We need to wrestle with how to formulate campaign language and public policy that are both just and can win the support of electoral majorities.  “Progressives” must recognize that everyday American voters don’t agree with their formulation of some major issues.  However, when carefully interviewed by poll takers, or approached by candidates who listen to voters, it turns out they support their substance.

Notice what is not mentioned in a current letter (July, 2026) from Bernie Sanders to supporters celebrating progressive and democratic socialist victories across the country:

Bernie’s formulations

– Medicare for All; healthcare is a right, not a privilege.

– Raise the minimum wage to a living wage so that no worker lives in poverty.

– Make it easier for workers to join unions.

– Build millions of low-income and affordable housing units.

– End Citizens United and reform our corrupt campaign finance system.

– Wealthy people should start paying their fair share of taxes.

– Stop endless wars and a bloated military budget.

– Address the existential threat of climate change.

– Make AI work for all, not just billionaire Big Tech owners.

He doesn’t deal with: 

* Race

* Gender/gender orientation

* Immigration

* Voting rights

* Police

* Foreign policy beyond what is in the Bernie list

? (whatever I’m omitting)

How do we deal with these and still win?

Don’t forget, the November general election is still in front of us.  Don’t be sanguine about what happens then. 

The central question is: how do we deal with divisive, particularly non-economic, issues and win majorities?  Can we  develop language that expresses our values but doesn’t alienate people who are threatened in their own status or class identities?  Might it be that these values are, indeed, American values and that past formulations have alienated rather than convinced?

Some Attempts at Winning Formulations:

1.  Race and National Origin.  Historic discrimination in employment, housing and education, land theft, slavery, and other exclusion based on race must be recognized and compensated for.  Equality of opportunity should be recognized by public policy and enforced by legal and judicial action.  This principle should apply to all people who suffered the consequences of such discrimination.

2.  Gender and gender orientation.  Every person should have the right to be who God, Nature or his or her choice determines.  A person’s celebration of their identity should respect the identities and beliefs of others.  The resolution of the tension between the two should be a matter of  respectful public policy.  Courts, not mobs, should decide where the line is drawn.

3.  Immigration.  The United States is a nation of immigrants except for the Native Americans who preceded them.  In the past, each generation of immigrants faced discrimination based on their language, looks and country of origin.  In the 21st century, we must not repeat that history.  People leave their home country because of “push” factors—typically poverty, discrimination or fear of a tyrant at home. People head to another country because of “pull” factors.  When American foreign policy supports brutal dictators in their home, they are pushed to leave.  When American trade policy (such as NAFTA) eliminates jobs in their home, they are pushed to leave in order to feed their families.. We have no right to complain when American military intervention abroad makes us no better in our treatment of people in other countries than the English Empire’s treatment of colonists here that led to the American Revolution in 1776.

4.  Voting is the minimum act of responsible citizenship.  Few democratic countries in the world have more restrictive rules and regulations (gerrymandering, access to polling places, and requirements for registration to name a few) than the United States.  It is not a race in which we should be among the last.  Public policy, such as making election day a paid national holiday, should be our goal, not restricting the right to vote.

5.  Police Community Relations.  The job of police must be to fairly enforce the law, and to respect the rights of all people with whom they deal.  All people should have the right to live in and work at places free from crime.  When police lose public respect it undermines their ability to protect and defend all of us.  No one should be afraid to “call the cops,” yet it is a recognized fact that police have arbitrarily and capriciously hurt and even killed innocent people who called them for protection.  Cops who engage in these behaviors should be disciplined and for some behaviors fired.  Foot patrols, police living in neighborhoods they serve, police-community review boards and other policies should be adopted to insure police presence and fair treatment. None of these needs to interfere with police doing their jobs.

6.  The Wealth of Individuals.  No democratic country in the world has as many tax loopholes and tax policies to benefit the wealthy.  This reward of wealth has nothing to do with productivity.  Other countries, including Ireland, Norway, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Belgium and Denmark are productive than the United States; Austria, Netherlands, Germany and Sweden are close behind.  They have taxes based on the ability to pay, and recognize this tax structure us necessary to create a society in which no one is too rich because to be too rich is to have too much power, and to be too rich is to be to disconnected from the livee of the majority of the people.

7.  The power of corporations.  Public policy must  break-up vast concentrations of power whose application undermines and destroys democracy.  Corporations are too powerful when they can abandon whole cities, states and regions to maximize profit for the few shareholders who own the vast majority of their stock.  Corporations are too powerful when they can overturn governments in foreign countries  because they threaten to increase their taxes.  Corporations are too powerful when they can move because unions have won decent wages, hours, benefits and working conditions for their workers.

8.  Public versus Private Ownership.  Twenty percent of American public utilities are municipally owned.  Their rates and services match or are better than those of privately owned utilities.  Public transit systems provide rail, bus and streetcar travel at rates lower than, and with quality as good or better than, private counterparts.  The problems of monopoly that arise in public services can be eliminated when democratic government and citizen involvement regulate and control them in the places of their jurisdiction.  Corrupt government, not public ownership, is the source of problems.

9.  Foreign Policy.  In a world in which the United States is by an overwhelming margin the most powerful, we do not need more than 800 military bases scattered throughout Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, and the Pacific Islands.  We do not need a military budget that consumes roughly one-half of our national treasury.  Since the end of the Cold War, we have intervened in the domestic politics of dozens of countries, often replacing struggling democracies with dictatorships.  We do not need to provide arms to foreign dictators who use them to suppress the rights of their own people.

Time for A Serious Conversation Based on Mutual Respect and the Desire to Solve a Real Problem

The simple fact is that alienating language and policy formulations that were either not winnable—thus incapable of solving the problem they sought to address— or unnecessary have paralyzed us. “Defund the Police” was one of the most apparent of them.  Anti-Zionism is another (I have Zionist friends who passionately oppose what Israel is doing in Gaza and who support the right o the Jewish people to a nation state).  “Fuck ICE” is a third.  Open borders is a fourth.  

In the absence of international government, nations have the right and responsibility to control their borders—which does not mean they should do so discriminatorily.

There have been plenty of others. If we do not get past the moral blackmail that has been used by self-righteous people we will not win the support of the majority of the American people.

And note this:  two contradictory things can be true at the same time.  Yes, Jefferson owned slaves.  Yes, the Declaration of Independence is a powerful statement against tyranny.  We can walk and chew gum at the same time!

The real problem is among us—organizers, activists, policy wonks, counter-culturalists and others who, in their passionate commitment to justice, ignore the necessity to communicate with everyday people.  The individualism of the American people, media domination by big business, campaign expenditures, White working class “isms,” or some other rationalization for our failure, are not the immediate obstacle we face—it is us.  If we do not get past the problems that we present ourselves we will not successfully challenge the power structure we all want to overcome. 

And this related point should be kept in mind.  In Fragments of a Century, Michael Harrington argued, “If the Left wants to change this country because it hates it, then the people will never listen to the Left and the people will be right.”

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