When you look back over the past year and consider that we entered the year in fear & trembling, is it possible to exit 2017 with a sense of emerging power and even optimism that the pendulum may now swing left? Could the arc of the universe now swing toward justice? Odd thought after the tax bill. Read on.

Question of the Day: We are going to do this every few days to try to encourage more dialog in the blog.  Today’s question is two part: 1) after looking over the reflection below, what was the most positive development of 2017?  2) What is the most ominous?  Just post your thoughts as a comment at the end of the blog.  And Happy New Year. Whatever we face in 2018, we’ll do it together.

A Look at 2017

Thanks to Marjorie Kamine who forwarded this. I was going to cobble together a list of good things in 2017 and will cheerfully forego that task now as Small Victories have done the job in spades and with humor. But this has a national lens so I wanted to preface it by a few NM and Santa Fe wins:

• Tim Keller as Mayor of ABQ (Thank you ABQ, Working Families, PDA, OurRevolution and all the grassroots folks who made it happen);
• Las Cruces City Council victories by progressives (thank you all the activists in LC who made this happen)
• Last year of Susana;
• PNM beginning to lose at the PRC and half of San Juan Generating Station has now closed (thank you New Energy Economy)
• A stronger Sanctuary City ordinance in Santa Fe (thank you Somos Un Pueblo Unido and SF Dreamers)
• 175% cap on predatory loan caps begins today; it felt like a total defeat, but 175% beats 1000% and in 2019, we’ll get 36%
• Ranked Choice Voting in SF-fingers still crossed (thank you FairVoteNM)
• A growing and stronger Retake Our Democracy that entered 2017 with 300 subscribers and exited with almost 2000
• A weekly radio show (Thank you KSFR)
• An awesome Roundhouse Activism Team that has been meeting twice a month for 9 months to develop our Roundhouse Activism Strategy for 2018-19 (Lynne Fischer, Meg Meltz, Lee Goodwin, Saraswati Khalsa, Michael Sperberg McQueen, Craig O’hare and with new members just getting on board in the past month or two)
• An extraordinary leadership team of Sara Hume, Jennifer Johnson, Cecile Lipworth, Julia Berman and Roxanne who have been meeting alternate weeks and in multiple retreats for six months, and last and most importantly,
• A wife, partner, editor, colleague, lover and co-parent of three adult kids and Quilo the adolescent cat. Roxanne, you are my inspiration and life partner. With all the above, who can complain? Here’s to creating a far, far better 2018…

I know there are more things locally to be grateful for, but Small Victories has quite a list to follow.  Be well my friends. Much to do in 2018.  Paul

Guys! We made it to the end of the year. Holy moly, what a year it has been. Before we go off and do some serious celebrating (aka naps for days), we decided to do a roundup of all that we have accomplished… and maybe went a little overboard, but we couldn’t help ourselves. If you want to see all 800+ victories we tracked this year, head on over to our archives.

We hope this year in review will pump you up for 2018—between the November midterms and fight for Dreamers, we have a BIG year ahead. Looking back on all we’ve accomplished, we’re feeling oh-so-ready to take on next year.

And if there’s one thing we learned from 2017, it’s this

1. First, the White House is a hot mess
SO MANY White House staff and appointees didn’t even make it through the first year:

�� Michael Flynn lasted less than month.
�� Sean Spicer resigned as White House press secretary after 6 months.
�� Steve Bannon was first removed from the National Security Council, then fired all together.
�� Then Pudzer withdrew, an Army secretary and a national security advisor pick both dropped out, and these advisors resigned en masse.
�� Georgetown students pushed White House aide (and Nazi sympathizer) Sebastian Gorka, to answer some tough questions, and he couldn’t take the heat. Aaand then he was also fired.
�� Trump’s Communications Director quit.
�� Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price is gone. #NoMorePrivatePlanesOnOurDime
�� Trump’s cybersecurity advisors took a stand and resigned en masse.
�� Sam Clovis—a right-wing radio host who is not a scientist and is also the worst—withdrew his nomination from a senior USDA position.
�� This anti-feminist nominated by Trump to be Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues withdrew her name from consideration.
�� Omarosa is out. She either resigned, or was fired… or was dragged out of the White House.
�� Two judicial nominees were dropped from consideration, and another withdrew his name after a recent humiliating experience.
�� Trump’s nominee to lead the EPA withdrew his nomination, and Trump’s pick to head the Export-Import bank was rejected.
�� Lots of other Trump officials didn’t last either.
�� And Scaramucci can at least say he won top spot for fastest firing in the first year. #AnyoneEvenRememberHim?

And while our main focus isn’t on the Mueller investigation, promising informationcontinues to come out, and it looks like there may be some progress on the horizon.

But maybe one of the biggest victories of all is that Trump is incompetent and doesn’t know how to govern, while we, the people, have become stronger, more organized, and collaborative.

