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As offensive as it may sound to today's sensitive ears, it was only 11 years ago that a young and rising United States senator wrote the following about immigration:

"When I see Mexican flags waved at pro-immigration demonstrations, I sometimes feel a flush of patriotic resentment. When I'm forced to use a translator to communicate with the guy fixing my car, I feel a certain frustration."

That senator was Democrat Barack Obama from Illinois.

The quote comes from his 2006 autobiography, "The Audacity of Hope." After getting our attention with that blunt description of his feelings, Obama goes on to argue against following those feelings as some people do, to justify denial of "rights and opportunities" to immigrants who want to become Americans.

I had forgotten about that quote until I ran across it in an important essay posted by liberal analyst Peter Beinart in The Atlantic this past week, as Democrats tried in vain to win a couple of congressional seats in traditionally red districts in Georgia and South Carolina.

Titled "How the Democrats Lost Their Way on Immigration," Beinart's piece describes a Democratic Party trying to recover from President Donald Trump's upset victory, yet too hung up on the culture wars commonly known as "political correctness."

Of course, one could just as easily say the same about the Trump era's Grand Old Party, too gridlocked, so far, by its own internal right-versus-far-right conflicts to pass major legislation, despite its control of both houses of Congress.

Still, Republican gridlock is thin consolation for the Democrats' long losing streak in President Obama's years. His two presidential victories distract us from Democratic losses of more than a thousand state legislative seats and governorships and two-thirds of the country's legislative chambers.

In some ways, I think Beinart is too hard on the Democrats in accounting for such losses. I trace the collapse of compromise on immigration to 2008 when I saw Arizona Sen. John McCain, on his way to winning the GOP presidential nomination, booed at the Conservative Political Action Conference convention for advocating comprehensive immigration reform. He later abandoned that cause, and efforts by both parties to revive it have failed.

Yet, let's give credit where it is due. Republicans were singing the blues in similar fashion when Obama's elections in 2008 and 2012 and other Democratic victories threatened the long-term future of the Republicans as a national party. Instead, grass-roots groups like the tea party movement scored victories at the state and local level that have led to the GOP's current dominance.

Which brings me back to how Obama's quote illustrates to me why he managed to succeed twice at something on which Hillary Clinton failed twice: winning the presidency. His feelings of "patriotic resentment" sound like an honest description of concerns that many people feel. Although today he might be castigated by ideological purists as "racist" or at least committing a "microaggression," it is through expressing such sincerely held feelings that honest dialogue can begin and, one hopes, lead to useful compromise and progress.

In the best of all possible political worlds, candidates from both parties calm such irrational fears by educating voters with real facts, not just alarm. Unfortunately we do not live in that best political world these days. Instead, we are treated to Trump's craven slander of immigrants in the U.S. illegally as an invading tide of "murderers" and "rapists."

Yet, if you don't allow candid discussion of real issues, phony hot-button issues will take center stage. Think of the difference it would have made if Clinton had expressed, as her husband used to say in his 1992 presidential bid, how "I feel your pain."

Today's post-Trump Democrats are divided. One side says they must abandon "identity politics" that appeal to every left-out group but working-class and middle-class whites, who feel left behind by economic and cultural change.

The other side says, no, giving voice to traditionally left-out women and minorities is a core belief and essential to the turnout the party needs to win elections especially when they don't have a big draw like Obama on the ballot.

I think both sides of that debate are right. Democrats have been most successful when they have given voice to bread-and-butter working-class concerns, regardless of race or tribe. They can do it again, if they really want to win.

Clarence Page, a member of the Tribune Editorial Board, blogs at http://www.chicagotribune.com/pagespage.

cpage@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @cptime

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Memo to the Democrats: Don't forget the 'forgotten' - Chicago Tribune - Chicago Tribune

In the late 1960s, some white liberals especially college-age baby boomers began to adopt a secularized version of liberal Protestant values. Yet even then, the Democratic Partys leaders retained a connection to those religious traditions, which allowed them to maintain their appeal to religious voters.

