I promised Friday that I would talk about the Roosevelt Institute’s report on what the Democrats should do next, which I think is a better “what Democrats need to do to win” report than the centrist one I talked about Friday. However, a friend sent me a video over the weekend that really hit home for me, and I wanted to write about that instead, but a promise is a promise. So, I’ll do both.
First off, about that Roosevelt Institute report. If Democrats want to win the next election, they need to stop running from government—and start proving it works. That’s the message of the Institute’s new report, Building a More Effective, Responsive Government. After decades of underfunding and risk aversion, the public sector often moves too slowly to meet people’s needs, allowing conservatives to paint it as broken. The fix? Make government bold, fast, and visible in people’s lives again. Drawing from insights of over 45 Biden-Harris officials, the report urges Democrats to modernize tech, cut red tape, hold corporations accountable, and deliver results ordinary people can see and feel. It’s not just good policy—it’s smart politics. When Democrats show that government can actually make life easier, they win both trust and elections. Makes a lot of sense, and they don’t even recommend throwing people under the bus.
Now about that video. It is a video of part of a Q & A part of an appearance by writer and public intellectual Ta-Nehisi Coates, shot by someone in the audience. It hits me right at home as someone who works at a university.
Last week, Penn State had a faculty/staff town hall, and our president said that she would not sign the pact that the Trump administration was trying to railroad other universities into signing. This made me feel better, and then I saw the Coates clip, and I felt even better. So far, it appears that the first university to sign it is no surprise: Christopher Rufo’s New College of Florida.
If indeed my employer refuses to sign this pact, then we will not fall into the category that Coates is talking about in his answer: Institutional Cowards. We see this over and over now, with our elite institutions. Law firms, universities, media companies, etc. keep bending the knee to an authoritarian, and while there are notable exceptions of fighting back, everywhere you look, there’s Neville Chamberlain, waving the little piece of paper declaring peace in our time as he is handing Poland over to Hitler.
Whether or not an institution such as Columbia University capitulates to Trump because they are scared or are complicit is open for debate, but these really are the only two options. Look, I know from working in the field that no one cares more about legacies than a university senior administration, and as Coates points out, eventually this will end, and legacies will be cemented.
I suppose Columbia’s president can go on and on about her CV, but my comeback to that would be that Chamberlain had an impressive CV, but history doesn’t really care about that, just his waving the paper and capitulating to Hitler. I suppose that one could make the argument, which I have before, that institutional elite leadership often has a siloed view of the world, one that even veers into the realm of child-like naivety. Surely no one who could be at a dinner party with me can do anything wrong, correct?
At one time, you could excuse the elites for not wanting to accept that any deal with Trump is a deal with a mobster, that he cannot be appeased. That claims like interest in combating antisemitism, protecting girls’ sports from a handful of trans athletes, or free speech are nothing but disingenuous covers for real intentions. That once you give Trump something, he’ll stop coming back and asking for more.
But now, if they really are the wisened people they claim to be, they have to know that Trump cannot be trusted on his word. That he’s a real threat to these institutions. To talk for years about how important and glorious these institutions are, and then refuse to protect them from a despot, is the very opposite of good leadership. So, I echo what Coates says in the video to those in power who bend the knee to Trump: Y’all are punks. And Coates’ final line: “tell your children who the cowards were.”
The last word goes to Ben Harper.