Support for an expansive “Project 2029” rests on a flawed theory of how to win back workers. Democrats instead should try a straightforward, muscular plan for change.
I think that ship sailed years ago. One single picture of the Ds in the SOTU or the vile, evil-looking Omar is enough to overwhelm any "policies." And health care? I thought Obamacare fixed that. Only Trump has actually lowered drug prices for anyone.
In short, Ds have a massive IMAGE problem, not a POLICIES problem. No one will trust the party until it can rid itself of all of these true haters, people who at every single opportunity tell the rest of us how wrong we are to love America. Until you can roll out hundreds of candidates who can say "I love America" WITHOUT adding a "but," the GOP will just sail along.
They could start by not being miserable and hateful to people who disagree. They could also start by not defending every dictator and theocracy in the world.
Well, I think Ds were very successful for years at having policies people didn't approve of, but had an image of "caring" that went a long way. The current crop doesn't care a whit about image. It's all about hate Trump.
These aren't specific policies (other than "tax the rich"). Build 25 million homes? Where? How? With what money? Fix the health care system? How, specifically?
Just a progressive wish list -- government should cut pay for CEOs? Unionize everyone?
Yep. I’m curious exactly what the plan is when all that new proposed housing runs into growth boundaries and other environmental issues so loved by their base.
As an example, building millions of middle class home would require the Dems to abandon their policies of restrictive planning and make it easy for landlords and developers to flourish.
Democrats loudly and proudly tried to force their ideas on everyone. Now you think “let’s just not talk about all that” will convince normies that Democrats have changed?
Normies will not believe Democrats until they actively disavow the craziness they have pushed for more than a decade.
"Instead of drawing up a panoply of progressive wish lists dubbed Project 2029, Democrats should ask themselves: can they fit the heart of their agenda on a one-page memo without resorting to vague platitudes?"
Justin, your talking points above are all well and good and I think even most Republicans would agree, but if you really want that permanent majority that Democrats have dreamed of, there's only two things the party needs to do:
1. Protect First and Second Amendment rights rather than attacking them. An informed and armed society prevents tyranny and are, as St. George Tucker once put it in Blackstone's Commentaries, the "Palladium of Liberty." Democrats have for decades been sending the message that they are the face of tyranny.
2. Keep boys and men out of girls and women's sports. What is the point of women's sports if men can compete with them? What do girls have to aspire to if they think that some smelly boy is going to crush them?
Now that Democrats have rediscovered secure borders, those two items are all it takes to win that permanent majority. It really is that simple.
"Now that Democrats have rediscovered secure borders...."
If only that were true. A solid majority of Democratic primary voters almost everywhere is now pro-open borders, although they don't use that term. They oppose all enforcement of immigration laws. If you enter the country or make a claim for asylum at the border, you get to stay forever - no deportations, period. I live in Minnesota, and this is the mindset of most Democratic voters here.
Your recommendation: "2. Keep boys and men out of girls and women's sports."
Project 2029 recommendation: "Replacing the current blanket ban on transgender participation in sports with evidence-based athletic standards that ensure fair play while respecting the dignity of all athletes. Sport-specific, medically informed guidelines, rather than sweeping bans, allow schools and leagues to maintain competitive integrity in ways consistent with modern science and the role athletics play in youth development."
Then, what do "evidence-based athletic standards" and "sport-specific, medically-informed guidelines" mean, in practice? It means boys and men in girls and women's sports. Project 2029 is trying to hide the reality behind a screen of euphemisms.
Just for grins maybe the Democrats should try turning one of the states where they have complete control of government into a place more people move to rather than places people are currently fleeing. Then run a campaign to take those policies national.
The Trump republicans have largely seized what for years WAS the democrat platform but with minimal government supervision. The pre-Trump gop consistently failed to make that shift and are of decreasing importance at an increasing rate.
What folk such this author fail to see is that Trump is an EFFECT. He’s not the CAUSE. You, or rather your substitution of marketing slogans for clear policies, are the cause.
I've been saying this for years. As odious as Trump is, normie Republicans and many independents vote for him as a reaction to the excesses of Democrats because he's willing to get down and dirty to fight those excesses.
If Democrats were to work on their policies rather than just tweaking the message, they would be much more likely to win back power.
There is more than one website which refers to Project 2029. I looked at Project2029.me to examine their proposals. One of these is titled "Make sure everyone pays their fair share of taxes." It repeats the myth of the 8% tax rate for billionaires, published by the Biden administration.
They cited Biden's claim "Billionaires on average pay about 8.2 percent in federal income tax—and many pay even less. " How did Biden get that number? By counting unrealized capital gains as current income while ignoring the future capital gains tax to be paid on it. It's Enron accounting.
I'm not a billionaire, but we had our best year by far last year, and we paid an "effective rate" of 3.4% according to the accountant. We had a couple of kids in college, got the senior discount on SS taxes or something, small discount for a business that makes almost nothing, standard deduction.
Taxes in America are crazy, people who work pay the most.
Let's assume that all of the economic/public assistance programs that this author recommends are adopted. Without severe restrictions on the immigration of low-skilled, low-income people to America those programs would quickly become unaffordable as new beneficiaries overwhelm tax resources. Here's the problem: the dominant faction in the Democratic party opposes ALL restrictions on immigration, ALL enforcement of immigration laws. A large majority of Democratic primary voters is effectively pro-open borders. We can't have an expanded welfare state and also have tens of millions of new beneficiaries for those programs.
Unfortunately, Dems have a different game plan. Talarico in Texas is the Dem candidate 2.0 prototype. He is the Left's encore to Spanberger and Sherrill. In Nov elections Dems successfully passed off Progressives as moderates in 2 Blue States.
Now Dems have set their sights on Red States, where they hope to elect Texas' first Democratic Socialist, with a lot of Biblical smoke and mirrors. Dems have no plans to amend Biden's policies, but they are hoping to hide them, by any means necessary. The current camoflauge de jour, is religion.
Texas is drowning in ads, op-eds and comments about Talarico being a different kind of Democrat. It is so ridiculous, it will be comical, assuming it does not work.
Talarico, the man "of God", by his own admission, believes in abortion until delivery, child gender transitions, the 2nd coming of the Green New Deal, Open borders and morphing the Texas tax code, into California's, or worse.
God called Mother Theresa to Calcutta to minister to India's lowest, poorest castes. God has evidently called Talarico to the posh Senate Dining Room, to minister to some of the wealthiest and most powerful people on earth, while basking in their luxury and clout.
Talarico ia a Mamdani clone, holding a Bible rather than a Quran. Dems will attempt to sell Talarico's near twin, Beshear, in the same manner. Give Crockett props for honesty, regarding her beliefs. At least Jasmine is not hiding her Democratic Socialism, like Talarico.
You’re right that Democrats can’t win durable trust with a sprawling counter, Project 2025. Compression and discipline matter. But I’m not sure the problem is just a failure to summarize. Real prioritization requires answering harder questions first.
What is the root cause of the most pressing national breakdown we’re trying to fix? What is the governing vision that addresses it? Without that clarity, any “one-page memo” risks being just a shorter wish list.
From there, prioritization would mean naming three or four specific economic actions that clearly flow from that diagnosis, not twenty goals, but a small set that visibly change lived experience. And it would also require drawing a few clear lines on the most destabilizing cultural questions, defining where the practical center is and being willing to defend it.
That kind of compression is not just rhetorical. It requires real tradeoffs and a decision-making structure willing to subordinate some claims to others. When an organization repeatedly produces outcomes that undermine its own stated goals, it is worth asking, borrowing from David Hanna’s work on organizational design, whether the structure itself is perfectly delivering what it is designed to deliver. If the party consistently defaults to addition over prioritization, or to economics over cultural boundary-setting, that is design. Until there is clarity about how decisions are actually made and who has authority to rank priorities, even a well-crafted one-page agenda may struggle to translate into durable change.
