A Rant: Three Fairy Tales from the new So-Called Left, as seen on DU

Three Fairy Tales from the New So-Called Left, as seen on DU...
(A Rant, By a Grimm Leftist Democrat Sparkly Fairy Princess, Damnit)

Cinderella Radicals
Meet the ugly stepsisters of the 1960s. It was once fashion among flower children to wear love-beads and peace signs. Were they all aware and active? No -- to many it was just cool to appear "anti-establishment." In reality, there were some mighty nasty people preaching peace and love. Some here wear leftism as fashion in the same way, to the point of being in competition for leftwardness -- can you fit into my leftist glass slipper? If you're at all to the right of Marx, the answer is NO -- you're "Repug Lite" or a "DINO." The "Lefter-Than-Thou" Prince is every bit as condescending and hypocritical as his brother, the "Holier-Than-Thou" Prince from the right. Both say, "If you're not like me, you're wrong" -- in this case, if the shoe doesn’t fit, you're some variation of a callous warmongering bomb-loving animal-abusing human-rights abolishing selfish imperialist capitalist -- because nobody else really feels it or cares like the glass fashion-wearers do, nobody is as sensitive and aware... especially not those wicked politicians who deal with the reality of consensus and compromise with Republicans in the legislature, and anybody who defends a single thing they do. They must like war! Open-mindedness? Love and peace? Acceptance, tolerance, understanding? You'll never make it to the ball that way, you bloodthirsty compromiser!

Sleeping Beauty Idealists.
Here idealism fights reality. You may be a socialist, but if you accept and work with the idea that people different from you exist, vote, and hold office, you're a wicked stepmother of evil Compromise. In our dreams, we can elect Dennis Kucinich or Maxine Waters or Michael Moore as president; we can dream away the fact that Greens, Socialists and Ralph Nader will never need to negotiate agreements, build consensus, or pass a bill with people who are opposites. In the dreamworld, it's so easy to talk the talk! Of course when it comes to running in elections against Democrats, that easy talk can actually hurt progress, but oh well. Perhaps the poor and oppressed just can't appreciate our idealism when it has the bad habit of running up against reality. But aren’t we great? Mirror mirror on the wall, who's the most radical militant of them all? Not those DINOs in Congress, that’s for sure!

Alices Through the Looking Glass
Here the so-called "far left" circles itself around so far, down down down through its mirror, that it meets its reflection in unity with the far right. Here you find people linking "leftist" websites that quote and link extreme rightwing websites; you find people defending Ramsey Clark, a man who'd jump at the chance to defend Hitler and claim the holocaust never happened; you find people espousing personal liberties without regard to others to the point of rightwing libertarianism, and progressing onward to a mad tea party where pacifism meets anarchy and assault weapons are the key to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Murder is anti-war! Violence is peace! Our peace allows stronger people to kill weaker people in their own countries and they all want it that way! Villains are heroes, and heroes are villains! Drink me! Really, I'm a different flavor! Would I lie to you? Drink me!!

The moral of the stories: We need to get clear on what we mean by the terms “leftist, liberal, socialist, progressive,” even “Democratic” – because there are now people here espousing and demonstrating a level of mean, condescending, narrow-minded, prejudiced cruelty in both the manner and the substance of their posts, even championing defenders of violence and genocide, using these terms. They are terms I’ve long embraced but can’t align myself with when defined by near-rightwing posturing in an effort to be “radical.” Do these terms still stand for moving forward with open-minded, informed thoughtfulness in accord with the Golden Rule, in opposition to oppression, violence and bigotry? Or have they come to stand for narrow-minded, knee-jerk opposition to everything that’s the least bit status quo, meeting the rightwing at the back of the circle?

Flame as you wish, if you read it all. Thanks for indulging me in the rant.

Everyone is bashing Kerry, Clinton, Obama, and so forth. It reminds me of a child who is hit by a bully. Instead of hitting the bully back, he hits someone else.

I agree it's all too easy to bash the people closest to us rather than fight the real foes who are farther away. :hi:

It will be interesting to read where this topic goes. I need to think a bit and will get back.

How refreshing for someone to say "I need to think a bit and get back!" We should all do that more often! :)

I like the sentiment. I am most fearful of arbitrary fractionation completly splitting the left because some of us can't hold a candle to the "purists" who contradict their own beliefs in practice. Sometimes I slip in and out of the above groups.

Thanks for the moment of reflection!

