Talking of “Bush tax cuts” at this point, as so many seem to do when discussing the change in tax policy set to go into force this coming New Years Day, is beyond absurd. What’s coming on Jan. 1, 2011 is the Obama Tax Increase — no less than the largest tax increase in our history, courtesy of a president who, last Tax Day, declared that working Americans should be “saying thank you” for the hefty check they had to write Uncle Sam in order to support the eternally vacationing president and his increasingly out-of-control federal bureaucracy.
At a time when copious amounts of smoke and mirrors are required to even create the illusion of an economic recovery in this country, the Obama tax increases are a disaster in the making that will drive the “progressive” knife further into the backs of the American working man and woman.
In their zealous, rigidly ideological desire to both fund their pet programs (like the $800 billion ”porkulus” project) and lavish state trips and to punish the nefarious “rich” who dared to be successful in a country built on merit-based reward, the president and his party — neither of whom are particularly perceptive when it comes to unintended consequences — are setting up the working class not only for an increase in taxes, but a decrease once again in employment and profitability.
The Obama Tax Increases aren’t, of course, limited just to those eeeevil “rich.” Rather, they will directly affect every American who currently pays into our bloated federal system, and in more than one way.
Back in July, Americans for Tax Reform released an outstanding one-pager on what we can expect when the Obama Tax Increases kick in January 1. Here are a few highlights:
- 10% [income tax] bracket rises to an expanded 15%
- The 25% bracket rises to 28%
- The 28% bracket rises to 31%
- The 33% bracket rises to 36%
- The 35% bracket rises to 39.6%
The marriage penalty will be expanded and the child tax credit reduced, and “the capital gains tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 20 percent in 2011. The dividends tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 39.6 percent in 2011. These rates will rise another 3.8 percent in 2013″ (ATR, same citation). Adding further insult and hardship to this is the return of the Death Tax, which is set to jump from 0 to 55%, meaning that over half of what you leave to your children when you die will go directly into Barack Obama and the Federal Government’s pockets. It may be time to start hiding that inheritance cash under a mattress or loose floorboard, unless you really do wish to will Obama & Co. as many rounds of golf and $200m/day Indian vacations as half-plus-five of your legacy can purchase.
The ramifications of the Obama Tax Increases for working class Americans are not limited to money being directly lifted from their paychecks and investment returns by the federal government, though. The fact is, even if the tax increases on the low and middle income portion of the work force (arguable and elastic designations both) are done away with by a lame duck session of the Democrat-led 111th Congress, and increases are put in place only for the “rich,” money — and, worse, jobs — will still be taken directly from working class Americans.
In June, economist Arthur Laffer wrote the following about the looming Obama Tax Increase:
…if people know tax rates will be higher next year than they are this year, what will those people do this year? They will shift production and income out of next year into this year to the extent possible. As a result, income this year has already been inflated above where it otherwise should be and next year, 2011, income will be lower than it otherwise should be.
Also, the prospect of rising prices, higher interest rates and more regulations next year will further entice demand and supply to be shifted from 2011 into 2010. In my view, this shift of income and demand is a major reason that the economy in 2010 has appeared as strong as it has. When we pass the tax boundary of Jan. 1, 2011, my best guess is that the train goes off the tracks and we get our worst nightmare of a severe “double dip” recession.
This was put much more casually and accessibly by Senator-elect Rand Paul (R-KY) on Tuesday night, when he responded to Wolf Blitzer’s on-air inquiry about the wisdom of a tax increase “on only the wealthiest Americans — those making $250,000 a year or more.” Paul said (paraphrase), “We all make a living working for, or selling things to, ‘rich’ people,” so taking more money out of their pockets directly affects the people whose livelihoods depend on that work and those sales.
Spot on.
Unfortunately, extravagant vacations and failed spending programs require capital — and the easiest way for the current administration to gain that is to simply take more of it, at the point of a gun, from the people who currently have it.
As Nathan Wurtzel wrote Wednesday on Twitter, following the president’s amazingly out-of-touch post-election press conference, “People who are scared of freedom bitterly cling to their government and spending” — a play (albeit a true one) on the ivory tower president’s campaign statement that when those wrong-headed, uneducated Americans “get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustration.”
