How a Green Won (Part II)

November 6, 2008, from wire services, San Francisco: Addressing a Mark Hopkins ballroom packed with dignitaries, Democratic Party operatives and the international news media, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi conceded defeat to her Green Party challenger, antiwar activist Cindy Sheehan last night. Pelosi’s concession capped a hard fought campaign setting progressives against an increasingly embattled Democratic Party leadership seen as complicit in the Bush administration’s decision to widen the American involvement in the Middle East beyond Iraq into Syria and Iran.

In scoring an unprecedented victory over a sitting speaker, the Sheehan candidacy was bolstered by its early alliance with the Greens. The insurgent party has become a formidable presence in San Francisco politics, holding two seats on the Board of Supervisors and on the School Board. Also notable was the support offered by former Board of Supervisor’s President Matt Gonzalez. Gonzalez’s 2003 mayoral campaign, which fell short by just over 14,000 votes, is widely viewed as having set the stage for Sheehan victory. Gonzalez’s decision to share his database of volunteers and financial supporters in exchange for a commitment on Sheehan’s part to run as a Green is credited with providing the electoral muscle which was key to the electoral landslide.

Also key to Sheehan’s victory was the early support of nationally known progressive journalists who made the campaign a central focus of several columns introducing the campaign to a national audience and attracting their support. One of these, syndicated columnist Norman Solomon waxed effusive on the Sheehan victory: “Many of us were chastened by our failure to support the Mayoral campaign of Matt Gonzalez. We came to recognize the Gonzalez near victory as a major missed opportunity for progressives as this would have provided us a legitimate, electable candidate for the presidency in 2008. We were sure not to duplicate our mistake with Cindy and recognized the importance of her campaign immediately after its announcement in July 2007.”

The success of Sheehan’s challenge was vexing to mainstream liberal publications which were generally lukewarm towards the Sheehan candidacy. Their failure to respond positively angered many progressive readers and as a result some have suffered significant losses in their subscription base. Most notable among these was the Nation magazine, though a contributing factor in the publication’s demise was a grassroots boycott in the wake of its endorsement of Hillary Clinton’s failed presidential campaign. The periodical is now operating under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The broad coalition behind Sheehan surprised veteran political observers and Democratic Party strategists in extending well beyond her core supporters in the anti-war movement. Civil rights advocates displeased with Pelosi’s failure to move on impeachment proceedings against an administration it saw as routinely demonstrating contempt for the constitution were forthcoming with substantial donations. Others contributed pro bono legal services necessary to defend the Green Party against harassment from a legal team turned loose by the national Democratic Party. Food and farm advocates, disgusted with Pelosi’s support for the 2007 Farm Bill derided as a sham and an environmental atrocity lavished volunteers with locally produced gourmet meals. San Francisco residents with longer memories who have never forgiven Pelosi for her engineering the delivery of the decommissioned Presidio military base into the hands of cronies of Pelosi’s husband’s real estate empire opened their apartments to out-of-town supporters who put in long hours on the campaign.

While national unions, as expected, endorsed Pelosi’s candidacy and contributed to the Democratic get out the vote effort, this was markedly less successful than in previous years. Unconfirmed reports indicate that union members aware of Pelosi’s key role in ramming through job destroying free trade agreements called in sick, refused to participate or, in some cases, actively sabotaged the campaign operation. Some phone bankers would, according to anonymous sources, substitute endorsements of Sheehan for the script provided by the Pelosi functionaries.

But perhaps most decisive was the intangible factor of personality. Ordinary voters appeared to develop a strong attachment to Sheehan, a divorced working class mother of three, whose entry into politics was precipitated by the death of her son Casey in what is now universally understood to be a the greatest foreign policy disaster in US history. Sheehan’s awkward, unschooled and plain spoken manner stood in stark contrast to the smooth manners, impeccable dress and polished rhetoric of Pelosi. Pelosi’s privileged background, the daughter of a big city mayor and her marriage into a billion dollar real estate empire while not figuring Sheehan campaign materials, appeared to become a serious liability among voters.

Pelosi is only the most visible casualty of a political tidal wave whose repercussions are only beginning to be understood by political analysts.

John Halle is a Professor at the Bard College Conservatory of Music and former Green Party Alderman from New Haven's Ninth Ward. Read other articles by John, or visit John's website.

12 comments on this article so far ...

