Let’s not repeat 2009.

Democrats are running that risk.

And so it begins, the slow rollback of expectations. President Biden is now willing to negotiate down YET FURTHER the $1400 checks, that were sold to the Georgia electorate as $2000 checks. This is a kick in the teeth to the multiracial working class coalition that Democrats turned out in Georgia earlier this month, and the staggering stupidity of it defies belief.

Democrats, after a solid start to the Biden Presidency, are courting a repeat of 2009, when the Obama administration broke its promises and rode back its pledges by engaging in toxic compromises with a resurgent GOP, all after running and winning on a wave of Hope And Change (tm). The resulting exasperation lead to Democrats staying home and Republicans seizing congress, and eventually electing Donald Trump to the Presidency.

Democrats have a chance here, and maybe their last chance, to avoid such an outcome, by fighting for the $2000 checks AS PROMISED, not moving on it, and clearly naming the Republicans who attempt to block the measure, while using every procedural quirk to pass the thing.

Meanwhile, let’s actually see a bold infrastructure package, let’s see a genuine public healthcare option, and let’s see the stuff Biden promised to deliver upon election. Even if they don’t pass, let it be because Republicans stopped it, meaning Democrats could run on the fact the GOP is blocking popular policy, and that Democrats fought until the end, not that Democrats compromised on core principles, and breached the trust they cultivated by not fighting for their constituents.

We can see history repeating itself already. Progressives must primary any Democrat who refuses to fight to deliver for their constituents, and seize the agenda come 2022. We must be there to harness that resentment, moving it leftwards, not rightwards as feels inevitable right now. It’s now clear progressives are going to have to run AGAINST the Democratic establishment in 2022 with a promise to change the party.