West Virginia's Governor, Joe Manchin, Big Coal's friend, wants Robert Byrd's old Senate seat. To that end, he arranged for a special election in November. Thinking it unseemly to appoint himself in the interim, he chose a flunky, Carte Goodwin, to hold his place. Enter Ken Hechler, age 95, a veteran West Virginia Congressman and Secretary of State. Hechler knows he can't beat Manchin. His aim is only to challenge the coal industry on the issue of mountain top removal. Progressives should think seriously about following his lead.
Barack Obama's hold on the nomination for president in 2012 is stronger than Manchin's for the Senate in 2010. This bodes ill for those who seek the "change" Obama's candidacy promised. His administration already takes most Democrats for granted. It could get worse; Obama might even stop doing the one "progressive" thing he does at all -- talking the talk.
In 2008, Obama was like a Rorschach inkblot upon whom voters projected their hopes. There were always reasons to be skeptical, but Obamamaniacs ignored them. Now many of them feel betrayed. Herein lies an opportunity.
The most effective way to nudge Obama to do what his supporters expected would be to launch a primary challenge organized around some of the expectations he raised. A primary contest would generate "teachable moments," the very thing Obama talks about and squanders. It might even force a change of course.
There is so much to run against! But now is not the time for a comprehensive challenge to the poverty of American liberalism. Better to focus narrowly, Hechler style, on one or several issues. Bundling teachable moments together in electoral campaigns only lessens their effect.
There are many functional equivalents of mountain top removal at the ready: the Bush-Obama wars (and the larger issue of American imperialism); the fact that Cheney/Bush era war criminals (including Cheney and Bush) have not been brought to justice; Obama's reluctance to take on the Israeli right and the Israel lobby; his obstruction of effective measures to stem ongoing and future ecological catastrophes; his servility towards Wall Street, and on and on.
The spin-doctors will say that running against Obama from the left will make Republican victories more likely, and that Obama is already too left for most Americans. The latter contention is nonsense, as anyone familiar with the polling data knows. As for the former, it is relevant that much the same was said about Hillary Clinton's reluctance to concede in the 2008 primary season. It is widely believed today that the long primary contest made Obama a better candidate, and helped him win in November.
To be sure, the Obama administration has scored victories -- for example, on health care and financial regulation. Arguably, these reforms are, on balance, beneficial. But they also entrench the power of those who created the problems they partially mitigate. Thus they are of a piece with what has gone wrong. The problem is not just Obama's leadership style. True enough: he is too deferential to economic elites, too servile towards powerful interest groups, and too "bipartisan." Part of the problem too is that he tries, desperately but always in vain, to placate those for whom a Sarah Palin presidency is not unthinkable. The main culprit, though, is corporate power.
In these days of "populist" outrage, corporations are easy targets. But, if Hechler is on to something, as I think he is, the trick is not to take the whole system on at once but to work hard instead on just one or several issues. The media would have to take notice. Then so would the public -- teaching mission accomplished!
To stay on focus, an insurgency needs a standard bearer; and while good issues abound, good leaders are hard to find. As Jimmy Carter's example shows, for a Democrat of consequence to speak truth to power, it is not enough just to command an audience; one must also be indifferent to the entreaties of the party's leadership. Is there anyone with national visibility who is "audacious" enough, as Obama might once have said, to withstand the inevitable abuse? Is there anyone able and willing to take on the role of educator in an electoral contest in which victory is impossible? The most likely candidates, members of the Congressional Black, Hispanic and Progressive caucuses, are almost as useless as Senators. Intent on remaining players, they habitually cave when push comes to shove. Do any of them have what it takes to rise to the occasion? The need is urgent and foot soldiers are there for the organizing. But there is a vacuum at the top. If it remains unfilled, Obama will continue the race to the right that has become emblematic of his presidency. Then everyone will lose.