I appreciate your open-mindedness and your comments. I try to stay wary of my own glass slippers, as well! :hi:

Quite the contrary...I enjoyed it immensely. Well done! :toast:

:toast:

Maybe DU needs a Democracy dictionary or something.

You and Husb2Sparkly are some of my favorite characters on DU, but this kind of thing is just going to create chaos and division.

I've grown to expect such advice from you.

What you outline here is pedantic and disrespectful to people, because you catagorize their current democratic politics as a fairy tale. You use the technique of false analogy. I don't know why. I'm more centrist than most, but I well recognize an attempt to demean people by reductionism.

required to handle the challenges presented in my fairy tales analogies. I trust that some, if not all, can say accept or reject what I'm saying without having a breakdown about it. So thanks, but I'm not worried.

you anticipate. ;-)

Thanks so much for all your advice, janx. It's always so appreciated. :eyes:

But please don't represent the whole message board in these terms. It's not real or genuine.

I'm sure most people can see I'm not trying to "represent the whole message board." If they misunderstand, I'll be sure to correct the misunderstanding. I find most people on DU are pretty smart, though, so don't worry.

...

Thank goodness you were kind enough to warn me. :eyes: You could be kind enough to leave this alone any time you'd like now.

NT!

I think it'd be great if we all agreed on what we mean by certain terms, simply to help communication; but the process of discussion to arrive at any agreement would be the most productive thing. I'm not sure we'll ever agree on what a "leftist" is; I just hate to see the term usurped to refer to something so close to rightwing radicalism, personally.

Thanks for your reply! :)

It's more sad than funny how purity is in the eye of the beholder.

and get carried away on the wind as soon as one realizes that "left" and "right" are an artificial distinction crafted by those in power to further the culture war that exists to distract us from taking power back from these asshats in the first place.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dichotomy

<<you find people espousing personal liberties without regard to others>>

I am a hardcore civil libertarian, and I wonder what exactly you would consider personal liberties "without regard for others".

In general, I believe that an individual's rights are only to be abridged if their actions impose unreasonably against someone else without their consent. Physical abuse or theft would qualify. Saying something out loud that is outside the mainstream or offends a person or group would not. Would that make me one of the extremists to whom you refer?

Symbolic violence is a form of attack on personal liberty.

Is more a reflection on the offending party than the subject.

People can say whatever the hell they want in proving themselves to be fools... that's fine with me.

Society, at that point can become a self-correcting system where maybe we'll all get a bit more polite again in the realization that we ACTUALLY have to live and work together.

Now - actually engaging in constructive dialogue... that's civilized.

i can go with that.

Those whose words have no merit would, in civilized discourse, be shut out of any decision making process.

Any merit behind hateful rhetoric needs be distilled and recognized.

Nice to know that very little merit can be found in derision.

Eventually, the Haters will be marginalized. It will be gradual, but I believe it will happen.

Therefore I stand by my conviction that hate-speech and malignant commentary are ultimately of no consequence.

Now if someone takes exception to such speech and uses it to justify errant or destructive behavior, then the law provides means to deal with that.

Over time - this will be self-correcting.

If society allows the KKK to run rampant, then this is a pre-cursor to violence, a promise of violence.

If society makes sure that free speach is free speach and not a threat of violence, this is a bigot's opinion.

because in my neighborhood that is greeting and not a bigot's opinion.

How would you operationally define "symbolic violence" for legal purposes?

I am not so naive as to think that the government or the courts, particularly of this administration, wouldn't exploit such an abstract notion as symbolic violence in order to protect their own interests.

In any case, I believe that we as critics of bigotry serve as a more powerful deterrant and harbinger of progress than suppression by the establishment.

"Error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it." --Thomas Jefferson: 1st Inaugural, 1801.

"Reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments. To make way for these, free inquiry must be indulged; and how can we wish others to indulge it while we refuse it ourselves?" --Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia Q.XVII, 1782.

Thanks for the post. Thomas Jefferson is my intellectual hero. (minus the cultural mores of his time, of course).

:yourock:

"if ever we are constrained to lift the hatchet against any tribe, we shall never lay down till that tribe is exterminated..." (quoted in Michael Mann The Darkside of Democracies: Explaining Ethnic Cleansing) Still looking for the original source note.

It seems men of reason choose to act on their prejudices, hold slaves, exterminate large grouops of people etc.

