Overall, it was both a relief and an energizer to see Kamala Harris put Donald Trump in his place last night in the big debate. We can only hope this was a turning point in the much-needed popular shift away from the MAGA fanatics, a takedown that is not just an energizer for those who believe in democracy but a downer for those who are either hard-core racists/sexists/fascists or who have been taken in up to now by all the lies, the hype, and the appeals to the worst in the human condition.
I will personally be doing a lot over the next 55 days to help get Trump defeated and help Democrats hold onto the Senate and take back the House. After this decisive Trump debate defeat, all of those things seem possible, though by no means a certainty. I will continue to go to Pennsylvania almost every Saturday between now and election day to do door knocking and talking to voters, as well as evening phone banking 2-3 times a week. I have adjusted my life so that I can do these things, which I can do because I am retired.
But as last night’s debate unfolded I found myself feeling not just elation over Harris’ clear-cut debate victory but also the necessity of progressives across a broad range of issues, constituencies and organizations taking steps to be better connected, to unite in some kind of a way, after November 5. That is needed because the debate made clear that Harris is not running as a progressive, even though some of her positions are definitely progressive. She is running as a representative of a broad, pro-democracy united force that includes lots of people and groups on the Left but also people like Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney!!!
Trump is so bad, so retrograde, so dangerous that this truly remarkable temporary alliance has come into being.
There were a number of things Harris said and didn’t say last night that were problematic if you are a progressive:
- While opposing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and supporting a “two-state solution” and “Palestinian self-determination,” her words, she said nothing about ending, or even pausing, US weapons shipments to Israel.
- On climate she was decidedly weak. She was uncritical of fracking; she could have referenced that there are lots of landowners and community people who have been poisoned by the expansion of the fracked gas industry, but she didn’t. She never took the initiative to talk about the need for a rapid shift off of fossil fuels to renewables, battery storage, electric cars, buses and trains and electric heat pumps for heating and cooling. At one point she did say, “I am proud that as vice president over the last four years, we have invested a trillion dollars in a clean energy economy.” That was good, no question. But she added to that sentence this problematic phrase, this very problematic reality: “while we have also increased domestic gas production to historic levels.”
- Despite Trump’s repeated racist and wildly inaccurate statements about immigrants, she never called him out on that.
- There was no mention of the importance of unions for working-class people, very little about labor.
- She continued to say, as she has done repeatedly in her speeches, that is a good thing that, to paraphrase, we are spending close to $1 trillion a year dominating the world militarily. She put it this way: “I believe in what we can do together that is about sustaining America’s standing in the world and ensuring we have the respect that we so rightly deserve including respecting our military and ensuring we have the most lethal fighting force in the world.”
Is it necessary politically that Harris take these kinds of less-than-progressive positions in order to amass the votes needed to defeat Trump? Maybe. I’m sure there are those in her campaign leadership who believe this, and she clearly has bought into it.
That is why it is so necessary that after Trump and MAGA are hopefully defeated, hopefully decisively, on November 5th, progressives must find the ways to strengthen our connections and expand our support so that going into 2025 we are in a position to fight for truly progressive actions across the board. But for the next 55 days we must each do all we can for a defeat of the fascist threat. First things first.
Ted Glick has been a progressive activist, organizer and writer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution. More info can be found at https://tedglick.com
Featured image: Screenshot from the September 10, 2024 presidential debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.
