“At cusp, choice is. With choice, spirit grows.” — Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land
“The darkest hour is just before dawn.” — Folk saying and song line.
There is a lot to fear today. The Demagogue and his lackeys are openly preparing an assault on voting, evidently to lay the ground for a second coup attempt in 2024. Russian troops have massed on Ukraine’s border and have entered Kazakhstan to help its current dictator put down a legitimate popular protest. China is making obvious moves toward Taiwan and the South China Sea. Meanwhile, our nation is divided and weak.
But there is also fertile ground for hope.
Real equality and justice could soon break out here at home, as never before. Then we could heal our national wounds, unite, and recapture the promise and power that once were our national birthright.
Outside of Georgia, voters don’t know Stacey Abrams well. But she has, in my view, demonstrated the greatest political brilliance since Barack Obama sat at the Resolute Desk.
When Abrams ran in 2018, she nearly became the first woman, and the very first Black person, to govern Georgia in its tortured history. The state had been the victim of General William Tecumseh Sherman’s infamous Civil-War March to the Sea. So it bears the scars of a long history of regional resentment and racism. To add to all that, Georgia’s then Secretary of State—now its governor—had rigged Georgia’s voting rules to disfavor non-white voters.
Despite these disadvantages, Abrams
came within 1.4% of winning the governor’s mansion. After she lost, she had a chance to run for an open Senate seat. Although many experts thought she could win, she declined. Instead, she decided to organize and work for equal access to voting, through her own “Fair Fight” organization. She also worked through her protege, Nse Ufot, and
her New Georgia Project.
The brilliance of Abrams’ strategic choice soon became evident. On the same day as the Capitol Insurrection, Reverend Ralph Warnock and Jon Ossoff won Georgia’s two seats in the US Senate. They are, respectively, the first Black man and the first Jew ever to represent Georgia there.
Instead of running herself, Abrams did the hard ground work to give the Dems and progressives narrow control of the US Senate. She gave her backers two US senators for the price of one.
Now Abrams is running for governor of Georgia again. If she wins, further voter suppression in Georgia will stop cold, by virtue of her gubernatorial veto. If she can bring a Democratic Secretary of State with her, voter suppression there may actually be reversed, just in time for the 2024 presidential election.
These are just two signs of Abrams’ strategic brilliance. While leading Georgia’s statehouse minority, she killed a proposal for regressive state-tax changes by quietly putting a numerical analysis of the proposal on every Georgia legislator’s desk. Her analysis showed that the bill would have reduced income taxes but raised
net taxes on 82% of Georgians.
Abrams avoids loaded political language. She doesn’t lead with her chin like some progressives. She doesn’t make it easy for demagogues to label her ideas and proposals “socialist.” Instead, she tells voters directly, in simple, concrete terms, how her plans for governing will improve their lives. And
her brand of community organizing doesn’t depend on the vagaries (or the expense!) of social media: she uses more durable people-to-people contact with neighbors and friends.
But the ultimate proof of Abrams’ strategic vision will come early next year. If she becomes Georgia’s governor, voter suppression there will subside. And Georgia will change from purple to blue, perhaps for a while.
Both Hillary Clinton and Stacey Abrams attended Yale Law School. But Clinton remained a lawyers’ lawyer, eventually rising to Secretary of State and a presidential candidate. Abrams
soon became a state legislator, with side trips into for-profit and non-profit corporate leadership. After losing her bid for the presidency, Clinton
confessed that she didn’t fully understand politics. Abrams has shown by her acts that she not only understands it: she has mastered it. I hope to live long enough to see her become the first female president. (Since I don’t plan to move to Georgia, that’ll be the only chance I’ll have to vote for her—something I will do with great enthusiasm.)
Abrams may have gone to law school. But she seems to think like an engineer. Remember
those professionals, who once designed our industries, highways, cars, airplanes, computers and smart phones? They don’t ask how to best serve some vague and fuzzy abstraction, how to pander to or delude the people, or how to aggrandize their own personal power. They ask how best to get a job done well and quickly. If only Abrams could somehow clone herself—one for every state!
I don’t know nearly as much about Beto O’Rourke as I do about Stacey Abrams. But what I know impresses me. He’s an experienced pol, with six years on the El Paso City Council and six years in the US House. Before politics, he had a checkered career in music, Internet publishing, and website design. His undergraduate degree is in English literature, and he’s fluent in Spanish. He’s not a lawyer, which is probably a good thing. We have too many of them in government. Besides, Texas loves buccaneers, not lawyers.
O’Rourke’s greatest claim to fame is nearly toppling the brilliant demagogue Ted Cruz from his US Senate perch in 2018. O’Rourke lost by 2.6%, but he had gained more votes than anyone expected and apparently helped down-ballot Democrats win. He made a name for himself, and he raised progressives’ hopes, by visiting every one of Texas’ 254 counties in his trademark battered pickup truck.
Let’s be honest. O’Rourke has not yet demonstrated a brilliant strategic mind like Abrams’. But he’s a solid progressive, an incredibly hard worker, and a man who understands the unmet needs of his state. He’s also running at a perfect time. The current Governor, Greg Abbott, has a terrible record, having presiding over: (1) the big Texas Polar Vortex Power Calamity and (2) the anti-vax, anti-mask, anti-health Texas Covid Debacle.
The demographics of Texas are changing rapidly. Voters are moving there from all over in search of a warmer climate, cheaper homes, and lower taxes. The North is coming South, bringing with it wealth, education and progressive ideas.
If O’Rourke can retire Abbott this year, he would make a political earthquake that would shake Texas and the nation. And he has a good chance to pull it off. After all, the last Democratic governor of Texas—a woman, Ann Richards—left office only 27 years ago.
How much difference would it make if Abrams becomes governor of Georgia and O’Rourke becomes governor of Texas? Both would stop voter suppression in their states dead in its tracks. Both could
reverse suppression if they brought other Democrats into state government. In presidential elections thereafter, the current battleground states would pale in importance.
Here are the numbers:
|
| Georgia | 16 |
| Texas | 40 |
| Total | 56 |
|
| Arizona | 11 |
| Michigan | 15 |
| Pennsylvania | 19 |
| Wisconsin | 10 |
| Total | 55 |
In other words, if Abrams can turn Georgia blue and O’Rourke can do the same for Texas, Democrats would need to win
none of today’s non-Southern battleground states to take the White House for the foreseeable future. If that doesn’t give you hope in this dreary winter of spreading Omicron, nothing will.
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