Do I think that slurs should be illegal? No, that wasn't the question. The question was whether or not they are not themselve attacks on liberty, which is equally an abstraction as terms such as 'symbolic violence'. How best to deal with them if not in law? Reason, another abstraction, still has yet to prove adequate in dealing with biggots. It seems to me that lingual slurs are a direct attack because they occur face to face in interaction. It can bring shame and anger upon the person attacked, which marks it as violent, and since it uses language, it makes it symbolic. There's a definition. What in that is liberty?

I've had some lengthy discussions here about offending or insulting other people (the confederate flag in particular). I would defend somebody's right to be offensive, even if I'd disagree with their choice or their denial of the reality that they're being offensive.

In general, I think left meets right when some actions harm, or in some cases endanger others when endangerment can reasonably be prevented; and, I think there's an overlap in the prevention and prosecution of real harm. There are some on the left who sometimes look at harsh measures of prevention/prosecution and focus on those as acts of offense or violence, rather than as necessary means of curbing far greater violence... As one example, David Koresh is defended both on the right and on the so-called far left. I'd rather stay very general here to avoid getting off track. I think in general we agree! :hi:

My instructor observed that the political spectrum is not simply linear, as the media trains us to believe, but rather circular. It occurred to me that if Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler, generally regarded as polar opposites, sat down for a chat about politics and avoided economic issues, they may well have found a great deal of common ground.

In my view, the range of ideology is also influenced by the scale of governmental interference, which always concerns me as a progressive libertarian. I hate all authoritarian establishments, whether liberal or conservative.

It's the same shit you get when you talk to a right wing fundy.

it can be a different side of the same coin. :hi:

typical shadow boxing in the narrow american political culture bubble. better questions than posed in this rant had best be asked quite soon by those who claim to be politically astute. time is running out for us all, no political party can salvage this mess. it comes down to radical lifestyle changes, direct action to prevent the holocaust of the biosphere and an awakening of the kind i'm not so sure the somnambulists in the never-never land are ready for. slavishly adhering to any political ideology is humanistic arrogance. as winona laduke says "do not be afraid of the level of change we need to make" and "it's time for us all to stop living the lie that is america."

Plus, I really have no patience for the kind of rants in the OP. Misguided at best and every bit as arrogant as the people she's ranting against.

:shrug:

Pointless indeed.

at least throw one that's enlightening. The throwing alone ("misguided," "arrogant," "pointless") is easy. What did you disagree with? What do you think the terms mean? Do you think there's any truth to the notion that there's hypocrisy hiding behind these terms on DU? No doubt you didn't want to make a post that was pointless, so... :shrug:

Another pointless spew to tell us who care about the direction of the PLANET to "sit down and shut up" again.

It DOES get very tiring!

If anyone wants my vote from now on, they will have to EARN it.

It's all very simple, really.

But some expect us to drink more koolaid and hold our values and beliefs to ourselves as we settly for 3rd and 10th best again - and lose - again.

A prime definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

I am breaking that chain.

especially that "slavishly adhering to any political ideology is humanistic arrogance." No question -- kool-aid of any flavor is still kool-aid.

Your rant defined you as 'reality-based' and 'far-leftists' as kooks who are hurting the cause of...????

Thanks for your intents and efforts to decry label-identity over-simplification but your rant is flawed and better used as a bad example to learn from.

Using the terms of 'left and right' and voodoo words like 'Marxist' and 'socialist' is THE PROBLEM.

How about:

Some people murder for money, some don't. I support those who don't.

YOU suggest Ramsey Clark is a holocaust-denying Hitler-loving wack job.
YOU illustrate the knee-jerk reductionism that inhibits understanding.

I refuse to tiptoe around just because the American people and a lot of politicians are asleep.

More than half of the American people are definitely asleep, and they are the main constituency of our politicians; our politicians get away with their own somnabulence because nobody's waking them up. That's not even at issue here! There's no question that grassroots activism on the left is what we need, hopefully as part of a stronger Democratic party with more focused leadership.

:)

Whoops. My bad

Sometimes my jaw drops open reading posts on DU. Since I hang out in middle-class, surburban circles -- deep in the heart of whitebread America -- I often have no idea what the hell some people are talking about. Indeed, I haven't heard the terms "warmonger", "fascist", or "corporatist" used since college in the '80's -- and hardly ever even back then since I attended St. John University in Queens, hardly a bastion of flaming liberalism and activism.

