We Must Do Better

The idea of what America can be deserves more than this; the American people deserve so much more. It is difficult watching our nation slide backward instead of moving forward. Knowing people voted intentionally to make that happen is frustrating and may make you want to give up. Don’t. There is more to it and more we can do.

Yes, some people voted for bad things, knowing fully what their ballot meant. But others felt ignored, left behind, mad at the government, and voted because they finally felt heard or wanted to shake up the system to force it to pay attention.

When life pushes you to the limit, you aren’t thinking about what a college protest is for or why an invasion of a country 5,000 miles away matters. You’re wondering why the government sends billions of dollars overseas while you’re struggling to feed your family.

Often, that level of hopelessness means people tune out. They’re too busy with their problems to bother with politics. Ninety million eligible voters didn’t vote at all.

In a country where the citizens choose who gets to craft laws and serve as President, where your voice tells our leaders why they will lose their jobs or get the job, those ninety million people decided that either their vote didn’t matter. More Americans felt politics was a waste of their time and didn’t vote than those who voted for either candidate.

Democracy can be exciting—it should be exciting. But that won’t happen if candidates avoid speaking openly about the issues or if we continue to be represented by the same politicians who haven’t solved our problems for the last 30+ years.

That is what plagues the Democratic party. It is controlled by members who have served since the 1980s and are more concerned with playing kingmaker behind the scenes than listening to and connecting with the people.

Americans don’t want everything handed to them. They rightfully expect that an honest day’s work comes with fair pay and that healthcare is a right, not a privilege. They want to be able to afford to take a simple vacation once a year and have a little extra to set aside for savings and retirement. This is how life in America should be, and it once was.

There used to be a middle class. People used to be able to have a house and a family on a single income. We can restore that American dream.

We need fresh faces ready to fight against corporate greed, special interests, and the establishment. We need a voice strong enough to combat the extremism and corruption that have spread throughout Congress and soon even the White House.

People also want clean air, water, and healthy food. They want the right to be themselves without discrimination. And they want a justice system that keeps them safe while affording everyone the right to due process.

None of this is radical. Much of it isn’t even considered progressive in other countries. Universal healthcare is used the world over and by all of our peer nations. It is a widely accepted, centrist approach to governing. That is what we need to help people understand. Even more importantly, each of these issues has to be framed in terms of how it makes life better for the working class and why it is a good use of their hard-earned tax dollars.

Equally important is ensuring the public understands why the misleading promises from the far right will hurt them, not help them.

It sounds great to say that taxes should be eliminated on Social Security benefits, but how about after you realize that doing so will make Social Security run out of its surplus years earlier, causing an automatic reduction in benefits larger than the removed tax? Blaming taxes is a cop-out to avoid the discussion of increasing the cap on paying into Social Security, which would extend current benefits for an additional 15 years or more.

Similarly, no tax on tips sounds fantastic, but it would be a minimal amount of additional money back in the pockets of anyone making a low wage. Eliminating tipped wages and increasing the federal minimum wage would be a more meaningful improvement.

Whenever talk of increasing the minimum wage comes up, the fearmongering begins with the claims that raising the federal minimum wage would cause inflation, negating worker gains. This isn’t true, but the way to explain that to voters isn’t through the data proving it isn’t true. It needs to be a simple message: When the minimum wage was at its highest, the middle class was the strongest, GDP growth was the highest, birth rates were higher, and a working-class job could purchase a house and support a family. A higher minimum wage is good for everyone and the nation as a whole.

It is time to get people excited about what is possible when they get involved in democracy and vote for change. That requires creating trust instead of delivering more hollow promises from people seeking power. This means politicians can’t accept corporate or special interest money. The people must fund them. That is how real change begins.