Art by Lisa Goodman aka Messy Bed Studio

2. Our voices are being heard
It hadn’t been 48 hours into 2017 before we had our very first victory—remember when the House GOP dropped their bid to gut the Office of Congressional Ethics? The press reported that people’s phone calls made the difference. We were just warming up.

We broke records with the number of phone calls we made to Washington this year, and people regularly held their elected officials accountable at town halls and protests—many of them by newly-formed Indivisible groups. According to Indivisible, by April alone, 250,000 people had attended 450 marches, town halls, and other events. #Incredible

✊  Colorado  ✊  Texas  ✊  Arkansas
✊  Iowa ✊  New York  ✊  And more
✊  Seriously—so many more

Sometimes it seemed like we were out at a protest every day:

��  The day after Trump was sworn in, we made history as millions of people all around the globe came out to march against everything he stood for.
��  In February, thousands attended Not My President’s Day rallies in dozens of cities.
��  Tens of thousands in the US and around the world on all seven continentsmarched to support science and evidence-based research. #ScienceNotSilence
��  120,000 people in over 200 communities marched to demand that Trump release his taxes. BTW, the 2018 tax march plans are already underway.
��  We protested to get an independent investigation into Trump’s ties to Russia, after he fired Comey. Hello, Robert Mueller!
��  Thousands of people in 135 cities across the country marched for truth, calling for greater transparency from the Trump administration.
��  Dinosaurs rallied outside the White House to protest proposed budget cuts that could lead to the “extinction” of service programs like AmeriCorps.
��  Some of the protests were (literally) out of this world.

Rhode Islanders showed us all how it’s done when they interrupted Senator Whitehouse’s dinner and demanded answers for his cabinet votes.

Even the rain and snow wouldn’t stop us. And when Congress went on recess, people made sure it was far from relaxing. Everyone standing up and speaking out—like 16-year-old Deja Foxx—made a difference in more ways than one.

Some elected officials skipped their town halls, so their constituents got creative. Groups have been:

��  Following their Representatives and Senators around town
��  Holding candlelight vigils for their safe return
��  Singing songs to woo them into a hosting events
��  Using one of our favorite Easter treats to get their point across
��  Convening their own town halls
��  Or going the milk carton route to try and find them

Plus, Democratic representatives held town halls in Republican districts, since their Republican counterparts can’t take the heat.

One of our favorite stories: Indivisible Missouri wanted a town hall with their senator, but he was in Tennessee holding a fundraiser. So Indivisible Tennessee paid him a visit, delivered their constituent letter, and held a rally on their behalf.

After Senator Daines helped block Elizabeth Warren from reading Coretta Scott King’s letter on the Senate floor, a group of women showed up at his office and read it to him.

We also saw students walk out during Mike Pence’s commencement address at Notre Dame; a small, conservative Christian college protest a visit from Pence; and Harvard students pull off a stunning silent protest against Betsy DeVos.

Plus Arizona and North Carolina killed bills that would have criminalized protesting, and the first batch of inauguration protesters were found not guilty on all charges.

And while we don’t approve of the majority of her voting record, even Susan Collins said it was constantly hearing from her constituents that made her vote no on the healthcare bill.

That’s why we’re happy to see people continuing to pay their representatives a visit—this time, to express outrage over the tax bill.

3. It was the year of the feminist
The Women’s March was the largest single-day protest in US history! We have so many feels looking back at all the photos from that day. ����

11. We also saw improvements on criminal justice
State and local prosecutors have been fighting back against Jeff Sessions’ desire for harsher sentencing policies (because, news flash: that’s a bad idea), and we saw improvements to the criminal justice system in:

A number of states have all or nearly eliminated cash bail, leading to promising results—we’re looking at you next, California. And we saw stories of local and national organizers, thousands of donations, and app developers helping hundreds of incarcerated mothers, fathers, men, and women return home to their families.

After football players began kneeling during the anthem to oppose police brutality against people of color, Trump crassly attacked their rights to silently and peacefully protest. But their protests only increased, and players, coaches, and team owners spoke out or knelt in solidarity with the players. ��

New York City became the first city in the country to divest its workers’ pensions from private prisons! (To learn more about why this is so important, check out Enlace’s Prison Divestment Campaign.) #MoreOfThisPlease

Many innocent people were freed thanks to help from family, friends, organizers, and journalists:
�� Massachusetts dismissed more than 20,000 cases where people had been wrongfully convicted of drug crimes.
��The Philadelphia Innocence Project secured the release of yet another manwrongly convicted and imprisoned.
��A Buzzfeed story helped free a Chicago man after spending 23 years behind bars in a likely-wrongful conviction
�� After ProPublica and Vanity Fair released an investigative report, Nevada issued a pardon for a man who was wrongfully convicted and imprisoned for 21 years.

In other news, Los Angeles and Nevada legalized recreational marijuana, and South Carolina legalized hemp. ��  #ItsTimeForAMarijuanaEmoji

And we can’t forget that President Obama commuted the sentences of Oscar López Rivera and Chelsea Manning before he left office, and both are now free.