I think this Nine Point list is a framework that can support successful candidacies. It's notable for what it omits, e.g.: gun control, social justice issues, abortion rights, and expansive trans rights. Basically, the culture war issues. These are the focus of many progressive activists, and I while I support some of these myself, I think it's time for progressives to step back and allow the New Deal economic priorities that defined the party become its electoral brand, while working on legislation to make incremental progress where necessary and possible on these other fronts.
Commenter 'Remember, remember' began this comment string by prioritizing the First and Second Amendments. I think that in the case of the First Amendment it's now easier to see how the Democratic Party was viewed by conservatives as undermining it, chiefly through well-intentioned social justice initiatives that had a chilling effect on those who were not aligned with a progressive agenda. MAGA has responded with massive institutionalization of anti-First Amendment orders that should have taught progressives and liberals what conservatives were experiencing. Unfortunate as it may seem, the ACLU's 1970s defense of the right of Nazis to march in Jewish neighborhoods is actually the model of Constitutional tolerance that we need to prevent the rise of Nazis in America -- we strayed from that and now we have a plainly fascist administration with elements that are openly National Socialist.
As a lifelong opponent of generally unlimited arms (and a believer that the Second Amendment's language does not in any way license that interpretation), like many on the Left I'm now keenly aware of the threat that American fascism presents and understand the feeling, whether justified or not, that motivated the formation of gun rights and militia movements. My hope is that we can evolve away from a society where the perception of political danger prompts people on both sides of the political spectrum to arm up, but it's time for progressives and liberals to recognize that gun control is an issue that we need to treat with "benign neglect," looking toward an era of far lower crime rates (which we're actually well on the way to reaching) and far less dramatic social division and atomization (which are increasing at an alarming rate) -- if we get to such a relative utopia, purchasing arms will become a less compelling felt need and we can look for new compromises.
A quick response to the second point "Remember, remember" made: Supporting transgender rights cannot succeed if it extends beyond reasonable bounds to special treatment at the expense of others. Sex-separated sports at or above middle school level can't generally accommodate trans athletes in women's sports competitions because they are physically advantaged -- it's not gender discrimination, it's level-playing field fairness. (There are acceptable work-arounds in some cases.) The best way to ensure that trans individuals have robust social rights is to strengthen anti-discrimination enforcement where the law clearly calls for it, support more research so we better understand what transgender means and how we should respond to it socially and medically, and follow opportunities as social acceptance gradually broadens. In electoral terms, it means what Mr. Vassallo indicates -- it should not be part of the Democratic Party's platform, and only a part of its brand to the degree that the Party is and has been for almost a century a party that welcomes every type of person who supports its core principles of broadly shared prosperity, social welfare, and fairness.
While you and I will never agree on the Second Amendment, we largely agree on the First. However, you neglect to mention the Biden Administration actively using intimidation tactics to force social media companies to censor right-wing voices.
Your comment about the ACLU's work in Skokie, IL was absolutely spot on. It was a profile in courage, particularly in the case of the lead attorney who is Jewish, but placed a higher priority on liberty than on religion or ethnicity. Sadly, like the SPLC, the ACLU has abandoned the fight for liberty and succumbed to the lure of partisan sponsorship.
Hi Remember, Yes, we'll disagree on the Second Amendment and some other things, but the important point is that disagreement isn't enmity. My approach has always been to hope for Democratic liberal majorities with a Republican conservative minority strong enough to force caution and curb excesses to which the Left is naturally prone. (Second best for me is just the reverse.) It's healthy for both liberal and conservative people to have strong ideals and advocate for them, but when ideals meet practice in life the art of good governance requires flexibility, adaptation, and the ability to recognize when the "other side" has identified where ideals are working against improving people's lives and strengthening broad national consensus.
Mussolini made union membership compulsory for all workers. Has Trump done that? Mussolini boasted in 1934 that three-quarters of the Italian economy, both agriculture and industry was nationalized. Has Trump nationalized three-quarter of the American economy? Mussolini put Italy back on the gold standard. Has Trump put the USA back on the gold standard? Trump ran for re-election and when he lost, grudgingly vacated office. Did Mussolini ever run for re-election? No, and unlike Trump he wasn't elected the first place. If Trump is a "fascist", then he is the only fascist in history who reduced government employment. Your description of the Trump administration as "plainly fascist" is plainly preposterous.
The model of fascism that I feel best applies when the term is used seriously includes three major elements: (1) The coercion of private enterprise to act as an arm of the corporate state; (2) The use of blood and soil ethnically based nationalism to foster coherence through demonization of the outsider; (3) The celebration of militarization and a policy of demanding hegemonic expansion that integrates ethnically similar peoples under the hegemon's direct power and coerces other states to be subservient to the hegemonic power's demands.
I taught this model, derived from classical Fascist theory and the dominant policies of the Axis powers in World War II, to college students for many years as the essential hallmarks of Fascism. I thought I was teaching a model that was important historically but not as a future possibility. The Trump administration's coercion of corporate and non-profit institutions, increasingly open white nationalism, and imperial pronouncements, such as the "Donroe Doctrine," demand for Greenland, military actions, etc., have brought this model to life.
According to you, the first major element of fascism is "the coercion of private enterprise to act as an arm of the corporate state".
From Forbes Magazine, 2/3/2025: "President Trump continued his aggressive use of presidential authority in his second week, including signing a new executive order last Friday: “Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation.” The eye-catching part of the order—highlighted in his signing remarks and fact sheet—is the directive to remove 10 existing regulations for every new one issued."
Ordering ten times more government regulations repealed than new ones added is clearly designed to reduce government coercion of private enterprise instead of increasing it. Trump did the exact opposite of what you said fascists do.
I don't intend to defend over-regulation, but we are speaking of entirely different forms of coercion. As Mitt Romney said in 2012, as long as the federal government made the basic rules of regulation clear businesses can adjust to them without coercion. If you want to return to the unregulated days corporate monopolies, child-labor, seven-day work weeks, and literally poisonous working conditions you're free to advocate for that. But saying regulation is "fascism" is a mis-definition. Every Allied country fighting fascism imposed regulations on business activities. That is not what fascism's "Corporate State" is about.
If you want to object to my characterization of the Trump administration as fascist, go ahead. I've explained my basis. For literally half a century I have refused to call any government program fascist or any individual who would not have welcomed the term. I've asked people on the Left to stop debasing the term by using it profligately and incoherently to express their opposition to what are actually conservative ideas, policies, and individuals. I did not believe that *looking like* a fascist state -- things liked masked agents acting without due process -- was essential enough to warrant the term "fascist." I never expected to use the term myself to label any American government and continually spoke against using it to describe Trump I.
However, when Trump unilaterally committed an act of war against Venezuela, issued his "Donroe Doctrine," and demanded the surrender of Greenland in order to maximize American interests, I believed that his administration had now fulfilled all three of the criteria I had analyzed for decades as core to classical Fascism. I first used the term in January.
You and JMan can pick and choose individual moments or policies that other administrations, Democratic and Republican, have followed to throw the term fascism at them. Almost every administration has used some element of fascism because fascism was, in fact, conceived originally as a viable approach to creating economically strong and politically unified states -- it had lots of admirers in the 1920. Then, as the implications of full-on fascism became increasingly visible, virtually the only admirers were the domestic proponents of fascism in the Axis states, their true allies in places like the Iberian Peninsula, and where puppet governments exercised dominion over effectively conquered territories.
"For literally half a century I have refused to call any government program fascist or any individual who would not have welcomed the term." Do you seriously claim that Trump, whom you called a fascist, would welcome that label?
No. But in my judgment, after years of refusing to apply that term to him when others did, I believe he has now met the definition I rely on. I hope you will consider the possibility that I am using the definition in good faith. I conveyed it for over thirty years as a descriptive definition based on other scholars' analyses (I am not a political scientist) and with no reference to American politics whatever. When I say I applied it to no one whom I thought would not welcome it I was speaking of people like the members of the American Nazi party and various figures on the "dark web" whom I studied in connection with trying to understand white nationalism in the US and Europe. I've been criticized many times over the years for asserting that various types of conservatives and the earlier phases of MAGA should not be called fascist because although there were characteristics consistent with fascism, this was very broadly true of many governments (and individuals) and we needed to reserve the term to the confluence of characteristics that made the fascist movements of the 1920s and 1930s so brutally dangerous.
