A Midnight Thought on the Next American Revolution (26 May 08)

( – promoted by buhdydharma )

Excerpted from Burning the Midnight Oil for the Next American Revolution (26 May 2008),

in the Burning the Midnight Oil Revolution-within-a-Revolution,

hosted by EENR

The Midnight Thought at the moment is on the issue of building the Progressive Populist Change Coalition in the context of the soon-to-begin US Presidential General Election Campaign.

As the Long, Flat, Bataan-Death-March to the Nomination winds down, it is perhaps natural for those deeply immersed in the day to day of the campaign to get caught up in identity-politics that it has descended into.

However, Senator Obama has an Appalachia problem, and the most promising way to overcome his Appalachia problem is not with identity politics, but with policy politics.

So, in this diary, three policy planks to stress when running in Western North Carolina, Western Ol’ Virginia, West Virginia, Northeastern Kentucky and … oh, yes … western Pennsylvania and southeastern Ohio.

Do not ever entirely forget Southeastern Ohio … its one reason why Ohio and Kentucky have swung together every since I’ve been alive (that is, ever since 1960).

What is the Appalachia Problem more specifically?

The Appalachia problem is not about winning or losing the General Election as such. From where he stands now, Senator Obama is on track to winning the General Election, without requiring either the Shenandoah or Upper Ohio River Valleys at all.

And after all, historically, while the Republicans have never, ever, won the White House without carrying Ohio, the Democrats have done that. Since the Democratic party started running a single Presidential candidate in 1828, Ohio voted against a winning Democratic candidate:

• for the Whig in 1836 against Martin van Buren;
  
• for the Whig in 1844 against James Polk;
  
• for the Republican in 1856 against James Buchanan;
  
• for the Republican in 1884 against Grover Cleveland;
  
• for the Republican in 1892 against Grover Cleveland;
  
• for the Republican in 1944 against FDR; and
  
• for the Republican in 1960 against JFK.
  

… or, IOW, as a Republican-leaning large swing state, losing Ohio has always meant losing the election for the Republican, but not always for the Democrat.

However, for a Democratic President, not winning Ohio has often meant a narrow win rather than a big win.

And that’s what the “Appalachia Problem” is … the challenge of wracking up a large enough win that Beltway Insiders see standing up to the Preisdent early on as a politically risky thing to do.

And y’all know what particular Beltway Insiders I am referring to here … those so-called “Blue Dogs”, heavily rumored to be Democrats, though evidence to that effect is sometimes a bit hard to scratch up.

Change the media refrain on “white, blue collar voters”, meaning in reality with reference to primary results to date, white, not-college-educated residents of Appalachia and its surrounding foothills, and all of a sudden someone facing a House re-election in 2010 that wants to make things hard on President Obama has to think about the risk of a “I stand behind the President 100%” primary challenger, just as foot draggers in 1932 had to worry about the risk of being primaried by a New Dealer in 1934.

So that’s what this is about … gaining a governing majority. And, looking at today’s electoral map, Senator Obama only has to whittle down Senator McCane’s margin in Appalachia, and he’ll have what will look like, in the immediate aftermath of the general election, a governing majority.

The Forgotten Policy Dimension

Ever since Senators Obama and Clinton adopted moderately watered down versions of Senator Edwards policy platform, there has only been modest policy differences to be able to point to. Hence the descent into the poisonous politics of group identity … and, as Senator Webb points out, when the Democratic Party looks to be pursuing the politics of identity, the “economic Democrats” of the Shenandoah and Upper Ohio River Valleys quite rightly conclude that they are going to be left with the crumbs that fall from the table, at the very best.

Now, maybe there is some brilliant political messaging strategy that can turn this on its head. But if there is, that’ll be a diary for some brilliant political messaging person.

And maybe there is some brilliant field organizing and tactical ground game that can turn this on its head. But if there is, that’ll be a diary for some brilliant political field person.

Now, while I certainly am no brilliant policy person, an advantage of addressing the Appalachian Problem with policy is that it does not require brilliance. Stick to the basics, look for common regional and community interests that are in the greater national interest, and promote them.

The thing is, on the policy front, Senator Obama has a wide open field to run in (as Senator Clinton would have had, were she on track to be the nominee). The Republican Party has been running for decades to gain power to put policies in place that, on their own account, would never attract a majority. So running against the Republican policies, by advancing real solutions to real problems, is not rocket science.

Policy One: Bio-coal

I got three … well, I got four, but I’ve already written the fourth one up so many times that I’m having trouble getting a fresh take on it, so I’ll just be writing up three …

… feel free to add more in the comments.

First, bio-coal. There was a time that rural Appalachia relied heavily on sustainable permaculture. You could raise about a much pork on an acre of Sweet Chestnut as you could on an acre of corn … and the acre did not have to be flat, and the pigs did the harvesting for you. But then came the blight, and that knocked the legs out from under that agricultural system.

But for bio-coal, there is no need to rely on any one variety of tree, so there is no need to open ourselves up to the dangers of monoculture. In particular, while most wood-coppice system have relied on a single variety for the source of the coppice and another for the long-harvest-cycle standards, its perfectly possible to have a mix of tree species in a coppice stand, keeping the rotation cycle at the frequency required by the  slower growing species in the stand.