Given the penchant this president and his party have already shown for thumbing their collective nose at the wishes of the American people (on the “stimulus,” on Obamacare, etc.), and for referring to those who dare question their policies as “unpatriotic, “dangerous to our democracy” and “our enemies,” it should be no surprise that the outcry of the citizenry, demonstrated both in protests and at the ballot box, would be swept aside by “progressives” who clearly believe they simply know better than everybody else what this country and its people need.
Tom Perriello always knew it would be hard to hold his seat in Congress. The progressive Democrat from Albemarle County, Va. represents a district designed to nullify liberal votes with a wide swath of conservative countryside. He was elected in 2008, riding President Obama’s coattails to victory by just 727 votes. He does not represent a swing district--he is a committed progressive in a solidly Republican district. But unlike his Blue Dog contemporaries, Perriello has voted like a progressive for the past two years. And unlike many Blue Dogs, he might actually pull out a victory tomorrow night, even in the face of a Republican wave fueled by double-digit unemployment. The mere fact that he’s in the running is a stunning accomplishment.
I lived in Perriello’s district for eight years before moving to Washington, D.C. this summer. For mountains, majesty, and rock ‘n roll, it simply can’t be beat. But there were problems, namely persistent racial tensions, a lousy economy and politicians who perpetuated these two troubles. For all but the last two years we were represented by Virgil Goode, a conservative Republican and unabashed bigot. Years before Fox News made Islamophobia a mainstream political view, Goode was openly attacking Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., on the grounds that he was – gasp!—a Muslim. Goode cruised to re-election every cycle, easily surviving the 2006 Democratic wave, despite being a Bush-backing war-monger in a year when voters were rejecting both Bush and his war in Iraq.
I lived in Charlottesville, a tiny outcropping of progressive politics at the northern tip of the Fifth District. From Charlottesville, the district fans out directly to the rural south, extending all the way to the North Carolina border. It’s a two-and-a-half hour drive straight south from Charlottesville to Danville, three hours southwest to Collinsville or southeast to Brunswick. All four towns are in the same district. Just 40,000 people live in Charlottesville—120,000 if you include Albemarle County (which is not as progressive as “the city”). But the district as a whole includes nearly 650,000 people, most of it tiny towns and farmland, and most of its inhabitants Republicans. Jerry Falwell’s right-wing conservative Christian enclave Liberty University is smack in the middle of Perriello country.
Conventional wisdom dictates that Democratic politicians in such districts vote like Republicans. Otherwise, a Republican runs against you, points out that you’re not a Republican, and beats you.
But Perriello decided to take a different tack when he was elected. Instead of capitulating to policies and votes he didn’t believe in, he would do what he thought was right, and make an aggressive case to voters that he was, in fact, right.
On every major vote in the past two years, Perriello voted with progressives, at times even voting against President Obama on the grounds that his policies were not progressive enough. He voted for healthcare reform and the stimulus package, but he voted against Wall Street reform because it didn’t hit the big banks hard enough, and he voted against disbursing the second round of bailout money to the banks (he wasn’t in office when the bank bailout was approved).
He never apologized for these votes or caved to right-wing rhetorical frames, and he hit the road to campaign on his record, explaining his positions directly to voters. This was old-school campaigning, and it wasn’t glamorous—trekking from Danville to Martinsville to Charlottesville every week, making speeches, shaking hands and answering questions in town-hall meetings. But Perriello is not your standard politician waiting for a cushy lobbyist job. He has a deep background in social justice work—he’s in Congress because he wants to make a difference, not to score a sweet paycheck.
All of that campaigning has paid off. Voters are pissed off this year. They’ve watched Wall Street profits soar on the back of a taxpayer-financed bailout, even as ordinary Americans have been laid off by the millions. Whether Republicans take control of the House tomorrow night or not, they will certainly make big gains as voters reject policymakers who cater to big banks while failing to tackle the jobs problem—either out of political cowardice or ideological blindness.
But Perriello is holding even with Republican challenger Robert Hurt. The fact that Perriello even has a chance in this election ought to be viewed as something of a miracle. Or maybe it’s just good governing, combined with good politics.
Tim Fernholz almost gets it right in his profile of Perriello for The American Prospect. But he misses the mark with this comment, which is going to be echoed by the Beltway establishment on Wednesday morning, however the race turns out:
“If Perriello can beat the odds tomorrow, it is not only his reputation, and the president's, that will be burnished . . . . Should he lose, the voices who call for a more timid Democratic Party will have a point in their favor.”