Trump's "America First" isolationism distinguished his administration from the behavior of the most important historical examples which, together with a family of explicitly fascist theory developed a century ago, shape what I (and others) believe should be the contours of the way we use the term. But now that the isolationist policy has abruptly devolved into large scale violent interventions globally and frankly expansionist claims for direct and indirect rule over the entire hemisphere I don't see any way to defend my former position that this is not a fascist administration. So I don't.
By your definition, the closest analogy to fascism in US history is the 20th century progressive movement, who widely admired Mussolini until he invaded Ethiopia. Using Bob's definition:
- Coercion of private property to serve state interests: the 20th century progressives did this in spades. He created the modern administrative state with the specific interest of coercing private property.
- Blood and soil nationalism: Wilson was a racist, a eugenicist and a Social Darwinist. He resegregated the Federal Government and screened Birth of a Nation at the White House.
- Militarism: Wilson was chomping at the bit to get into WW1
I'm not willing to spend time in rabbit holes with you JMan. I've responded to Mr. Olson and you together in a reply to him. You're free to use your own definition and apply the term in accord with it (as you do below). So am I.
Also I would use a different definition of fascism:
- a collectivist ideology drawing on continental philosophy going back to Rousseau (or Plato), syndicalists like Sorel etc..
- In keeping with continental political philosophy, they rejected individual rights in favor of the general will.
- an essentially revolutionary secular ideology that valorizes a mythic tradition that never existed over actual current traditions (read: Christianity). So the Italian fascists had a mythic image of Ancient Rome that hadn't existed in 1500 years. The Nazis had a mythic vision of the a Holy Roman Empire that never really existed (Voltaire: the Holy Roman Empire is neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire).
On this vision, Trump's Enlightenment commitments to free speech, impartiality (e.g. anti-DEI), individual rights, and civic nationalism are clearly out of step.
"Soil ethnicity"? I assume this is the new Dem catch phrase to attempt to render "citizenship" via birth, meaningless?
We were in Europe a few years ago, and I read a local newspaper that reported polling showed between 750 million and 1 billion world residents would immediately relocate to the US, if they knew they would be allowed to do so, and to remain forever.
The piece addressed that while Europe was also drowning in unsanctioned mass migration, the US is often a global migrant's first choice. However, the US is harder to reach for the billions, not residing in the Americas.
Migrants can leave North Africa in a small, rickety boat and hope to arrive in Italy in one piece, and on to other EU nations or England. They could not arrive on US soil as easily, without a plane ticket and a long walk.
"Blood and soil" is a common phrase to describe ethnically based territorial nationalism, Ms. Ross. It was a Nazi coinage (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_and_soil) and equally reflected Japanese fascist views. It is not a new catch phrase -- certainly not of Democrats -- and is so common I did not expect it to be misunderstood. My apologies.
Will take your word for it. FYI, have visited Japan and Korea several times for work and pleasure. Cannot imagine the democracies would take kindly to a "fascist" label, anymore than the Dutch, or many other nations who control their own borders, would hear the phrasing.
Have we really reached the point where a democracy, with free and fair elections, but lacking Open borders, or the next thing to it, are Fascists, if they control their own boundaries?
Tokyo, is already one of the most densely populated places in the world, along with Seoul. The vast majority of both populations reside in high rises, with less living space than 800 Sq. ft. per family.
Exactly how many migrants must they cram into their already tightly packed cities to shed a "fascist" label?
I'm glad you've had a chance to visit Japan, Ms. Ross. It's a wonderful country. I was lucky enough to study there for several months about forty-five years ago and I have enormous admiration for Japanese culture.
My references to Japan concern the period from the early 1930s through the Second World War when it was avowedly fascist, and celebrated a vision of the Japanese people as divinely blessed with superior virtue, the natural masters of Asia, destined to conquer and render subservient the peoples of East and Southeast Asia in what it called the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere (a variation of the Lebensraum doctrine that flowed from fascist Germany's doctrine of Aryan supremacy and German hegemony). The Japanese governments of that era adopted the corporate-government model developed first by Italian theorists and the practices of the Italian Fascist government, promoted celebration of warrior culture adapted from traditional samurai models, and, having earlier turned Korea and Taiwan into Japanese Imperial colonies, first invaded Manchuria and set up a puppet government, and then invade in turn China, Hong Kong, and the various countries of Southeast Asia (driving the American presence out of the Philippines and the British, French, and Dutch out of their various colonial possessions). Fascist Japan was an explicit ally of the German and Italian Axis Powers, which is why its bombing of Pearl Harbor meant that when the US responded by declaring war on Japan it simultaneously went to war with Mussolini's Italy and Nazi Germany.
After the Japanese surrender the US Occupation found the defeated Japanese highly compliant, and the Occupation government, under Gen. MacArthur, wrote a new and liberal constitution for Japan that was ratified by the Japanese legislature and that has governed the country ever since. While there are still elements in Japanese political practice that are also found in fascist states, as I've said before this is true of almost any government if you search them out (just as there are elements of almost every government with elements in common with Communist governments!). Japan's misadventure with fascism ended in 1945. Contemporary Japanese immigration issues (which are complex and in the process of a stage of change and reaction) have nothing to do with my points concerning Japan's fascist era and its role in helping us understand how the term "fascism" is best understood.
He lives in a bubble, like 99% of the left. So he'll throw the F-word around but refuse to have a principled discussion or debate about immigration.
His claim about Venezuela is also interesting: he never called the deporter-in-chief Obama the F-word for bombing Libya without Congressional approval.
> “ MAGA has responded with massive institutionalization of anti-First Amendment orders that should have taught progressives and liberals what conservatives were experiencing.”
Please give examples.
We do know that Biden had social media sites censor conservative content such as Hunter Biden’s laptop and Covid origins. On free speech, Trump is clearly far more (classically) liberal than leftists.
Just a few government/NGOs established under Biden:
Department of State: Used the Global Engagement Center (GEC) to, according to lawsuits, fund and encourage private, third-party censorship of media outlets.
Disinformation Governance Board (DHS): Although paused, this board was created within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to combat misinformation.
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA): Described by lawmakers as a central hub for pressuring social media companies to take action against protected speech.
-- Election Integrity Partnership (EIP): A coalition of researchers and universities (including Stanford) that partnered with CISA to flag content, often leading to the deplatforming or restriction of users.
Virality Project: A Stanford-based initiative that targeted "misinformation"
Stanford Internet Observatory: Part of the EIP and Virality Project, which worked directly with government agencies.
Global Disinformation Index (GDI): A group funded by the State Department that aimed to blacklist or deplatform certain media outlets.
It's a great list and, as you say, is still missing a lot which all speaks to the difficulty of creating a bold yet short & sweet platform that will inspire people before they bog down halfway through the list. Another key thing is to present the benefits of these things, not the mechanics -- "sell the brownie, not the recipe" as we say in the comms world.
By contemporary liberal standards, 'only' 9 points could be radically simple. But as a normies, I thought you were going to pick only one value to rule them all. I'd still like to hear what that is, because even Obama had political capital for one one major reform. If we can can only do one out of 9 on the list, which one?
Your list is good, but many of the planks require Dems, in essence, not to be Dems. It's easier than that: the Dems need to abandon far left planks that few like, emphasize the issues that appeal to a wide range of voters, and get center candidates. Too many Dem candidatesare just unacceptable to a wide range of voters. In essence, abandon most of the modern progressivism. It's hard for zealots to change their ways.
I have an opportunity to offer your suggestions to the Democratic Party this weekend.
Saturday we have the precinct caucuses, and the week following the county caucuses, and I assume at some later time the state caucuses. Part of the purview of the caucuses is to offer up suggestions to be on the county platform etc. A small way the ideas percolate up to our betters.
