Your semi-regular round-up of local progressive blog posts which you may find worth your while to read. Here are some blogs posts (typically from Newark Ohio News Analysis or Working Families First or NONA and WF1st) which may be more than a couple weeks old, but they are still worthy of your attention.
Recent blog posts by fellow Licking County Progressives that you may have missed:
- (NONA, “Food For Thought”, February 6th, 2020) Stan writes about the nationwide danger of voter enthusiasm declining, the loss of faith in our elections, and the reduced turnout in certain areas, the Democratic Party’s dilemma of corporate ties, and how all of that even impacts the conditions of a struggling democracy on a local level.
- (NONA, “Whatever is good will appear”, February 9th, 2020) Stan delves deeper into the issue of voter suppression, but from a different angle. He explores how development for purposes of aiding the market always seems to supersede development for community benefit. In this message, he notes that the recent appointment of Newark Development Partners alum Spencer Barker to the Newark City Council has a hidden message for the downtrodden: “don’t bother voting, we’ve got this”. Part of this critique is in highlighting the slow crawl of development in helping local homeless via a former Family Dollar building as compared to the swift renovation of a market-based segment of town near the town Square.
- (NONA, “American Factory”, February 15th, 2020) Stan discusses the importance of coming together and having community discussion about informative works, such as films and books.
- (NONA, “Both Side-ism”, February 20th, 2020) Stan highlights the corruption of our for-profit media by noting its selective coverage of current events, and more specifically its intentional lack of coverage of local politics.
- (NONA, “C U and US”, February 28th, 2020) Stan openly wonders about the potential benefits of having a campaign with two – instead of one – prominent Democratic Socialists running for president and how it would help expose the problems with our corporate-friendly system in the age of Citizens United.
- (NONA, “How Bernie Sanders Has Already Won”, March 4th, 2020) Stan explores how the coronavirus outbreak is forcing the mainstream of American politics to seriously take a look at the numerous proposals offered by Bernie; especially Medicare for All.\
- (NONA, “Trump Lite”, March 12th, 2020) Stan highlights the problematic contrast that the American people may soon face between the corrupt incumbent president and the lukewarm support for a “return to normalcy” as exhibited in the campaign of the former Vice President leading the charge to challenge him.
- (NONA, “Reaching for the Impossible”, March 17th, 2020) Stan helps to explain why a candidate like Bernie Sanders doesn’t simply give up when the cards are stacked highly against him and why grassroots movements are so vital to change.
- (NONA, “The Wartime President”, March 22nd, 2020) Stan excellently analyzes the seemingly perpetual feeling of being in a “State of War” against the invisible enemy of coronavirus. He underlines part of how the fear and the need for feeling safe is helping an authoritarian president exploit this moment to expand his reach and power.
- (NONA, “Questions”, March 29th, 2020) Stan looks into what he says are questions for which there appear to be no answers. The main question in all of this seems to be that while former Vice President Joe Biden may have consolidated party support to stop the insurgency of Bernie Sanders, what does Joe have planned to wake up the base and defeat Trump?
The Licking County Progressives 