This is wrong. Perriello won in 2008 by just 727 votes. Any Democrat who entered office by so slim a margin is almost certain to lose this year. By any conventional political analysis, Perriello should be getting trounced He faces a massive voter registration disadvantage, representing a district that is designed to crush progressive voices during what is expected to be a wave election for Republicans, amid strong anti-incumbent attitudes sparked by high unemployment. But he’s holding even. That’s incredible. Even if things go well for Democrats tomorrow, and they hold the House, candidates in much safer districts than Perreillo’s are going to lose.
The Perriello lesson, in other words, is already clear. Whether he wins or loses on November 2, having the courage to govern by his convictions and do real work to sell those policies has paid off. It might not get him re-elected. But in an all-but-impossible district, losing close sends a clear signal to actual swing districts. Governing like a pretend-Republican only reinforces the Republican world-view and aligns voters against you. If you want to have a chance, you have to stand for something. Tom Perriello stood for something these past two years, and even if it can’t overcome a terrible economy to win him two more years, the political establishment should take heart.
benchcraft company scamCorrected Nov. 17: The Catholic bishops' surprise election yesterday of New York's Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan as their president is more bad news for Obama in 2012.
News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...
Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.
benchcraft company scam
Talking of “Bush tax cuts” at this point, as so many seem to do when discussing the change in tax policy set to go into force this coming New Years Day, is beyond absurd. What’s coming on Jan. 1, 2011 is the Obama Tax Increase — no less than the largest tax increase in our history, courtesy of a president who, last Tax Day, declared that working Americans should be “saying thank you” for the hefty check they had to write Uncle Sam in order to support the eternally vacationing president and his increasingly out-of-control federal bureaucracy.
At a time when copious amounts of smoke and mirrors are required to even create the illusion of an economic recovery in this country, the Obama tax increases are a disaster in the making that will drive the “progressive” knife further into the backs of the American working man and woman.
In their zealous, rigidly ideological desire to both fund their pet programs (like the $800 billion ”porkulus” project) and lavish state trips and to punish the nefarious “rich” who dared to be successful in a country built on merit-based reward, the president and his party — neither of whom are particularly perceptive when it comes to unintended consequences — are setting up the working class not only for an increase in taxes, but a decrease once again in employment and profitability.
The Obama Tax Increases aren’t, of course, limited just to those eeeevil “rich.” Rather, they will directly affect every American who currently pays into our bloated federal system, and in more than one way.
Back in July, Americans for Tax Reform released an outstanding one-pager on what we can expect when the Obama Tax Increases kick in January 1. Here are a few highlights:
- 10% [income tax] bracket rises to an expanded 15%
- The 25% bracket rises to 28%
- The 28% bracket rises to 31%
- The 33% bracket rises to 36%
- The 35% bracket rises to 39.6%
The marriage penalty will be expanded and the child tax credit reduced, and “the capital gains tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 20 percent in 2011. The dividends tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 39.6 percent in 2011. These rates will rise another 3.8 percent in 2013″ (ATR, same citation). Adding further insult and hardship to this is the return of the Death Tax, which is set to jump from 0 to 55%, meaning that over half of what you leave to your children when you die will go directly into Barack Obama and the Federal Government’s pockets. It may be time to start hiding that inheritance cash under a mattress or loose floorboard, unless you really do wish to will Obama & Co. as many rounds of golf and $200m/day Indian vacations as half-plus-five of your legacy can purchase.
The ramifications of the Obama Tax Increases for working class Americans are not limited to money being directly lifted from their paychecks and investment returns by the federal government, though. The fact is, even if the tax increases on the low and middle income portion of the work force (arguable and elastic designations both) are done away with by a lame duck session of the Democrat-led 111th Congress, and increases are put in place only for the “rich,” money — and, worse, jobs — will still be taken directly from working class Americans.
In June, economist Arthur Laffer wrote the following about the looming Obama Tax Increase:
…if people know tax rates will be higher next year than they are this year, what will those people do this year? They will shift production and income out of next year into this year to the extent possible. As a result, income this year has already been inflated above where it otherwise should be and next year, 2011, income will be lower than it otherwise should be.
Also, the prospect of rising prices, higher interest rates and more regulations next year will further entice demand and supply to be shifted from 2011 into 2010. In my view, this shift of income and demand is a major reason that the economy in 2010 has appeared as strong as it has. When we pass the tax boundary of Jan. 1, 2011, my best guess is that the train goes off the tracks and we get our worst nightmare of a severe “double dip” recession.