I used to organise these things back when it was how we had our primaries, some fairly spirited caucuses. Now they are a way to get election judges and precinct coordinators. I'm there to listen for anything that might in any way benefit the working class, I'm skeptical but curious. We lose elections, usually it'a a 60/40 kind of thing. More Democrats here own pickups and guns than most coastal Republicans, but our party is might be a better fit in AOC's district.
I like the numbered suggestions of this essay but think we should concentrate on improving on things Trump started.
Take #1 for example. If you have 20 illegal workers for ever job opening wages won't increase, I think they call it "labor supply" or something. Likewise if you can make a widget in Asia for $1 labor costs or in Alabama for $15 labor cost, Alabama will never be able to compete. We need borders and tariffs. Waiting for things to improve generations from now won't cut it.
#2 Middle class? meaning who? is $200,000 middle class? Most people making that think it is. Can we make homes affordable for the $60,000 household? Whenever I hear affordable housing without actual real numbers. I don't believe. I figure we are talking about that beach house in Malibu for Ezra.
#3 and #4 Yup, get rid of 401Ks and IRAs and all those other tax loopholes that only help the few. Instead a pension people can actually live on, and I've heard socialist health care plans from conservative economists that make sense. We already pay for huge sectors of the population, might as well include everyone and force the medical industrial complex into bankruptcy.
#5 and #6 Republicans certainly have no monopoly on self dealing and rent seeking. How to cut it out when all politicians seem to be complicit?
I guess I'd also add a new bounty on wolves and some public long range shooting facilities, lower the cost of diesel.
Every American worker is eligible to put money into an IRA, whether traditional, Roth, or after-tax. Most are covered by employer-sponsored defined contribution plans such as 401k's and only half of the eligible participate. If defined-contribution retirement savings accounts "only help the few", that is because only the few put much money into them.
You’ll often find that people who are “well to do” got that way through the delayed gratification of sacrificing in the short term to gain prosperity in the long term.
I agree, I consider myself very comfortable, I also figure as a good citizen I'd like to see fewer of my fellow citizens make poor choices and end up under the bridge.
Good luck with that. You would have to sell deferred gratification to a country whose citizens vastly prefer instant gratification. Notice, for instance, that about one third of 401k accounts are cashed out instead of rolled over when the participant changes jobs.
I had the good fortune to work for a large employee-owned company with a volunteer who explained to all new employees the value of buying stock and investing in our 401K. I think most people just need to be educated about these things, maybe a class in high school? But as long as you have one political party promising endless benefits and something for nothing by taking from "the billionaires" you will have a huge swath of people refusing to save.
Who do you suggest manage said pension? How do you define “actually live on”? Should said pensions be required to support a middle class lifestyle in expensive places like SFO or NYC?
As for private pensions, most of the companies I’ve worked for don’t exist anymore, but the money they put in my 401k is still there and continues to earn interest. While not everyone has access to 401k/403b IRAs are available to everyone. The tax “loophole” is simply a tax deferment. I.e. All money goes in pre-tax then after you hit 59.5 all disbursements are taxed as regular income. We should be expanding these not curtailing them.
Government has done a lot better than private companies with pensions. Private they sell off all the assets, take the stock options, and declare bankruptcy leaving us with the tab or giving retirees nothing. Amount to actually live on is median income. "expensive" move to West Virginia. Both the cities you mention suck.
Median, not average, 401K at retirement is just under $100K, enough to stretch SS for maybe 5 years if people are careful, after that, it's giving away samples at Costco. High income can contribute $30K a year now, more than many people earn. My IRA quadrupled, I'll pay zero capital gains on it. If you make good money, 401Ks and all the similar things are a great way to get out of taxes, otherwise people just don't make enough or are unsophisticated about money, and contribute nothing..
Most people, and increasingly the professional managerial class, are dumb as a rock about money. I see no harm in keeping them from working at 80 yrs old with a liveable govt pension and a decent social safety net.
College, health insurance, all huge tax breaks for those who make enough. Trump at least bumped the standard deduction up high enough so most people don't itemize. Deductions are just give aways to the already rich. SALT, mortgage, private jets, the list is endless.
“ My IRA quadrupled, I'll pay zero capital gains on it”
True. You will pay the higher income tax rate on the money when you take It out. There is a certain ant and the grasshopper fable to all of this.
What you’re describing is essentially Social Security, which is currently underfunded, and no one wants to have a honest debate about what it will take to fix that.
There's a joint life expectancy loophole that allows me not to withdraw until I'm a million years old. I figure I can pay for the last few months at a raisin farm and it's a medical write off.
I do want to eventually zero out the IRA. Regular equities inherit and capital gains goes back to zero.
"Government has done a lot better than private companies with pensions." Government just bleeds the taxpayers for their pension funds. See: Illinois, California, New Jersey, and most cities with police and fire unions. Omaha Public Schools has $1.1 BILLION in unfunded liabilities.
In order for defined benefit retirement plans to make a come back, the trade off is to radically change the governing regulation, ERISA. Most companies converted to defined contribution plans so they could put tens of thousands dollars more money into a defined contribution plan for their valued employees, like a 401k, rather than paying to comply with ERISA.
No defined benefits. I'm sick of seeing the government use taxpayer money to bail out unions that made bad-faith defined benefit retirement programs to give themselves gold-plated retirements that cannot scale to the population as a whole.
I'd support mandatory savings into a lifestyle mutual fund *or* bonds as a supplement to Social Security.
Labor Union underfunded pensions is just the tip of the iceberg. Have you looked at the underfunded state and city pensions? I’d like to suggest adding a new no. 1 item to the Democrats policy agenda, “We promise to add no new class of beneficiaries to Social Security”. Radical right? The crazy part is national, state, and local officials stealing pensions. It is like the folks who grantee to feed everyone, by adding more water to the soup as needed. https://reason.org/commentary/public-pension-debt-rankings-for-state-and-local-governments/
I haven't followed the issue closely but with all of the consolidation of companies and buyouts I would assume people would lose out on being eligible for a pension, and at least you take the 401K with you. One thing I've noticed with Social Security, any attempts to reduce it are toxic. At least with SS you have no choice, it doesn't grow as fast as the market but the S&P also has long stretches where it is flat. SS money going into the general fund is a mistake. People know that when that money has to come out we either get deeper in debt or pay taxes.
Projected Benefit Shortfall: After 2034, if no policy changes are made, Social Security would still be able to pay approximately 81% of scheduled benefits using ongoing tax revenues.
2
2 Sources From the Social Security Trustees 2025 annual report.
I prefer the responsibility/risk profile of my savings (from deferred spending in my working years) to the guaranteed political siren call to give away the money of the rich, (like this retired widow who worked for decades, saves regularly, and invests carefully). I’ll put my money on the possible growth of the US economy any day. I don't trust politicians to do the right thing when they can buy votes instead by redistributing my life savings.
I have to assume you also get Social Security benefits every month.
Musk stops paying social security taxes at about three minutes past midnight every January 1st. I estimate I paid about $154 including medicare. We could completely make up for any shortfall by simply taxing unearned income. I'll tell you, unearned income is pretty doggone easy to make, I maybe open a web site to see how much or a hard copy letter.
For many of my elderly neighbors, Social Security is the entirety of their income. Their husbands are dead from black lung or cancer. After the mines shut down everyone went to work making plutonium triggers for the bombs. I certainly wouldn't characterize my neighbors as irresponsible, they're just normal people going on about their workaday lives. Small houses, no foreign vacations, modest lifestyles.
1. Why is there a finding shortfall for SS? Poor prior planning. 2. What to do about it? Make a series of structural changes, like President Reagan and Tip O’Neal did in the 80’s, to extent the program for another 75 years. Change the age for full benefits, the monthly contributions, etc. Restrict participation to retirement and disability benefits to those SS was always meant to cover. But the key is for Democrats to support efforts to shore up the plan. Continuing to put their heads in the sand is the most cruel choice for the most vulnerable.
I think that ship sailed years ago. One single picture of the Ds in the SOTU or the vile, evil-looking Omar is enough to overwhelm any "policies." And health care? I thought Obamacare fixed that. Only Trump has actually lowered drug prices for anyone.
