The Texas Observer

by Josh Berthume

Drew Ryun surveys the hotel conference room and he can feel the dissatisfaction—anger, even—radiating from the 40 or so newly forged conservative activists seated in front of him.

“You are all here because you are upset about something,” says Ryun, the executive director of American Majority, whose mission is to train a national network of activists committed to limited government. “You want to know what you can do to turn the tide in this country.”

There are a few murmurs and a boisterous, “Yes!”

“We all share common values as conservatives. We all want to hold our elected officials accountable,” he says, pacing at the front of the room. “But here’s a test: Who here can name every member of your school board?”

Silence.

Ryun is practicing the ancient art of political organizing, a tradition once thought lost in the age of television campaigning. But after the Christian Right and the Obama Left reinvented personal politicking for the 21^st century, the old wizardry is making a comeback. After the Tea Parties are over and the Fox News van has skipped town, American Majority is training activists to organize their communities and win elections. When conservatives talk about taking back Congress, and eventually the White House, this is how they plan to do it.

At this Thursday night meeting in Dallas, Ryun uses the audience’s political ignorance as a teachable moment. He has demonstrated that angry chanting at Tea Parties or loud shouting at Town Hall Meetings does not an effective activist make. Like an Army drill sergeant, he’s tearing down these wannabes in order to build them back up as political warriors, with a full complement of weaponry.

“Okay. So what are you so pissed about? The people that make decisions are the ones that actually get elected to office,” Ryun says. “If you don’t know who the people are that are making  the decisions that most directly affect you, what are you so mad at?”

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Drew Ryun says he helped his twin brother Ned launch American Majority in January 2008. They are the sons of former Kansas congressman Jim Ryun, who the National Review ranked as the most conservative member of Congress in 2006. Ned, who serves as the president of American Majority, worked as a writer in the Bush administration. Drew previously ran the grassroots operation of the Republican National Committee.

American Majority’s staff includes many former Republican Party operatives and former elected officials. Nevertheless, the group claims to be non-partisan—a requirement to keep their non-profit status. American Majority’s non-partisan status is hard to accept, until Drew and Ned explain how they consider most elected conservatives to either be insufficiently conservative or, worse, falsely conservative.

American Majority intends not only to take back the government, but also to define what it means to be a conservative.

Drew Ryun says Republicans ruined the conservative brand and that’s why Democrats won in 2006 and 2008.

When I look at election losses, I see conservatives saying, ‘What’s the difference? What am I sending these guys to DC for anyways? They’re not doing anything,’” Ryun explains. “Some Republicans in DC will say, ‘Well, where else are conservatives gonna go? They have to vote for us.’ But they don’t. I think a lot of them have been staying home.”

Ryun sites a recent Gallup poll that says 40% of Americans identify themselves as conservative, and 20% consider themselves liberal or progressive. And in those numbers, he sees opportunity.

Thousands of people are attending American Majority training sessions, and so far progressives are failing to take them seriously. Progressives too often chuckle at the crazy signs they see in rally footage, and they label everyone in the opposition as Glenn Beck zealots, Birthers or Secessionists. That could turn out to be a big mistake.

Forget for a moment that the Tea Party message is a muddled mess. Likewise, forget your doubts that these activists are organized enough to do more than show up and get angry. Forget the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy–even if you believe it.

Instead consider these simple facts: American Majority has a field office in Dallas, and since it began operating in late May, the group has held 12 training sessions (half for activist trainings, half for candidates), with six more on the calendar before the end of the year. Ryan says American Majority’s goal for 2010 is to have a thousand new activists trained and engaged as well as 100 candidates running for office in Texas. At this rate they will make that goal and likely exceed it.

When asked to state American Majority’s end goal, Ryun says he will only be satisfied when American Majority candidates take over the city council in Berkeley, California. Sitting in on their training session, it becomes clear that these are not the “Crazy Uncles” you see on TV. Those in attendance are not the folks who think  Barack Obama is an Arab. These are the folks who work the call centers and block-walk. The conservative Ryun twins are savvy operatives, and they have embraced the new version of the old wizardry. They are actively rebuilding the conservative political machine from the ground up.

