Our Campaign
There was a major failing in our progressives campaigns. That was that we did not clearly differentiate our beliefs from the beliefs of corporate Democrats (sometimes “The old blues”) who control the party. One place where we need to differentiate our beliefs is on our beliefs in the purpose of the Precinct Committee Officers (PCOs). State law in RCW 29A.80 establishes the PCOs as having fiduciary responsibility for the party. The PCOs are the board of directors of the party. A second place where the purpose and responsibility of the PCOs is established is in our bylaws in Articles XII an XIII. But in addition the PCOs are responsible for the by-laws as a whole, and although our PCOs, through the bylaws have abdicated much of their responsibility and passed it on mainly to the executive board and the county chair of the party, PCOs are ultimately responsible through state law and can and should be held responsible for all actions of the party both good, bad, legal and illegal. A third place where the responsibility of the PCOs and the party as a whole is established is in the preamble to the bylaws stating the purposes of the Jefferson County Democrats (JCD). Emphasis on the word PLATFORM mine.
<BEGIN QUOTE>
The purposes of the JCD are:
A. To elect to national, state, county and other offices Democratic candidates who embody, support, and promote the PLATFORM of the JCD, and to support them while in office as they act to improve the well-being of the citizens of Jefferson County.
B. To adopt and promote the PLATFORM of the JCD to serve as the standard for elected Democratic officials and as goals for the citizens of Jefferson County.
C. To endorse and/or support organizations and activities that reflect the PLATFORM of the JCD and that improve the welfare of Jefferson County, its people, and its natural environment. …
<END QUOTE>
This establishes the platform as a part of the bylaws by reference and the responsibility of all members of the party to uphold the platform. The platform itself calls for candidates who we support to state their differences with the platform. The purpose of this is not to require that all candidates agree with all of our platform but to require that they state where they disagree so that citizens and members of the Democratic party can make informed choices about who they wish to support and ultimately vote for. The PCOs should also be held to this standard. PCOs, make it clear where you do and do not agree with the platform. Tell us who you have supported in the past.
The term “Corporate Democrat” may be a little harsh to apply to the folks who are not self proclaimed progressives, and progressive may be a little too general a term to apply to the more radical part of the party seeking massive and radical change, but I think there are some clear differences. The first most obvious is the willingness of the corporate democrats in the party to give money and support to Democrats who take large amounts of money from corporate interests as well. Second is their unwillingness to “embody, support, and promote the platform of the JCD”. Here are some quotes from the facebook page of Bruce Cowan that makes this clear.
>>Libby Urner Wennstrom:
I too am really troubled by PCOs campaigning on an issue platform – this is pretty much the opposite of what a PCO is supposed to do, representing ALL of their precinct to the County party. The Democratic Party needs to actually work to elect Democrats, rather than endlessly bickering over fine points of doctrine.
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>>Bruce Cowan:
One point of my campaign is that it is not the role of a PCO to determine whether a candidate, past or present, is sufficiently progressive. That is for the members and the voters we serve on behalf of the party.
<snip..>
>>Bruce Cowan:
Some PCO candidates on the Progressive Slate make the erroneous assumption that nobody but them is progressive or embraces any of their views.
We have already agreed upon the platform although Bruce and Libby should state this explicitly, so we do have a lot of common ground. One of the responsibilities of PCOs is to help voters know what a candidate stands for, where they get their money and how they support or differ from our platform. Exposing a candidates faults and virtues before an election is a responsibility. PCOs actively advocate through endorsements and equally without much oversight, in the donation of money to campaigns to actively support some candidates over others. Decisions are made long before Democrats at large go to the polls. The idea that the PCOs are worker bees bound by allegiance to some party queen bee, and their only purpose is to gather honey (money and votes) for the hive is not supported either by the platform nor by the bylaws, nor would I suggest by the voters. The corporate Democrats have structured the party to discourage PCOs from taking positions. The PCO handbook of the state party says very little about the moral and ethical responsibility of the PCOs but couches their main responsibilities mainly in terms of canvasing, walking lists and worker bee activities. PCOs are our representatives in the party not only to elect folks who claim to be Democrats, but to establish the structure and nature of the party and to reflect the will of the people. They are responsible to us, the Democratic populace as established in state law and they are mandated to support the party platform in the bylaws. This is not to say that they should not contact members in their precinct or canvas, but that their duties go far beyond this.
The party is malleable. The party by-laws, and the platform are malleable documents. They can and will be changed. I am particularly worried about a possible attack on the progressive platform adopted in 2018 and approved at the county convention by a majority of declared Democrats present. This is the platform of the party until the next county convention is actually held. Fortunately, the Democrats showed up in 2018. Even many who have been sorely disillusioned by the current party. This is the only document in the party that is voted on by Democrats at large and I believe is already under attack. Either through negligence or intention, the only complete version of the platform available still has the heading “Proposed Platform”. The platform has been broken into sections and followed immediately by the platform of 2016 as if it were a part of the current platform. The division line that follows further identifies the two platforms as if they were one. In my opinion the platform of 2016 was probably the worst platform of any Democratic party at that time.
