Guest post by Noel Holston
On the first night of the first round of debates among Democratic presidential aspirants, Julián Castro, who was Secretary of Housing and Urban Development in the Obama administration, had a spotlight-grabbing moment when he upbraided fellow Texan Beto O’Rourke for not supporting his plan to end criminal penalties for undocumented immigrants crossing our southern border from Mexico.
On the second night, when a different 10 hopefuls fanned across NBC’s Wheel of Fortune stage, the impact of Castro’s attack was obvious. Aked if they backed Castro’s plan, nine candidates raised their hands. All 10 said they would back federal health subsidies for undocumented immigrants, an idea President Barack Obama nixed a decade earlier.
The candidates’ stampede to out “left” each other reached its most bizarre point when Castro volunteered that his universal healthcare plan would cover abortions, including abortions for trans women. At least this would not be a benefit that would significantly affect the deficit.
Since those nights, one of the hottest topics among the commentariat has been whether Democrats are going to blow their opportunity to dethrone President Trump by catering to their most progressive constituents.
Writing in The Atlantic, Peter Beinart asked, “Will the Democratic Party go too far?”
“I’ll vote for almost any Democrat, but lurching left won’t beat Trump,” read the headline on a USA Today editorial by Tom Nichols, a national security professor at the Naval War College and a self-identified “Never Trump”-er.
“Democratic candidates veer left, leaving behind successful midterm strategy,” read the headline on a Washington Post analysis piece by Michael Scherer, one of its national correspondents.
Hogwash, say others, among them Keith A. Spencer, writing in Salon.com about “hard evidence” that supposedly proves a centrist Democrat will belly flop in 2020.
Other op-ed’s have warned Democrats to beware of Republican trolls trying to trick them into pursuing foolish moderation.
So, what are Democrats to do?
Well, what if they borrowed a phrase from “A Clockwork Chartreuse,” Loudon Wainwright III’s tongue-in-cheek paean to an anarchist: “Let’s burn down McDonald’s/Let’s go whole hog.”
Here are few things Democratic candidates can advocate at the next round of debates – July 30 and 31, CNN — if they really, really want to test the notion that the way to deny Donald Trump a second term is not moderation but a triple jump to the left. In no particular order:
Claiming “originalist” interpretation, ban private ownership of all firearms designed after 1789, the year the U.S. Constitution was ratified.
Ban bacon and big-ass pick-up trucks.
Remove slave owners’ heads from Mt. Rushmore.
Outlaw Mountain Dew.
Expand national park acreage to include Texas.
Along with abolishing private health insurance and replacing it with Medicare for All, reimburse patients for parking at hospital ramps.
Mandatory kale consumption.
Stop construction of Trump’s wall; commence construction of automated “people mover” walkways.
Change national anthem to Neil Diamond’s immigrant-friendly “(Coming to) America.”
Abolish apple pie as the national dessert. I’m thinking rhubarb.
Note: Noel Holston is a freelance writer who lives in Athens, Georgia. He’s a contributing essayist to Medium.com, TVWorthWatching.com, and other websites. He previously wrote about television and radio at Newsday (200-2005) and, as a crosstown counterpart to the Pioneer Press’s Brian Lambert, at the Star Tribune (1986-2000). He’s the author of “Life After Deaf: My Misadventures in Hearing Loss and Recovery,” which is scheduled for publication fall of 2019 by Skyhorse.
The Democratic candidates cannot go too far to the left, any more than tRump et al went too far to the right. By far, the largest number of disenfranchised voter in this country are well to the left. Unless the out of touch DRMs can figure that out, we will be stuck with tRump McConnell et al. The end of the universe as intelligent people see it.
Nice! I especially like “Outlaw Mountain Dew.”
I’m the daughter of an immigrant from Jamaica, and I respect the motivations that drive people to come here. I also think we need a more rational, and perhaps more stringent, immigration policy. I don’t think the progressives understand that it’s not just white people who look askance at untrammeled immigration, and I don’t think they realize that doubts about immigration are not always fueled by racism.
Many Hispanics and African Americans are very concerned about the effect of a large influx of low-skilled immigrants on the working poor and working class communites they join. For example, read https://www.afro.com/democrats-immigration-dogma-is-damaging-african-american-communities/. Of course the Democrats take those votes for granted, but the time may be upon us when there is a point of diminishing return for voting democrat.
I believe we must set things in better order for the working poor, as well as the fallen-on-hard-times white, black, and brown working class people, before setting our sites on saving everyone else. The white Trump voters spoke to this in 2016, but I don’t think Democrats have listened. It may not be very long before black and brown people speak to it as well.
As for me, I can’t vote for Trump. But if the democrats persist in this foolishness, I may — for the first time in my voting life — stay home on election day.
Ruth has an especially good point regarding current American citizens, both native born and naturalized, who need help. Is it possible that Democrats could alienate even more of them by prioritizing refugees from Central American countries? I would say yes. I believe we have to temper our compassion with realism.
Ruth, I agree that there needs to be limits and a much more rational immigration policy. But I also know that 1) people fleeing some of the most violent countries in the world in Central America have a reasonable asylum case that the law allows them to make and 2) overall, as this article notes, for fiscal and economic reasons, the U.S. needs more immigrants, not fewer.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/03/business/economy/immigration-labor-economy.html
Yes, I get the NY Times, and I understand their position, which is very pro-immigration with no questions asked. Also I understand about the issue of violence, as Jamaica once had the highest murder rate in the world, and still goes through periods that rival what has been going on in Central America.
A couple of things to note: crime in Central America, although still appalling, has decreased significantly over the past few years, while the numbers of people claiming asylum have surged. Much of what is driving asylum seeking right now is economic stress, which is an issue for people all over the planet. That is why people from Congo and Bangladesh are coming into Mexico in order to gain access to the U.S. border.
And yes we have a labor shortage. We’ve had them before, and they tend to go in cycles. The low-skilled workers we let in over the next few years will be here for the next job shortage. Poverty in low-skilled immigrant communities has a strong tendency to become generational. So what we’re talking about is increasing future competition within a vulnerable class in order for employers to be able to pay below living-wage rates now.
I respect the needs of employers, and I don’t know what the answer is, and I am not anti-immigration. But I am disappointed that the Left does not address the aforementioned problems up front and address how to help wage dependent communities when boom times are over. I suspect that most far-Left progressives did not grow up poor, and are not tuned in to the economics of low wage communities in the U.S.
I am also disappointed that the Right is making this about race, rather than talking about the economic issues. Neither Left nor Right is helping the long-term interests of working poor and working class people in the U.S. However, the Left’s proposals, which amount to having open borders, have a very good chance of causing grave harm to poor communities in the future beyond anything the Right is currently proposing. Just sayin’. . .
But … but … if we ban Mountain Dew, ‘Murica’s giant diabetes-treatment industry would crash! Talk about your typical liberal, lefty Big Gummint lack of concern for real Americans!
Also, what will all those people do if they have teeth?