Editor's Cut

Sestak vs. Specter

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

The debate over issues like President Obama's stimulus, healthcare reform and climate change have revealed fault lines in the country, but also within the Democratic party. In the stimulus fight, longtime Republican Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter backed President Obama. In April, Senator Specter switched parties, edging Democrats closer to a so-called "super-majority" in the Senate and roiling Washington. But for progressives, is Senator Specter an ally, or someone who switched parties out of political convenience?

Tomorrow, Senator Specter will face political bloggers, Pennsylvania voters and his primary opponent, Democratic Congressman Joe Sestak, in a forum held as part of the "Netroots Nation" yearly conference of progressive bloggers and online activists. The Specter-Sestak debate with be co-moderated by The Nation's own Net Movement Correspondent Ari Melber and Pennsylvania blogger Susie Madrak, and live streaming here at TheNation.com at 11 AM Friday, EST.

In 2007, Netroots Nation (then "Yearly Kos") was the site of one of the most thoughtful, informed and vigorous debates of the Presidential primary cycle. By bringing together Sestak and Specter -- who are engaged in what may be the defining race of the 2010 Democratic primary season -- Netroots Nation is keeping online citizen engagement at the forefront of our modern political process, and taking head-on the future of the Democratic party.

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August 13, 2009

Organizing For A Public Option?

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

For those who were counting on President Obama's grassroots army-- Organizing for America (OFA)--to lead the fight this August for a public health insurance option, there are some troubling signs.

This week, OFA Director Mitch Stewart sent two e-mails to members--one asking them to call their representatives and another asking them to visit their representatives' offices. There was no message to advocate for the public option in either e-mail.

When calling their legislators, Stewart directs OFA members to say, "Thanks for working to enact real health insurance reform this year. Voters like me support your efforts."

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August 12, 2009

HCAN Turns Up the Heat

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

In 2007, USAction Executive Director Jeff Blum and Richard Kirsch, then-director of Citizen Action of New York, were tossing around the idea of how best to advance the fight for quality affordable healthcare for everyone. They reached a simple conclusion.

"If we could bring a wide array of progressive forces together," Blum says, "progressives would be able to compete with the deep-pockets and insider lobbyists on the right."

That realization, combined with vast coalition building experience among the key players and a set of principles all could agree on, led to the creation of Health Care for America Now (HCAN)--the largest single-issue progressive coalition in modern American history. This August, with the battle over healthcare reform raging, the success of HCAN will be a determining factor in whether we get a progressive bill--a robust public option and a progressive tax to pay for it--out of Congress.

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August 7, 2009

Rep. Ryan's Plan to Make Your Healthcare Worse

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Last week, I co-hosted Carlos Watson's morning news program on MSNBC. In an interview with Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin Congressman was combative as he wrongly dismissed Democratic proposals for healthcare reform as "the government taking it over." Ryan claimed he wants to get "everybody insured" and that his Patient's Choice Act would do just that--giving people "the ability...to have a plan just like the one we have here in Congress."

It appears, however, that Ryan is just another conservative cog in what New York Times columnist Paul Krugman calls "a wall of misinformation."

Just check out the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) new scathing report entitled Coburn-Ryan Health Bill Would Jeopardize Coverage for Many, While Failing To Reduce the Number of Uninsured Significantly. Here's just some of the damage this bill would do:

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August 4, 2009

Wealth for the Common Good

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

At a moment when conservative Democrats are holding real healthcare reform hostage under the guise of "fiscal discipline"--fighting against a robust public option, promoting a regressive taxation of health benefits, and opposing a surtax on the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans--a network of business leaders and high net worth individuals has emerged as a powerful and sane voice in this debate: Wealth for the Common Good.

Recognizing that the Bush tax cuts allowed households with incomes over $250,000 to save more than $700 billion during a time of war-- and that the economic policies of the past thirty years have disproportionately benefited top earners--Wealth for the Common Good has called on the Obama administration and Congress to immediately repeal the Bush cuts for households earning over $235,000 before they expire in 2011. That would raise an estimated $43 billion in revenues and help address this nation's public investment deficit--in healthcare, schools, infrastructure and other areas vital to our nation's health and wealth. Over 200 individuals (including me) who would pay these taxes have now signed onto the petition which will be delivered to President Obama, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and (for what it's worth) House Republican Leader John Boehner.

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July 30, 2009

Congress Shouldn't Skip Town

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

This isn't a healthcare crisis, this is a state of emergency. 14,000 Americans are losing their coverage every day, and 17,000 are forced into bankruptcy every week because they can't pay their medical bills.

So what's Congress doing?

Going on vacation.

