The three guest speakers who joined Chris Fitzsimon at today’s NC Policy Watch Crucial Conversation luncheon delivered mostly optimistic messages about the long-term electoral prospects for progressives in North Carolina in the years ahead. For a variety of reasons — history, voter attitudes on the issues, improved organizational structures to name a few — Tom Jensen, Carol Teal, and Dan Blue III remain quite positive about the future. (We’ll post a video of the event in the coming days.)

That said, there’s no denying that there were some troubling and discouraging developments on November 4 — both in the elections results themselves and in the frustrating apathy of many potential voters who might have participated. In this vein, a regular NC Policy Watch contributor, Prof. Charles Beem of UNC Pembroke, recently authored the following election post mortem that is decidedly less optimistic.

Troubling takeaways from the election
By Dr. Charles Beem

There are a lot of disturbing takeaways from the recent election results. For progressives, Thom Tillis’ narrow victory and the stronger-than-ever, gerrymandered majorities in the General Assembly and the state’s congressional delegations were enough to make one feel as if the energetic Moral Monday protests and organizing efforts of the past couple of years have produced precious little effect.

Perhaps even sadder is the fact that it is clear today that a critical mass of citizens simply do not seem to care who gets elected to public office, while a highly motivated minority, whose hatred of President Obama defies a rational explanation, are the tail wagging the dog of contemporary America.

The day after the election I made the mistake of asking the eighteen students in my World Civilizations class how many of them voted last Tuesday. The answer was none, even though (or perhaps because, in part) North Carolina’s voter repression law had severely circumscribed their ability to vote.

Scary, right? What is even more chilling is that earlier in the semester this same class read the book “How the Irish Saved Civilization,” in which author Thomas Cahill persuasively attributed the fall of the Roman Empire (an empire plagued by structural decay, grave economic disparity between rich and poor, and barbarians at the gates — sound familiar?), to the fact that the Roman people ultimately did not care enough to intervene. Instead, they allowed the affluent to drive their civilization into the ground simply for their own short term economic benefit. Sad to say, not a single student made the critical connection between the lessons of history and their own reality as American citizens. Read More

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