Having worked in local government for 15+ years, I am extremely cynical about politics and politicians. If I find a politician who has the integrity and guts to try to do what's right, I'm ecstatic. Many people posting on DU are in La-La land when it comes to the practical, ugly reality of politics. They want perfection. These people, in all honesty, bug the hell out of me. I'm still mad about '00 -- I blame the La-La land idealists who voted for Nader for putting Bush in the White House. "Vote fraud" my butt, Nader voters handed Bush the election. These same people, I bet, are the ones who write me back when I post some practical-oriented idea for winning elections and tell me I'm a jerk for even trying: There's always some excuse -- the elections are rigged, the MSM is beholden to corporations, the DLC is evil, etc., etc. etc.

If those on the far left want to spend all their time arguing about political purity, what a "true" Democrat is, and attendent issues, fine. These are good discussions to have. I just wish they wouldn't criticize people who work in the real world of politics so harshly. I've been there and trust me, it's hard to get anything worthwhile done. A little progress, in my mind, is better than none. Working within "the system" is better than standing on the sidelines heckling. Getting Democrats elected is better than letting Republicans get elected. Before criticizing so harshly, they should try running for local office -- it'd be an eye-opener.

P.S. What does DINO stand for anyway??

(DINO = "Democrat In Name Only.") Thanks for your response! :hi:

Whining and heckling is how they affirm their identity and justify their existence. Someday someone's going to right a book about that mindset.

They're always whining, and they're always 'scared', 'terrified', etc...

Their alienation from their own country is so engrained in their beings that to get rid of that security blanket would surely throw them into an asylum.

Welcome anyway, hope you're wearing flame-retardant clothing. Actually, of course, much of the "whining" involves complaints about legitimate issues. For example, Bush is truly ripping us off, the 24/7 news cycle and the consolidation of the news industry makes thoughtful newscasts a thing of the past, etc., etc. etc. The difference between me and them is that I haven't given up yet (probably because I had pretty low standards going in). Give me another ten years, though, and I'll probably be as "alienated from my own country" as them. (If any more nut-jobs like Bush come along it won't matter anyway since the country will be too far down the path to economic ruin and geopolitical chaos for it to be saved.)

the world of "real" politics as is positioned in the miasma of US party politics is an energy sink. I would suggest realpolitik has more to do with food,clothing,shelter,work etc. working within a diseased system to get to a condition of health is madness. of course having a dem in office is better than a rep. but so is my shoe. standing on the sidelines at this juncture is also unacceptable but i feel there are much more direct ways to catalyze change. in fact i know there are from first hand experience. we can do this without politicians. time is running out. massive civil disobedience-community gardens-sharing resources-radical reduction in energy usage. we have to do it all.

Before we get to massive civil disobedience I'd like to take a shot at helping the Democratic Party find its voice and see what we can do about getting better media coverage of critical issues. I'm in favor of community gardens, however: My father-in-law grew tomatoes in his backyard at one point and they were excellent. (Squirrels and rabbits were a continuing problem, however, and would have to be addressed.)

P.S. I don't know how many votes your shoe would garner in the typical local election but I'd bet it has a higher IQ than many politicians I've met.

There are at least a few (maybe more than a few) realists here who recognize that their idealism is idealism and that while philosophy lives and breathes in the realm of idealism, politics lives and breathes in the muddy world of compromise, expediency and realism.

You've been quite creative with your fairy tale analogies and they are apt metaphors as far as you have taken them. However, even three "groups" isn't enough to encompass the diversity here.

I agree that it would be useful to define the terms so that we speak a common language.

P.S.
I'm jealous! I always wanted to be a Sparkly Fairy Princess, Damnit! Instead I just get to be a House Wolf.

P.P.S.
Nice writing, that's for your post, hope it leads to some good discussion.

You're right, I'm only describing a limited issue here. There could be several volumes to capture the full range of diversity on DU, and even then it wouldn't come close -- that's what it's all about! (The irony is how freepers get bent out of shape at being unwelcome here, claiming we're all "in lockstep" -- hah! If they only knew!)

Being Sparkly Fairy Princess isn't all it's cracked up to be. You get to huff and puff and stuff, and all I have is this stupid broken wand. ;)

And then there's the tarnished tiara ......

Considering the number of hours that FR and Right Wing News and others have devoted to searching through our posts, they should know better. This site is almost always a bloodbath. We are decidedly not slow to criticize one another, as this very thread demonstrates.

But don't hold back ...

"We need to get clear on what we mean by the terms “leftist, liberal, socialist, progressive,” even “Democratic”"

Please define these mysterious terms and end the awful confusion
once and for all.

