Obama Hosts Progressives at the White House
At a private White House cocktail reception last night for leaders of major progressive groups, Barack Obama and his wife Michelle appealed to these leaders and signaled that their groups would play a key role in driving the big progressive changes at the heart of the White House’s legislative agenda, an attendee tells me.
The message was that these groups would be valuable as a kind of progressive outside “echo chamber,” as the attendee puts it.
So who was there? Christy Hardin Smith reports:
Jimmy Hoffa of the Teamsters; Mark Ayers, head of the Building and Construction Trades Department of AFL-CIO; Jerry McEntee of AFSCME; Randi Weingarten of AFT; Dennis Van Roekel of NEA; Carl Pope of Sierra Club; Andre Delattre of PIRGs; Janice McGee; Cecile Richards
onof Planned Parenthood; Kathryn Kolbert of People For the American Way; Joe Solomonese of Human Rights Campaign; Wade Henderson of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights; Jerry Hudson of SEIU; Andy Stern of SEIU; Eli Pariser and Justin Ruben of MoveOn.org. (btw, Eli will be moving up to the board of directors for MoveOn and Justin will be taking over day to day operations helm shortly. Congrats to both!); Van Jones; Tom Donahue of the US Chamber of Commerce; Harry Alford of the National Black Chamber of Commerce; John Castellani of the Business Roundtable
That's a good list of progressives, but how on earth did the Democrat-hating Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable end up at a progressive event?
- Bob Fertik's blog
- Login or register to post comments
Printer-friendly version- Send to friend
Join us & contribute
Proud members of the Democratic Party
Copyright 2006 Democrats.com. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy
I've got a better list of progressives
Are you familiar with the Progressive Ideas Network? In December 2007 leaders from progressive groups and think tanks came together and formed the Progressive Ideas Network. Here are the groups: Campaign for America's Future, Center for Community Change, Center for Economic and Policy Research, Commonweal Institute, Commonwealth Institute, Center on Wisconsin Strategy, Demos, Drum Major Institute for Public Policy, Economic Policy Institute, Grassroots Policy Project, Green For All, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, Institute for Policy Studies, The Jamestown Project, New Vision: An Institute for Policy and Progress, The Opportunity Agenda, Progressive States Network, Redefining Progress, The Roosevelt Institution, Sightline Institute.
The idea behind it is to set aside specific short-term goals of individual organizations in an effort to aide the progressive movement in the long-term, by forming a cohesive, united, and organized body that can coordinate efforts amongst the groups and provide training for its members. The Progressive Ideas Network just released a book outlining a solid plan of action for the new administration, Thinking Big. Support the progressive movement and empower yourself to use the democracy to make a difference! buy your copy today!