Progressive Update--10/21/2005

Approval Ratings—Yes, America hates Georgie, and feels hoodwinked into having believed that he had some leadership skills. I read that some moderate Republicans consider W to be ‘radioactive’, and are working hard to distance themselves from the White House (and DeLay, and perhaps Frist). As a strategist, I would have preferred the Republicans to have taken longer to see how awful this President and party leadership has been, and to have a wonderful tailwind for a Progressive advance in the 2006 Congressional elections. Oh well.

Harriet Myers –I am so torn here. I think that she would be an awful Supreme Court Justice, for many reasons. However, as a pragmatic progressive, do I think that we’ll get a superior choice should she be shot down in the Senate? Actually, I think that it is time for progressives of both parties to stand up and say Enough is Enough, President Bush. Stop sending us your buddies who are not qualified for the post. Send us someone who can do the job. Send us someone other than Harriet Myers. If indeed she is voted down and Georgie nominates a more qualified, but even less progressive candidate, then we can let the American public judge, and let the Republican Party decide whether they can risk being associated with such a divisive candidate.

2K and Why—Vigils are planned to mark the 2,000 US soldier’s death in Iraq (tracked at icasualties.org). Go to www.paceminterris.com for information on local vigils (no information is there yet as there have only been 1,993 deaths so far.

What Next—Be asking yourself how involved you want to be in 2006, as we grab seats in Congress from Republicans who have rubber-stamped the awful policies of this White House. If we do nothing, we will be telling Congress that we don’t care about the crap that they have been doing, and I care. How about you?

Progressive Democrats of Delaware—They meet the first Wednesday of each month at 7pm at the Delaware Democratic HQ. Go to www.progressivedemsdel.org for more information.

48% Club—Their Yahoo Group’s calendar lists the monthly Common Cause of Delaware meetings. The next one is 11/14/2005 from 7-9pm

Framing—I continue to monitor Jeff Feldman’s site www.frameshopisopen.com . The articles continue to be quite interesting, and Jeff has been adding more content lately.

Citizen Training—My church, the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Newark (UUFN), is hosting a monthly ‘citizen training’, at which we will jointly explore how to better learn about current events, and how to share our views with the media, and with elected and appointed officials. If you are interested, the next session is at UUFN (420 Willa Road, Newark, Delaware) from 9-11am on Thursday 10/27 (next Thursday). We are hosting a Meet Your Representatives forum on Wednesday night 11/9/05 from 7-8:30pm with representatives of Newark City Council, Christina School Board, and New Castle County Council. We are also exploring a bill in Dover on ‘open air redistricting’.

Progressive Line—Ernie Lehman maintains a great clearinghouse of local progressive news. Go to www.theprogressiveline.com for more information.

Walmart Movie—There is a free screening of ‘the Walmart movie’ at UUFN (www.uufn.org) on 11/13 at 12:30pm. Go to http://action.bravenewfilms.org/event/wm_screening.jsp?event_KEY=5916 for more information.

What it Means to be Progressive—There is a free speech by Ruy Teixeira (Center for American Progress) on 10/25 from 6:30-8:30pm in Wolf Hall room 100 at the University of Delaware, sponsored by campusprogress.org.

Blog—All of my postings are at http://paulprogressive.blogspot.com/. I will get this posted on Monday.