This was put much more casually and accessibly by Senator-elect Rand Paul (R-KY) on Tuesday night, when he responded to Wolf Blitzer’s on-air inquiry about the wisdom of a tax increase “on only the wealthiest Americans — those making $250,000 a year or more.” Paul said (paraphrase), “We all make a living working for, or selling things to, ‘rich’ people,” so taking more money out of their pockets directly affects the people whose livelihoods depend on that work and those sales.
Spot on.
Unfortunately, extravagant vacations and failed spending programs require capital — and the easiest way for the current administration to gain that is to simply take more of it, at the point of a gun, from the people who currently have it.
As Nathan Wurtzel wrote Wednesday on Twitter, following the president’s amazingly out-of-touch post-election press conference, “People who are scared of freedom bitterly cling to their government and spending” — a play (albeit a true one) on the ivory tower president’s campaign statement that when those wrong-headed, uneducated Americans “get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustration.”
Given the penchant this president and his party have already shown for thumbing their collective nose at the wishes of the American people (on the “stimulus,” on Obamacare, etc.), and for referring to those who dare question their policies as “unpatriotic, “dangerous to our democracy” and “our enemies,” it should be no surprise that the outcry of the citizenry, demonstrated both in protests and at the ballot box, would be swept aside by “progressives” who clearly believe they simply know better than everybody else what this country and its people need.
Tom Perriello always knew it would be hard to hold his seat in Congress. The progressive Democrat from Albemarle County, Va. represents a district designed to nullify liberal votes with a wide swath of conservative countryside. He was elected in 2008, riding President Obama’s coattails to victory by just 727 votes. He does not represent a swing district--he is a committed progressive in a solidly Republican district. But unlike his Blue Dog contemporaries, Perriello has voted like a progressive for the past two years. And unlike many Blue Dogs, he might actually pull out a victory tomorrow night, even in the face of a Republican wave fueled by double-digit unemployment. The mere fact that he’s in the running is a stunning accomplishment.
I lived in Perriello’s district for eight years before moving to Washington, D.C. this summer. For mountains, majesty, and rock ‘n roll, it simply can’t be beat. But there were problems, namely persistent racial tensions, a lousy economy and politicians who perpetuated these two troubles. For all but the last two years we were represented by Virgil Goode, a conservative Republican and unabashed bigot. Years before Fox News made Islamophobia a mainstream political view, Goode was openly attacking Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., on the grounds that he was – gasp!—a Muslim. Goode cruised to re-election every cycle, easily surviving the 2006 Democratic wave, despite being a Bush-backing war-monger in a year when voters were rejecting both Bush and his war in Iraq.
I lived in Charlottesville, a tiny outcropping of progressive politics at the northern tip of the Fifth District. From Charlottesville, the district fans out directly to the rural south, extending all the way to the North Carolina border. It’s a two-and-a-half hour drive straight south from Charlottesville to Danville, three hours southwest to Collinsville or southeast to Brunswick. All four towns are in the same district. Just 40,000 people live in Charlottesville—120,000 if you include Albemarle County (which is not as progressive as “the city”). But the district as a whole includes nearly 650,000 people, most of it tiny towns and farmland, and most of its inhabitants Republicans. Jerry Falwell’s right-wing conservative Christian enclave Liberty University is smack in the middle of Perriello country.
Conventional wisdom dictates that Democratic politicians in such districts vote like Republicans. Otherwise, a Republican runs against you, points out that you’re not a Republican, and beats you.
But Perriello decided to take a different tack when he was elected. Instead of capitulating to policies and votes he didn’t believe in, he would do what he thought was right, and make an aggressive case to voters that he was, in fact, right.
On every major vote in the past two years, Perriello voted with progressives, at times even voting against President Obama on the grounds that his policies were not progressive enough. He voted for healthcare reform and the stimulus package, but he voted against Wall Street reform because it didn’t hit the big banks hard enough, and he voted against disbursing the second round of bailout money to the banks (he wasn’t in office when the bank bailout was approved).
He never apologized for these votes or caved to right-wing rhetorical frames, and he hit the road to campaign on his record, explaining his positions directly to voters. This was old-school campaigning, and it wasn’t glamorous—trekking from Danville to Martinsville to Charlottesville every week, making speeches, shaking hands and answering questions in town-hall meetings. But Perriello is not your standard politician waiting for a cushy lobbyist job. He has a deep background in social justice work—he’s in Congress because he wants to make a difference, not to score a sweet paycheck.
