Adam Green: Progressive Agenda is Mainstream Agenda

Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and a graduate of the School of Media and Public Affairs, spoke to the College Democrats Thursday night to give them words of encouragement going into the 2010 elections.

Green, who previously worked for MoveOn.org and several campaigns such as that of Tim Johnson of South Dakota, said that PCCC was founded to provide Democrat activists with an alternative to institutions such as the Democratic National Committee.

“A lot of candidates who went on to vote against Obama’s health care agenda, Obama’s environmental bill, received the most money from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee,” said Green. “We want to give people the opportunity to vote with their dollars and volunteer hours, and force the DCCC to compete and become more progressive.”

Green said that the conventional wisdom about candidates needing to pander to the center on issues is “wrong.”

“What genius came up with the idea that because something is in the ideological center of our country, that’s in the center of the bell curve?” He asked, referring to the widely-accepted bell curve showing that the majority of Americans are in the political center, with fewer voters leaning to the left or right of the political spectrum. “We have a lot of ignorance in the media about the center of our ideology being in the center of the bell curve, and a lot of it comes from pundits we’re taught to respect.”

“A progressive agenda is a mainstream agenda,” he added. “The center of our country is progressive.”

Green cited polls showing that, before the health care reform vote, over 70 percent of Americans wanted a public option, and yet many Congressional Democrats said they would only support health care reform legislation if it did not include a public option.

“The problem with Democrats is that they aren’t representing their districts,” Green said.

One of these Democrats, Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., is now facing a primary challenge from Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter, who is catching up with Lincoln in recent polls. The PCCC and other organizations helped Halter bring in $1.5 million in grassroots donations.

Green assured the College Democrats that giving conservative Democrats such as Lincoln primary challenges by more progressive candidates would not threaten their majorities in both houses of Congress.

“There is room in the Democrat party for new ideas. It’s okay to question authority, to question conventional wisdom, to question the norms,” he said. “The book is constantly being re-written.”