Eugene McCarthy and Robert F. Kennedy, the partys leading antiwar candidates for the presidential nomination in 1968, were practicing Catholics who found inspiration in the churchs teachings. Jimmy Carter was a Southern Baptist deacon who regularly taught an adult Sunday school class during his 1976 campaign for president.

Jesse Jackson, who won several primaries in 1984 and 1988, was an ordained minister. Al Gore was a Southern Baptist who had attended divinity school. Bill Clinton had deep roots in the Southern Baptist tradition, despite his troubled relationship with some of the conservative leaders of his denomination during his presidency.

Hillary Clinton frequently cited her Methodist faith as a source of her values. And Barack Obama, despite a secular upbringing, learned to speak in the theological cadences of a Protestant Christian tradition while attending a progressive African-American church in Chicago.

Yet now younger, secular Democrats are attempting to separate their partys progressive values from those religious traditions. Some may belong to a religious tradition or consider themselves to be spiritual people, but they are not able to speak the language of a communally based faith because it does not inform or shape their political views.

This has posed a problem at the polls, because most Democratic voters are not as secular as these activists might assume. While only 47 percent of white, college-educated Democrats identify as Christians, Christianity remains the faith of 81 percent of African-American Democrats and 76 percent of Latino Democrats.

The religious differences between generations are just as stark as the differences between racial groups. While 35 percent of millennials report having no religious affiliation, only 17 percent of baby boomers and fewer than 11 percent of Americans born before 1945 are religiously unaffiliated.

The party is thus split between a minority of young, educated, secular white activists and a larger group of African-Americans, Hispanics and older whites whose political values are closely tied to their faith. No wonder candidates like Mr. Ossoff struggled to connect with key blocs of the Democratic coalition.

And its also no wonder that the Democratic congressional leadership is still dominated by a graying generation of leaders; they are the only ones who can bridge the partys religious divide. The median age of House Democratic representatives is now well over 60 the highest in decades, and several years older than the median Republican age.

All four of Georgias Democratic representatives are 60 or older, and most have deep roots in the African-American Baptist tradition. If Mr. Ossoff had been elected to represent the Sixth District, he would have been over 30 years younger than the next-youngest member of the Georgia Democratic delegation, and he would have represented a very different set of cultural values.

What can Democrats do to bridge the divide between young, secular party activists and the rest of voters? Oddly, last years presidential run by Senator Bernie Sanders, a secular Jew, may suggest a way forward.

Mr. Sanderss non-Christian background may have hurt him in the South; he did poorly among African-American voters, despite his consistent civil rights record. But he did what few other secular candidates have done: He won a sympathetic hearing from conservative evangelicals with a speech that gave a religious grounding for his economic views, complete with biblical citations. When Mr. Sanders spoke at Liberty University, he did not pretend to share evangelical Christians faith, but he showed respect for his audiences religious tradition.

To do the same, secular Democrats need to study the religious language of Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. They need to take the time to learn the religious values of their audience. They need to be honest about their own secularity, but acknowledge their debt to the religious traditions that have shaped their progressive ideology.

Only through a willingness to ground their policy proposals in the religious values of prospective voters will they be able to convince people of faith that they are not a threat to their values but are instead an ally in a common cause.

Daniel K. Williams is a professor of history at the University of West Georgia and the author of Gods Own Party: The Making of the Christian Right.

Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook and Twitter (@NYTopinion), and sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter.

A version of this op-ed appears in print on June 24, 2017, on Page A19 of the New York edition with the headline: The Democrats Religion Problem.

