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Democrat Jon Ossoffs loss in the Georgia special congressional election has demoralized progressives who hoped it would signal an anti-Trump wave that could turn the House from red to blue in 2018.

The left is fractured, with disagreements between the Bernie and Hillary wings of the Democratic Party threatening to undercut its ability to turn out the base, appeal to independents and win over disillusioned GOP voters. The question remains whether the so-called resistance can transform itself from a throng of angry voices into a majority capable of creating lasting progressive change.

As activists take up this challenge, they should study the playbook of one of the most successful social justice movements in history: the fight for LGBTQ equality. In short order, our movement beat back the AIDS epidemic, ended sodomy bans, won access to military service and marriage and ultimately more than doubled public approval of gay identity.

There were several keys to the movements victories. But one lesson in particular applies to todays deeply divided politics: Success came when LGBTQ advocates learned to speak the language of those they most needed to enlist rather than those who already agreed with them.

Striving to see our cause through the eyes of folks we didnt know well, who were indifferent and sometimes actively opposed to our goals, meant adopting a principle from the world of social work: Changing peoples hearts and minds requires meeting them where they are. To some, framing our goals in terms aimed at more conservative audiences was tantamount to selling out. Yet we learned that such pragmatism could achieve more and more durable social change than ideological purity.

The battle for marriage equality is a case in point. For years, LGBTQ activists, who were largely (but not exclusively) creatures of the left, avoided making marriage a priority. Many considered it conformist, even retrograde, at odds with the most radical, passionately held ideals of gay liberation.

When activists did include marriage on their agenda, they tended to speak of it in legalistic terms that stressed entitlement to equal rights; they emphasized the deprivations lack of insurance and tax benefits, for instance associated with being denied a license to wed. Those tactics werent ineffective; they helped create domestic partnership protections in many towns and states, and by 2004 notched one all-out victory: Same-sex couples gained the right to wed in Massachusetts in a state Supreme Court decision.

Yet social conservatives were stirring a backlash and also racking up wins, proactively passing same-sex marriage bans in dozens of states. As troubling, public approval of marriage equality, which had been rising throughout the 1990s, plateaued at around 34% in 2000. LGBTQ advocates had the support of staunch liberals, but they were failing to win over the next batch of supporters needed to build a majority coalition: the moderates of the moveable middle.

So marriage advocates scrutinized their message. Backed by donors dedicated to winning the battle, gay rights organizations hired pollsters to conduct focus groups of moderate liberals and conservatives who supported gay rights but not gay marriage. The results hit strategists like lightning. When straight people were asked why they cared about marriage, they mentioned love, commitment and family; yet they thought gay people wanted to marry for different reasons: the rights and benefits. The moveable middle wasnt moving because its members didnt recognize same-sex couples wish to wed as similar to their own.

In response, several gay groups created new campaigns that framed the issue in starkly personal terms. What if you couldnt marry the person you love? asked one ad field-tested in Santa Barbara to counter Californias infamous Proposition 8. Although most Southern Californians voted in favor of the anti-gay-marriage ballot measure, in Santa Barbara County it lost by 10 points.

We quit talking about legal benefits, talking from the head, said Tim Sweeney, a longtime gay activist. Instead, the marriage equality battle would turn on core values. The trick was to appeal to human empathy rather than to merely emphasize demands or appear to be subversive.

By 2011, a slim majority of Americans were telling pollsters they supported same-sex marriage. It was no coincidence when, the next year, President Obama announced his support as well. When he did, he adopted the movements language of common values, saying that incredibly committed monogamous same-sex relationships among White House staffers had changed his mind. Likewise, three years later, when Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy penned his majority opinion in Obergefell vs. Hodges, he referenced the emotional resonance of marriage, citing its nobility and worthiness, in guaranteeing it to same-sex couples. Marriage equality, now supported by 60% of Americans, was the law of the land.

