On Wed, 21 Jul 2004, Doug Henwood wrote:
What the conservatives did was very different. But they also had very different issues than us -- ones that
1) they deeply believed in;
2) which could be vitally affected at the most local levels; and
3) which were so far off the map that they rated immmediate news and affected the national discourse
namely the school issues of prayer and creationism, and the strategy of constraining abortion by the death of a thousand pin prick regulations.
I don't know if we have any issues that fill those three conditions. Can anyone think of any?
Local minimum wage/living wage laws. Workplace safety regulations.
Them we have already in New York.
State-financed public health insurance. Equal pay enforcement.
Those can only be affected at the state level, -- which in our state, means taking over governorship and the speakership. Nothing short of that would have any effect at all. There would be no interim victories. You can't nominate the speaker without taking over the state wide party. Theoretically you could however take over the governorship through a third party or through an outside draft -- in which case you don't have to take over the party machine.
Alternative energy experiments. Land use/sprawl issues. Small school experiments. Road pricing. Etc.
To the extent those are local (like protesting development or setting up charter schools) they're really not party issues. To the extent you want state aid in terms of money or grid that buys back power, it's another speakership/governorship issue.
No! They definately are not. They are playing the third party fusion game
They're not entirely independent of the Dem Party. They're doing an inside/outside thing.
Yes, I know, that's what the fusion strategy is all about.
I think maybe I've over-interpreted your question. I seem to be going a level of specficity beyond what you're looking for. If all you meant to ask was "is it useful for lefties to engage in electoral politics with some of their energies?" then my answer's yes, and we have no more argument. I thought you were talking about the relative merits of specific strategies -- becoming Democrats, trying to become the dominant Democrats, launching a third party, going half and half (the fusion strategy), working as outside pressure groups, fighting to change the electoral rules, etc.
Michael
