority to efforts to restore the economic prosperity and living wage jobs that Middle America enjoyed just a few decades ago.

4) Recruit as many local progressive candidates–in the mold of Marcy Winograd, John Laesch, Dennis Kucinich, and Paul Wellstone—as possible. If we can run progressives in many races simultaneously, it will be more difficult for the Democratic leadership to swarm against them as they did against Marcy Winograd in California. She ran a courageous campaign, but was defeated by the combined might of the California and national Democratic Party).

5) Become expert at reaching out and organizing new and occasional voters as Obama did in 2008. Limiting our efforts to only regular voters favors the Party backed candidates. We need to become skillful at getting that additional 5% to 10% turnout—the new and occasional voters–that can put a progressive over the top. This is where a platform aimed at the most immediate needs of working and middle class Americans can make a big difference on election day. Also, we should study the organizing techniques of community organizations such as National People’s Action.

6) Build local and state coalitions that continue operating beyond a specific election or issue campaigns. PDA’s vision already includes permanent organizations. But to win campaigns, we need to build coalitions with labor, issue and community groups that continue after the campaign, regardless of results. These coalitions will be the key to holding accountable those Democratic candidates that we helped elect.

We, in the PDA Chicago chapter, think these changes will help unify the progressive movement and put PDA into a stronger position both inside and outside the Democratic Party.