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The Democrats' Religion Problem - New York Times

OBAMACARE FAILURE IS ON THE DEMOCRATS

Premium and deductible costs are rising and choice and competition are decreasing. As of now, over 1,200 counties will have only one insurance provider available on the individual market next year, and 35,000 individuals will live in counties with no options available at all. These numbers are expected to increase as insurers finalize their 2018 plans in the upcoming weeks, and yet, Democratic lawmakers have not introduced any major legislation to try and fix the system.

Obamacare Failure Is on the Democrats By Juliana Darrow National Review June 23, 2017

Senate Republicans are planning to vote on their version of the long-awaited health-care replacement bill as early as next week; this is the latest development in the contentious process of dismantling the Affordable Care Act. The unveiling of the Better Care Reconciliation Act sets up another showdown of competing narratives: ACA supporters will accuse Republicans of cutting coverage and reducing benefits and the GOP will point to a flawed system that is losing insurers and forcing double-digit premium increases on families across the country.

This face-off is nothing new. The conversation has played out repeatedly over the past six months. But one thing no one seems to be talking about is that Republicans are the only ones attempting to address the rising costs, declining quality of coverage, and increasing lack of choice in the health-care marketplace.

Democrats seem to be content with the status quo of the Affordable Care Act. Premium and deductible costs are rising and choice and competition are decreasing. As of now, over 1,200 counties will have only one insurance provider available on the individual market next year, and 35,000 individuals will live in counties with no options available at all. These numbers are expected to increase as insurers finalize their 2018 plans in the upcoming weeks, and yet, Democratic lawmakers have not introduced any major legislation to try and fix the system. They have taken the easy way out: showboating and complaining instead of working on a solution to stabilize the health-insurance market.

Republicans should no longer let their colleagues across the aisle get a free pass on the health-care-reform discussion. They cannot assume that just because the ACA is unpopular with their conservative base, replacing it will be a political win for the party. In addition to highlighting the merits of their own bill, Republicans must also continue to show the country that the ACA is a disastrous law, but one that Democrats are nonetheless committed to preserving.

The Democrats refusal to change current law most likely stems from an unwillingness to admit that the ACA has not lived up to its promises. Conservatives predicted eight years ago that a government-heavy health-care system would lead to decreased competition and increased costs. Democrats should not let embarrassment that those predictions came true prevent real solutions and lasting reform.

Read the full article here.

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National Review: Obamacare Failure Is on the Democrats - The White House (blog)

The Washington Post's national security reporters unveil the deep divisions inside the Obama White House over how to respond to Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election. (Whitney Leaming,Osman Malik/The Washington Post)

Today, Greg Miller, Ellen Nakashima and Adam Entous have a blockbuster behind-the-scenes story about how the Obama administration handled the Russian effort to manipulate the 2016 presidential election, one that is both shocking and maddening. Reading it, one cant avoid the conclusion that if it had happened during a Republican administration, things would have gone very differently.

What comes through again and again is that the Obama administration was terrified of looking partisan or doing anything that might seem like it was putting a thumb on the scale of the election, and the result was paralysis. This is a manifestation of what some years ago I began calling the Audacity Gap.

Democrats are forever worried about whether they might be criticized, whether Republicans will be mean to them, whether they might look as though theyre being partisan, and whether they might be subjected to a round of stern editorials. Republicans, on the other hand, just dont care. What theyre worried about is winning, and they dont let the kinds of criticism that frightens Democrats impede them. It makes Republicans the party of Yes we can, while Democrats are the party of Maybe we shouldnt.

So as the full scope of the Russian assault on the American election became clear, two things happened again and again. First, whenever the Obama administration would approach Republicans to try to issue some kind of bipartisan condemnation or coordinate efforts to minimize the effects of the attack, the GOP response was essentially, To hell with you, Democrats, after which the administration would slink back and do little or nothing. And second, even when they were deliberating on their own, the administration kept pulling back from responses it might take out of fear that someone might call them partisan.