In short, Ds have a massive IMAGE problem, not a POLICIES problem. No one will trust the party until it can rid itself of all of these true haters, people who at every single opportunity tell the rest of us how wrong we are to love America. Until you can roll out hundreds of candidates who can say "I love America" WITHOUT adding a "but," the GOP will just sail along.
How do you change the image without changing the policies?
They could start by not being miserable and hateful to people who disagree. They could also start by not defending every dictator and theocracy in the world.
Well, I think Ds were very successful for years at having policies people didn't approve of, but had an image of "caring" that went a long way. The current crop doesn't care a whit about image. It's all about hate Trump.
Show that some of their policies work.
Show that they can be responsible with my money.
Show humility.
These aren't specific policies (other than "tax the rich"). Build 25 million homes? Where? How? With what money? Fix the health care system? How, specifically?
Just a progressive wish list -- government should cut pay for CEOs? Unionize everyone?
Yep. I’m curious exactly what the plan is when all that new proposed housing runs into growth boundaries and other environmental issues so loved by their base.
Well who is going to build 25M houses? I mean, come on.
As an example, building millions of middle class home would require the Dems to abandon their policies of restrictive planning and make it easy for landlords and developers to flourish.
Democrats loudly and proudly tried to force their ideas on everyone. Now you think “let’s just not talk about all that” will convince normies that Democrats have changed?
Normies will not believe Democrats until they actively disavow the craziness they have pushed for more than a decade.
"Instead of drawing up a panoply of progressive wish lists dubbed Project 2029, Democrats should ask themselves: can they fit the heart of their agenda on a one-page memo without resorting to vague platitudes?"
Justin, your talking points above are all well and good and I think even most Republicans would agree, but if you really want that permanent majority that Democrats have dreamed of, there's only two things the party needs to do:
1. Protect First and Second Amendment rights rather than attacking them. An informed and armed society prevents tyranny and are, as St. George Tucker once put it in Blackstone's Commentaries, the "Palladium of Liberty." Democrats have for decades been sending the message that they are the face of tyranny.
2. Keep boys and men out of girls and women's sports. What is the point of women's sports if men can compete with them? What do girls have to aspire to if they think that some smelly boy is going to crush them?
Now that Democrats have rediscovered secure borders, those two items are all it takes to win that permanent majority. It really is that simple.
"Now that Democrats have rediscovered secure borders...."
If only that were true. A solid majority of Democratic primary voters almost everywhere is now pro-open borders, although they don't use that term. They oppose all enforcement of immigration laws. If you enter the country or make a claim for asylum at the border, you get to stay forever - no deportations, period. I live in Minnesota, and this is the mindset of most Democratic voters here.
More voters.
Your recommendation: "2. Keep boys and men out of girls and women's sports."
Project 2029 recommendation: "Replacing the current blanket ban on transgender participation in sports with evidence-based athletic standards that ensure fair play while respecting the dignity of all athletes. Sport-specific, medically informed guidelines, rather than sweeping bans, allow schools and leagues to maintain competitive integrity in ways consistent with modern science and the role athletics play in youth development."
Then, what do "evidence-based athletic standards" and "sport-specific, medically-informed guidelines" mean, in practice? It means boys and men in girls and women's sports. Project 2029 is trying to hide the reality behind a screen of euphemisms.
Your point exactly -- the Dems don't understand things.
Just for grins maybe the Democrats should try turning one of the states where they have complete control of government into a place more people move to rather than places people are currently fleeing. Then run a campaign to take those policies national.
The Trump republicans have largely seized what for years WAS the democrat platform but with minimal government supervision. The pre-Trump gop consistently failed to make that shift and are of decreasing importance at an increasing rate.
What folk such this author fail to see is that Trump is an EFFECT. He’s not the CAUSE. You, or rather your substitution of marketing slogans for clear policies, are the cause.
Not gonna get better till you do.
I've been saying this for years. As odious as Trump is, normie Republicans and many independents vote for him as a reaction to the excesses of Democrats because he's willing to get down and dirty to fight those excesses.
If Democrats were to work on their policies rather than just tweaking the message, they would be much more likely to win back power.
Given current democrat leadership that’s not happening. I think it will require a serious butt kicking to realign with reality.
There is more than one website which refers to Project 2029. I looked at Project2029.me to examine their proposals. One of these is titled "Make sure everyone pays their fair share of taxes." It repeats the myth of the 8% tax rate for billionaires, published by the Biden administration.
They cited Biden's claim "Billionaires on average pay about 8.2 percent in federal income tax—and many pay even less. " How did Biden get that number? By counting unrealized capital gains as current income while ignoring the future capital gains tax to be paid on it. It's Enron accounting.
I'm not a billionaire, but we had our best year by far last year, and we paid an "effective rate" of 3.4% according to the accountant. We had a couple of kids in college, got the senior discount on SS taxes or something, small discount for a business that makes almost nothing, standard deduction.
Taxes in America are crazy, people who work pay the most.
You had the best year ever with a business that made next to nothing?
Let's assume that all of the economic/public assistance programs that this author recommends are adopted. Without severe restrictions on the immigration of low-skilled, low-income people to America those programs would quickly become unaffordable as new beneficiaries overwhelm tax resources. Here's the problem: the dominant faction in the Democratic party opposes ALL restrictions on immigration, ALL enforcement of immigration laws. A large majority of Democratic primary voters is effectively pro-open borders. We can't have an expanded welfare state and also have tens of millions of new beneficiaries for those programs.
Unfortunately, Dems have a different game plan. Talarico in Texas is the Dem candidate 2.0 prototype. He is the Left's encore to Spanberger and Sherrill. In Nov elections Dems successfully passed off Progressives as moderates in 2 Blue States.
Now Dems have set their sights on Red States, where they hope to elect Texas' first Democratic Socialist, with a lot of Biblical smoke and mirrors. Dems have no plans to amend Biden's policies, but they are hoping to hide them, by any means necessary. The current camoflauge de jour, is religion.
Texas is drowning in ads, op-eds and comments about Talarico being a different kind of Democrat. It is so ridiculous, it will be comical, assuming it does not work.
Talarico, the man "of God", by his own admission, believes in abortion until delivery, child gender transitions, the 2nd coming of the Green New Deal, Open borders and morphing the Texas tax code, into California's, or worse.
God called Mother Theresa to Calcutta to minister to India's lowest, poorest castes. God has evidently called Talarico to the posh Senate Dining Room, to minister to some of the wealthiest and most powerful people on earth, while basking in their luxury and clout.
Talarico ia a Mamdani clone, holding a Bible rather than a Quran. Dems will attempt to sell Talarico's near twin, Beshear, in the same manner. Give Crockett props for honesty, regarding her beliefs. At least Jasmine is not hiding her Democratic Socialism, like Talarico.
You’re right that Democrats can’t win durable trust with a sprawling counter, Project 2025. Compression and discipline matter. But I’m not sure the problem is just a failure to summarize. Real prioritization requires answering harder questions first.
What is the root cause of the most pressing national breakdown we’re trying to fix? What is the governing vision that addresses it? Without that clarity, any “one-page memo” risks being just a shorter wish list.
From there, prioritization would mean naming three or four specific economic actions that clearly flow from that diagnosis, not twenty goals, but a small set that visibly change lived experience. And it would also require drawing a few clear lines on the most destabilizing cultural questions, defining where the practical center is and being willing to defend it.
That kind of compression is not just rhetorical. It requires real tradeoffs and a decision-making structure willing to subordinate some claims to others. When an organization repeatedly produces outcomes that undermine its own stated goals, it is worth asking, borrowing from David Hanna’s work on organizational design, whether the structure itself is perfectly delivering what it is designed to deliver. If the party consistently defaults to addition over prioritization, or to economics over cultural boundary-setting, that is design. Until there is clarity about how decisions are actually made and who has authority to rank priorities, even a well-crafted one-page agenda may struggle to translate into durable change.
I think this Nine Point list is a framework that can support successful candidacies. It's notable for what it omits, e.g.: gun control, social justice issues, abortion rights, and expansive trans rights. Basically, the culture war issues. These are the focus of many progressive activists, and I while I support some of these myself, I think it's time for progressives to step back and allow the New Deal economic priorities that defined the party become its electoral brand, while working on legislation to make incremental progress where necessary and possible on these other fronts.