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July 28, 2009

Around The Nation

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Last summer, just hours after President Bush continued his dangerous expansion of executive powers and signed the "FISA Amendments Act of 2008," legislation that needlessly expanded the government's ability to spy on it's own citizens, The Nation joined with the ACLU in a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the act. (Read our original post here.) We sued on behalf of ourself and two of our contributing writers--Naomi Klein and Chris Hedges--arguing vigorously that as journalists, FISA inhibited our reporting, and put at grave risk brave whistleblowers who seek to come forward and challenge authority.

Our lawsuit--which has been led by a remarkable legal team at the ACLU --is a coalition effort. We're suing along with Amnesty International USA, Human Rights Watch, Global Fund for Women, PEN American Center, the Washington Office on Latin America, Service Employees International Union and several private attorneys. The plaintiffs have one thing in common: We all challenge the constitutionality of FISA, arguing that it is an illegal--and wholly unnecessary--act that makes us less safe, not more, and erodes our basic values.

Last week, we got our day in court.

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July 27, 2009

Ain't Nothing Centrist About Them

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

At this moment -- when 72 percent of the nation supports a public plan option and 14,000 people lose their healthcare every day -- the House Blue Dogs and conservative Democratic Senators are doing just about everything they can to cripple real health care reform.

So why does the media keep ceding them the label of "centrist" or "moderate" as if they are the guardians of mainstream values?

In a recent profile on reform slayer Max Baucus -- Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and creator of his majority Republican "Coalition of the Willing" -- Washington Post reporter Dan Eggen refers to Baucus as "a longtime centrist in the Democratic caucus." Even Harold Meyerson -- who along with E.J. Dionne and Ruth Marcus keeps the Washington Post op-ed page from being neocon central and is one of the best in the business at understanding the ideologies at play in Washington -- in a recent op-ed repeatedly decries the "centrist Democrats" such as the Blue Dogs who fight against taxing the richest 1 percent of Americans and promote a "can't-do" view of government.

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July 24, 2009

A Better Way for Afghan Women than War

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Earlier this year, I challenged the notion put forth by some feminists and human rights groups that a US military presence in Afghanistan is both justified and necessary in order to protect Afghan women and girls. I interviewed Kavita Ramdas, President of the Global Fund for Women, who discussed how the women of Afghanistan are hardly united on the need for the US military in their country, and many make a strong case that the war in Afghanistan and US occupation in fact exacerbates the plight of women.

The crucial question of how best to help Afghan women and girls is once again being raised within the peace movement and the media. The Feminist Majority Foundation (FMF)--an invaluable organization dedicated to women's equality, reproductive health, and non-violence-- has made the decision to essentially support the Obama administration's escalation as necessary in order to protect women and girls from the Taliban and enable a "significant redevelopment effort." (Coincidentally, columnist Tom Friedman, who has opposed escalation, is also rethinking his position based on the idea that our presence will create greater opportunities and protection for women and girls.)

While I admire FMF for much of its work, including its fight against the oppression of Afghan women and girls since 1996--and I acknowledge that these are complex and emotional issues--I disagree with the organization's position here. I also take issue with an op-ed by FMF president Eleanor Smeal and board member Helen Cho that characterizes those who advocate for a US withdrawal as wanting to "just walk away", or "abandon the women and girls of Afghanistan." These criticisms are reminiscent of the "cut and run" accusations against a peace and justice movement that wisely opposed the disastrous occupation of Iraq (and FMF was a part of that movement).

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July 21, 2009

Eric Cantor's Cant

By Katrina vanden Heuvel

Virginia congressman Eric Cantor may be a GOP rising star, but he sure is a hypocrite. How else to describe someone who's a leading critic of President Obama's Recovery Act and joins his congressional colleagues to urge Virginia's Department of Transportation to apply for stimulus money for high-speed rail? If that isn't two-faced, what is ?

He's also a demagogue: "Millions of jobs will be crushed by the Administration's policies." Say what? The stimulus may have been too small and overemphasized tax cuts, but it's helped states, including his own, with longer unemployment benefits, expanded food stamps and subsidies for people who've lost jobs to extend their health insurance. It's also kept teachers in the classroom, cops on the street and got workers rehired. Hours after Cantor delivered the GOP's weekly radio address blasting the stimulus, Vice-President Biden announced that $1.5 million of the bill's money would go to the Richmond Police Department to retain officers. And $20 million is going to Chesterfield County, a suburb of Richmond, to help 275 teachers from being fired. Virginia's working men and women should remember that Cantor fought hard to cut a provision in the stimulus bill that was designed to help low-income workers.

As Obama marks his sixth month in office, his Presidency will be judged by its laser-like focus on creating jobs, good jobs, and many of them. Double-digit unemployment is a ticking time bomb and his economic team needs to work quickly to defuse it. But Cantor & crew don't care about creating jobs. They want to spin the debate about the economy so their party, which has absolutely nothing to offer working people, games the 2010 midterm elections.

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July 19, 2009