Posts by Andrea Batista Schlesinger

Andrea Batista Schlesinger is the Executive Director of the Drum Major Institute.

Why Obama, McCain and You Should Care that Middle-Class Americans have no Idea what Congress is up to
Posted by Andrea Batista Schlesinger, Drum Major Institute on August 21, 2008 at 3:00 PM.

From Andrea Batista Schlesinger:

Is all of the House of Representatives and one-third of the Senate up for election in November? In the midst of all of the talk of vice presidential choices, Paris Hilton and who is the real celebrity, and how much was raised this quarter by the DNC and RNC, I almost forgot.

Well, I didn't forget. I can't forget. But things are seriously amiss when it comes to the attention paid to The Other Election day happening on November 4 - and, frankly, on how much people know or follow Congress at all. When 72% of middle-class Americans can't name a single bill passed by Congress in the last two years that benefited them or their families, we have a problem on our hands.

Now I'm not expecting people to have encyclopedic knowledge of the voting records of their representatives, but in a time in which the minimum wage was increased and college made more affordable and a stimulus package passed, that percentage speaks to a profound disconnect between people and their policymakers that festers in a culture in which reporting on Congress is confused with political horseracing.

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Members of Congress Graded on Middle Class Accountability
Posted by Andrea Batista Schlesinger, Drum Major Institute on March 12, 2008 at 10:08 AM.

If the middle class could give your Congressmember a grade, what would it be? Today, DMI releases grades for every senator and representative, evaluating their votes on key legislation that affects the current and aspiring middle class.



2007 began as a year of great promise. Congress was flooded with dozens of new members, many elected with a pledge to address the middle-class squeeze and help more working people attain a middle-class standard of living. Important legislation--from expanding children's health coverage to bringing down the cost of college loans--was introduced and brought to a vote. But, faced with Senate filibusters and a recalcitrant President, many bills died or were passed in watered-down form. Still, the bills that did become law represent concrete gains for current and aspiring middle-class Americans, including a higher minimum wage, expanded Pell Grants, a freeze on middle class tax hikes and lower costs to fuel cars.



TheMiddleClass.org 2007 Congressional Scorecard takes a closer look at the decisions made by Congress, from the one-year freeze to prevent the Alternative Minimum Tax from hitting middle-class families to the filibuster that originally torpedoed a minimum wage increase (later passed) and the trade bill that put the interests of multinational corporations and large investors before the concerns of middle-class Americans.



After examining 13 bills in detail, the 2007 Congressional Scorecard assigns a grade to each Member of Congress based on his or her support for the middle class. On the whole, Congress squeaked by with a passing grade in 2007, but there is considerable room for improvement. Just 62% of Representatives and 56% of Senators received a C or better. While this middle-class record is far better than the first term of the 109th Congress, the millions of Americans striving to attain--or hold onto--a middle-class standard of living deserve more from their elected representatives.

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Americans Demand Change, The State of the Union Address Is More of The Same
Posted by Andrea Batista Schlesinger, Drum Major Institute on January 29, 2008 at 7:20 AM.

DMI's Rapid Response to the 2008 State of the Union

Click here to read DMI's full analysis of the President's domestic policy prescriptions - complete with statistics and talking points -- online at www.drummajorinstitute.org/sotu2008

The American people want change. Every Presidential candidate, Democrat and Republican, has made this a mantra. But the State of the Union Address reveals no alteration from President George W. Bush. This year the President labored to keep breathing life into the same worn out ideology that has repeatedly failed America's current and aspiring middle class.

The President continues to proclaim the foundation of our economy sound when so many current and aspiring middle-class Americans are losing their spot in the American Dream. He prioritizes ideology over proven methods of stimulating the economy and providing health care. He uses the language of consumer choice to dress up what really amounts to unbridled corporate power and profiteering. He continues to assert that the market will right itself, if only people understand it more and restrict it less, despite all of the evidence to the contrary.

Despite the praise-worthy components of President Bush's address tonight - his signing of the Energy Independence and Security Act, his cooperation with Congress to pass a stimulus reform that would include millions of low-income Americans he initially intended to exclude, his newfound interest in supporting military families - his approach reflected a commitment to ideology, as opposed to willingness to see how that ideology has actually impacted current and aspiring middle-class Americans.

After years of insisting that the economy was doing great as middle-class families were squeezed by stagnant wages and a rising cost of living, it takes weak corporate profits to make the President recognize that times are tough.

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Note to the '08 Candidates: The American Heartland is a Big City
Posted by Andrea Batista Schlesinger, Drum Major Institute on December 20, 2007 at 8:01 PM.

In today's presidential campaign, America is all heartland -- tractor pulls, county fairs, town halls and truck stops. Candidates scramble for photo ops in plaid, stump in wheat fields and scarf down corn dogs. Our country, it seems, is all country.

Yet we are an urban nation. More than 80% of Americans live in cities. Urbanites drive 90% of our economy. In pandering to rural voters, presidential candidates ignore the bread and butter issues that most Americans deal with every day -- housing, transportation, infrastructure, crime, education.

Have the presidential candidates lost touch with urban America? Are "urban issues" code for poor people and ethnic minorities, and thus to be avoided at all costs? Should the candidates have an urban agenda? What should it be?

To find out, we asked the people who know our cities best -- America's Mayors. In punchy video interviews, a diverse and influential group of mayors gave their prescription for an agenda that supports American cities, and thus America at large.

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