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NEWSFLASH: America Doesn't Like Its Jobs Shipped Overseas
Open Left - Front Page —
... The Journal focuses in on Democrat Jeff Merkley's anti-NAFTA campaign in Oregon, which I wrote about in an earlier newspaper column - but the change in the trade debate goes way beyond one or two senate races. Even the most ardent free-trade fundamentalists are feeling the heat. ...
Mandate Watch - Bellwether Races/Initiatives To Watch Below the Presidential Contest
Open Left - Front Page —
... - The Smith-Merkley Senate Race: As I wrote in a newspaper column in October, the senate race between incumbent Sen. Gordon Smith (R) and challenger Jeff Merkley (D) provides arguably the starkest economic contrast on key issues like trade and globalization - and in a state where populist Democrats are supposedly unable to run on such issues. Should Merkley win with his anti-NAFTA, anti-Wall-Street-bailout campaign, it will prove that even in a state like Oregon with a significant export economy, Democrats can compete and win with a populist economic message. ...
David Sirota: Mandate Watch - Bellwether Races/Initiatives To Watch Below the Presidential Contest
Politics on HuffingtonPost.com —
... - The Smith-Merkley Senate Race: As I wrote in a newspaper column in October, the senate race between incumbent Sen. Gordon Smith (R) and challenger Jeff Merkley (D) provides arguably the starkest economic contrast on key issues like trade and globalization - and in a state where populist Democrats are supposedly unable to run on such issues. Should Merkley win with his anti-NAFTA, anti-Wall-Street-bailout campaign, it will prove that even in a state like Oregon with a significant export economy, Democrats can compete and win with a populist economic message. ...
David Sirota: Mandate Watch -- Bellwether Races/Initiatives To Watch Below the Presidential Contest
Politics on HuffingtonPost.com —
... - The Smith-Merkley Senate Race: As I wrote in a newspaper column in October, the senate race between incumbent Sen. Gordon Smith (R) and challenger Jeff Merkley (D) provides arguably the starkest economic contrast on key issues like trade and globalization - and in a state where populist Democrats are supposedly unable to run on such issues. Should Merkley win with his anti-NAFTA, anti-Wall-Street-bailout campaign, it will prove that even in a state like Oregon with a significant export economy, Democrats can compete and win with a populist economic message. ...
Did Merkley Pull It Off? Hell Yes.
Open Left - Front Page —
Back in mid-October I wrote a column about Oregon Democratic Senate candidate (now Senator-elect) Jeff Merkley and why his campaign against Republican Sen. Gordon Smith was so important in forging a class-based, cross-geographic coalition between blue- and white-collar constituencies: ...
Tom Udall, Mark Udall, Jeff Merkley - and What the Bailout Says About the New Senate
Open Left - Front Page —
... against the bailout as a candidate for Senate (again, not because he didn't trust Bush, but because he said he was conceptually against giving away money to Wall Street), and then voted for the bailout today. Again, this suggests Merkley - who I was previously convinced was a principled working-class populist - is starting his Senate career epitomizing the worst kinds of images people have of politicians - those who sound like they're for "the folks" at election time, and then who sell out "the folks" once in Washington. ...
David Sirota: What Today's Bailout Vote Says About the New Senate
Politics on HuffingtonPost.com —
... against the bailout as a candidate for Senate (again, not because he didn't trust Bush, but because he said he was conceptually against giving away money to Wall Street), and then voted for the bailout today. Again, this suggests Merkley - who I was previously convinced was a principled working-class populist - is starting his Senate career epitomizing the worst kinds of images people have of politicians - those who sound like they're for "the folks" at election time, and then who sell out "the folks" once in Washington. ...
Here's What Sows Cynicism
Open Left - Front Page —
... I point this out not to pick on Merkley - I sincerely have high hopes for him, and was an outspoken advocate of his candidacy. I point it out to show exactly what sows cynicism in the public and in the activist class.* ...
Proof Progressive Pressure Matters: Merkley On Pushing the White House & Backing Bankruptcy Reform
Open Left - Front Page —
... . Merkley is a Better Democrat, and a guy I genuinely like, admire and advocated for during the campaign (my column about him, for instance, was featured as the rebuttal piece to the Oregonian's editorial supporting Gordon Smith). So I was interested to hear why he could cast such a vote only weeks after taking such a strong stand against the bill he voted for. ...
