Concluded Borosage in his closing remarks at the Campaign For America's Future.
Progressives from all over the country convened for three successful days in Washington to discuss everything from the health care and educational finance crisis, the necessity of implementing a meaningful public health care option, to the role of new media (bloggery versus print journalism and old fashioned TV), our billions in a massive trade deficit, our shrinking manufacturing industrial base, our rising unemployment and the need to strengthen unions and statutory provisions to encourage unionization, our Pell Grant deficit, our Afghani war problem and all the things we elected Obama to fix. Panel after panel gave strategic angles and analysis.
Closing speakers were inspirational noting that the civil rights legends like Jesse Jackson who came in all humility to address leveling the playing field in education, stood shoulder to shoulder once with civil rights greats walking with Martin Luther King, Jr. Through seven degrees of separation I felt more connected to Martin Luther King by being blessed with Jackson's presence and marvelled at how astounding it truly is that now we have an African American President.
A meme can be a crippling assumption that blocks change. This was a Meme-busting convention which threw down the gauntlet to challenge us all to dream bigger and better and push the envelope on the possible. The "Washington as usual" mantra was crushed beneath the
"Yes we can" ethic- Yes we can get universal health care with a public option, Yes we can have a country where higher education is subsidized adequately for those who need it so all are educated as far as their dreams take them, Yes we can have a regenerated industrial base through a new green economy and a positive balance of trade, Yes we can make Peace in Afghanistan and Iraq, Yes we can rebuild our infrastructure, Yes we can have a country where once again the next generation is better off than the previous one. The American dream was alive and well at the Progressive conference. Platitudes aside, it is now time to get down to business. The easy part was "taking back" the country. The hard part will be building it again on a platform of socio-economic and educational Justice and Equity to compete in the global marketplace.
HUGE thanks again to the Campaign for America's Future and all it's organizers, staff and directors.
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