The progressive vision for America -- to make life better for all families, not just the privileged elite at the top -- has suffered setbacks.

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The progressive vision for America -- to make life better for all families, not just the privileged elite at the top -- has suffered setbacks. After the 2016 election, Republicans control the White House, both chambers of Congress and more than half of state governments.

Liberal hopes for free college, universal healthcare, equal opportunity, female rights, higher minimum wage, less militarism, less imprisonment and other left-wing goals seem doomed, at least for now. All that reform-minded folks can do is try to prevent losses of past social progress.

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts is trying to rally progressives into stronger unified resistance against the conservative Trump era. Her new book, "This Fight is Our Fight: The Battle to Save America's Middle Class," is a blunt weapon.

From the New Deal to the 1980s, she points out, America "built the greatest middle class the world has ever known." She continues:

"We built it ourselves, using our own hard work and the tools of government to open up more opportunities for millions of people. We used it all -- tax policy, investments in public education, new infrastructure, support for research, rules that protected consumers and investors, antitrust laws -- to promote and expand our middle class". Income growth was widespread, and the people who did most of the work -- the 90 percent of America -- also got most of the gains."

However, trickle-down economics under President Reagan turned the tables, giving ever-bigger favors to the rich, who used snowballing technology and their amassed wealth to corral more power.

Warren, a former Harvard professor, writes that she spent years researching the "great and terrible story" of middle-class decline. Today, college debt hobbles many families. Job insecurity grows as electronic breakthroughs wipe out more jobs. Wealth keeps amassing in hands of the 1 percent who control corporations and investments -- and who stash their money in overseas shelters.

"People are angry because trade deals seem to be building jobs and opportunities for workers in other parts of the world, while leaving abandoned factories here at home," Warren continues. ""Today, this country works great for those at the top. It works great for every corporation rich enough to hire an army of lobbyists and lawyers. It works great for every billionaire who pays taxes at lower rates than the hired help. It works great for everyone with the money to buy favors in Washington."

She calls President Trump a man "always on the hunt for his next big con." She urges progressives to follow the pattern of the million-member Women's March on Washington, to mobilize resistance against conservative attempts to slash the public safety net and human rights.

Another form of resistance is citizen lawsuits to prevent new law changes from scuttling past public gains locked into statutes.

With Republicans controlling most government power, will it be possible for progressives to resist effectively? Maybe -- maybe not. But at least conscientious Americans shouldn't just surrender.

Authors Bio:

James A. Haught was born on Feb. 20, 1932, in a small West Virginia farm town that had no electricity or paved streets.  He graduated from a rural high school with 13 students in the senior class.  He came to Charleston, worked as a delivery boy, then became a teen-age apprentice printer at the Charleston Daily Mail in 1951.  Developing a yen to be a reporter, he volunteered to work without pay in the Daily Mail newsroom on his days off to learn the trade.  This arrangement continued several months, until The Charleston Gazette offered a full-time news job in 1953.  He has been at the Gazette ever since - except for a few months in 1959 when he was press aide to Sen. Robert Byrd.

During his six decades in newspaper life, he has been police reporter, religion columnist, feature writer and night city editor - then he was investigative reporter for 13 years, and his work led to several corruption convictions.  In 1983 he was named associate editor, and in 1992 he became editor.  In 2015, as The Gazette combined with the Daily Mail, he assumed the title of editor emeritus, but still works full-time.  He writes nearly 400 Gazette editorials a year, plus personal columns and news articles.

Haught has won two dozen national newswriting awards, and is author of 11 books and 100 magazine essays.  About 60 of his columns have been distributed by national syndicates.  He also is a senior editor of Free Inquiry magazine. He is listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in the World, Contemporary Authors and 2000 Outstanding Intellectuals of the 21st Century.  He has four children, 12 grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.

His books include “Holy Horrors” (1990), “Science in a Nanosecond” (1990), “Holy Hatred” (1995), “2,000 Years of Disbelief” (1996), “Honest Doubt” (2007), “Amazon Moon” (2007), “Fascinating West Virginia” (2008), “Fading Faith” (2010), “Religion is Dying” (2014), “Hurrah for Liberals (2016), plus a 1992 art book featuring lovers depicted by master artists, to refute both bluenose censors and crude pornographers.

For years, he enjoyed hiking with Kanawha Trail Club, participating in a philosophy group, and taking grandchildren swimming off his old sailboat. He is a longtime member of Charleston’s Unitarian Universalist Congregation.

Haught continues working full-time at 85.