12. As well as economic justice
The Fight for $15 continues, with the minimum wage increasing all across thecountry. #FifteenForAll

This year brought so many union wins—and so many new unions!

States began guaranteeing paid family leave, financial assistance to caregivers, and more flexible work schedules.

New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee, and San Francisco all rolled out free college programs. On the national level, support continues to grow for Bernie Sanders’ College for All Act.

Students can look forward to school lunches for once:

��  New York City is providing free lunch to every single student in public school.
��  New Mexico outlawed school lunch shaming.
��   Spelman and Morehouse students secured free meals for food insecure students.
��  A fund honoring Philando Castile’s work as a cafeteria supervisor raised enough money to erase every St. Paul student’s school lunch debt.

Plus, people in Los Angeles voted to tax themselves to help the homeless; Portland, Oregon is divesting from all corporations; and Philadelphia is launching income-based water bills.

13. And this is why every vote counts
Tireless work from black organizers gave Doug Jones his shocking win in Alabama. Jones, and everyone else, should read this letter from the groups that elected him. #PoliticiansWorkForUs

This November looked very different from last year! This year delivered so many historic wins from people of color, transgender candidates, women, and socialists. You can find all of them here, but we can’t help but highlight the newly-elected Andrea Jenkins, Danica Roem, Larry Krasner, and Vernetta Alston; the fact that every member of the Palm Springs, CA City Council identifies as LGBTQ+; and Ashley Bennett’s triumph against a Republican politician who made a sexist joke about the Women’s March. #Winning

Earlier this year, we cheered on these candidates:
��  khalid kamau, a socialist and Black Lives Matter organizer, was elected to city council.
��  Randall Woodfin won the Birmingham, Alabama mayoral race.
��  Chokwe Antar Lumumba became mayor in Jackson, Mississippi, carrying on his father’s legacy.

And there were other big wins in special elections, including some seats that have never been held by a Democrat before:

A Hawaii state rep left the Republican party to join the Democrats, and a Republican judge resigned to protest his own party’s behavior—and so the governor could appoint a Democrat to replace him. We also can’t forget the elation we felt when these senators persisted and reclaimed their time.

We have our eyes on the 2018 midterms:

• Scientists and Muslim-Americans are signing up to run.
• 16,000 women told Emily’s List they want to run for office (compared to 920 total in the past two years).
• 369 women are running for Congress, more than ever before.
• A bunch of GOP reps, including Jason Chaffetz, aren’t running for reelection in 2018.
• It will soon be easier to learn who is funding political ads on Facebook and in California.

104 women currently serve in Congress, the largest amount in our history, but we’re hoping 2018 will blow that number out of the water.

And while we’re talking about all the election wins, we have to talk about the important work being done to protect voting rights.

We’re making progress against gerrymandering, from a huge Supreme Court ruling to state-level victories:

We also saw wins against voter ID laws, and for automatic voter registration and restoring voting rights to people who committed felonies.

We loved seeing 80,000 people march in Raleigh, NC for voting rights, and were thrilled to learn that College Park, Maryland granted undocumented immigrants and other non-citizens voting rights in local elections.

And nearly every state came out against the Trump administration’s election commission, which eventually suspended their voter data request. But that’s not all—the commission is being investigated while facing seven federal lawsuits (they already lost one), and now one of their members is suing them as well.

14. It was the year of Superwomen & #OscarsNotSoWhite
Even though Trump doesn’t care about the arts at all, we’re happy Congress understands why they are so important—and increased funding to the NEA in 2017. But that was only the beginning.

From box office successes:
⭐ Hidden Figures beat Star Wars at the box office its opening weekend.
⭐ I Am Not Your Negro became the highest-grossing theatrical release in its distributor’s history.
⭐ Wonder Woman broke box office records all over the place—beating previous grosses by women directors and all superhero origin stories to date.

To a lot of firsts:
⭐ Girls Trip became the first film to be written, directed, and produced by, and starring, people of color to cross the $100 million mark.
⭐ Get Out director Jordan Peele became the first black writer-director to have a feature debut earn more than $100 million.
⭐ Moonlight was the first best picture winner at the Oscars to have an all-black cast AND the first film centered on an LGBTQ character.
⭐ Viola Davis became the first black woman to win an Emmy, Tony, and Oscar for acting.
⭐ Mahershala Ali became the first Muslim man to win an Oscar.
⭐ Riz Ahmed became the first South Asian—and first Muslim—man to win an acting Emmy.
⭐ Lena Waithe became the first black woman to win an Emmy for comedy writing.
⭐ Michael Che became the first black head writer at SNL.

Phew. Thanks again to Marjorie Kamine

Happy New Year to All. Be safe. Designate a driver.

In solidarity,

Paul & Roxanne

Categories: Uncategorized

Tags: Featured, read more