What’s a Progressive to Do?

We’re worried. We see George W. Bush gaining in the polls, and it scares us. Not because he’s more conservative than Ronald Reagan or Richard Nixon; he’s not. But at this moment in history, a Republican in the White House is about as dangerous as it gets. Our entire system is wavering on a precipice of corporatization, about to take a plunge that will carry most people with it.

Social Security is on the brink of being taken over by private industry. The hard sell is, we’ll have more control of our own money. Yeah, sure. Have you tried to control the stock market lately? Once Social Security is in the hands of brokers and bankers, there’s nothing social or secure about it.

Medicare is facing a similar fate. Through the Bill Clinton years, Medicare benefits have been cut back, which is bad enough. But if the next step is taken and Bush’s “voucher” plan is adopted, Medicare is history. Add to this other worries--public schools threatened to extinction by vouchers; prisons run by corporations that use prisoners for cheap labor; the sale of our public works and public lands to private companies--and what have you got? The United States of Corporations. Is that a country we want to live in?

We know we have to elect a Democratic Congress that, hopefully, opposes this corporatization. We’re working on that. But the buck really stops with the White House. And so, knowing that Bush will lop off whatever thin string holds our system together, we look hopefully to Al Gore.

This is not a simple decision for us. Historically, Gore has represented the more conservative element in the Democratic Party. He has always supported a disproportionately large military budget, as well as the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, Kosovo--all the wars, as a matter of fact. Despite his closeness to labor, he’s a strong supporter of the North American Free Trade Agreement and now the China trade bill, both devastating blows to labor. He supported the welfare cuts that have put a million more children on the streets, and he has never supported any universal health care plan that has been put out there. In short, he has never even pretended to support the progressive agenda.

He has a lot of company. The progressive element of the Democratic Party has been all but ignored by the conservative Democratic leadership for a decade. Meanwhile, our party continues to lose ground.

So where do we go to get representation? We can turn to Ralph Nader, whom we respect and basically agree with. But he can’t win this time. We’d like to turn to Gore, confident that he can stop this erosion of the people’s programs. To do that we need assurances that he will boldly halt the corporatization of America and return our country to us.

We want a United States of the people, not the corporations. This is our agenda. Can Gore assure us that it is his?