THE TRUE STATE OF THE UNION

Honesty is the best policy

Two nights ago, President Biden gave a State of The Union address which was vigorous and largely effective.  

At the same time, it showed all the signs of a candidate and a campaign cloistered away from the American people. The speech displayed way too little understanding of the struggles of life for the majority of Americans. Biden has been buffered from that reality by closed door events, staged “spontaneous drop-ins,” distanced from the press and from actual voters.

I have been talking with people around the country. I’ve heard their stories, their lives, their voices. I have spoken to individuals and communities who have been ignored by modern politicians. The true state of the union is that the average American is struggling, both spiritually and economically. And if Democrats want to win in 2024, we better start listening to people now. If we don’t - if it takes a Republican Senator in her tradwife-in-the-kitchen rebuttal to point out that people are choosing between buying their medicine or paying their rent - then we’re in trouble. Such an image of everyday despair is one the President himself should have used. And he should do more than just use the image, as the Republicans do. He should stand for policies that actually assuage the pain.

Denying that pain is a disastrous strategy for 2024. For the majority of Americans it can make you sound seriously out of touch if you refuse to even acknowledge the chronic stress that people are experiencing. I’ve been running for President because neither Republican nor Democratic elites are paying the attention that should be paid - that must be paid - to the West Virginia coal miners who have black lung disease yet no medical insurance, or the millions of children with asthma due to the toxic environment of their neighborhoods, who can’t even run for 30 seconds without running out of breath. The President’s message the other night was “Look at me! We’ve made a bit of a difference!”

Biden spoke at length about the struggles of reducing insulin prices, trying to negotiate drug prices, capping costs and so forth. It’s true that he has made those incremental changes. But those changes do not represent fundamental reform. What he should do, and what I would do, is to fight for Medicare for All. When 75-90 million people are uninsured or underinsured - when millions who have the insurance to cover a doctor’s visit still don’t have coverage for the tests or the medicine that the doctor prescribes - then the ubiquitous despair in modern American life isn’t ended. It’s simply tweaked.

Biden said he wants an economy “where everyone has a fair shot (…) and the poor have a way up,” yet his policies do not match his rhetoric. If that was really what he stood for, he would be fighting for a guaranteed living wage. Over the twelve years that Joe Biden has been in the White House, the minimum wage has not been lifted above $7.25 an hour. Someone needs to explain how you can work your way up from that.

Although the President argued for military aid to both Ukraine and Israel, nothing could be more obvious to the American people than that the forever war machine which dominates Washington is neither good for others nor good for us. The war in Gaza is a humanitarian disaster the President must put an end to, now. We need to begin an era in which we are as sophisticated in the ways of waging peace as we are sophisticated in the ways of waging war.

The speech went on to say “We are making history by confronting the climate crisis, not denying it.” I’m sorry, but the kind of history we’re making is not something that will impress our grandchildren. While the President has made admirable investments in clean energy, he has made even larger ones in dirty energy. He has given more oil drilling permits than even President Trump did. He has approved the Willow Project. There is a classic purse thief distraction technique going on here: bragging about all you do for the climate, in hopes people won’t notice how much more you do for Big Oil. In order for Democrats to win over a younger generation of Americans in 2024, we’re going to have to do a whole lot more than slowing down our walk to environmental disaster.

And whoever wrote that line in the speech that says “Respect free and fair elections!” certainly must know all the ways in which my own candidacy has been suppressed.

It’s not that people don’t realize Donald Trump is dangerous. Millions do. But not wanting Trump to be President does not necessarily equate with making sure you go vote for Biden. I know the Democratic establishment is under the impression that if they raise enough money, and make enough TV ads, then they’ll be able to scrape out a win in November. But they shouldn’t be so sure.

I’ve thought I was the best candidate to be the Democratic nominee, and I still do, for the very reason that I would be offering people much, much more ,Our country needs universal healthcare, tuition free college and tech school, and a guaranteed living wage; the establishment of a Department of Peace and the Department of Children and Youth; a plan for reparations and the declaration of a Climate Emergency to mass mobilize for the development of a green energy economy; and ending America’s Drug War. I realize my chances for that occurring are drastically diminished. But I’m not sticking around in hopes that I can win; I’m sticking around in hopes that I can contribute. I know the way that voters hear me. I know I’m hitting a vein. I know that’s why the establishment muffled my campaign. But I’m going to keep talking - I’m staying in the race - because the things I’m proposing reflect some very deep yearnings of the American heart right now. They are things that would win the election.

We will not win by denying the truth of Americans’ everyday lived experience. Consumer confidence, as well as confidence in our future, are among the lowest ever. With increasing economic anxiety come diseases and deaths of despair. And voters don’t want to hear their pain glossed over; they want to hear their pain validated, and addressed.

Leadership at this time takes more than marketing skill; it takes vision. Simply arguing that Trump is so bad gives people nothing to vote for, only something to vote against. And we can do so much better. By offering people genuine hope that their lives can get better, by addressing not only the symptoms of our problems but their root causes, and by calling people to the great cause of creating a new chapter in American history, we can not only beat Trump - we can truly heal the nation.