There are fundamental differences between the views of progressives and the views of the corporate Democrats. We believe that for the sake of the world and humanity, in every thing we do we are progressives. When we walk down the street we want people to say, “there goes a progressive, they are working to make sure corporate money is out of politics, nuclear proliferation is ended, global warming and climate change is mitigated, that black lives matter, that no one is illegal, that love has no gender etc.” I want my PCO to be able to say that our party supports these many things to candidates who may have taken massive amounts of corporate money. Look up Derek Kilmer in opensecrets.org. I want my PCO to say to people who they canvas that our platform is what our party stands for and be able to tell people how much Derek Kilmer supports or fails to support our platform. I want my PCO to ask Derek why he votes against the principals in many of the planks of our platform. And I don’t think the Democratic party should give him money if the answers are not satisfactory. These are not “fine points of doctrine.” Unlike the corporate Democrats, progressives want the populace to be informed about the candidates and the candidates to be informed about our platform. Just supporting Democratic candidates is not enough.
Unfortunately in my campaign, simply stating that corporate money should get out of politics, nuclear proliferation must be ended, that global warming and climate change must be mitigated, that black lives matter, that no one is illegal, that love has no gender etc. did not distinguish me sufficiently from my opponent who I also think believes and accepts much of the platform, but has drunk the cool-aid served by the greater party that promotes the view that it is not the responsibility of PCOs to reflect their own morality or the purposes of the party as reflected in the platform, but only to be a worker bee, that choices are made only by the people at the polls. This is of course an abdication of responsibility. This abdication is also seen in some parts of our current by-laws. I would suggest, that as long as PCOs buy into this mentality, that we will not move sufficiently fast to prevent the possible extinction of the species. Fortunately in some places the party is changing. I would like to see it happen here. It is perfectly possible to be a good person and wrong. I think that Bruce Cowan and Libby Urner, who I quoted above, are good people but mistaken.
I know that some progressives have been sufficiently disillusioned with the party to feel that it is a waste of their time to try to make the party more liberal and that the local party is too dominated by corporate Democrats. They feel their voices not only have not been heard but have been actively suppressed. They will probably continue in most cases to vote Democratic but will put their efforts elsewhere in the coming election season to provide money and support to Bernie endorsed Democrats and other progressive causes. This is not an irrational position. The Democratic party is only one tool out of many that we have to change the world. If we can not change the party locally, maybe we can help other localities to change and elect progressive Democrats. Most of these disillusioned Democrats undoubtedly will vote for Biden in 2020. The scourge of republicanism must be stopped.
Many times Democrats hearken back to the supposed Halcyon Days of the Democratic party in the era of FDR, often dropping their voices voices slightly to indicate the holiness of that era. There is no doubt that FDR was one of the people responsible for a number of important social programs such as social security and the new deal. His administration also set up massive investment in infra-structure projects employing many non-black poor workers in civic works. He also appointed Hugo Black to the supreme court, an avowed member of the Ku Klux Klan, and made a devils deal with the southern Democrats that he would not interfere with Jim Crow in order to obtain their support. He actively worked against his wife in suppressing the anti lynching bill to insure it never crossed his desk. And he put in concentration camps every American of Japanese decent on the west coast. It is difficult to bring up FDR and Black Live Matter at the same time without some cognitive dissonance. Slavery is one of the defining parts of American history as well as imperialism, near constant warfare and the extermination of indigenous peoples.
Probably the most liberal of Democrats were LBJ and Jimmy Carter, but both of them failed on the imperialism and warfare fronts. I marched in the streets shouting “LBJ LBJ how many kids have you killed today” along with many from my generation protesting the Viet Nam war. LBJ designed the “Great Society” legislation to expand civil rights, public broadcasting, Medicare, Medicaid, aid to education, the arts, urban and rural development, public services and the “War on Poverty”; Civil rights bills that he signed banned racial discrimination in public facilities, interstate commerce, the workplace and housing; The Voting Rights Act prohibited certain requirements in southern states used to disenfranchise African Americans; The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, encouraging greater immigration from regions other than Europe;*(above rephrased from Wikipedia article) That I would hold up such a war monger and in other ways a racist as the height of morality in the Democratic party is an indication of the actual depths of depravity in the party. On the other hand, this is the only party I have ever felt any ownership in and my faith in its ability to change was renewed with the campaign of Bernie Sanders and also to a degree with that of Elizabeth Warren.
As progressives, we do not sit back and wait for the elections. It is our duty to actively inform voters about the candidates. To insure voters know their differences. It is our duty to insure that candidates agree for the most part with our local Democratic platform and to insure that voters know where candidates disagree. We must change the party to be more democratic and more capable of being a force for good. We need to keep our eyes on the prize. End nuclear proliferation and the military-industrial complex, mitigate and eventually end human caused climate change, Black Lives Matter, no one is illegal, love has no gender. We must hold ourselves and every member of the Democratic party to these high standards. We must all continue to fight in our own small ways for the survival of our species.