Some on todays left act as though the only way to achieve their goals is by catering to the most liberal leanings of the group. A very progressive manifesto is how Bernie Sanders recently characterized what Democrats need to win back power. Yet its far from clear that a to the barricades image is the best way to advance progressive aims. Indeed, it was a positive message based not on outrage but common human values that took gay marriage from fringe to respectable to just plain normal.

Pragmatic engagement with those who werent the natural supporters of LGBTQ rights made lives tangibly better for gay people and inched us all closer to realizing a truly progressive vision.

Nathaniel Frank is author of Awakening: How Gays and Lesbians Brought Marriage Equality to America and director of the What We Know project at Columbia Law School.

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Two progressive groups are teaming up for a six-figure radio ad buy targeting Republican Sens. Jeff FlakeJeff FlakeSenate should seek to retain its 'blue slip' tradition for judicial nominees Progressives target Heller and Flake on Senate GOP bill The Hill's Whip List: Senate ObamaCare repeal bill MORE (Ariz.) and Dean HellerDean HellerTrump called Cruz to press him on ObamaCare repeal bill: report Biden rips Senate GOP healthcare bill, says it 'isn't about healthcare' Pro-Trump group launches seven-figure ad buy against GOP senator opposing repeal bill MORE (Nev.), using veterans from their home states to warn against siding with the Senate GOPs healthcare reform plan.

Stand Up America and VoteVets.org are behind the buy, first reported by The Hill, which warns that the GOP's planned cuts to Medicaid could weigh heavy on veterans.

Nearly 2 million veterans rely on Medicaid for our health care. But if the Affordable Care Act is repealed, Medicaid will be slashed making it harder for veterans across Arizona to get healthcare, veterans say in the radio ads.

Thats outrageous and its wrong. You cant repeal the Affordable Care Act and call yourself pro-veteran.

Stand Up America has also made smaller digital buys in Ohio, Maine, Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania, home to senators that Democrats believe could be convinced to vote against the bill, calling on residents to call their senators and demand that they vote against the plan.

The Senate plan, releasedThursdayafter weeks of secrecy, repeals controversial pieces of ObamaCare such as its insurance mandate, instead providing tax credits to help defray the cost of insurance premiums.

It also includes deep Medicaid cuts, rolling back the Medicaid expansion that provides coverage for about 11 million people and eventually making changes to Medicaid that slows the growth of payment caps.

The bill will only need a majority of senators to pass, giving the Republicans room for two defections thanks to Vice President Pences tie-breaking vote.

Four senators have already come out against the plan as is, although theyve suggested they could be convinced if changes are adopted, leaving Democrats scrambling to pressure enough senators to sink the bill.

Heller and Flake are in a particular bind thanks to their vulnerable positions heading into their reelection races they are the only two Republican senators that Democrats have a real shot at ousting.

And Heller has received no air cover from key Republicans in his state, specifically Gov. Brian Sandoval, who has emerged as a vocal critic of the plans Medicaid cuts.

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Progressives target Heller and Flake on Senate GOP bill - The Hill

Progressives bristled when Elon Musk, a purported leader of the green movement, associated himself with President Donald Trump by joining two advisory councils. After all, as a presidential candidate, Trump had claimed global warming was a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese government.

When Trump announced on June 1 that the United States would withdraw from the Paris climate accord, Musk, the guru behind Tesla Motors and SolarCity, both green companies, resigned from the advisory councils. Climate change is real, Musk wrote in a tweet. Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world.

For standing up to Trump, progressives applauded Musk, who regained his liberal bona fides. Or so it seemed. In fact, another problem looms for Musk that could have a much more devastating effect on his image, for while Musk is good on most leftist issues he has not always been good to the employees who work for him.