Lets remember that the scope of Russian interference came into focus last summer. In June, it first became public that the Russians had infiltrated the systems of the Democratic National Committee. In July, during the Democratic convention, Wikileaks released internal DNC emails and those of John Podesta, who was chairing Hillary Clintons campaign, in an attempt to embarrass them and sow division within the Democratic Party (which turned out to be highly successful). In August, the intelligence services determined that there was a coordinated attack underway and that it was likely being directed by Vladimir Putin himself.

Apart from the creation and dissemination of a flood of phony anti-Clinton propaganda, administration officials were concerned that Russian hackers might try to directly affect voting systems, which we later learned they did in fact do. But when Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson attempted to do something about it, he got a partisan reaction:

On Aug. 15, Johnson arranged a conference call with dozens of state officials, hoping to enlist their support [for shoring up the security of their systems]. He ran into a wall of resistance.

The reaction ranged from neutral to negative, Johnson said in congressional testimony Wednesday.

Brian Kemp, the Republican secretary of state of Georgia, used the call to denounce Johnsons proposal as an assault on state rights. I think it was a politically calculated move by the previous administration, Kemp said in a recent interview, adding that he remains unconvinced that Russia waged a campaign to disrupt the 2016 race. I dont necessarily believe that, he said.

The same thing happened from Republicans in Congress: The administration sought a bipartisan response, and Republicans shut it down.

In early September, Johnson, [FBI Director] James Comey and [White House homeland security adviser Lisa] Monaco arrived on Capitol Hill in a caravan of black SUVs for a meeting with 12 key members of Congress, including the leadership of both parties.

The meeting devolved into a partisan squabble.

The Dems were, Hey, we have to tell the public, recalled one participant. But Republicans resisted, arguing that to warn the public that the election was under attack would further Russias aim of sapping confidence in the system.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) went further, officials said, voicing skepticism that the underlying intelligence truly supported the White Houses claims. Through a spokeswoman, McConnell declined to comment, citing the secrecy of that meeting.

Key Democrats were stunned by the GOP response and exasperated that the White House seemed willing to let Republican opposition block any pre-election move.

And as Miller, Nakashima and Entous reported in a previous article, the always-shrewd McConnell knew exactly what button he had to push to get the administration to back off:

According to several officials, McConnell raised doubts about the underlying intelligence and made clear to the administration that he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics.

In other words, Republicans acted like partisans, and successfully rolled over Democrats who didnt want to seem like partisans. Within weeks, the administration decided not to take any action against Moscow before the election. They feared that any action would be seen as political and that Putin, motivated by a seething resentment of Clinton, was prepared to go beyond fake news and email dumps.

Now lets fast-forward to after the election is over. Perhaps the most head-spinning part of this report concerns a proposal to form a bipartisan commission to investigate Russian interference in the election:

But as soon as [White House chief of staff Denis] McDonough introduced the proposal for a commission, he began criticizing it, arguing that it would be perceived as partisan and almost certainly blocked by Congress.

Obama then echoed McDonoughs critique, effectively killing any chance that a Russia commission would be formed.

The election was already over, and they were still worried that something as obviously necessary as a bipartisan commission would be perceived as partisan. Savor that one for a moment.

There are some excuses you can come up with for the Obama administrations hesitance to act decisively against this threat, both in terms of publicizing it and in retaliating against Russia. It was concerned about setting off an escalating conflict with Russia, and its actions were colored by its assumption that Clinton would win, which was of course the assumption held by nearly everyone, Republican or Democrat. But imagine what would have happened if there were a Republican administration in office, and Russia mounted a full-scale assault on our election with the obvious intent of hamstringing the future Republican president (at a minimum) or getting the Democrat elected. Could anyone who knows anything about todays GOP actually believe it would have been so tentative?

Not on your life. Every Republican in Washington from the president on down would have been on TV every day saying that the Democratic nominee was a Russian stooge. They would have undertaken a comprehensive package of retaliatory measures immediately, not waiting until after the election was over. They would have talked about nothing else for months.

