If Democrats Didn’t Suck, by David Swanson

Image by Stephen Melkisethian via Flickr

by David Swanson
Writer, Dandelion Salad
Let’s Try Democracy, July 1, 2022
July 10, 2022

If Democrats threw out the filibuster today and rapidly passed legislation over the next 8 months as if they gave a damn — as if they were, oh, I don’t know, the Supreme Court — and if they put just what they’re increasing the military budget by into their Build Back Better bill, if they put through with majority votes just those items they were elected on that are favored by significant majorities in the country, they’d have done enough by 6 months from now to not lose those elections. And if they kept going, they’d need never lose an election again. The whole premise of keeping the filibuster around to restrain the Republicans is the plan to go on sucking badly for 6 more months in order to lose — combined with the delusion that Republicans are going to be restrained by something that THEY can and will choose to throw out. The Republicans will certainly plan on never losing an election again. Any elections they can’t win or rig, they can ask the Supreme Court to fix up for them — and hire Al Gore to explain to us that we should sit back and take it.

If the Democrats were not fundamentally committed to sucking, here’s what they might do:

1) abolish Congressional vacations for the next 8 months

2) abolish the filibuster

3) abolish student debt

4) make college free

5) tax billionaires

6) tax quasi-billionaires

7) tax corporations

8) de-fund nuclear weapons

9) pass a major Green New Deal

10) close foreign military bases

11) create enhanced and public Medicare for All

12) restore the minimum wage

13) strip the Supreme Court of major powers assumed by it

14) expand the Supreme Court and fill it with ideal justices just out of law school

15) ban war weapons from individuals

16) ban war weapons from police

17) legislate a universal right to 18th century muskets for members of the National Guard, with no further gun rights for anyone

18) legislate abortion rights

19) ban school prayer

20) ban school sports prayer

21) ban Congressional prayer

22) legislate card-check organizing and ban “right to work” laws

23) legislate paid sick and family leave

24) legislate the inalienable right to vote for all U.S. residents over 16

25) create universal preschool

26) create a decent system of trains

27) create public financing of election campaigns

28) make the test for citizenship possession of a pulse

29) rip down borders

30) abolish weapons sales to foreign governments

31) quadruple non-strings non-military actual humanitarian foreign aid

32) create a department of unarmed nonviolent civil defense

33) ban fracking

34) give back Oklahoma again

35) tax offshoring

36) remove the cap on Social Security taxes and expand Social Security

37) abolish the federal death penalty

38) Decriminalize marijuana

39) Eliminate cash bail and mandatory minimums

40) Ban armed drones, mass surveillance, telemarketing, and Congress Members owning stock

41) Break up high-tech monopolies

42) Make DC and Puerto Rico states

43) Convene hearings at which to hear and learn from nations that handled COVID well

44) Announce a schedule of impeachments of horrendous abusers of power currently and formerly holding high offices in government, including in Congress and on the Supreme Court

45) End the war on Yemen

Do one of those a day for the next 45 days and you’re at mid-August. Then keep going. Make clear that you intend to keep going. Make clear that you’ve decided to copy from Republicans their willingness to act rather than their funders and policies. And then explain to me how the Democrats are doomed to lose the next elections and so had better keep the filibuster in place and rely on Joe Biden vetoes to save the world, as if Biden ever saw something horrible he would veto, as if Biden wouldn’t make a key bipartisan principle out of not vetoing, as if the world could survive simply by slowing the destruction rather than implementing the radical changes required, even if Biden would lift a finger to slow it.

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David Swanson is an author, activist, journalist, and radio host. He is director of WorldBeyondWar.org and campaign coordinator for RootsAction.org. Swanson’s books include Leaving World War II Behind (2020), Curing Exceptionalism: What’s wrong with how we think about the United States? What can we do about it? (2018) and War Is A Lie (2010; 2nd Ed. 2016). He blogs at DavidSwanson.org and WarIsACrime.org. He hosts Talk Nation Radio. He is a Nobel Peace Prize Nominee and U.S. Peace Prize Recipient. Support David’s work.

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