Consider a report issued in May from Worksafe, a California-based organization devoted to reducing workplace hazards. Based on figures obtained from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, a federal agency, Worksafe made some startling conclusions about conditions in Teslas Fremont, California, plant, which employs some 5,000 people. Teslas total recordable incidence rate in 2015 was 31 percent higher than the industry-wide incident rate, the report stated, noting there were 8.8 injuries per 100 workers. More troubling, the rate of serious injuries at [the] plant those that result in days away from work, restricted duty, or job transfer was approximately double the industry rate for 2015. Tesla is nonunion; Musk has resisted efforts to unionize.

That same month, The Guardian published an alarming article detailing Tesla workers laboring under grueling pressure which they attribute to Musks aggressive production goals. According to The Guardian, Ambulances have been called more than 100 times since 2014 for workers experiencing fainting spells, dizziness, seizures, abnormal breathing and chest pains. Hundreds more were called for injuries and other medical issues.

Firsthand worker accounts were harrowing. One worker recalled a scene all-too-common at Tesla: Ive seen people pass out, hit the floor like a pancake and smash their face open. They just send us to work around him while hes still lying on the floor. Another said: We had an associate on my line, he just kept working, kept working, kept working, next thing you know he just fell on the ground. Yet another, Michael Sanchez, disabled with two herniated discs, described what it was like working while injured: You can make it through Monday. You can make it through Tuesday. Come Wednesday, you start to feel something. Thursday is pain. Friday is agonizing. Saturday youre just making it through the day.

The current controversy about labor practices started in February when Jose Moran, a Tesla employee for four years, wrote a blogpost on Medium that attracted national attention. Im proud to be part of a team that is bringing green cars to the masses, Moran began. However, I often feel like I am working for a company of the future under working conditions of the past. Most of mycoworkers work well over 40 hours a week, including excessive mandatory overtime. The hard, manual labor we put in to make Tesla successful is done at great risk to our bodies. Preventable injuries happen often. A few months ago, six out of eight people in my work team were out on medical leave at the same time due to various work-related injuries. Moran revealed that he had put in 60 to 70 hours a week for the four years he worked at Tesla.

Subpar working conditions produce subpar results, which explains why, some observers contend, Consumer Reports placed Tesla 25th out of 29 brands in 2016. But workers at Tesla should not point out flaws to management, or there will be consequences, according to Cristina Balan, a former Tesla employee who became concerned about the companys quality standards. I wanted to alert Elon, Balan told The New Yorker in January, without lawyers or V.P.s present, that his company was in trouble. People are afraid of losing their jobs if they speak up and this will get worse as they try to mass-produce automobiles in a company that isnt ready to do that.

The magazine reported Balan says she was demoted, harassed, and ultimately forced to quit because she spoke up about shoddy workmanship, though Tesla denies that Balan was forced to quit over the issues she raised. On June 26, the matter will come before a judge in an arbitration hearing in San Francisco.

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Musk Pleases Progressives by Bailing on Trump; Will His Record on Workers' Rights Drag Him Down? - HuffPost

What else can possibly go wrong with our great country, the former shining city on the hill, that is being tarnished day by day by influential anti-American groups with huge coffers?

Liberals from California and smaller blue states are exerting their influence on the electoral process in red states, determined to flip them to blue, and, by and large, are succeeding with the exception of the most recent election in Georgias 6th district where Democrats spent over $23 million, the most in the history of the House of Representative elections ever.

Im still scratching my head trying to understand the insanity of 144,000 low information Americans from Georgia who voted for the Democrat candidate Jon Ossoff, a French President Macron look-alike, even though he did not reside in their district and did not have much of a platform. No amount of cash, air time, dishonest claims, speeches, and other shenanigans Hollywood and progressives around the country engaged in, convinced the rest of the well-informed Georgia voters to elect Jon Ossoff.

Someone comically wrote that Snowflakes are crying their Ossoff in their parents basements after the results of the election determined that Ossoff lost.

