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The Democratic Strategist

Political Strategy for a Permanent Democratic Majority

Political Strategy Notes – Thanksgiving Edition

Give thanks for the “We Are Wisconsin” protest movement for starting a political earthquake that woke America up to the Republican campaign to crush the labor movement. Same goes for “We Are Ohio,” for their inspiring victory in smashing SB5.
Do read Dana Milbank’s WaPo column on wingnut Sen. Jon Kyl, poster-boy for GOP obstructionism, and thank God he’s retiring.
Also at the Post, Fareed Zakaria’s column “Be thankful — sensible solutions do exist for U.S. problems” cites “a groundswell for deeper political reform” as cause for optimism about America’s future.
A little gratitude is in order for the San Antonio federal court, which proposed a new redistricting map in which three additional Texas state legislative districts would have people of color as majorities. If the ruling holds up in a Supreme Court review, Dems will have an edge in winning back control of the state legislature.
Give thanks, Dems, for still-growing polarization and disunity within the GOP. As Hunter puts it at Daily Kos, “A secret Republican group bent on defeating a Republican because that Republican isn’t seen as ideologically insane enough to truly represent their crazy-ass party?…The ideological hoops you have to jump through these days in order to be considered a true conservative have become too numerous to count…Now you’re not a “true” conservative unless you want to roll back eighty years of government, replace the Constitution with the Ten Commandments and fire illegal immigrants out of a cannon into an electrified alligator-filled lake of molten sulfur.”
Be thankful, very thankful, for YouTube, the peoples’ video forum, which empowers everyone to make political ads like this one, or this one.
Progressive Dems can give thanks for Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders, for keeping the populist torch blue-hot, as Scott Thill explains in his Alternet post, “10 Great Things To Be Thankful For in 2011.”
Give it up also for Occupy Wall St., for putting economic inequality on the front burner, with a special nod to the brave younguns of UC-Davis for showing America what courageous, disciplined nonviolence looks like.
And please don’t forget to express a little appreciation for MSNBC for providing significant week-night air-time for strong progressive voices like Maddow, Schultz, O’Donnell, Sharpton and Matthews, something I didn’t expect to see in my lifetime on any major network.

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