People Power Expressed in Election Results

Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org) AlterNet [1] / By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers [2] People Power Expressed in Election Results November 9, 2013 | Sometimes it feels like elections are an exercise in futility. We live in a mirage democracy [3] in which major party candidates are vetted by the corporate machine before they get on the ballot and third party candidates who represent the values of the movement are undercut by actions in which the major parties collude against them. History instructs that in this environment, it is important to build the movement and use what tools are available to shift power to the people. San Francisco-based lawyer-activist Randy Shaw writes in his new edition of The Activist’s Handbook [4] “that neither politicians nor political parties are the prime movers for progressive change.” He lists actions that should be taken regardless of whom is in power to further the movement’s goals. The elections this week provide many lessons for the movement. Third party candidates built their bases and honed the skills of their campaign teams so they can try again next time. The greatest successes and lessons from failures were in the area of direct democracy through voter initiatives. There were multiple examples of the people winning on issues in which the resistance movement has been active, as well as a couple of examples where money overcame people’s movements. Of course, as in every week, there were a lot of non-electoral movement activities too. We may be at the beginning of the end of poverty wages for workers. Two votes showed progress [5] in the minimum wage battle. In Washington State, residents of SeaTac voted for a raise to $15 per hour for airport workers. In New Jersey, a statewide vote raised the minimum wage by $1 to $8.75 an hour, still not a living wage, but the initiative also changed the state constitution by requiring automatic raises based on inflation. The New Jersey vote is also of interest because it reversed a decision by Governor Chris Christie who refused to raise the minimum wage. South Dakota, Alaska and Idaho will likely be voting on raising the minimum wage in upcoming elections. It is urgent that the race to the bottom in wages ends. A report this week showed that 40 percent of Americans earn under $25,000 annually [6]. In this 40 percent the average income is $17,500. Fifty percent of Americans earn under $30,000. These numbers emphasize that the U.S. has become a nation of poverty-wage workers, rather than one with a vibrant middle class. Even worse, as the Economic Policy Institute [7] put it this week, “Low-wage workers are robbed far more often than banks, gas stations and convenience stores combined” by their employers who ignore minimum wage laws. Workers lose 15% of their already low income in theft. The laws are not enforced because there is only one inspector for every 141,000 workers. And now, due to cuts in food stamps, we expect the situation to deteriorate. Josh Eidelson reports [8] that hunger is a spark for riots. There is no question that votes on the minimum wage were empowered by the actions of low wage workers and the highlighting of the wealth divide by the Occupy movement. Strikes by low-wage workers continued this week. In Los Angles, Walmart workers went on strike [9] with the support of hundreds of community members standing in solidarity with them. Workers and their allies escalated to nonviolent resistance actions [10], resulting in more than 50 arrests. This is the right time to escalate and we hope this tactic spreads nationally. In Las Vegas, culinary workers [11] went on strike and were arrested when they held a sit-in at the Cosmopolitan casino. In these insecure economic times, it takes great courage for low-wage workers to stand up to big corporations. Communities should stand with them [12] and realize that their success is good for all of us. The vibrant movement against hydro-fracking [13] also had significant success at the polls with bans on hyrdro-fracking [14] enacted in Colorado and Ohio. In Colorado, three communities voted for a ban and one other will recount after a 38 vote defeat. The votes in Colorado overcame the pro-fracking governor, John Hickenlooper, as well as the money of the oil and gas industry. In Ohio, one community passed a fracking ban initiative. The community in Boulder, CO cleared a final significant hurdle in their campaign to end the use of coal and transition to renewable energy. Despite the massive amounts of money spent by Xcel Energy and its fake front group that pushed a harmful voter initiative, Boulder voted to create a municipal energy utility that will shift to clean, sustainable energy [14]. This has been a long-fought effort with the voters winning multiple initiatives in recent years. Xcel Energy was defeated by a well-organized and well-educated community. The vote was a landslide 66.5 percent to 31.1 percent. Now, the activists in Boulder are prepared to help [15] other communities municipalize their energy and transition to a carbon-free, nuclear-free energy economy. Progress continues to be made in ending the war on marijuana [16]. Portland, Maine became the first state in the Northeast to legalize the use of marijuana in a landslide vote; and three cities in Michigan also voted to legalize marijuana use. Colorado voted in favor of taxes on commercial production and retail sales of marijuana (people can grow up to six plants for personal use without paying a tax), 65 percent of voters decided in favor of a 15 percent excise tax