My magic wand isn't that powerful. I'm suggesting we don't agree on what the terms mean -- I wasn't using the "Royal We" when I suggested "We" could get clearer. I'm the Sparkly Fairy Princess Damnit, but I'm not the Damned Queen. Geez.

Sorry. Carry on.

and I'm serious that I think there are terms that are getting cloudy in their meaning, and even usurped as something approaching rightwing radicalism. That concerns me. But I certainly never meant to imply that I have the answers.

If I ever do, I'll be the first to let you know. Right now, I can't even get my tiara to stay on straight.

And we have as many rightwingers on the Democratic side as the GOP, except that ours disguise themselves as pragmatists that parrot the language of Reaganism.

Let me be perfectly clear: the only way to fix this country is to dismantle Conservatism in its entirety, and that means going as far back as reversing everything Ronald Reagan did. We must also break up the media monopolies and return the airways to its lawful owners, the American people. All federal judges that are members of the rightwing Federalist Society must be purged from the judiciary. This is the only way to terminate the grave threat they pose to our liberties. If this sound too radical, well, you cannot treat cancer with aspirin, and Conservatism is a cancer in our nation and must be exterminated.

label proudly.

For twenty years, I've watched Democrats sell out farmers, blue collar workers, the poor, health care, gay people, and human rights; they've let media consolidation and voter fraud occur without a whimper, and Lord knows what else, all in the spirit of "bipartisanship."

Somehow the Republicans never have to compromise with us.

Bipartisanship on measures for the common good: no problem.

Bipartisanship in the sense of playing along with whatever evil scheme the Republicanites dream up: bad

"Bipartisanship" and "compromise" are in themselves neutral terms. There's no particular virtue in being "bipartisan" or "conciliatory." There's no particular harm, either, not unless these are shorthand terms for consistently wimping out when the Republicans say "boo" and not having the guts to stand up for what's right--such as not going to war just because the pResident feels like it.

I'm hoping we get back to the day when the most power Republicans have is to compromise with us. No question about it.

I've always worn the label "far left" proudly, as well.

Perfect timing and quite enjoyable.

Not sure we need to define the terms you listed though - everyone has their own definition and that should be ok. Trying to define just plays into the hands of those on DU who want to divide dems into the good, the bad and the treasonous.

A lot of DU is an "outlier", not mainstream America or mainstream Dem. It brings an interesting and needed perspective, but also tends to be arrogant, self-righteous, and exclusionary. Thankfully, there's lots of dems working on building the party who are perhaps more pragmatic and less shrill.

Once again, thanks Sparkly!

I'm not into definitions for their own sake, and certainly not to divide; I just want to make sure the language is clear so we know what each other means... Kind of like the terms "Christian" and "conservative" don't stand for what they used to; sometimes here I feel like "leftist" doesn't mean what it used to, or even "Democrat."

Maybe it's impossible to decide on any definitions or reach agreement on what those terms mean; I just wanted to say that sometimes the word "left" has become a disguise for all kinds of things around here that I question. That's all.

Thanks for your thoughtful response. :)

What a great post. No way I could have put it those terms, but it's all very clear. You should see about getting that published someplace.

Thanks very much, rockymountaindem. :)

and read them before going to bed at night. The exercise might help us put perspective on the views we hold, what we talk about, the actions we take, and the attitudes that we project during the day in the real world.

(edited to correct typo)

I should have known you would understand these fairy tales! :hi:

"Alices Through the Looking Glass
Here the so-called 'far left' circles itself around so far, down down down through its mirror, that it meets its reflection in unity with the far right. Here you find people linking 'leftist' websites that quote and link extreme rightwing websites; you find people defending Ramsey Clark, a man who'd jump at the chance to defend Hitler and claim the holocaust never happened; you find people espousing personal liberties without regard to others to the point of rightwing libertarianism, and progressing onward to a mad tea party where pacifism meets anarchy and assault weapons are the key to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Murder is anti-war! Violence is peace! Our peace allows stronger people to kill weaker people in their own countries and they all want it that way! Villains are heroes, and heroes are villains! Drink me! Really, I'm a different flavor! Would I lie to you? Drink me!!"

Seriously, that is deep. A perfect portrait of a certain type of 'mad house' liberalism - where you can't ever judge anyone, and America is always evil.

and welcome to DU. What I was getting at is a point where "left" goes so far around the circle one way, and "right" goes so far around the circle the other way, that they actually meet at a point that neither will quite recognize, but both consider Absolute Truth in their own philosophies, and it seems to be a point of blinding light -- up is down, wrong is right -- as they overlap.

