The Washington Post’s uber rich 1%er class warrior Katrina vanden Heuvel joins in on the whole “what happens after Hillary wins?” genre of opinion pieces, and it’s a doozy
A progressive’s answer to Trumpism
How the Democratic Party can reach out to Trump voters after Election Day.As election 2016 winds to an end, it’s hard not to begin looking beyond Nov. 8. With Donald Trump behind in the polls and lashing out at the media, there is rampant speculation that Trump is laying the groundwork to launch his own media empire in the wake of his likely defeat. Yet, if he loses, Trump’s next move may well be less important than what’s in store for his supporters, whose long-simmering pain and rage have exploded into plain view.
This is followed by paragraph after paragraph of slamming Trump and many of his supporters, while at the same time backhandedly acknowledging that his supporters have some points on the lousy economy and stuff, before arriving at the ideas the Democrats should employ to reach out to Trump voters
A serious progressive agenda should grapple with the grave challenges that many Trump supporters face. To that end, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) — who won strong support from working-class whites in the primaries — offered a useful blueprint. To start, we need a more progressive trade policy that gives priority to working people over corporate lobbyists and profits. As Roosevelt Institute fellow Mike Konczal argues, a truly progressive vision for trade would not embrace Trump’s retrograde protectionism but would strengthen workers’ rights and preserve the ability of countries to regulate multinational corporations. We also need debt-free college to increase opportunities for the next generation. And we need “Medicare for all†to create more security and flexibility as the traditional nature of work evolves.
So, the idea here is to reach out to Trump voters by pushing Big Government ideas and policies? Free college and health care for all, paid for by???????
As University of California at Berkeley law professor Ian Haney-López recently wrote in the Nation, “Remaking our politics and economy depends on a broad coalition that must include substantial numbers of racially anxious whites. Ignoring their fears, or worse, pandering to them, further impoverishes all of us. Instead, we must have a unified message for whites as well as people of color: Fearful of one another, we too easily hand over power to moneyed interests, but working together, we can rebuild the American Dream.â€
Katrina is nothing if not consistent. As a super rich person herself (some estimate she’s worth $430 million) she’s espousing class warfare against her own class as a way to entice Trump voters
Whatever happens when the votes are counted in two weeks, it will be a political and moral imperative for Democrats to start paying attention to many of Trump’s supporters and working to advance an inclusive populism that gives them hope for their future. If they fail, it’s only a matter of time before a more polished, less toxic Trump emerges and threatens to drag us all back into the past.
Usually, I would say that there’s no way the big government dominance of a Progressive (nice fascist) agenda would work in enticing Republican voters to come together with Democrats. However, this is the era of Trump, and most Trump supporters have seemingly given up their Republican/Conservative beliefs in favor of populism/nationalism, so, it just might work.
Crossed at Right Wing News.
