Rebuild the Dream (9 page)

In many ways, the movement that elected Obama was born in 2003, taking the form of a massive, desperate effort to derail Bush's planned invasion of Iraq. Millions of Americans marched, signed online petitions, and spoke out to stop the war. They used the Internet to self-organize in a way that was original and stunning; membership in a tiny, online group called
Moveon.org
swelled into the millions, and the organization became a household name. Thousands of women flocked to the banner of a new peace group called Code Pink. Activists from antiglobalization struggles brought forward a youthful fighting spirit and creativity, much of it birthed and shaped in the 1999 Battle in Seattle, in which people gathered from around the world to protest a meeting of the World Trade Organization. Important coalitions such as Win Without War and United for Peace and Justice sprang up to give voice to the peace-seeking majority of Americans.

In just six weeks, the nascent antiwar/pro-peace movement had mobilized more people against the invasion of Iraq than had been organized to stop the Vietnam War in the first six years of that conflict. And the movement quickly linked to similar mobilizations across the globe. The
New York Times
declared that the peace effort had become a second “superpower,” embodying and expressing the force of world public opinion.

It is especially important to remember that at the head of all this there was no “One Great Leader.” There was no singular messiah, no superstar stepping in to play the role of savior. There was no single organization, giving orders.

And yet in depth, breadth, creativity, and speed of development, the peace movement was without precedent. With no solitary hero directing its efforts, the push for peace produced some of the largest demonstrations in the history of humanity—with tens of millions of people self-organizing against the Bush juggernaut.

Ultimately, the antiwar mobilization failed to prevent the war, but it became the sign—and the seed—of things to come.

When the bombs started falling in Iraq, the war protestors could have quit, gone home, and given up. They could have thrown up their hands and said, “This is too hard. We can't do anything about the way things are going in this country.” But they didn't quit. They held onto their “hopes,” and they still wanted “change.” They refused to give up on America.

As a result, the antiwar movement of 2003 became a movement for nonviolent regime change in 2004. The people birthed a grassroots crusade to unseat a sitting, wartime president. The Democrats nominated a good, dedicated, and accomplished presidential
candidate, U.S. senator John Kerry. For all his strengths, Kerry was never seen as a superhero. Yet it almost didn't matter; the people were growing a super movement.

Former Vermont governor Howard Dean's heroic effort in the 2004 primaries had already shown the power of new, online tech tools and unorthodox campaign approaches. Dean's novel fund-raising model used the Internet to solicit small donations (eighty dollars on average) from a broad base, inverting the traditional high-cost, high-touch formula in which candidates relied on a few wealthy, established political donors for large sums. This was the model the Obama campaign would later perfect and ride to the White House.

All across the country, ordinary people got involved in the 2004 presidential election with unusual passion and fervor. This was especially true for young people (the Millennials), who began to emerge as a major voice and force through edgy new groups such as League of Young Voters, Hip Hop Summit, Hip Hop Caucus, PunkVoter, HeadCount, Generational Alliance, and Voto Latino, as well as Rock the Vote, United States Student Association (USSA), Black Youth Vote!, and campus PIRGs.

Film director Michael Moore's electrifying cinematic intervention,
Fahrenheit 9/11
, further riled up the base. Lines to get into the film on the opening weekend snaked around blocks. Despite screening in a limited number of theaters, the film broke multiple records, earning more the first weekend than its blockbuster competitors and going on to become the highest-grossing documentary ever.

San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom shook up the establishment by calling for the issuing of marriage licenses to same-sex couples in 2004. The quest for marriage equality took its place under a spotlight nationwide—and stayed there, thanks to the persistence of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, intersex, and questioning community. Determined to end this form of unequal treatment,
these groups carried on nonviolent battles, in courtrooms, on the airwaves, on city streets and during every subsequent election cycle. Their courage and passion added greatly to the growing momentum for positive change.

By November, millions were on the move—organizing themselves outside of the formal structures of the campaign, uniting across lines of class and color. Leaving nothing to chance, people even volunteered for “election protection” efforts—overseeing voting booths to avoid a repeat of the fiasco that led to the U.S. Supreme Court's selection of George W. Bush as our forty-third president in 2000.

This flourishing of electoral activism was much bigger than Senator Kerry's official presidential campaign. Many who had supported Ralph Nader's Green Party bid in 2000 came rushing back into the fold. But it was much broader in scope than the Democratic Party. In 2004, we saw the birth of a genuine, pro-democracy movement—standing up against the entire apparatus of one-party rule in Washington, DC.

Everyone remembers Kerry's stinging loss at the ballot box on election night, but they forget that this newborn, fledgling force came within one hundred thousand votes in Ohio of evicting Bush from the White House. That's how powerful this progressive, people-powered phenomenon had already become, way back in 2004.

Once again, people could have quit, saying, “We give up. We gave it our best shot. America just can't be fixed.” But, once again, they didn't quit. They held on to their “hopes,” and they kept fighting for “change.” Post-election blues did not turn into apathy.

Instead, the pro-democracy movement rapidly reinvented itself with a dazzling array of new tools and organizations. For instance, the Huffington Post Internet newspaper was born that year, bringing real sophistication and celebrity pizzazz to something the media had begun calling the “blogosphere.” Powered mainly by pajama-clad rebels against the Bush-Cheney status quo, progressive blog sites such as Daily Kos and Talking Points Memo matured to give liberals a new communication capacity that finally leveled the playing field with right-wing talk radio.