The point where left meets right is where I say, that's not left anymore.

And yes, to some that's a point where America is always evil.

I think you could be one, a professional writer.

...and exactly right in every particular. You said precisely what many of us feel, but have been unable to articulate as clearly as you have done here. It belongs on the front page of DU, IMO.

:toast: :beer: :yourock:

'ultra-liberals,' 'radicals,' etc. I'm afraid that you have bought the repuke line. Many of us 'moderate' on most issues, or even, god-forbid, right-of-center on some issues. You could at least find out what the *real* positions of the DNC bashers are, instead of just making up repuke-like strawmen.

Never was my intention.

I've seen Clark excoriated as unfitting to carry any message of justice for his work against the hypocritical NATO war crimes trial against Milosevic, certainly a monstrous leader like the dozens the the US has installed, armed, trained, and tolerated.

So Ramsey Clark is the root of this reductionist rant calling for being 'reality-based'?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1516683

...in which I repeatedly, politely asked for credible, unbiased sources for the allegations two posters were making about Clark. Instead, all I got were misleading articles from real "far left" sites, some of which didn't even contain the allegations being made, and exhortations to use Google (as if the burden of proof was on me, instead of those making the allegations).

I think pointing out that the allegations could not be backed up with credible sources ticked Sparkly off. That was not my intent; I merely wanted something with which to examine Clark and come to a fair conclusion. In my mind, that's a reasonable stance.

:shrug:

(referring to the IOC link of Ramsey criticising the war crimes trial of Milosevic and Saddam)

Check this out folks, because it isn't a defense of Milosevic or Saddam!

>>IT IS AN INDICTMENT OF NATO FOR DOING TO YUGOSLAVIA WHAT BUSH IS DOING TO SADDAM!!<<

Get it? We know the scam of supporting Saddam, weakening him,knocking him off by playing White Hat Rescue Jesus just to take economic control of the region, RIGHT?? RIGHT??!!

And we are NOT Saddam supporters, for gawds sake!!

Read this and you will also get a different view of Wesley Clark for his role. Understand that the Geneva Conventions outlaw destroying civilians and civilian infrastructure, especially with depleted uranium weapons, something we all want to see Bush* in the Hague for, right?.

>snip<

""With this trial," said International Action Center (IAC) representative Bill Doares from Amsterdam, "Washington and its NATO allies hopes to pin the guilt for the 10 years of civil war in the Balkans on the Yugoslav leader. The goal of these big powers is to shift the blame for the war they fomented onto the victims, the Serbian people and all the other peoples of Yugoslavia."

>snip<


"Confused about why the U.S. bombed Yugoslavia? That's because you never heard about the hidden agenda behind the dismemberment of this multiethnic country.

Washington and NATO strategists invoked humanitarian principles to justify their war. But they practiced the divide-and-conquer tactics used by empires since the days of imperial Rome.

Behind the façade of concern for self-determination, they sliced away most of the republics of Yugoslavia, one by one, through economic pressure, political threats and, finally, outright warfare.

This book presents evidence gathered by dozens of nongovernmental hearings in 1999 and 2000 that the NATO countries engaged in a decade-long conspiracy to foment war in Yugoslavia in order to split it up.

Now NATO has military bases all over the Balkans, Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia. They are the Roman legions for Western transnational corporations and Big Oil.

In the 40+ essays presented here, leading anti-war activists and analysts from many countries take up The Hague Tribunal, the occupation of Kosovo, media lies, war crimes and the blatant illegality of NATO aggression. Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark writes on "Blaming the victim."

>snip<

Wars are almost ALWAYS, ALWAYS for economic reasons and Tinoire's citing of the unacceptable treaty NATO offered that demanded 'free-market' economic rape that the IMF, WTO, and White House use to conquer regions seems to be in play here and Ramsey Clark was way ahead of us after seeing it from the inside during the 1960s.

I think Ramsey shows us just what a Trojan Horse Wesley is in the 'Battle of the Clarks.' It took us until recently to realize how much Republican corporateer policy Clinton and other DLC candidates have gotten over on us while we think in terms of Dem or Repub.

This fascist neo-con-type shit has been going on for decades, people!
Read 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' by John Perkins. This goes back to the 1940s and 1950s with the current players and back to the 18th century in American history.