Turning coppiced wood into bio-coal is a far more labor intensive enterprise than mining coal, and the labor is located in the local area of the stand of coppice. A dollar’s worth of bio-coal will bring far more employment into an Appalachian county than a dollar’s worth of mineral coal ever did.

And Senator Obama has enough leeway in his existing Energy Policy that he can just announce a focus on bio-coal without requiring any big new policy roll-out. That is, he can say, “John McCain is offering the country four more years of sound-bite, sound-good, do-little Energy Policy. Last year, I set forth a real Energy Policy with real Energy Solutions. Let me give you an example of a real Energy Solution that is going to be offering new jobs in Green Energy Industries right here in {Eastern-KY / WV / Southeastern-OH / Western-PA / Western-VA / Western-NC} … bio-coal. A dollar’s worth of bio-coal, raised sustainably by harvesting wood down to its rootstock and then allowing it to regrow, will create far more employment than a dollar’s worth of mineral coal ever did.”

“This is something we could have been doing for the last eight years … but the Bush administration was more interested in social division at home and an incompetent invasion of the wrong enemy at the wrong time abroad. And if you elect John McCain, that is exactly what he will deliver … four more years of social division and misguided foreign policy, and four more years of empty talk about Energy Independence while the big oil and coal companies rake in record profits.”

Policy Two: Modular Pumped Hydro

Opportunities for sustainable bio-coal production is not the only big opportunities for Green Collar jobs in Appalachia. Some of our biggest potential sources of sustainable Green Electricity are things like wind and concentrated thermal solar and supplementing big hydro dams with run-of-the-river hydro. And these are volatile energy sources.

Indeed, that is one of the strategic benefits of bio-coal … it is a readily stored, readily transported, non-volatile energy source. However, until we have developed and rolled out a system of Direct Carbon Fuel Cell power plants, we will be using thermal plants to convert bio-coal to electricity … and any thermal plant has an extended start-up cycle that it has to go through.

The most energy efficient existing technology for quick-start energy storage on the day-to-week-to-month time scale is pumped hydro … basically running a hydro generator as a motor to pump water uphill, to store energy, then reversing the cycle and allowing the water to drive the generator to retrieve the energy.

Traditional hydro, of course, has any number of potential environmental problems. Further, each traditional hydro plant is tailored to its particular site, reducing opportunities for scale economies.

And that is where modular pumped storage hydro comes in. Modular pumped storage hydro pumps the water back and forth between holding tanks … IOW, one holding tank down in the hollow, and one up near the ridge. That means that it can use a standardized set-up, with everything except the holding tanks and pipe between them produced assembly-line fashion.

What you need as a resource for modular pumped storage hydro is … well, an elevation. A 100m (330ft) elevation is considered a minimum, but the steeper, the more energy is stored for the same investment in material … an 800 foot elevation is good.

Now, look at a map. One part of the US that will definitely be importing renewable sustainable electricity from inland is the Northeast Corridor, between Washington DC and Boston.

The lowest line losses will come from putting the energy storage between the net sustainable energy exporting states and the net sustainable energy importing states … and the best efficiency comes from placing the energy storage in areas with plenty of steep hills to work with.

Notice that there does not have to be any special favors to Appalachia to establish this industry in Appalachia. Appalachia has the two basic resources required:

• Location Plus Elevation

All that Appalachia needs to get this industry started is An Administration that is serious about Doing Something about Green Collar Jobs, instead of just Talking about it.

Policy Three: Rural Broadband

Since the 1930’s … heck, since the 1830’s … the Democratic Party has been serious about supporting free enterprise in rural areas. Rural electrification opened the way for new businesses to establish in rural areas that were previously restricted to urban areas. Regulation requiring rural telephone service is another big example.

Today, the best way that a business has to break through barriers of distance from suppliers and customers is to rely on the internet. However, increasingly, this means relying on broadband access to the internet. And far too many rural areas are blocked from broadband access.

With modern developments in wireless networks, it is possible to roll out a nationwide wireless broadband system, which will support the development of new businesses … big and small … in rural areas across the country.

This is, of course, just adopting one of Edwards key rural development planks, and packaging it up for the Battle for Appalachia.

And, of course, it could be portrayed as a “welfare” or “rural support” program … but Senator Obama will get a lot more benefit from it in the Shenandoah and Upper Ohio River Valleys if he follows Edward’s lead and portrays it as a pro-rural-business, pro-jobs policy.

Building a New Coalition for a New Age

These are, of course, only three policies … I’ve got more of my own, and of course there’s a lot of nuggets still to be mined from Edwards’s policy platform.

More important than these three specific policies is the approach of using policy that can be clearly (and, given a financial advantage over McCain, repeatedly) portrayed as in the national interest, and in the interest of the working people of the Shenandoah and Upper Ohio River Valleys.

And … and this is a key element of the strategy … policies where the people that Senator Obama is appealing to in the Battle for Appalachia can see for themselves where they fit in a new governing coalition. Not, “I’ll look out for ways to swing jobs your way because I identify with you” … but the far firmer promise of, “My policies are going to swing jobs your way because they are going to create industries that will want to set up shop in your region”.

Anyway, that’s a sketch of the idea, I thought I’d share it.