Code Red

How Progressives and Moderates Can Unite to Save Our Country

By: E.J. Dionne Jr.

Narrated by: Adam Barr, E.J. Dionne Jr.

Length: 7 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's summary

This program includes an introduction read by the author.

New York Times best-selling author and Washington Post columnist E. J. Dionne, Jr., sounds the alarm in Code Red, calling for an alliance between progressives and moderates to seize the moment and restore hope to America’s future for the 2020 presidential election.

Will progressives and moderates feud while America burns? Or will these natural allies take advantage of the greatest opportunity since the New Deal Era to strengthen American democracy, foster social justice, and turn back the threats of the Trump Era?

The United States stands at a crossroads. Broad and principled opposition to Donald Trump’s presidency has drawn millions of previously disengaged citizens to the public square and to the ballot boxes. This inspired and growing activism for social and political change hasn’t been seen since the days of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal policies and the Progressive and Civil Rights movements. But if progressives and moderates are unable - and unwilling - to overcome their differences, they could not only enable Trump to prevail again but also squander an occasion for launching a new era of reform.

In Code Red, award-winning journalist E. J. Dionne, Jr., calls for a shared commitment to decency and a politics focused on freedom, fairness, and the future, encouraging progressives and moderates to explore common ground and expand the unity that brought about Democrat victories in the 2018 elections. He offers a unifying model for furthering progress with a Politics of Remedy, Dignity, and More: one that solves problems, resolve disputes, and moves forward; that sits at the heart of the demands for justice by both long-marginalized and recently-displaced groups; and that posits a positive future for Americans with more covered by health insurance, more with decent wages, more with good schools, more security from gun violence, more action to roll back climate change.

Breaking through the partisan noise and cutting against conventional wisdom to provide a realistic look at political possibilities, Dionne offers a strategy for progressives and moderates to think more clearly and accept the responsibilities that history now imposes on them. Because at this point in our national story, change can’t wait.

A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin's Press

"An exquisitely timed book...'Code Red' is a worthwhile exploration of the shared goals (and shared enemies) that unite moderates and progressives. But more than that, it is a sharp reminder that the common ground on which Dionne built his career has been badly eroded, with little prospect that it will soon be restored." (New York Times Book Review)

"Highly engaging, intellectually sound, and morally grounded" (Washington Monthly)

"The Washington Post columnist and NPR commentator offers a passionately reasoned argument for why both progressive and moderate wings of the Democratic Party must put aside differences to defeat Donald Trump in 2020.... A well-argued and persuasive treatise by a deeply concerned journalist and citizen." (Kirkus Reviews)

©2020 E.J. Dionne, Jr. (P)2020 Macmillan Audio

Misses the mark

Having listened to this after the 2020 election, I of course, have the benefit of living through the election and its near-term aftermath. Hind-sight, as they say is 20-20. That said, the author appears to have made some of the same mistakes in interpreting the opinion of the American people - at least a very large minority of them when it comes to the presidential election. He was even further off when it comes to the House and Senate outcomes. Apparently the American people were not as "tired of a Republican party and conservative movement ..." as his research suggested given that the Democrats lost seats in the House and their potential, extremely thin majority in the Senate hangs in the balance of the run-off votes in January. Pollsters and the media that rely on the results must find a better way to glean the true prevailing perspectives of the American people. Dionne's argument that progressives and moderates must work together is, however right on target.

Excellent ideas I needed to hear right now

Had to rewind and listen again multiple times, and I don't think I'm done with that. Narrator consistently mispronounced "Kamala" and "Roosevelt"