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Syndicated columnist E.J. Dionne of The Washington Post offers his prescription for how President Obama and congressional Democrats can regain political traction in the wake of the Massachusetts Senate election that cost the Democrats its filibuster-proof majority. He says that the Democrats get into a "useless argument" over whether to move to the left or to the center. Dionne said that Obama should mobilize progressives and win the center, using populist positions on economic issues. Dionne also explains how he thinks progressives should address voter fears about the federal deficit.

Dionne was interviewed at St. Paul's College in Washington, where he gave the 2010 Hecker Lecture.

This video by OWL: The Voice of Midlife and Older Women raises the alarm about the creation of a fast-track commission that would allow the White House and Congress to cut Social Security and other benefits without going through the normal democratic process of debate and compromise. Congress was set to make a decision January 20 on the fast-track commission in conjunction with a vote to raise the debt ceiling. The full action alert, along with a way to contact your senator to oppose the creation of the commission, is available at SocialSecurityMatters.org.

Roger Hickey, co-director of the Campaign for America's Future, takes on the GOP-backed deficit commission in an interview on The Real News Network. Hickey says the commission, a concept being pushed by a foundation backed by Wall Street mogul Peter G. Peterson that is at the center of a journalism ethics controversy at The Washington Post, would be used to force through cuts in social programs.

Co-directors Robert Borosage and Roger Hickey look back at the progressive movement in 2009 and discuss what it will take to win the political challenges of 2010. They argue that the past year has shown the necessity of an independent progressive movement to hold President Obama to his promises and to hold Congress accountable to the people. The political agenda they lay out for 2010 includes strengthening health care reform, keeping the economic recovery and job production on track, financial reform and protecting the social safety net.

Our bloggers Terrance Heath and Bill Scher dive into the question that is now dominating progressive political debate: Has the health care reform bill been so seriously compromised—first with the dilution and ultimate elimination of the public option and now with the capitulation to the demands of two senators to not even allow persons 55 and over to buy in to the Medicare program—that it's not worth passing? Watch this video, and then you decide.

Leo Gerard, president of the United Steelworkers union, analyzes the White House summit on jobs December 3, where he was one of the labor participants. He says in this interview that he was buoyed by the good ideas that were presented at the summit, and praises Obama for using the summit to put a focus on creating jobs. Now, he says, Congress and the administration must act to address the infrastructure, trade, training and manufacturing policy issues that must be tackled to produce jobs in both the short and long term.