We're being played by a good cop/bad cop routine on each side.
Chomsky is right about how long the American power structure has been consistently pschopathically AMORAL.

It is about power, not ideology. Power protects itself like any other organism in nature. That's why the American government has been genocidal for 200 years, not just all of a sudden!

Read Chomsky's 'Understanding Power' and learn why Ramsey Clark and so many others see the poverty and blood behind the flag every time.

That's a truth even some liberals can't handle. Tough. Disabuse your illusions and join those who aren't invested in fantasy.

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will you stop calling me mean names?

:eyes:

While I don't agree with all the characterizations, and while I find ranting and raving fun on occasion, I'm a moderate at heart. I see reaching out to folks on the other side of the aisle as part of my job.

One of my best friends in town's a Moonie, for example. But he's also one of the most compassionate, charitable, fun folks around, and he tends to be (quite surprisingly) a *moderate* Republican. We've had many fruitful debates aobut politics, particularly in regards to Big Business. I just steer well clear away from Moon and religion in general, and we're fine.

Radical leftism really isn't that different from radical rightism. Though I admit that having grown up with the latter, I'd love to see what the former would be like for a change.

-- ArchTeryx

I'm actually a late bloomer in political activism. Selection 2000 mobilized me into action, and the internet made it easy and even fun. But, that aside, my feelings about "DINO" are more practical than idealistic. It just doesn't seem that the tactics of compromising and kow towing to Repukes, while simultaneously moving twoard the center and away from our base, has worked. Looks to me like the farther center we move the more seats we lose in Congress. If the voting machines don't permanently provide Pukes with electoral fixes, I believe we could end this trend by consistently and loudly addressing and embracing true progressive policies. We need to give our base a real reason, not just ABB, to get off their butts and vote.

like Sharpton -- but don't we have to do this, for unity?

"Our peace allows stronger people to kill weaker people in their own countries and they all want it that way" -- punchy caricature, to be sure, but aside from the "they all want it that way," what's the alternative? We allow this all the time, all over the world. If we oppose the imperialist war in Iraq, we _have_ to be willing to let the strong kill the weak; Hussein was no sweetheart, he did tremendous numbers of executions. I'm sympathetic to your viewpoint here. I don't like the idea of allowing such violence, but it seems to me we have a tradeoff. We can allow evil people do horrible things to their citizens, or we can take on the collective guilt of making war and stopping them. When I was considering the war, before it happened, whether Kerry and W were right about it being justified on the grounds of WMD's, I decided it wasn't . . . but I was wondering about the justification on the grounds of human rights. I decided it wasn't for that reason, too. Sure, Hussein was not nice, but at least it was HIM doing it, not US. When it comes to a tradeoff between the suffering of others and my guilt, I prefer to keep my hands clean. Who wouldn't?

Anyway, maybe they DO want to be in a dictatorship. The Germans did in '37, or whenever it was. Depressing thought.

This site is comprised of two types of people;idealists and pragmatists...


I believe those who have had the most profound impact on our life successfully combined both of them...

who believe in libertarianism "to the point of right-wing libertarians." Not to mention ignorant and sensational.

I used to be a state socialist -- I've been a self-professed Democrat since I was nine years old, and as I've gotten older, read more political science and have had a cruel awakening by meeting "big brother's other brother," namely, right-wing authoritarian statism, I've become decidedly more lax on my left-wing authoritarianism. In fact, though I am a libertarian socialist, and I believe in charity, thrift, minimalism, utilitarianism, egalitarianism, responsible consumerism, unions, the cooperative, the commune, etc., I am also a federalist, and I am in favor of the free market and de-centralized government.

Why?

Two reasons:

1. It is not the elite or the rich that destroy us. We destroy ourselves (with their help and encouragement, however).

and

2. As much as I despise right-wing social institutions, consumerism, imperialistic worldviews, resource grabs, corporate wars, nationalism, jingoism and the hypocritical Mammon churches, unfortunately, what makes them so powerful IS the state -- it always has, and especially now that the patients are running the asylum. The state stabilizes society, protects and encourages concentration of wealth, endorses and promotes patriarchal social institutions, and provides a "psychological distance," where people believe that somewhere the cogs are moving around in their best interest, and they don't have to be responsible for democracy.

To tell you the truth, I believe in freedom of association, free speech, the end of the public school system and the abolishment of federal income taxes. Why? Because I'm heartless? Because I'm not compassionate?