Commenter 'Remember, remember' began this comment string by prioritizing the First and Second Amendments. I think that in the case of the First Amendment it's now easier to see how the Democratic Party was viewed by conservatives as undermining it, chiefly through well-intentioned social justice initiatives that had a chilling effect on those who were not aligned with a progressive agenda. MAGA has responded with massive institutionalization of anti-First Amendment orders that should have taught progressives and liberals what conservatives were experiencing. Unfortunate as it may seem, the ACLU's 1970s defense of the right of Nazis to march in Jewish neighborhoods is actually the model of Constitutional tolerance that we need to prevent the rise of Nazis in America -- we strayed from that and now we have a plainly fascist administration with elements that are openly National Socialist.
As a lifelong opponent of generally unlimited arms (and a believer that the Second Amendment's language does not in any way license that interpretation), like many on the Left I'm now keenly aware of the threat that American fascism presents and understand the feeling, whether justified or not, that motivated the formation of gun rights and militia movements. My hope is that we can evolve away from a society where the perception of political danger prompts people on both sides of the political spectrum to arm up, but it's time for progressives and liberals to recognize that gun control is an issue that we need to treat with "benign neglect," looking toward an era of far lower crime rates (which we're actually well on the way to reaching) and far less dramatic social division and atomization (which are increasing at an alarming rate) -- if we get to such a relative utopia, purchasing arms will become a less compelling felt need and we can look for new compromises.
A quick response to the second point "Remember, remember" made: Supporting transgender rights cannot succeed if it extends beyond reasonable bounds to special treatment at the expense of others. Sex-separated sports at or above middle school level can't generally accommodate trans athletes in women's sports competitions because they are physically advantaged -- it's not gender discrimination, it's level-playing field fairness. (There are acceptable work-arounds in some cases.) The best way to ensure that trans individuals have robust social rights is to strengthen anti-discrimination enforcement where the law clearly calls for it, support more research so we better understand what transgender means and how we should respond to it socially and medically, and follow opportunities as social acceptance gradually broadens. In electoral terms, it means what Mr. Vassallo indicates -- it should not be part of the Democratic Party's platform, and only a part of its brand to the degree that the Party is and has been for almost a century a party that welcomes every type of person who supports its core principles of broadly shared prosperity, social welfare, and fairness.
Bob,
While you and I will never agree on the Second Amendment, we largely agree on the First. However, you neglect to mention the Biden Administration actively using intimidation tactics to force social media companies to censor right-wing voices.
Your comment about the ACLU's work in Skokie, IL was absolutely spot on. It was a profile in courage, particularly in the case of the lead attorney who is Jewish, but placed a higher priority on liberty than on religion or ethnicity. Sadly, like the SPLC, the ACLU has abandoned the fight for liberty and succumbed to the lure of partisan sponsorship.
Hi Remember, Yes, we'll disagree on the Second Amendment and some other things, but the important point is that disagreement isn't enmity. My approach has always been to hope for Democratic liberal majorities with a Republican conservative minority strong enough to force caution and curb excesses to which the Left is naturally prone. (Second best for me is just the reverse.) It's healthy for both liberal and conservative people to have strong ideals and advocate for them, but when ideals meet practice in life the art of good governance requires flexibility, adaptation, and the ability to recognize when the "other side" has identified where ideals are working against improving people's lives and strengthening broad national consensus.
Well said, Bob. :-)
Mussolini made union membership compulsory for all workers. Has Trump done that? Mussolini boasted in 1934 that three-quarters of the Italian economy, both agriculture and industry was nationalized. Has Trump nationalized three-quarter of the American economy? Mussolini put Italy back on the gold standard. Has Trump put the USA back on the gold standard? Trump ran for re-election and when he lost, grudgingly vacated office. Did Mussolini ever run for re-election? No, and unlike Trump he wasn't elected the first place. If Trump is a "fascist", then he is the only fascist in history who reduced government employment. Your description of the Trump administration as "plainly fascist" is plainly preposterous.
The model of fascism that I feel best applies when the term is used seriously includes three major elements: (1) The coercion of private enterprise to act as an arm of the corporate state; (2) The use of blood and soil ethnically based nationalism to foster coherence through demonization of the outsider; (3) The celebration of militarization and a policy of demanding hegemonic expansion that integrates ethnically similar peoples under the hegemon's direct power and coerces other states to be subservient to the hegemonic power's demands.
I taught this model, derived from classical Fascist theory and the dominant policies of the Axis powers in World War II, to college students for many years as the essential hallmarks of Fascism. I thought I was teaching a model that was important historically but not as a future possibility. The Trump administration's coercion of corporate and non-profit institutions, increasingly open white nationalism, and imperial pronouncements, such as the "Donroe Doctrine," demand for Greenland, military actions, etc., have brought this model to life.
According to you, the first major element of fascism is "the coercion of private enterprise to act as an arm of the corporate state".
From Forbes Magazine, 2/3/2025: "President Trump continued his aggressive use of presidential authority in his second week, including signing a new executive order last Friday: “Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation.” The eye-catching part of the order—highlighted in his signing remarks and fact sheet—is the directive to remove 10 existing regulations for every new one issued."
Ordering ten times more government regulations repealed than new ones added is clearly designed to reduce government coercion of private enterprise instead of increasing it. Trump did the exact opposite of what you said fascists do.
I don't intend to defend over-regulation, but we are speaking of entirely different forms of coercion. As Mitt Romney said in 2012, as long as the federal government made the basic rules of regulation clear businesses can adjust to them without coercion. If you want to return to the unregulated days corporate monopolies, child-labor, seven-day work weeks, and literally poisonous working conditions you're free to advocate for that. But saying regulation is "fascism" is a mis-definition. Every Allied country fighting fascism imposed regulations on business activities. That is not what fascism's "Corporate State" is about.
If you want to object to my characterization of the Trump administration as fascist, go ahead. I've explained my basis. For literally half a century I have refused to call any government program fascist or any individual who would not have welcomed the term. I've asked people on the Left to stop debasing the term by using it profligately and incoherently to express their opposition to what are actually conservative ideas, policies, and individuals. I did not believe that *looking like* a fascist state -- things liked masked agents acting without due process -- was essential enough to warrant the term "fascist." I never expected to use the term myself to label any American government and continually spoke against using it to describe Trump I.
However, when Trump unilaterally committed an act of war against Venezuela, issued his "Donroe Doctrine," and demanded the surrender of Greenland in order to maximize American interests, I believed that his administration had now fulfilled all three of the criteria I had analyzed for decades as core to classical Fascism. I first used the term in January.
You and JMan can pick and choose individual moments or policies that other administrations, Democratic and Republican, have followed to throw the term fascism at them. Almost every administration has used some element of fascism because fascism was, in fact, conceived originally as a viable approach to creating economically strong and politically unified states -- it had lots of admirers in the 1920. Then, as the implications of full-on fascism became increasingly visible, virtually the only admirers were the domestic proponents of fascism in the Axis states, their true allies in places like the Iberian Peninsula, and where puppet governments exercised dominion over effectively conquered territories.
"For literally half a century I have refused to call any government program fascist or any individual who would not have welcomed the term." Do you seriously claim that Trump, whom you called a fascist, would welcome that label?
No. But in my judgment, after years of refusing to apply that term to him when others did, I believe he has now met the definition I rely on. I hope you will consider the possibility that I am using the definition in good faith. I conveyed it for over thirty years as a descriptive definition based on other scholars' analyses (I am not a political scientist) and with no reference to American politics whatever. When I say I applied it to no one whom I thought would not welcome it I was speaking of people like the members of the American Nazi party and various figures on the "dark web" whom I studied in connection with trying to understand white nationalism in the US and Europe. I've been criticized many times over the years for asserting that various types of conservatives and the earlier phases of MAGA should not be called fascist because although there were characteristics consistent with fascism, this was very broadly true of many governments (and individuals) and we needed to reserve the term to the confluence of characteristics that made the fascist movements of the 1920s and 1930s so brutally dangerous.
