Progressives are always ahead of the game

[DIVINEprividence]

...and there lies the dilemma. They are often way ahead of the electorate, often uncomfortably so (gay marriage, climate change etc.) who catch up like 10 years later after liberals have paid a dear price for the backlash. This is what I want to avoid. So the challenge now is how do progressive sell their message, which is the correct policy position in most cases, and yet beyond the comfort zone of more moderate Democrats and the electorate in general, in a way that does not produce electoral fear based backlash? As a moderate Democrat who secretly roots for progressives may I offer this suggestion. Frame everything in terms of economic pain for not acting and the economic benefits of going for it. Appeal to people’s greed to achieve our “spiritual” goals. We are so fcked up, yes, we have to use the “s” word.

[cachukis]

1. The people who are ahead are making it happen for their children.

[FakeNoose]

2. I have an example that illustrates this point

Remember back in the 1970's if you went to a restaurant or a bar, you just lit up your cigarette and smoked in front of everybody? Then later in the 80's and early 90's, the restaurant would ask you "Smoking or non-smoking?" The customers who wanted to smoke could all sit together and blow their smoke at each other. The customers who didn't smoke would just sit in the non-smoking area. Then by the early 2000's people didn't want to wait for non-smoking seats but they were seeing the smoking side of the room was mostly empty. So the non-smokers just took over the smoking side. The restaurant owners complained that they were losing customers by sectioning off special areas for smokers and non-smokers.

Then finally some states like NY and PA (and others) just banned smoking altogether in restaurants. It no longer matters where anybody sits in the restaurant or bars, you will not breathe any smoke. Now of course in 2021 it's not just restaurants and bars, it's every public building everywhere in the USA. A few privately owned clubs and such still allow smoking, but for the most part it's not allowed anywhere. If you must smoke, you must go outside. Everybody deals with it, everybody accepts it. Our public behavior has completely changed in the last 40 years.

I'm not going to say that progressives caused this behavioral modification, because I'm not even sure it was politically motivated. But it's a good example of how Americans CAN and WILL change, when there's a good reason to do so.

[brush]

3. Both progressives and the two center right Senators have to give...

on the $15 minimum wage issue so there's no hold-up on Biden's rescue bill. Biden and Schumer have to confer with both sides and offer Sinema and Manchin bacon to take home on another issue important to their constituents if they agree to come up to say...$13.50 or even $12.50 an hour or so, and conversely ask Sanders to come down to the same rate because right now with small business in the economic doldrums, there's no way there's enough support for $15.00 an hour.