For more information about American Majority:

Ned Ryun at a Salina, Kansas rally

Rachel Maddow on American Majority

Ned Ryun’s Response to Rachel Maddow  

American Majority on YouTube

American Majority’s Twitter Activism guide  

In case you haven’t visited our homepage in a while… We’ve rolled out four new staff-written blogs with fresh content (almost) every day.

• At “Purple Texas,” Observer Editor Bob Moser is reporting on, poking fun at and scrutinizing Texas’ 2010 elections from a progressive-populist point of view.

• Investigative reporter Melissa del Bosque is blogging at “La Linea,” where she’s taking a look at immigration politics and culture along the Texas-Mexico border, dispelling stereotypes and myths along the way.

• Dave Mann, the Observer’s associate editor, casts a critical eye on the conventional wisdom at “The Contrarian.” Dave is ferreting out hidden stories, bogus facts and generally being a lovable curmudgeon.

• Yours Truly is serving up underreported news and analysis about Texas and the environment at “Forrest For The Tree.”

• Also, don’t miss Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist Ben Sargent’s “Loon Star State” in which Sargent offers his take on the nuttiest, weirdest, most outrageous happenings and politics in the strangest state in the union. Exclusive in the Observer.

Please bookmark the new blogs. This space will remain inactive for the time-being.

Progressive Texans’ hopes to have a dog in next year’s gubernatorial hunt were dimmed on Friday when Kirk Watson announced that he’ll forego the race and run for re-election to the state Senate.

On his Watson Wire, the former Austin mayor displayed his political acumen by explaining his decision without really explaining it. “First of all, I really like serving in the Senate and representing the citizens of Travis County,” he wrote. The other consideration, Watson said, was—repeat after me—wanting to spend more time with his family, particularly his younger son, who’s just entering high school.

In reality, of course, Watson would have been leading a semi-functional Democratic state party into battle against the huge money and superior organization that’ll be behind the Republican nominee, whether it’s Gov. Rick Perry or Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. Watson, a tall, charismatic fellow who can “talk Texan” with the best of them, wasseen by many as the only Democrat capable of putting up a fight. But Watson, who’s in his early 50s, can afford to wait another cycle for Texas’ blue tide to rise a few more feet.

Watson’s decision leaves former state Rep. and U.S. Ambassador Tom Schieffer and humorist Kinky Friedman as the only Democratic candidates more than a dozen Texas could name. It could make it more likely that Ronnie Earle, the former Travis district attorney whom Watson once worked for, will jump into the race, as he’s been hinting for months.

The least-surprising reaction to Watson’s announcement came from an undoubtedly relieved Schieffer. According to the Houston Chronicle, he “welcomed Watson’s announcement” and said that “men and women of his character and capability are needed in the state Senate.”

St. Paul’s Cathedral is one of the great buildings in Christendom. It is impossible to walk through it and not feel the presence and the glory of God. Its architect, Sir Christopher Wren, is buried there, and over his tomb is this inscription: Si monumentum requiris, circumspice: “If you seek his monument, look around you.”

The Texan departing the White House need not spend tens of millions on a monument to himself and his philosophy at SMU. If you want to see the monument to the conservative philosophy of governing – the philosophy followed so faithfully by George W. Bush — look around you. Men and women who followed the conservative philosophy of President Bush were the architects of so many of the crises we face. The Republican Party has controlled the White House for the last eight years, controlled the Congress for 12 of the last 14 years, and dominated our federal courts. So it is fair to ask folks to look around.

Look at the greed on Wall Street. It was fed by a Bush-conservative architecture of greed and de-regulation, of government siding with quick-buck artists that goes all the way back to the Savings & Loan crisis of the 80’s.

Look at our unemployment woes. Unemployment hit a low of 3.9 percent under President Clinton’s progressive economic policies. It is now 6.5 percent and climbing. Or look at our rising poverty rate, our record rate of home foreclosures, our skyrocketing numbers of bankruptcies.