In that same vein, progressive talk radio network Air America hit its stride in 2005. Launched in 2004, it provided an important platform for on-air personalities Rachel Maddow, Thom Hartmann, and Al Franken. Those voices remain significant despite the network's ultimate failure due to financial troubles. Former vice president Al Gore created a television network, Current TV, in the spring of 2005. While the network is still defining and refining its voice today, it provides an important, independent perspective in the media landscape.

By far the most significant contribution to the progressive media landscape came with Jon Stewart's
Daily Show
, which averaged 1 million viewers per night in 2003 (and would go on to average 2 million viewers per night by 2008). A spin off,
The Colbert Report
, launched in 2005 to similar success. Cornering the market on “infotainment,” the two programs are so popular with young audiences (median age of thirty-five), they have become the primary news source within that demographic.

In 2005,
Don't Think of an Elephant
became a must-read sensation among those frustrated with the Democrats' chronic messaging misfires. Written by UC Berkeley linguistics professor George Lakoff, the 2004 book had progressives everywhere discussing the need for better “framing” of liberal issues and for more sophisticated
communications overall. In hindsight, the pro-democracy movement was pre-adapting to rally around a national leader who could demonstrate the superior messaging skills and communications acumen that the party seemed to be lacking.

The same year, longtime Democratic Party stalwart Rob Stein helped to found the Democracy Alliance (DA), with major backing from heavy hitters Peter Lewis of Progressive Insurance, Herb and Marion Sandler, and George Soros. Through the DA, major liberal donors could join forces to fund progressive infrastructure to counter the well-funded and sophisticated conservative apparatus. Since its founding, the DA has helped direct nearly $150 million to progressive organizations.

Also in 2005, a powerhouse coalition called the Apollo Alliance, founded in 2001, came into its own. Its goals included American energy independence, as well as cleaner and more energy-efficient alternatives. Its model of alliance skillfully bridged once-oppositional groups, including businesses, environmental organizations, and more than thirty labor unions. Together they popularized the idea of clean energy jobs. (I later joined its board of directors; Apollo supported me in promoting green jobs for low-income people and people of color through my own organizations—the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and Green for All.)

With the Center for American Progress—founded by John Podesta in 2003 and coming into force by 2005—progressives finally had a think tank and policy center on par with the conservative Heritage Foundation. Existing heavyweights in the policy world—PolicyLink, Demos, Campaign for America's Future, Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), and the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS)—were ramping up their efforts.

Within this larger re-invention, the Democratic Party went through a major overhaul. Ironically, the party found itself in the
hands of two fighters who held opposing visions of the way forward. Firebrand Howard Dean was now running the Democratic National Committee (DNC). He advocated a fifty-state strategy, insisting the Democrats had to become a truly national party, and he invested organizing resources around the country to make that happen. On the other hand, U.S. representative Rahm Emanuel had taken the helm at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC). His job was to expand the number of Democrats in the House of Representatives—with a goal of taking over that body. He held the opposite view of Dean, vowing to focus party resources primarily on those purple districts where Emanuel thought Democrats could pick up seats. These two, strong-willed partisans fought bitterly and publicly over their divergent approaches. But in the end, perhaps both were right. By having a broad national strategy, complemented by areas of strategic focus, the Democrats were moving themselves into position for victory in 2006.

But the most significant development in 2005 arose from tragedy. That August, Hurricane Katrina drowned an American city. Watching the predominately black residents of New Orleans struggle to survive while the Bush administration bungled the response, Americans on both sides of the political aisle were sickened. For millions, Bush's presidency drowned in the floodwaters of Katrina. We were spending billions invading countries halfway around the world, but we could not help our own citizens get food, water, and shelter in their time of greatest need. The smirking and the shirking
in the White House were just not that cute any more. Many came to the conclusion that something was desperately wrong in our country and that nothing could be fixed until the GOP stranglehold on all three branches of government was ended.

These inventive responses to our nation's problems defined 2005—a year when those who thought the country was headed in the wrong direction started creating new institutions and birthing new ideas with which to win over the country.

The accumulation of all of these innovations—and more—paid off handsomely in 2006. That year, Al Gore shattered the national and global complacency about climate and energy with his film
An Inconvenient Truth
. Gore's courageous and inspired “Paul Revere” ride through the global consciousness presented a sharp contrast: the kind of moral leadership he would have brought to the White House had he won the presidential bid in 2000, versus the kowtowing to the military-petroleum complex that the Bush-Cheney administration represented. The public's appetite for “change” was whetted. Deepening concerns about the planet's fate super-charged the growing hunger for a powerful course correction.

Also, that year, a new force for good stepped out of the shadows and into the spotlight: the Latino-led movement for immigration reform. Savvy organizations such as the Center for Community Change (CCC), National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON), National Council of La Raza (NCLR), Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán (MEChA), and the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA) had been laying the groundwork for years. The trigger was the Border Protection,
Anti-Terrorism, and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005—also known as H.R. 4437. The proposed legislation would have classified as felons any undocumented immigrant, as well as anyone who helped undocumented immigrants enter or remain in the United States. And yet, in many places, the nation's agricultural and service sectors were almost entirely dependent on immigrant labor. Brown hands were literally feeding, housing, and caring for millions of Americans. The idea that America would rely upon as well as attack the same community outraged people of conscience.