Thats not because they would have seen it as a profound threat to American sovereignty. We know that, because they dont care about that threat right now, as real as it is. Heck, the Republican nominee for president not only didnt condemn the Russian assault, he celebrated it. Donald Trump gleefully brought up Wikileaks 164 times on the campaign trail and publicly implored Russia to hack into his opponents email to see if any damaging information might be found there. Republicans have steadfastly resisted any investigation into what happened in the 2016 election.

No, they would have seen it as a threat to their own partisan interests, and responded with the same ferocity that they bring to all partisan conflicts. They wouldnt have worried about being criticized or being called partisan; they would have fought.

And in that case, it would have been the right thing to do. Instead, Vladimir Putin got just about everything he wanted: a destabilized, delegitimized, demoralized American system, and the election of a president whose advisers are tied up in an intricate web of connections to Russia and who is himself bizarrely solicitous of Putins needs and wants.

Theres no way to know whether the election might have turned out differently if the Obama administration had reacted more aggressively to the Russian assault. What we do know is that once again, Democrats were paralyzed by their worries about how things might look. Its not something Republicans ever concern themselves with and all you have to do is look at whos in charge in Washington to see the results.

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How Democratic timidity may have helped Trump get elected - Washington Post (blog)

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren tried to rally beleaguered Democrats at a town hall in Lowell last night, decrying the partys woeful track record in recent special elections saying it sucks to keep losing to the GOP.

I get it, said Warren, answering a question about what can be done to remove House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. Its tough out there right now for the Democrats. You dont have to remind me. 0-for-4 in special elections that sucks.

But she cautioned that Democrats have too much at stake in Washington to spend time infighting.

The one thing weve got to do is weve got to keep in mind that we cant be spending our energy shouting at each other, said Warren. Boy, now more than ever we have got to keep our eye on what the Republican majority in the House and Senate and Donald Trump in the White House will do to America.

Warrens comments came on the heels of a bruising loss in a special election in Georgia on Tuesday, where Republican Karen Handel defeated Democrat Jon Ossoff by about 6 points, despite Democrats pouring in tens of millions of dollars and hyping the showdown as a referendum on President Trump.

In South Carolina the same night, Republican congressional candidate Ralph Norman beat Democrat Archie Parnell by a 3-point margin. The GOP also grabbed House seats recently in Montana and Kansas.

U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Salem) was quick to knock how Democrats have handled the post-presidential election era as news of the losses came in.

#Ossof Race better be a wake up call for Democrats business as usual isnt working, Moulton tweeted. Time to stop rehashing 2016 and talk about the future.

Moulton has also called for a new generation of leadership in the party, in a shot at longtime House leader Pelosi.

Seth makes a very legitimate point, Warren told reporters after the town hall last night. He wants to see leadership evolve. Thats fine. I just want to be really clear that were not firing at each other. There are always changes. When I came into the Senate, Harry Reid was the leader. Now its Chuck Schumer. The leadership team has changed. I understand there are changes.

Warren who has been mentioned as a possible presidential candidate in 2020 also blasted the Republican health care bill, calling it a tax-cut bill aimed at protecting the wealthy. Republicans in the Senate hope to vote on the bill by next week, but key GOP holdouts could block that plan.

Republicans have said its more important to give tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires than it is for us to help provide medical care for millions of our citizens, Warren said. This is not an economics decision. This is a values decision. This is a measure of who we are as a people.

Warren did say she would be open to meeting with the group Veterans Assisting Veterans, which is alleging that the Bay State senator puts the priorities of illegal immigrants ahead of those of war vets.

Look, all three of my brothers are veterans and I have been very committed on veterans issues long before I got into the United States Senate, both at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the research work Ive done, she said. And, now in particular that Im on the Armed Services Committee, advancing bills to help veterans in every way that I can. I think my office has reached out and Im glad to meet with anybody.

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Warren exhorts Democrats - Boston Herald