All of that campaigning has paid off. Voters are pissed off this year. They’ve watched Wall Street profits soar on the back of a taxpayer-financed bailout, even as ordinary Americans have been laid off by the millions. Whether Republicans take control of the House tomorrow night or not, they will certainly make big gains as voters reject policymakers who cater to big banks while failing to tackle the jobs problem—either out of political cowardice or ideological blindness.
But Perriello is holding even with Republican challenger Robert Hurt. The fact that Perriello even has a chance in this election ought to be viewed as something of a miracle. Or maybe it’s just good governing, combined with good politics.
Tim Fernholz almost gets it right in his profile of Perriello for The American Prospect. But he misses the mark with this comment, which is going to be echoed by the Beltway establishment on Wednesday morning, however the race turns out:
“If Perriello can beat the odds tomorrow, it is not only his reputation, and the president's, that will be burnished . . . . Should he lose, the voices who call for a more timid Democratic Party will have a point in their favor.”
This is wrong. Perriello won in 2008 by just 727 votes. Any Democrat who entered office by so slim a margin is almost certain to lose this year. By any conventional political analysis, Perriello should be getting trounced He faces a massive voter registration disadvantage, representing a district that is designed to crush progressive voices during what is expected to be a wave election for Republicans, amid strong anti-incumbent attitudes sparked by high unemployment. But he’s holding even. That’s incredible. Even if things go well for Democrats tomorrow, and they hold the House, candidates in much safer districts than Perreillo’s are going to lose.
The Perriello lesson, in other words, is already clear. Whether he wins or loses on November 2, having the courage to govern by his convictions and do real work to sell those policies has paid off. It might not get him re-elected. But in an all-but-impossible district, losing close sends a clear signal to actual swing districts. Governing like a pretend-Republican only reinforces the Republican world-view and aligns voters against you. If you want to have a chance, you have to stand for something. Tom Perriello stood for something these past two years, and even if it can’t overcome a terrible economy to win him two more years, the political establishment should take heart.
benchcraft company scamCorrected Nov. 17: The Catholic bishops' surprise election yesterday of New York's Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan as their president is more bad news for Obama in 2012.
News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...
Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.
bench craft company scambench craft company scam
benchcraft company scamCorrected Nov. 17: The Catholic bishops' surprise election yesterday of New York's Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan as their president is more bad news for Obama in 2012.
News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...
Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.
benchcraft company scam
Talking of “Bush tax cuts” at this point, as so many seem to do when discussing the change in tax policy set to go into force this coming New Years Day, is beyond absurd. What’s coming on Jan. 1, 2011 is the Obama Tax Increase — no less than the largest tax increase in our history, courtesy of a president who, last Tax Day, declared that working Americans should be “saying thank you” for the hefty check they had to write Uncle Sam in order to support the eternally vacationing president and his increasingly out-of-control federal bureaucracy.
At a time when copious amounts of smoke and mirrors are required to even create the illusion of an economic recovery in this country, the Obama tax increases are a disaster in the making that will drive the “progressive” knife further into the backs of the American working man and woman.
In their zealous, rigidly ideological desire to both fund their pet programs (like the $800 billion ”porkulus” project) and lavish state trips and to punish the nefarious “rich” who dared to be successful in a country built on merit-based reward, the president and his party — neither of whom are particularly perceptive when it comes to unintended consequences — are setting up the working class not only for an increase in taxes, but a decrease once again in employment and profitability.
The Obama Tax Increases aren’t, of course, limited just to those eeeevil “rich.” Rather, they will directly affect every American who currently pays into our bloated federal system, and in more than one way.
Back in July, Americans for Tax Reform released an outstanding one-pager on what we can expect when the Obama Tax Increases kick in January 1. Here are a few highlights:
- 10% [income tax] bracket rises to an expanded 15%
- The 25% bracket rises to 28%
- The 28% bracket rises to 31%
- The 33% bracket rises to 36%
- The 35% bracket rises to 39.6%
The marriage penalty will be expanded and the child tax credit reduced, and “the capital gains tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 20 percent in 2011. The dividends tax will rise from 15 percent this year to 39.6 percent in 2011. These rates will rise another 3.8 percent in 2013″ (ATR, same citation). Adding further insult and hardship to this is the return of the Death Tax, which is set to jump from 0 to 55%, meaning that over half of what you leave to your children when you die will go directly into Barack Obama and the Federal Government’s pockets. It may be time to start hiding that inheritance cash under a mattress or loose floorboard, unless you really do wish to will Obama & Co. as many rounds of golf and $200m/day Indian vacations as half-plus-five of your legacy can purchase.