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  1. Sunil Sharma said on July 30th, 2007 at 3:53pm #

    And just so there is no confusion, this is a speculative fiction article. –The editors

  2. Michael Donnelly said on July 30th, 2007 at 5:13pm #

    Nice fantasy. However, hitching to the brain-dead Greens would never work. After all, they’d still be touting a “safe states” non-strategy nationally. (Wouldn’t want to challenge the latest D war-monger, now would we?) Lest one forget the worst ever poltical non-strategy of all time – a major cause of Bush’s reelection; read how world class self-promoter and recent DV contributor Ted Glick sold it last time: http://www.zmag.org/Sustainers/Content/2003-07/01glick.cfm

  3. joell said on July 30th, 2007 at 6:38pm #

    “Gonzalez’s 2003 mayoral campaign, which fell short by fewer than 1,000 votes”

    get the basic facts correct; it was more like 15,000. however, the greens are a force in S.F. and could be of great benefit to cindy.

    cindy, be very careful with the greens. some , especially in decision making positions, are not trustworthy. Seek their support, but like nader 04, run as an independent. otherwise, you may encounter, like he did, a rigged process, and not have ballot status.

  4. Hue Longer said on July 30th, 2007 at 6:40pm #

    Is this satire or fiction? Is it a candy or a breath mint? I’m only trained to see one and one half levels of irony and I am now in dire need of a joint. Where is the straight line, predictable newsletter that I hoped for after canceling my subscription to National Lampoon? What chance of competing with the Wall Street Journal will you guys have if you keep this confusing nonsense up?

    On a sideways note, Pelosi has confirmed that she will soon be doing a spread for Hustler, as she is desperate to remain in the slime light after losing to Sheehan

  5. Sunil Sharma said on July 30th, 2007 at 7:17pm #

    Joell wrote: “get the basic facts correct; it was more like 15,000. however, the greens are a force in S.F. and could be of great benefit to cindy.”

    Correct, Gonzalez lost by 14,217 votes. Error corrected. Thanks!

  6. Sunil Sharma said on July 30th, 2007 at 7:19pm #

    Hue Longer wrote: “On a sideways note, Pelosi has confirmed that she will soon be doing a spread for Hustler, as she is desperate to remain in the slime light after losing to Sheehan.”

    Blahh! Remind me not to buy that issue!

  7. Sunil Sharma said on July 30th, 2007 at 7:21pm #

    Hue Longer wrote: “What chance of competing with the Wall Street Journal will you guys have if you keep this confusing nonsense up? ”

    I gave up on trying to outsell the WSJ a long time ago. Now my main aspiration in life is to publish a newsletter with fewer typos than CounterPunch. Seems realistic enough . . .

  8. Hue Longer said on July 30th, 2007 at 9:00pm #

    lol on CP… Regarding Pelosi…I am ashamed to admit that I am attracted to her…maybe it was her maniacal grin after winning the house…it was scary, crazy and it turned me on.

  9. Gary Kleppe said on July 31st, 2007 at 6:32am #

    We came to recognize the Gonzalez near victory as a major missed opportunity for progressives as this would have provided us a legitimate, electable candidate for the presidency in 2008.

    Who’s going to tell Norman Solomon that Gonzalez is only a captain?

    As for the article as a whole, I think it makes an important point, that author wish fulfillment is one of the easiest ways to ruin a work of fiction.

  10. Gary Kleppe said on July 31st, 2007 at 6:33am #

    Whoops, forget the captain bit. I thought “major” was a typo but I just misread it.

  11. Random said on August 25th, 2007 at 6:35pm #

    Oy, as an untrustworthy, braid-nead Green, I have to say that these exercises in speculative fiction initially struck me as a being, well a bit dodgy. But the more I thought about it, the more it became clear to me that such imaginings are precisely what may be needed . “If you can dream it, you can do it.” Envisioning scenarios such as these are certainly inspirational, likened to the first step in a journey of 1,000 Li.
    What’s the harm, as long as people at the Nation don’t jump out of windows thinking they’re out a job and rush their resumes over to Hustler.

  12. Camille Tuason Mata said on April 11th, 2008 at 12:07pm #

    I agree with Fandom (August 25, 2007). Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither were the Black vote, citizenship rights for aliens, women’s right to an education, and the ending of slavery. Cindy Sheehan, the lone, ailing mother, who lost a son to the premature decision to scapegoat Iraq for 9-11, managed to rally hundreds of protests over a period of two weeks after her image flashed on national and international news. Thereafter, she inspired thousands of mothers across the country to form a group called Code Pink to protest the government’s right to simply send their sons and daughters to invade a country based on some fictitious notion that their weapons of mass destruction could actually outnumber that of the United States. Keep in mind that it was not weapons of mass destruction that did the twin towers in, but strategic planning. Along the same lines, Ralph Nader’s public outcry against corporate welfare and the corporatization of democracy has resulted in corporations sitting down with environmental and labor groups to talk about how they can contribute to human rights and environmental behavior (read: McDonalds and Starbucks). When the going gets tough and the voices of the naysayers begin to boom just a little too loud,the voice of common sense takes control and I think about Sheehan and Nader, my role models, and know that in this country, just about anything is possible, including changing the electoral college and really making the electoral process a populist one.