and a special sales tax of 10 percent on marijuana products sold by the state-licensed stores. Three communities in Colorado, one of two states to vote for legal sales of marijuana in 2012 (Washington was the other), voted for municipal referenda that impose additional sales taxes on marijuana at the city level. Coloradans need to be careful with over-taxing as an illegal market will continue if prices are too high due to taxes. These votes come at a time when a recent Gallup poll showed 58% of the public supports marijuana legalization. In addition to Colorado and Washington, 20 other states allow medical use of marijuana. This trend of reform began with a statewide vote in California in 1996 allowing medical use of marijuana and has picked up steam in recent years. There are likely to be additional votes on the legalization of marijuana in 2014 and 2016. The marijuana issue may be like the gay rights issue, a social issue whose time has come. Advocates should keep the pressure on and not assume victory is inevitable. There will be push back from those who oppose reform and advocates will need to push back harder to show they have sufficient power to carry the end of the marijuana war to completion. Legalizing marijuana will make a huge difference in ending mass incarceration and police abuse which continues to run rampant. Protests are ongoing in Santa Rosa, CA where a police officer shot and killed a 13 year old, Andy Lopez [17]. And this week in Baltimore, parents spoke out [18] against police brutality in the city. In New York City, there is hope that stop and frisk policies will end. The new mayor, Bill de Blasio, ran on a platform against stop and frisk but when he is in office, he will have to be held accountable for that promise. The judge who was removed from the case after her decision to end stop and frisk was suspended [19] is fighting back and calling for a hearing on her removal. Moms for Marijuana [20] showed this week that the war on families is also caused by Child Protective Services taking children out of their homes. Not all of the election news was good news when it came to voter initiatives. In South Portland, Maine, a local zoning ordinance that sought to stop the building of a tar sands pipeline terminal [21] was thrown out by voters in a close 51-49 vote (less than 200 votes). The industry poured money into the small community of 25,000 people. Their front group, Save Our Working Waterfront, received most of its $600,000 from the Maine Energy Marketers Association (or MEMA) and oil giants Citgo, Irving, and the American Petroleum Institute. The group trying to prevent the tar sands terminal, Protect South Portland, raised $42,000. It also looks like there will be bad news in Washington on the labeling of GMO foods [21]. The campaign for labeling has not conceded defeat yet, waiting for a count of all the mailed in ballots, but is down by ten points. Big money poured in and the “No on 522” campaign spent $22 million to prevent labeling. Almost all of the money came from out of state from big agribusiness corporations and industry lobbyists, especially the Grocery Manufacturers Association. The campaign for labeling GMO foods, which spent almost $8 million, was overwhelmed by the big business donors. What are the lessons to learn from these victories and defeats? All of the initiatives had movements supporting them, indeed came out of resistance movements. The two that lost involved tremendous spending by corporate interests, but there was corporate money in many of the campaigns that were won as well. Some of the issues that won were supported by campaigns that have been going on for a decade or more. It is important to be persistent. We hope for further analysis, so we can all have a better understanding of the dynamics involved. As far as political campaigns, there seems to be the most excitement about the landslide victory of Bill de Blasio. De Blasio distinguished himself from mayors like Bloomberg and Giuliani by using strong rhetoric on the immense wealth divide in New York and putting forward a proposal to tax the wealth in order to pay for early schooling for the poor and working class. He will remove Police Commissioner Ray Kelly who has managed the racially unfair stop and frisk program. We understand the hope of many about de Blasio but urge movements in New York to push him. There are also concerning signs that he may be another corporate Democrat who knows what issues can be used to win elections. He was campaign manager for Hillary Clinton and was endorsed by President Obama. His tax proposal may turn out to be a mirage because it requires legislation from the state government to raise taxes in the city. That may be a hard sell. Randy Shaw writes that it is important to establish “fear-and-loathing relationships with elected officials” in order to make them act in the interest of the public. If the labor and social and economic justice movements realize that it is their job to push de Blasio, and do not count on him to do the right thing without pressure, then there are reasons to be hopeful. The other races we were most excited about were local races of two socialists and Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins. None of them won, but they all came close. The Socialist Alternative’s Kshama Sawant in Seattle and Ty Moore in Minneapolis, both first time candidates, seem to have gone down to defeat but the results were very close. Both say they will run again. It is too soon to say whether this means candidates from the left will win in the near future, but we do know from polling that opposition