The ramifications of the Obama Tax Increases for working class Americans are not limited to money being directly lifted from their paychecks and investment returns by the federal government, though. The fact is, even if the tax increases on the low and middle income portion of the work force (arguable and elastic designations both) are done away with by a lame duck session of the Democrat-led 111th Congress, and increases are put in place only for the “rich,” money — and, worse, jobs — will still be taken directly from working class Americans.
In June, economist Arthur Laffer wrote the following about the looming Obama Tax Increase:
…if people know tax rates will be higher next year than they are this year, what will those people do this year? They will shift production and income out of next year into this year to the extent possible. As a result, income this year has already been inflated above where it otherwise should be and next year, 2011, income will be lower than it otherwise should be.
Also, the prospect of rising prices, higher interest rates and more regulations next year will further entice demand and supply to be shifted from 2011 into 2010. In my view, this shift of income and demand is a major reason that the economy in 2010 has appeared as strong as it has. When we pass the tax boundary of Jan. 1, 2011, my best guess is that the train goes off the tracks and we get our worst nightmare of a severe “double dip” recession.
This was put much more casually and accessibly by Senator-elect Rand Paul (R-KY) on Tuesday night, when he responded to Wolf Blitzer’s on-air inquiry about the wisdom of a tax increase “on only the wealthiest Americans — those making $250,000 a year or more.” Paul said (paraphrase), “We all make a living working for, or selling things to, ‘rich’ people,” so taking more money out of their pockets directly affects the people whose livelihoods depend on that work and those sales.
Spot on.
Unfortunately, extravagant vacations and failed spending programs require capital — and the easiest way for the current administration to gain that is to simply take more of it, at the point of a gun, from the people who currently have it.
As Nathan Wurtzel wrote Wednesday on Twitter, following the president’s amazingly out-of-touch post-election press conference, “People who are scared of freedom bitterly cling to their government and spending” — a play (albeit a true one) on the ivory tower president’s campaign statement that when those wrong-headed, uneducated Americans “get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustration.”
Given the penchant this president and his party have already shown for thumbing their collective nose at the wishes of the American people (on the “stimulus,” on Obamacare, etc.), and for referring to those who dare question their policies as “unpatriotic, “dangerous to our democracy” and “our enemies,” it should be no surprise that the outcry of the citizenry, demonstrated both in protests and at the ballot box, would be swept aside by “progressives” who clearly believe they simply know better than everybody else what this country and its people need.
Tom Perriello always knew it would be hard to hold his seat in Congress. The progressive Democrat from Albemarle County, Va. represents a district designed to nullify liberal votes with a wide swath of conservative countryside. He was elected in 2008, riding President Obama’s coattails to victory by just 727 votes. He does not represent a swing district--he is a committed progressive in a solidly Republican district. But unlike his Blue Dog contemporaries, Perriello has voted like a progressive for the past two years. And unlike many Blue Dogs, he might actually pull out a victory tomorrow night, even in the face of a Republican wave fueled by double-digit unemployment. The mere fact that he’s in the running is a stunning accomplishment.
I lived in Perriello’s district for eight years before moving to Washington, D.C. this summer. For mountains, majesty, and rock ‘n roll, it simply can’t be beat. But there were problems, namely persistent racial tensions, a lousy economy and politicians who perpetuated these two troubles. For all but the last two years we were represented by Virgil Goode, a conservative Republican and unabashed bigot. Years before Fox News made Islamophobia a mainstream political view, Goode was openly attacking Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., on the grounds that he was – gasp!—a Muslim. Goode cruised to re-election every cycle, easily surviving the 2006 Democratic wave, despite being a Bush-backing war-monger in a year when voters were rejecting both Bush and his war in Iraq.
I lived in Charlottesville, a tiny outcropping of progressive politics at the northern tip of the Fifth District. From Charlottesville, the district fans out directly to the rural south, extending all the way to the North Carolina border. It’s a two-and-a-half hour drive straight south from Charlottesville to Danville, three hours southwest to Collinsville or southeast to Brunswick. All four towns are in the same district. Just 40,000 people live in Charlottesville—120,000 if you include Albemarle County (which is not as progressive as “the city”). But the district as a whole includes nearly 650,000 people, most of it tiny towns and farmland, and most of its inhabitants Republicans. Jerry Falwell’s right-wing conservative Christian enclave Liberty University is smack in the middle of Perriello country.
Conventional wisdom dictates that Democratic politicians in such districts vote like Republicans. Otherwise, a Republican runs against you, points out that you’re not a Republican, and beats you.
But Perriello decided to take a different tack when he was elected. Instead of capitulating to policies and votes he didn’t believe in, he would do what he thought was right, and make an aggressive case to voters that he was, in fact, right.
On every major vote in the past two years, Perriello voted with progressives, at times even voting against President Obama on the grounds that his policies were not progressive enough. He voted for healthcare reform and the stimulus package, but he voted against Wall Street reform because it didn’t hit the big banks hard enough, and he voted against disbursing the second round of bailout money to the banks (he wasn’t in office when the bank bailout was approved).
He never apologized for these votes or caved to right-wing rhetorical frames, and he hit the road to campaign on his record, explaining his positions directly to voters. This was old-school campaigning, and it wasn’t glamorous—trekking from Danville to Martinsville to Charlottesville every week, making speeches, shaking hands and answering questions in town-hall meetings. But Perriello is not your standard politician waiting for a cushy lobbyist job. He has a deep background in social justice work—he’s in Congress because he wants to make a difference, not to score a sweet paycheck.
All of that campaigning has paid off. Voters are pissed off this year. They’ve watched Wall Street profits soar on the back of a taxpayer-financed bailout, even as ordinary Americans have been laid off by the millions. Whether Republicans take control of the House tomorrow night or not, they will certainly make big gains as voters reject policymakers who cater to big banks while failing to tackle the jobs problem—either out of political cowardice or ideological blindness.
But Perriello is holding even with Republican challenger Robert Hurt. The fact that Perriello even has a chance in this election ought to be viewed as something of a miracle. Or maybe it’s just good governing, combined with good politics.
Tim Fernholz almost gets it right in his profile of Perriello for The American Prospect. But he misses the mark with this comment, which is going to be echoed by the Beltway establishment on Wednesday morning, however the race turns out:
“If Perriello can beat the odds tomorrow, it is not only his reputation, and the president's, that will be burnished . . . . Should he lose, the voices who call for a more timid Democratic Party will have a point in their favor.”
This is wrong. Perriello won in 2008 by just 727 votes. Any Democrat who entered office by so slim a margin is almost certain to lose this year. By any conventional political analysis, Perriello should be getting trounced He faces a massive voter registration disadvantage, representing a district that is designed to crush progressive voices during what is expected to be a wave election for Republicans, amid strong anti-incumbent attitudes sparked by high unemployment. But he’s holding even. That’s incredible. Even if things go well for Democrats tomorrow, and they hold the House, candidates in much safer districts than Perreillo’s are going to lose.
The Perriello lesson, in other words, is already clear. Whether he wins or loses on November 2, having the courage to govern by his convictions and do real work to sell those policies has paid off. It might not get him re-elected. But in an all-but-impossible district, losing close sends a clear signal to actual swing districts. Governing like a pretend-Republican only reinforces the Republican world-view and aligns voters against you. If you want to have a chance, you have to stand for something. Tom Perriello stood for something these past two years, and even if it can’t overcome a terrible economy to win him two more years, the political establishment should take heart.
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bench craft company scamCorrected Nov. 17: The Catholic bishops' surprise election yesterday of New York's Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan as their president is more bad news for Obama in 2012.
News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...
Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.
benchcraft company scam
benchcraft company scamCorrected Nov. 17: The Catholic bishops' surprise election yesterday of New York's Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan as their president is more bad news for Obama in 2012.
News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...
Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.
bench craft company scamCorrected Nov. 17: The Catholic bishops' surprise election yesterday of New York's Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan as their president is more bad news for Obama in 2012.
News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...
Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.
bench craft company scamCorrected Nov. 17: The Catholic bishops' surprise election yesterday of New York's Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan as their president is more bad news for Obama in 2012.
News publishers and readers both benefit when journalists get proper credit for their work. That can be difficult, with news spreading so quickly and many websites syndicating articles to others. That's why we're experimenting with two ...
Read our Xbox 360 news of 360-exclusive Fallout: NV DLC revealed.
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