Trying to cajole young voters who had just graduated from high school, frustrated that conservative parents interfered with their attempts to reach potential 18-year old voters living in their parents basements, voters who have no idea who runs the political world and our lives into the ground, Democrats complained to the compliant press that parents were mean and unresponsive to their frequent calls and attempts to brainwash their offspring to vote for the Democrat candidate.

The socialist Democrat platform was well articulated by candidates like Bernie Sanders. Vote for collectivism and social justice, he told his young and nave followers; when I lose, I can buy an expensive sports car and a second home in Vermont while you dopes are driving tin cans or old cars with the Feel the burn and Coexist bumper stickers on and lay your head down on your parents couch in the basement after a hard days work as baristas at Starbucks.

Democrats from progressive states have deep pockets which they spend on Millennials and other misinformed and brainwashed young people who, for $15 an hour, a living wage, will go anywhere dressed in black, with face masks, like the cowardly anarchists and fascists that they are, and will destroy someone elses property in the name of social justice and equality. The not-so-feminine and self-described nasty women dress in vagina costumes like vile idiots. They attack people who disagree with their insanity and demonize our duly-elected President with vitriolic hate.

Progressives have been moving to conservative states in droves, changing the face of the electorate and flipping parts of a red state into blue, eventually succeeding in flipping the entire state to the progressive agenda by dominating in a few very populous cities. Thus, a state like Virginia, because of its heavy concentration of communists and other fellow travelers in the northern part, it has elected a fellow progressive governor, senators, and other representatives despite the fact that the rest of the state is very much conservative.

Former Rep. Allen West, who was redistricted out of his seat by his own Republican party who did not like his America-first stance on many issues, compared this exodus of progressives and invasion of conservative states to the Muslim Hijra which is also taking place all over the world as we speak, including the United States. By far they are succeeding in colonizing western civilization beyond their wildest dreams, both in Europe and here at home.

If you add into the mix the illegal vote of so many aliens who have crossed our border unlawfully or were brought here by the Obama administration, one can see how elections are swayed in the direction of the Socialist Democrat Party, which now runs or heavily influences all the blue states, our government, the military, the fake main stream media, all the technology monopolies, social media outlets, publishing houses, academia, schools, Christian churches, the legal system, and the Deep State.

What conservatives are left with is the alternative media and talk radio with voices like Michael Savage, Laura Ingraham, Rush Limbaugh, and TV personalities like Lou Dobbs and Sean Hannity. Nobody is sure how long that will last. Liberals, the intolerant bunch that they are, operate on the following predilection - you have a right to say what you want, as long as you agree with me.

We were lucky that Georgia conservatism won this battle. Will we be lucky next time and win the war? Most Americans have been lulled into a false sense of security, have food on the table, air conditioning, heat, water, in-door plumbing, multiple sports channels, a home sweet home and, as long as nobody bothers their daily routines, they dont care who is in charge of their global enslavement. So they vote in more of the same corrupt politicians of both parties.

Many go to church and bend over backwards to appease the few atheists and their fellow travelers who demand separation of church and state in schools but say nothing when special accommodations are made for Muslim children and their prayer needs.

American Christian children are being indoctrinated into Islam by the Common Core curriculum in public and private schools, and are forced to go to the bathroom with a pedophile/mentally deranged person who pretends or feels that he is a she.

What else can possibly go wrong with our great country, the former shining city on the hill, that is being tarnished day by day by influential anti-American groups with huge coffers?

Listen to Dr. Paugh on Butler on Business, every Wednesday to Thursday at 10:49 AM EST

Dr. Ileana Johnson Paugh, Romanian Conservative is a freelance writer, author, radio commentator, and speaker. Her books, Echoes of Communism, Liberty on Life Support and U.N. Agenda 21: Environmental Piracy, Communism 2.0: 25 Years Later are available at Amazon in paperback and Kindle.

Her commentaries reflect American Exceptionalism, the economy, immigration, and education.Visit her website, ileanajohnson.com

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Progressives moving in on conservative states in droves - Canada Free Press