Look at our pathetic dependence on dangerous and dirty foreign oil. It’s the result Bush-conservative energy policy that subsidized oil companies and de-funded the alternative energy sources that could have made us free.

Look at the debt and deficit. They have skyrocketed because of a Bush-conservative philosophy that rewarded those at the top of the economic pyramid while punishing those who were working hard to climb their way up.

Look at the millions of American families who have been turned down for health insurance, and the millions of small businesses who have been priced out of the market — all victims of a Bush-conservative philosophy that protects big insurance companies and hammers working families whose only sin is wanting to see a doctor when they’re sick.

And then look at what is infecting all of it: a culture of cronyism and corruption under conservatives that has given us government of the lobbyists, by the lobbyists and for the lobbyists.

Most tragically, look at the lives lost, the limbs severed, the families shattered because of this unjust, unwise, unwarranted war. Look at the military families struggling to stay together under the strain of deployments that are too frequent and last too long. Look at the unappreciated heroes battling traumatic brain injury or post-traumatic stress disorder. Look at the untold thousands of Iraqi families whose tears are never seen and whose cries are never heard.

This is the monument to Bush-style conservatives. They are its architects. Look around you. See what the Bush-conservative philosophy has done to the country we love. The sooner we take a wrecking ball to that monument the better.

It will take time, but I am convinced that President-elect Barack Obama is committed to building something new. Something beautiful and strong. Something that, like that great old cathedral in London, will welcome everyone in, raise their spirits, lift their sights and remind us all that - as President Kennedy said - “here on earth, God’s work must truly be our own.”

–Paul Begala

Photo by Dave McNeely

“You know,” she said after we met him. “That young man could be President some day.”

“What?” I said. “Are you crazy? Not in our lifetimes.” We both knew what I meant. After all, that young man was black. And she and I had both grown up white and liberal in a segregated Houston with “Colored” restrooms, “Whites Only” water fountains, and lily-white lunch counters. In the mid-1960s we had both worked on The Houston Chronicle, where there were a grand total of two black faces in the newsroom, and where we had to plead with and cajole our editors to let us do a long story on poverty in the city. There wasn’t much coverage of the black community back then that didn’t involve crime.

She was Molly Ivins, my dear friend of 45 years before she died in 2007, having had an illustrious career as a reporter, editor of The Texas Observer, and widely syndicated columnist.

“That young man” was Barack Obama. The occasion was the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston, where Obama had given the keynote address.

“Oh, ye of little faith,” Molly should have said to me.

We both saw stardom in that young man. But Molly saw more. Molly saw a time when the United States of America could put aside racial division and elect a black person President.

I fear I still saw those “Colored” and “Whites Only” signs, the fire hoses and police dogs, and Nixon’s “Southern strategy.”

Well, it did happen in my lifetime. Sadly, not in Molly’s.

Looking at this picture taken by our old friend Dave McNeely (the veteran reporter who was there with us in those Houston Chronicle days), I thought about that night in Boston a little over four years ago. I thought about Molly’s hopeful words.

How she would have loved last night. How she would have loved to hear: “President-Elect Barack Obama.”

Ken Bunting, another old friend who’s now associate publisher of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, said of Molly by email this morning, “I’m not much of a believer, but I think our friend is looking down and smiling right along with Barack’s grandma.”

You know, I think he is right.

Van Jones, founder of Green For All, brought a much needed breath of fresh air into the stale atmosphere of Austin’s convention center, which contained the hung-over, sparse remains of the Netroots Nation blogger crowd Sunday morning.

“Wake up. And stay up!” Jones commanded the subdued audience upon taking the stage.

More than his jokes or energy, it was his forward-looking message — a challenge to the progressive bloggers to move beyond their like-minded critiques toward positions of action and leadership — that stirred things up.

“You all got a problem, because y’all are about to win,” Jones said. “Now, you have to prove your ideas are good for governing, not just protesting.”

Jones also issued a warning. Using the Carter presidency as an example, he said the Left must be careful about its excitement over the Obama presidency.

