Every once in a while you see a quote that really captures the point of view of your opposition really nicely. We got a doozy over the weekend.
In a Washington Post story with the headline “Major business group hits road to stamp out socialism,” we hear about about a political tour the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is launching to go out to more than 30 House and Senate districts across 20 states to preach the gospel of modern capitalism.
In the story, the Chamber president and CEO gives us this gem:
“As Americans feel challenges, they seem to look for other solutions. We can’t let that happen.”
God forbid we let people look for solutions to problems like not being able to afford their housing, utilities, health care, groceries, or filling up their gas tank; like wages that don’t keep up with inflation or allow us to live a good life; like the hundred different kinds of junk fees and hidden costs that nickel and dime us to death; or like the big corporate monopolies keeping farmers and small businesses from being able to earn a decent living.
The solution the Chamber of Commerce offers is don’t look for a solution, because apparently everything is just fine the way it is.
There is nothing wrong with fair market competition with lots of different competing companies and products, governed by rules of the road that everyone has to live by, with cops on the beat to make sure the cheaters and scammers go to jail. However, when companies start getting too big, too economically and politically powerful, and begin muscling out their competition, they corrupt the system and it stops working for consumers, working people, and the whole society.
Unfortunately, that is where the modern form of capitalism has devolved. Massive corporate conglomerates have almost all the power, including the power with their huge piles of cash to corrupt the politicians who are supposed to be overseeing them.
Because our corporate overlords are offering no solutions, that gives progressives a big opportunity, because we do have solutions:
We can increase the minimum wage to $25 an hour.
We can make labor unions much stronger, and make it easier for workers to organize them.
We can aggressively enforce antitrust laws and break up the monopolies that are price gouging and crushing small and medium sized businesses.
We can lower health care costs and make health care available to everyone.
We can aggressively regulate Wall Street and Big Tech, especially the AI and crypto companies.
We can help small local businesses flourish with a combination of small business loans; incubation and coaching resources; tax credits rewarding good practices like higher wages; and increased help in fighting monopolistic tactics.
We can provide families far more resources for child care and elder care.
We can save and enhance Social Security by taxing the wealthy at the same rate on Social Security taxes as working people.
The Challenge Ahead of Us
Our big business opposition makes life easier for us when they tell people to stop looking for solutions for the havoc the current economic system is wreaking in their lives. However, the challenges in front of us are still big. The crazy piles of money being spent on elections, lobbying, and PR are high hurdles to overcome every day. The law-breaking, authoritarian fascists running our government will do anything to stay in power.
And voters, even though they are economic populists and with us on most issues, remain skeptical about the role of government, and have mixed feelings about many different issues. A New York Times piece talks about this dynamic: voters don’t line up in neat ideological groups. They are with the progressive movement on some issues, not so much on others.
The other thing is that on many issues, a lot of voters are genuinely torn. On immigration, many voters want a strong, secure border and the deportation of undocumented immigrants who commit crimes. At the same time, they sympathize with immigrant families, don’t want to deport people who have lived here for decades and built businesses and families, and don’t want ICE rampaging through neighborhoods shooting people. Their tendency is to trust the police and prosecutors, but they don’t want people’s right to a fair trial taken away. They don’t like the idea of people born as boys playing girls sports, but don’t want kids bullied and demonized either.
This is why they are called swing voters.
The answer is not mushy moderation, or carefully treading around issues so that it looks like you don’t believe in anything.
To reach the voters we need to reach, we must listen to their concerns and have genuine dialogue about why we believe what we believe — and always, always pivot back to the idea that we are going to fight the wealthy and powerful on their behalf.
That combination is the formula for turning a good Democratic year into a great one, and turning 2026 and 2028 into a realignment.