Hell no. I want to get as far away from the freepers and the delusionals as possible and endorse a system of governance that helps us take care of our own lives and our communities on a local and personal level. I want to renounce the "national consciousness," which, in partnership with national branding and television channels, have rendered much of our psychological existence outside of our immediate physical sphere.

It sounds like this is simply a thinly veiled attempt to marginalize those who don't want to swallow the DLC party line. Compromising with the corpo-fascist, theocratic, neoconservative GOP will get us nowhere. They just bite off little chunks of us with their language manipulation, psychological propaganda, logical fallacies, appeals to emotion and pronouncements of absolutism deemed from above by the God of SUVs and Quarter Pounders.

And they'll bite until there's nothing left. One day, they'll convince mainstream democrats that the progressive and leftist movement are unamerican commie trai--

oh, wait.

And I'm happily surprised at how well it was recieved. Most of the replies seem to be positive, and the few that aren't pretty much just prove your point. I think it shows that most people on DU are pretty well balanced, there's just a very loud group of people who aren't.

I try and post as though Freepers are reading every one of them, so I try not to fuel their lyin'fires :D

I sometimes wonder how many DUers are Freepin' moles? Especially the Bush bashers. I mean, we should hate and loathe the man, just his politics? Bashing just makes us all look like haters, not to mention earning the "sour grapes" label?

Again, thanks for your thoughts!

I've only been coming here to read the message boards, and coming from a red state, I have been disappointed with primarily two things on these boards;
1) the intolerance of several non-christian leftists towards ANYONE professing the Christian faith, no matter whether that person is on the christian right, christian middle, or christian left. They seem to have bought what the media wants us to think; christians are only on the right.
and
2) and related, the seemingly total disregard for pragmatism, realism, and yes, compromising, necessary to live in a democracy.

As I look around my red-state voting friends and acquaintances, they are really OK people, working, raising families, etc. They are not Tom Delay, the village idiot in the WH, Newt Gingrich, or Rush Limbaugh. However, they listen to their drivel day after day on Fox news and the other corporate news providers, and they start believing it because its what they hear all day. If they were to get on this message board and read some of the stuff I complain about above, they would never vote for a democrat again.

It will surely attract a lot of flames from the types you described.

or whatever people think of me, this is part of the problem with the Democratic Party as a whole. We are being portrayed as "elitist" by the mainstream media(no abbreviations here), and it simply isn't true. The Democrats used to be the party of ALL of the people and sadly, that is no longer the case. We are all happy that Democratic Underground is gaining prominence in America, but at what cost? Will some of the generalizations that some in here make destroy the Democratic Party? It seems that there are very few like me on these forums, and maybe thats not so bad. But Democratic Underground must be represented by more than the homosexual view, more than the seemingly socialist view, more than the me first view, we need to be inclusive of uneducated folks like me who drive pick up trucks, watch sports, drink beer, have REAL religious beliefs, and don't always agree with the idealistic viewpoints that some espouse in here. Some of the knee jerk stuff in here makes all of us look bad. Yes, we are all human and we all make mistakes, but in my opinion, we are at war, so to speak; a war of idealogical views and we should try and stick together as much as possible. Sparkly, thank you for the post, and all others, thank you for putting up with this rambling.

I love this line:

"Will some of the generalizations that some in here make destroy the Democratic Party?"

DU GENERALIZATIONS DESTROY DEMOCRATIC PARTY

Some might laugh, but unless we become the party of the blue collar
dumb asses, we'll never be Republicans.

but you sound pretty smart to me (ever notice that some highly educated people can't manage their way out of a paper bag? -- a college or graduate degree does NOT equate to intelligence)

I couldn't agree more with what you're saying -- some of the stuff people say on DU makes my hair stand on end. And some (not all, but some) get really obnoxious if you try to disagree, even if you do it in as polite a manner as possible.

Please stay and keep posting on DU -- we need intelligent, articulate people like you on here.

P.S. You call that rambling??? Have you seen some of the posts on here??????

the rest of the guys here at DU who are not quite radical with their thinking. For me radical left is just the same with the radical right. It is just as dangerous as the righteous right people that we have now as our govt. Radical left view their views and opinions as the absolute just what the radical right are espousing. Like many or few of DUers here I believe in God and I am a proud Christian, which frankly is kind of being shunned here at DU. I hope that all factions of the Democratic Party can and will work together for the better of the party and for this fine country U.S.A.

..our "Boston Cream Pie" Democrats?

What about DEMS who LIKE Tennessee Ernie Ford?!?!?!?!