Right Democrat: A Mainstream Populist Voice

Let's stop the Bush administration's CAFTA sellout. Write your representative today.


Your AddressYour City ST Zip
Dear [Your Rep's Name]:As your constituent and an American citizen, I am greatly concerned about the economic consequences of our already astronomical and still growing trade deficit ($618 billion in 2004) and the continuing loss of U.S. manufacturing jobs. This year the trade deficit is already running $100 billion above last year.I believe that a significant source of these problems is the nation’s continued commitment to poorly designed "free trade" agreements. The Dominican Republic – Central American Free Trade Agreement (DR–CAFTA) currently being considered is an excellent example. While its proponents argue that it will stimulate the U.S. economy, the reality is that CAFTA is an outsourcing agreement for multinational corporations that will cost additional American factories and jobs. Here are the reasons why:
There is no Central American market for U.S. Exports.The six countries involved have a combined GDP of $85 billion. In comparison, New Haven, Connecticut, has a GDP of $80 billion. Over 40 percent of the population of these countries lives in poverty. These countries simply lack the purchasing power to become net consumers of U.S. goods. Even the most optimistic forecasts predict that DR– CAFTA will only add $1 billion in U.S. exports, a drop in the bucket of our current trade deficit. However, DR–CAFTA would open the U.S. market to more cheap imports, further undercutting American manufacturers. DR-CAFTA is an outsourcing agreement.CAFTA would allow for more "turnaround" exports – products shipped south for assembly and then back north for final sale in the U.S. The result would be a net loss of U.S. textile and apparel jobs. Already one third of our trade with these countries is in turn-around exports.DR-CAFTA threatens U.S. sovereignty Chapter Nine of CAFTA invalidates "domestic procurement" laws. This means that, at a time when many middle class American jobs are already being outsourced, state and federal agencies would be barred from legislating ‘Buy American’ guidelines in their purchasing decisions.DR-CAFTA will set the tone for future economic policyPassage of CAFTA would greatly influence future economic policy. If Congress, the Executive Branch, and the multinational corporate lobbyists are able to pass this trade agreement, the momentum in Washington will swing to those seeking further outsourcing agreements, such as the Free Trade Area of the Americas, the Doha Round, a new Andean FTA, and a host of new bilateral FTAs. We need to stop DR–CAFTA and start to re-think American trade policy so that trade benefits all Americans, not just multinational corporations.DR – CAFTA is a further assault on an already imperiled middle class, and I urge you to vote against it. If we are to realize our potential as a country, and retain the strong, broad middle class that is America’s singular political and economic achievement, we must fight to keep a vibrant manufacturing base and good jobs here in America.Thank you for your consideration of my views.Sincerely,Your Name Here

http://www.americaneconomicalert.org

Citizens Against Government Waste has praised a list of reforms offered by the House Blue Dog (conservative) Democrats to restore fiscal responsibility to the federal government. "I am pleased that there is a mounting recognization on Capitol Hill that spending is out of control and something must be done,” said CAGW President Tom Schatz. “The Blue Dogs have provided 12 ideas to bring more order to the budget process. Most are proposals that CAGW has supported in the past and continues to support today.”
The Blue Dog’s 12-point Reform Plan for Restoring Fiscal Sanity includes the following commonsense ideas: a balanced budget amendment; holding increases in spending for the next three fiscal years to 2.1 percent; requiring all federal agencies to audit their books; requiring a roll call vote on all bills that cost more than $50 million and whenever Congress raises the debt ceiling; setting money aside for clearly defined emergencies; allowing three-day deliberation periods before voting on a bill, giving members time to analyze its contents; honest CBO estimates; and improved Congressional oversight.
“It is our hope that the Blue Dog’s proposal to improve the budget process is a change for the better on Capitol Hill. If it is accompanied by a genuine commitment to vote for serious reforms, we welcome it,” concluded Schatz.
The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste is the lobbying arm of Citizens Against Government Waste, the nation's largest nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government.

Dr. Glenn Browder, a former Democratic Congressman from Alabama is currently a professor of political science at Jacksonville State University. He has a brillant essay online which explains how the Democrats "lost the South" and gives some thought provoking ideas on how the Democratic can once again become competitive in Dixie. Dr. Browder describes the current approach of most Democratic Party leaders to the South and Middle America as like "dinosaurs waiting for the weather to change." Every concerned Democrat activist should read Dr. Browder's essay at http://www.emergingdemocraticmajorityweblog.com/browder I would encourage everyone to read the full text as he has a lot of worthwhile observations about politics in the South and certainly much of it could apply to other areas of "Red" America as well. Thank you, Dr. Browder for pointing the way back for our party.

Here's some great advice for Democrats from www.redstate.org Voters are fed up with the Republican leadership's inability to get control over illegal immigration and the growing Bush deficit. If only the Democrats had the courage to get out in front on these issues and move to the center on social issues.