Trump's "America First" isolationism distinguished his administration from the behavior of the most important historical examples which, together with a family of explicitly fascist theory developed a century ago, shape what I (and others) believe should be the contours of the way we use the term. But now that the isolationist policy has abruptly devolved into large scale violent interventions globally and frankly expansionist claims for direct and indirect rule over the entire hemisphere I don't see any way to defend my former position that this is not a fascist administration. So I don't.
By your definition, the closest analogy to fascism in US history is the 20th century progressive movement, who widely admired Mussolini until he invaded Ethiopia. Using Bob's definition:
- Coercion of private property to serve state interests: the 20th century progressives did this in spades. He created the modern administrative state with the specific interest of coercing private property.
- Blood and soil nationalism: Wilson was a racist, a eugenicist and a Social Darwinist. He resegregated the Federal Government and screened Birth of a Nation at the White House.
- Militarism: Wilson was chomping at the bit to get into WW1
I'm not willing to spend time in rabbit holes with you JMan. I've responded to Mr. Olson and you together in a reply to him. You're free to use your own definition and apply the term in accord with it (as you do below). So am I.
Also I would use a different definition of fascism:
- a collectivist ideology drawing on continental philosophy going back to Rousseau (or Plato), syndicalists like Sorel etc..
- In keeping with continental political philosophy, they rejected individual rights in favor of the general will.
- an essentially revolutionary secular ideology that valorizes a mythic tradition that never existed over actual current traditions (read: Christianity). So the Italian fascists had a mythic image of Ancient Rome that hadn't existed in 1500 years. The Nazis had a mythic vision of the a Holy Roman Empire that never really existed (Voltaire: the Holy Roman Empire is neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire).
On this vision, Trump's Enlightenment commitments to free speech, impartiality (e.g. anti-DEI), individual rights, and civic nationalism are clearly out of step.
"Soil ethnicity"? I assume this is the new Dem catch phrase to attempt to render "citizenship" via birth, meaningless?
We were in Europe a few years ago, and I read a local newspaper that reported polling showed between 750 million and 1 billion world residents would immediately relocate to the US, if they knew they would be allowed to do so, and to remain forever.
The piece addressed that while Europe was also drowning in unsanctioned mass migration, the US is often a global migrant's first choice. However, the US is harder to reach for the billions, not residing in the Americas.
Migrants can leave North Africa in a small, rickety boat and hope to arrive in Italy in one piece, and on to other EU nations or England. They could not arrive on US soil as easily, without a plane ticket and a long walk.
"Blood and soil" is a common phrase to describe ethnically based territorial nationalism, Ms. Ross. It was a Nazi coinage (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_and_soil) and equally reflected Japanese fascist views. It is not a new catch phrase -- certainly not of Democrats -- and is so common I did not expect it to be misunderstood. My apologies.
Will take your word for it. FYI, have visited Japan and Korea several times for work and pleasure. Cannot imagine the democracies would take kindly to a "fascist" label, anymore than the Dutch, or many other nations who control their own borders, would hear the phrasing.
Have we really reached the point where a democracy, with free and fair elections, but lacking Open borders, or the next thing to it, are Fascists, if they control their own boundaries?
Tokyo, is already one of the most densely populated places in the world, along with Seoul. The vast majority of both populations reside in high rises, with less living space than 800 Sq. ft. per family.
Exactly how many migrants must they cram into their already tightly packed cities to shed a "fascist" label?
I'm glad you've had a chance to visit Japan, Ms. Ross. It's a wonderful country. I was lucky enough to study there for several months about forty-five years ago and I have enormous admiration for Japanese culture.
My references to Japan concern the period from the early 1930s through the Second World War when it was avowedly fascist, and celebrated a vision of the Japanese people as divinely blessed with superior virtue, the natural masters of Asia, destined to conquer and render subservient the peoples of East and Southeast Asia in what it called the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere (a variation of the Lebensraum doctrine that flowed from fascist Germany's doctrine of Aryan supremacy and German hegemony). The Japanese governments of that era adopted the corporate-government model developed first by Italian theorists and the practices of the Italian Fascist government, promoted celebration of warrior culture adapted from traditional samurai models, and, having earlier turned Korea and Taiwan into Japanese Imperial colonies, first invaded Manchuria and set up a puppet government, and then invade in turn China, Hong Kong, and the various countries of Southeast Asia (driving the American presence out of the Philippines and the British, French, and Dutch out of their various colonial possessions). Fascist Japan was an explicit ally of the German and Italian Axis Powers, which is why its bombing of Pearl Harbor meant that when the US responded by declaring war on Japan it simultaneously went to war with Mussolini's Italy and Nazi Germany.
After the Japanese surrender the US Occupation found the defeated Japanese highly compliant, and the Occupation government, under Gen. MacArthur, wrote a new and liberal constitution for Japan that was ratified by the Japanese legislature and that has governed the country ever since. While there are still elements in Japanese political practice that are also found in fascist states, as I've said before this is true of almost any government if you search them out (just as there are elements of almost every government with elements in common with Communist governments!). Japan's misadventure with fascism ended in 1945. Contemporary Japanese immigration issues (which are complex and in the process of a stage of change and reaction) have nothing to do with my points concerning Japan's fascist era and its role in helping us understand how the term "fascism" is best understood.
He lives in a bubble, like 99% of the left. So he'll throw the F-word around but refuse to have a principled discussion or debate about immigration.
His claim about Venezuela is also interesting: he never called the deporter-in-chief Obama the F-word for bombing Libya without Congressional approval.
> “ MAGA has responded with massive institutionalization of anti-First Amendment orders that should have taught progressives and liberals what conservatives were experiencing.”
Please give examples.
We do know that Biden had social media sites censor conservative content such as Hunter Biden’s laptop and Covid origins. On free speech, Trump is clearly far more (classically) liberal than leftists.
Just a few government/NGOs established under Biden:
Department of State: Used the Global Engagement Center (GEC) to, according to lawsuits, fund and encourage private, third-party censorship of media outlets.
Disinformation Governance Board (DHS): Although paused, this board was created within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to combat misinformation.
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA): Described by lawmakers as a central hub for pressuring social media companies to take action against protected speech.
-- Election Integrity Partnership (EIP): A coalition of researchers and universities (including Stanford) that partnered with CISA to flag content, often leading to the deplatforming or restriction of users.
Virality Project: A Stanford-based initiative that targeted "misinformation"
Stanford Internet Observatory: Part of the EIP and Virality Project, which worked directly with government agencies.
Global Disinformation Index (GDI): A group funded by the State Department that aimed to blacklist or deplatform certain media outlets.
But sure, let's go with Trump is the censor.
Just curious - do you care more about maintaining the Iranian regime or defending Western civilization by destroying it?
Of course the de facto Democratic answer is "maintain".
And that is horrific.
It's a great list and, as you say, is still missing a lot which all speaks to the difficulty of creating a bold yet short & sweet platform that will inspire people before they bog down halfway through the list. Another key thing is to present the benefits of these things, not the mechanics -- "sell the brownie, not the recipe" as we say in the comms world.
By contemporary liberal standards, 'only' 9 points could be radically simple. But as a normies, I thought you were going to pick only one value to rule them all. I'd still like to hear what that is, because even Obama had political capital for one one major reform. If we can can only do one out of 9 on the list, which one?
Your list is good, but many of the planks require Dems, in essence, not to be Dems. It's easier than that: the Dems need to abandon far left planks that few like, emphasize the issues that appeal to a wide range of voters, and get center candidates. Too many Dem candidatesare just unacceptable to a wide range of voters. In essence, abandon most of the modern progressivism. It's hard for zealots to change their ways.
I have an opportunity to offer your suggestions to the Democratic Party this weekend.
Saturday we have the precinct caucuses, and the week following the county caucuses, and I assume at some later time the state caucuses. Part of the purview of the caucuses is to offer up suggestions to be on the county platform etc. A small way the ideas percolate up to our betters.