“You can probably get him elected, but not reelected,” said Jones. “Not unless we get really smart about his reelection right now.”

A Democratic president and Congress will leave conservatives with nothing to do but run their mouths, at a time when the new leadership will be inheriting a country that’s heading for stagflation, just as when Carter took office, Jones said.

And Jones fears the result will be a right-wing backlash and years of conservative rule, just like after Carter left office.

To beat stagflation, energy prices must come down, Jones said. The conservatives’ solution is drill and burn, and “we are getting our butts whupped by this drill, drill, drill mantra.” This, he says, is because the green movement is and will continue to be a target of conservatives who label it an elitist movement that leaves the working classes behind.

“It is up to us to say ‘this is not a movement we are going to do to poor people, it is a movement we are doing for poor people,’ he said.

The movement is not dependent upon new technology or new policy, but politics, Jones said. To win, green advocates must change the nature of the debate by promoting the positive aspects of energy reform, like job growth, rather than accentuating the negative, like global warming.

Winning also requires action, not just talk about the problem, said Jones—Action like advocating for the Green Jobs Act and Green Block Grant, and participating in the nationwide green jobs mobilization campaign he’s launching September 27.

As the national landscape changes, the role of the blogosphere is changing. And, as the final keynote speaker, Jones told bloggers their future task requires increasing inclusivity. “You can’t save the polar bear without saving the poor children too. It is one movement,” he said.

A theme is developing at the Netroots Nation Convention: Don’t expect Senator Obama to be the magic bullet when it comes to cleaning up the wreckage of eight years of George W.’s misrule.

The Center for Constitutional Rights, a New York-based legal advocacy organization hosted a panel Saturday afternoon on Guantanamo and Habeas Corpus and what the president can do in the first 100 days of his term to restore the Constitution and the Rule of Law.

As Americans we are hooked on the idea that any problem can be solved with 10 simple solutions or in some given number of days. Yesterday, former counter-terrorism czar Richard Clarke plugged his 12 solutions for our national security crisis at his panel.

The consensus on today’s panel of lawyers and journalists was that it will take more than a push broom and 100 days to clean upDubya’s mess. The picture was bleak: our Constitution is in tatters and the Supreme Court and Congress have descended into an Alice in Wonderland world where right is wrong and up is down.

Admittedly, it was depressing. Still it was energizing to see a large room nearly filled with extremely concerned and pissed-off citizens. At one point, an attendee stood up and asked what bloggers and activists could do to turn the ship around.

Panelist Jeremy Scahill, author of Blackwater: the Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army (yes his book was plugged at the panel) encouraged attendees to spend less time behind the computer and more time in the streets protesting.

Scahill saved his most scathing remarks for Congressional Democrats, including Barack Obama, commenting that instead of defining themselves as a real opposition party, the Dems had undermined efforts to hold Bush’s administration accountable. “Bush is operating in an enforcement-free zone inside the United States and outside the United States,” he said.

Scahill warned that the U.S. was in the midst of the most radical privatization agenda in history with a record number of private contractors carrying out government duties around the world. To illustrate this, he reminded the audience that Blackwater and Dyncorp were at the moment guarding Sen. Obama as he toured Afghanistan and Iraq.

ACLU Lawyer and panelist Jameel Jaffar told the audience that it was wrong and dangerous to blame Bush for everything. He cited the Supreme Court and Congress as miserable failures when it came to defending democracy and the Constitution.

“Ultimately, it will take more than a change in administration to effect the change we want,” he said. “The most important thing in the first 100 days is to set up a truth and accountability mechanism like the 9-11 Commission,” he suggested.

The take-home message was that American citizens need to keep a close eye on their government — now more than ever — and hold political leaders accountable. This includes Barack Obama, no matter how badly Democrats want to see him in the White House.

Scahill exhorted the crowd — many of them Obama supporters — to “cheat” on their candidate with a little bit of conscience.

“John McCain and a head of lettuce could get the same number of votes,” he said, drawing laughs from the crowd. “Now is when you really need to hold Obama’s feet to the fire, because he needs your votes and he needs your money — he won’t need them after November.”