The first party to aggressively push for policies to control illegal immigration will earn tremendous political capital with the American public.
Right now, illegal immigration is the one issue on which the vast majority of the American public is at odds with both major political parties. I defy anyone to consider one single other issue in which less than 40% of the U. S. Population approves of the way at least one of the parties is handling it at any given time.
The reality is that right now, the only reason one party hasn't politically overwhelmed the other on this issue is that frankly, the American public is disgusted with the way both parties are handling this. What makes this an especially dangerous issue for both parties is that the rank and file, dyed-in-the-wool members of the party are showing a growing restlessness, and willing to shift voting patterns on this issue alone.
The Republican party shot themselves in the foot when the Bush administration treated Tom Tankredo disrespectfully over his immigration legislation - but thankfully, few outside of Colorado know who Tankredo is, so the Elephants still have a reasonable shot of assimilating his message. On the other hand, if the Democrats get smart, and give national air-time to four or five Tankredos of their own (especially if they are from the southwest), the public could well send the GOP a wake-up call in 2006.
2. The first party to act like deficit hawks will earn enormous political capital with the American public.
There is ample evidence already that the Democrats realize the potential political gain of playing this card - and we are hearing more and more Democrats bemoan "deficit spending." The problem for Democrats is that they have about six decades of irrational spending history to run against, and further their entire agenda as a political party is built around spending more, not less. Ergo, the Democrat plan for becoming a deficit hawk is always tax more - and running on that platform is a political funeral waiting to happen. The Republicans could successfully run on a deficit hawk agenda in the 90s because their solution, spend less, was more palatable with the American public. We will see whether the Democrat approach can be as successful.
However, Republicans perhaps have an even greater hill to climb in this discussion, because they have in practice abandoned spend less as a political rallying cry. This buffoonery and abandonment of conservative principles has allowed the Democrats to bemoan deficit spending and gain traction, without having to actually articulate how they would fix the deficit (tax hikes).
The long and short of it is, if the Republicans can haul spending back under control, they will remove a huge bullet from the Democrats' gun. If they fail to do so, they will allow the opposition party an easy and virtually free sounding board on an issue that is of deep concern to almost all Americans.
3. If Democrats are to regain national power, they must abandon the pro-choice litmus test.
Much hay has been made recently about voters who vote according to "moral values", and their significance in the last election. Democrats would do well to look back on the last few decades of history, and wonder why it is that they have lost credibility with deeply religious voters - voters who in times past either went Democrat or split more or less down the middle.
Smart Democrats will realize that this shift has been a gradual one - not one that appeared in the vacuum of 2004. The last three decades have seen the most pronounced shift in mainline Protestant and Catholic voters from blue to red, and this as much as anything has contributed to the loss of the national majority by the Democrats. While other issues surely exist at the periphery of the morals debate, only one moral issue has stood front-and-center during the entire shift: abortion.
In the early days of Roe, this was not so much of a political party issue as it was a regional issue. Therefore, southern Democrats (especially) could run on comfortably pro-life platforms, while sticking with their bread-and-butter economic issues. However, somewhere along the way, abortion became a litmus test for Democrats who wished to assume the national stage. One after another, prominent Democrats like Jesse Jackson, Al Gore, Bill Clinton, and Dick Gephardt were forced to toe the pro-choice line, and it became clear that strongly pro-life voters had no home in the Democratic party. If the donkeys are to regain power, they need to see this for what it is: one of the more boneheaded political maneuvers in this century.
As a strongly pro-life voter, I hated 2004's GOP national convention, but I had to admit that in all its cynicism, it was a cunning bit of political theater. What the GOP has realized and capitalized on is that a party that is seen as at least tolerant of those on both sides of the abortion debate stands to gain huge swaths of the American public who are fed up with the extremists on both sides. The Democrats in '08 can steal huge amounts of Republican thunder by running a single prime-time speaker who makes one single pro-life remark. Just one. Just a 30 minute appearance by Casey Jr. saying that someone who is pro-life like him has a home in the national Democratic party. Their failure to do this will equate to a continued downward spiral in the polls.

It is time for the voice of conservative Democrats to be heard again. For too long, we have sat on the sidelines and allowed politically correct leftists to destroy our party. As a working class Democrat who is too poor to become a Republican and insufficiently politically correct to feel welcome at most Democratic club meetings, I am ready to work for a change. Democrats don't win elections by pandering the fringes of our party. Being a Democrat is about making government fiscally responsible and taking an active role in solving problems. Democrats recognize that we need a social safety net, labor unions and regulations to protect us from the greed of the marketplace. The Democratic Party party gave us great things like collective bargaining; wage and hour laws; Social Security; Medicare; grants and loans for higher education; rural electrification and programs to help farmers. Unfortunately, the Democratic Party and modern liberalism have become associated with gun control, late term abortion and gay marriage. The obsession of many Democratic party activists with a narrow range of social issues has alientated many working families and religious voters from our party. We need to help move the Democrats back to middle on the social issues. I know that I'm not alone and there are many rank and file Democrats who feel the same way and want to take back our party and our country. Let's be heard !

Link to Illinois conservative Democrats webpage
http://www.il-democrats.org/conservativedemocrats.html