Editor’s Note: Each week we cross-post an excerpt from Katrina vanden Heuvel’s column at the WashingtonPost.com. Read the full text of Katrina’s column here.
For the national Democratic Party, there are only two possible outcomes in today’s elections: bad and worse. Even in the best-case scenario, Democrats will barely hang onto a narrow Senate majority that is virtually powerless in the face of Republican obstruction. However, while the headlines tomorrow are likely to be grim, progressives can take heart in tangible policy victories in four states, all solid red in the last election, where voters are set to give the working poor a much-needed raise.
Perhaps no issue has been a bigger political winner this year than raising the minimum wage. Indeed, after Seattle raised its minimum wage to a record $15 an hour and fast-food workers nationwide united to demand higher pay, the undeniable resonance of this issue with mostly apathetic midterm voters demonstrates the power of social movements to transcend partisan politics and drive the electoral agenda. Furthermore, it is a clear signal that these elections, whatever their outcome, should not be thought of as a triumph of right-wing politics over progressive Democratic ideas. To the contrary, if Republicans prevail, it will be in spite of their support for right-wing policies.
In Alaska, Senator Mark Begich (D) has been fighting for his political life, but his chances of survival have received a boost from a ballot initiative to increase the state’s minimum wage to $9.75 per hour by 2016. In a recent poll, 61 percent of voters said they support the measure. Enthusiasm is so strong that Begich’s Republican opponent, Dan Sullivan, now publicly supports the initiative despite previously claiming that raising the minimum wage would “shackle Alaska’s potential to grow jobs.”
Read the full text of Katrina’s column here.