I used to organise these things back when it was how we had our primaries, some fairly spirited caucuses. Now they are a way to get election judges and precinct coordinators. I'm there to listen for anything that might in any way benefit the working class, I'm skeptical but curious. We lose elections, usually it'a a 60/40 kind of thing. More Democrats here own pickups and guns than most coastal Republicans, but our party is might be a better fit in AOC's district.
I like the numbered suggestions of this essay but think we should concentrate on improving on things Trump started.
Take #1 for example. If you have 20 illegal workers for ever job opening wages won't increase, I think they call it "labor supply" or something. Likewise if you can make a widget in Asia for $1 labor costs or in Alabama for $15 labor cost, Alabama will never be able to compete. We need borders and tariffs. Waiting for things to improve generations from now won't cut it.
#2 Middle class? meaning who? is $200,000 middle class? Most people making that think it is. Can we make homes affordable for the $60,000 household? Whenever I hear affordable housing without actual real numbers. I don't believe. I figure we are talking about that beach house in Malibu for Ezra.
#3 and #4 Yup, get rid of 401Ks and IRAs and all those other tax loopholes that only help the few. Instead a pension people can actually live on, and I've heard socialist health care plans from conservative economists that make sense. We already pay for huge sectors of the population, might as well include everyone and force the medical industrial complex into bankruptcy.
#5 and #6 Republicans certainly have no monopoly on self dealing and rent seeking. How to cut it out when all politicians seem to be complicit?
I guess I'd also add a new bounty on wolves and some public long range shooting facilities, lower the cost of diesel.
Every American worker is eligible to put money into an IRA, whether traditional, Roth, or after-tax. Most are covered by employer-sponsored defined contribution plans such as 401k's and only half of the eligible participate. If defined-contribution retirement savings accounts "only help the few", that is because only the few put much money into them.
Exactly. So only a few get the benefits, and that few almost always means well to do. Which sucks.
You’ll often find that people who are “well to do” got that way through the delayed gratification of sacrificing in the short term to gain prosperity in the long term.
I agree, I consider myself very comfortable, I also figure as a good citizen I'd like to see fewer of my fellow citizens make poor choices and end up under the bridge.
Good luck with that. You would have to sell deferred gratification to a country whose citizens vastly prefer instant gratification. Notice, for instance, that about one third of 401k accounts are cashed out instead of rolled over when the participant changes jobs.
I had the good fortune to work for a large employee-owned company with a volunteer who explained to all new employees the value of buying stock and investing in our 401K. I think most people just need to be educated about these things, maybe a class in high school? But as long as you have one political party promising endless benefits and something for nothing by taking from "the billionaires" you will have a huge swath of people refusing to save.
Who do you suggest manage said pension? How do you define “actually live on”? Should said pensions be required to support a middle class lifestyle in expensive places like SFO or NYC?
As for private pensions, most of the companies I’ve worked for don’t exist anymore, but the money they put in my 401k is still there and continues to earn interest. While not everyone has access to 401k/403b IRAs are available to everyone. The tax “loophole” is simply a tax deferment. I.e. All money goes in pre-tax then after you hit 59.5 all disbursements are taxed as regular income. We should be expanding these not curtailing them.
Government has done a lot better than private companies with pensions. Private they sell off all the assets, take the stock options, and declare bankruptcy leaving us with the tab or giving retirees nothing. Amount to actually live on is median income. "expensive" move to West Virginia. Both the cities you mention suck.
Median, not average, 401K at retirement is just under $100K, enough to stretch SS for maybe 5 years if people are careful, after that, it's giving away samples at Costco. High income can contribute $30K a year now, more than many people earn. My IRA quadrupled, I'll pay zero capital gains on it. If you make good money, 401Ks and all the similar things are a great way to get out of taxes, otherwise people just don't make enough or are unsophisticated about money, and contribute nothing..
Most people, and increasingly the professional managerial class, are dumb as a rock about money. I see no harm in keeping them from working at 80 yrs old with a liveable govt pension and a decent social safety net.
College, health insurance, all huge tax breaks for those who make enough. Trump at least bumped the standard deduction up high enough so most people don't itemize. Deductions are just give aways to the already rich. SALT, mortgage, private jets, the list is endless.
“ My IRA quadrupled, I'll pay zero capital gains on it”
True. You will pay the higher income tax rate on the money when you take It out. There is a certain ant and the grasshopper fable to all of this.
What you’re describing is essentially Social Security, which is currently underfunded, and no one wants to have a honest debate about what it will take to fix that.
There's a joint life expectancy loophole that allows me not to withdraw until I'm a million years old. I figure I can pay for the last few months at a raisin farm and it's a medical write off.
I do want to eventually zero out the IRA. Regular equities inherit and capital gains goes back to zero.
"Government has done a lot better than private companies with pensions." Government just bleeds the taxpayers for their pension funds. See: Illinois, California, New Jersey, and most cities with police and fire unions. Omaha Public Schools has $1.1 BILLION in unfunded liabilities.
In order for defined benefit retirement plans to make a come back, the trade off is to radically change the governing regulation, ERISA. Most companies converted to defined contribution plans so they could put tens of thousands dollars more money into a defined contribution plan for their valued employees, like a 401k, rather than paying to comply with ERISA.
No defined benefits. I'm sick of seeing the government use taxpayer money to bail out unions that made bad-faith defined benefit retirement programs to give themselves gold-plated retirements that cannot scale to the population as a whole.
I'd support mandatory savings into a lifestyle mutual fund *or* bonds as a supplement to Social Security.
Labor Union underfunded pensions is just the tip of the iceberg. Have you looked at the underfunded state and city pensions? I’d like to suggest adding a new no. 1 item to the Democrats policy agenda, “We promise to add no new class of beneficiaries to Social Security”. Radical right? The crazy part is national, state, and local officials stealing pensions. It is like the folks who grantee to feed everyone, by adding more water to the soup as needed. https://reason.org/commentary/public-pension-debt-rankings-for-state-and-local-governments/
I haven't followed the issue closely but with all of the consolidation of companies and buyouts I would assume people would lose out on being eligible for a pension, and at least you take the 401K with you. One thing I've noticed with Social Security, any attempts to reduce it are toxic. At least with SS you have no choice, it doesn't grow as fast as the market but the S&P also has long stretches where it is flat. SS money going into the general fund is a mistake. People know that when that money has to come out we either get deeper in debt or pay taxes.
Projected Benefit Shortfall: After 2034, if no policy changes are made, Social Security would still be able to pay approximately 81% of scheduled benefits using ongoing tax revenues.
2
2 Sources From the Social Security Trustees 2025 annual report.
I prefer the responsibility/risk profile of my savings (from deferred spending in my working years) to the guaranteed political siren call to give away the money of the rich, (like this retired widow who worked for decades, saves regularly, and invests carefully). I’ll put my money on the possible growth of the US economy any day. I don't trust politicians to do the right thing when they can buy votes instead by redistributing my life savings.
I have to assume you also get Social Security benefits every month.
Musk stops paying social security taxes at about three minutes past midnight every January 1st. I estimate I paid about $154 including medicare. We could completely make up for any shortfall by simply taxing unearned income. I'll tell you, unearned income is pretty doggone easy to make, I maybe open a web site to see how much or a hard copy letter.
For many of my elderly neighbors, Social Security is the entirety of their income. Their husbands are dead from black lung or cancer. After the mines shut down everyone went to work making plutonium triggers for the bombs. I certainly wouldn't characterize my neighbors as irresponsible, they're just normal people going on about their workaday lives. Small houses, no foreign vacations, modest lifestyles.
1. Why is there a finding shortfall for SS? Poor prior planning. 2. What to do about it? Make a series of structural changes, like President Reagan and Tip O’Neal did in the 80’s, to extent the program for another 75 years. Change the age for full benefits, the monthly contributions, etc. Restrict participation to retirement and disability benefits to those SS was always meant to cover. But the key is for Democrats to support efforts to shore up the plan. Continuing to put their heads in the sand is the most cruel choice for the most vulnerable.