to the two corporate parties is at higher levels than ever before. Hawkins, who has run for office before, ran an excellent campaign and seemed in striking distance of winning a city council seat in Syracuse, NY. At the end of the campaign the Working Families Party once again showed that it is really just another wing of the Democratic Party. Rather than supporting Hawkins, whose agenda is more consistent with what Working Families say is on their agenda, they ran a door-to-door campaign pushing to support the Democratic incumbent. We are much less impressed with the victory of Terry McAuliffe in Virginia. He ran against an incredibly weak and extreme right-wing Republican and barely won. He is the poster child for corporate Democrats. He was a fundraiser for the Clintons and chaired both Bill and Hillary’s presidential campaigns. He raised $275 million for Bill Clinton, including the largest single fundraising event in history which raised $26 million. In the gubernatorial race this year, he outspent his opponent by almost $15 million and despite having a double digit lead in recent weeks barely won. Until the next round, it is important to use the tools we have to continue to build a broad and diverse movement and to challenge corporate power. As we have written numerous times, the Trans-Pacific Partnership [22] (TPP), if passed, would be a huge corporate power grab. The Obama Administration has asked Congress to grant it Fast Track in order to sign the TPP into law with limited oversight. In addition to telling their members of Congress to vote against Fast Track, communities are starting to pass resolutions saying that they will not obey if the TPP [23] is passed and prohibits them from acting in their best interests. A global day of action against toxic trade agreements is being planned for December 3. Read about the initiatives and day of action here [24]. Another example of corporate influence causing harm to the public is the ongoing disaster at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant in Japan. Tokyo Power & Electric Company (TEPCO) has demonstrated that it is incapable of handling the crises and the bodies that should be intervening are corrupted by the nuclear industry. This week, activists delivered petitions and letters [25] signed by people and organizations all over the world calling for independent expert and civilian oversight and access to accurate information. Monday, Nov. 11, will be a day of fasting and reflection [25] on the apocalyptic potential for catastrophe if another natural or manmade event causes a massive release of radiation. It is clear that the current political and economic systems are incapable of protecting people and the planet. It is up to us to take action in whatever way we can using the many nonviolent tactics at our disposal to build people power, resist corporate power and create a more just and sustainable world. This article is produced by PopularResistance.org [26] in conjunction with AlterNet. It is based on PopularResistance.org’s weekly newsletter [27] reviewing the activities of the resistance movement. Source URL: http://www.alternet.org/activism/people-power-expressed-election-results Links: [1] http://alternet.org [2] http://www.alternet.org/authors/kevin-zeese-and-margaret-flowers [3] http://truth-out.org/news/item/14489-lifting-the-veil-of-mirage-democracy-in-the-united-states [4] http://www.popularresistance.org/activists-handbook-a-checklist-for-change/ [5] http://www.popularresistance.org/voters-saying-yes-to-rise-in-minimum-wage/ [6] http://www.popularresistance.org/forty-percent-of-workers-made-less-than-20000-last-year/ [7] http://www.popularresistance.org/low-wage-workers-robbed-more-than-banks-gas-stations-convenience-stores-combined/ [8] http://www.popularresistance.org/expect-food-riots-if-food-stamps-are-cut/ [9] http://www.popularresistance.org/la-walmart-workers-go-on-strike/ [10] http://www.popularresistance.org/photos-walmart-workers-escalate-to-civil-resistance/ [11] http://www.popularresistance.org/workers-arrested-in-casino-for-sit-in/ [12] http://www.popularresistance.org/time-for-communities-to-join-and-support-low-wage-workers-strieks/ [13] http://www.popularresistance.org/tag/fracking/ [14] http://www.popularresistance.org/rule-of-money-loses-to-organized-people-in-colorado/ [15] http://clearingthefogradio.org/dirty-energys-dirty-tactics-boulder-on-the-front-lines-of-the-renewable-energy-future/ [16] http://www.popularresistance.org/election-victory-pot-use-legalized-in-portland-maine-3-michigan-cities/ [17] http://www.popularresistance.org/police-killing-of-teenager-andy-lopez-ignites-latino-community-youth/ [18] http://www.popularresistance.org/baltimore-families-speak-out-against-police-brutality/ [19] http://www.popularresistance.org/appeals-court-allows-stop-and-frisk-removes-judge/ [20] http://www.popularresistance.org/moms-for-marijuana-time-to-end-the-war-on-families/ [21] http://www.popularresistance.org/the-rule-of-money-shows-itself-in-two-voter-intiatives/ [22] http://www.FlushTheTPP.org [23] http://www.popularresistance.org/trans-pacific-partnership-we-will-not-obey/ [24] http://www.popularresistance.org/call-to-action-demand-democracy-global-actions-against-toxic-trade-deals/ [25] http://www.popularresistance.org/take-action-for-international-assistance-with-the-crises-at-fukushima/ [26] http://www.popularresistance.org/ [27] http://www.popularresistance.org/category/newsletter/ Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218. Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/ "The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs