Reply #44: Send Matt Tabbibi straight to skid row. [View All]

But I will say, like Bernie Sander's I've simply stopped identifying as a liberal because of so much of this and self-identify as a Socialist in Democratic Party clothing. I don't think there's that much per say wrong with a well-of liberal party. The problem becomes when that perception of "elitism" forces us away from our core principles, for example the recent immigration debate i.e. the New Southern Strategy. What exactly is Tabbibi's solution? A label change to progressive? :rofl:

I will say though that Tabbibi clearly does not know his history and is making a largely rhetorical argument. The claim: "They haven’t yet come up with something to replace the synergy of patrician and middle-class interests that the New Deal represented," completely misrepresents the genesis of the New Deal in the face of the "the business of America is business" crowd of the GOP. The Roosevelt's although the Right-wing has always tried to portray them as hypocrites, did an enormous amount that truly did benefit all Americans. So although I advocate revolutionary tactics in some instances, I believe that this country can change, because it has changed both in favor of racial pluralism on some level and in favor of social mobility on some level. Ultimately, this disconnect between the understanding of the history of this country and the conditions of the present public discursive corrupts the basic premise of the article i.e. that something is wrong with the label of "liberalism."

Consider the following passage: "That, in sum, is why I don’t call myself a liberal. To me the word “liberalism” describes an era whose time is past, a time when a liberal was defined more by who he was fighting against – the Man – than what he was fighting for. A liberal wielding power is always going to seem a bit strange because a liberal always imagines himself in an intrepid fight against power, not holding it. I therefore prefer the word “progressive,” which describes in a neutral way a set of political values without having these class or aesthetic connotations. To me a progressive is not fighting Mom and Dad, Nixon, Bush or really any people at all, but things – political corruption, commercialism, pollution, etc. It doesn’t have that same Marxian us-versus-them connotation that liberalism still has, sometimes ridiculously. It’s about goals, not people."

Matt Tabbibi this is not about goals or perceptions, this is about people, and liberalism throughout it's history has always been about people. Matt Tabbibi exemplifies exactly what he is railing against, and that is just sad. Cho Seung-Hui and Matt Tabbibi have one key thing in common. As much as they rail against their own "victim-complex" (shades of Larry Elder), they are perfectly willing to play it out as they have concieved it; everyone is a victim.

I frankly believe this book should be the "official" book of DU: http://www.amazon.com/Nickel-Dimed-Not-Getting-America/dp/0805063897/ref=sr_1_1/105-6375967-7925217?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1182122944&sr=1-1

If you're still reading this, :yourock: