The Terrorists Strike -- Markets Crumble
We had been told since the beginning that the Taliban, Al Qaeda and jihadists in general worked on what was called a "biblical calendar." None of this faster, quicker B.S. They woyuld take their time in restoring the Caliphate.
Fair enough.
But who knew the Weather Underground had that same sort of patience? Just as we had thought they had become an historical footnote, SDS terrorists William Ayers and his gal pal Bernardine Dohrn have struck their mortal blows against the core of our nation.
Doggone it, thanks to Mr. McCain for denouncing this threat in time, though his warning didn't come quite soon enough to ward off the attack. He did the best he could, putting Country First.
In the meantime, we awake this morning only to be stunned by the smoking rubble all around us, the realization that after 35 years of careful planning the terrorists have finally struck:
Wall Street is in ruins and a series of orchestrated detonations sweep the globe.
Devastation spreads into the heartland.
Europe buckles.
The good news is that Senator McCain and Governor Palin are on the case! Rooting out and ruthlessly exposing the terrorists! And remember, John McCain knows how to win wars.
We shall prevail.
October 6th, 2008 at 11:12 am
OH man! Turn on C Span. Its 2;15 ish EST.
Oversight Hearing proceedings. Watch, Fuld, Lehman CEO squirm.
This will be on again tonight 8 pm.
Funny, only Democrats are doing the grilling.
Of course, too fucking late.
It was known this chicanery was going on for years.
But get out the popcorn. This is really “reality tv”. Or maybe SUR real ity TV.
October 6th, 2008 at 11:17 am
NON OF THIS IS DUE TO REAGANOMICS. Nope, don’t blame neoliberalism.
BLAME WILLIAM AYERS!!!
This is all his and his crazy sects fault.
October 6th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Fine, take up for attempted murder.
October 6th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Marc, surely you meant to call them “Weatherman terrorists,” not “SDS terrorists.”
October 6th, 2008 at 12:53 pm
Hey, don’t forget the war against earmarks–that pernicious practice that consumes such a huge portion of the budget. Getting the right perspective matters, and McCain is nailing that one. If we had that $18 billion back we could make a nasty dent in the $11 trillion national debt.
October 6th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Carl Oglesby’s recent, wry, droll, sane account of SDS and its subsequent meltdown ‘Ravens in the Storm’, casts a pretty damning shadow on psycho bitch Dohrn and Ayers.
Ayers daddy a utilites company CEO with connections that Dohrn rehabilitated VERY FAST.
SDS was so infiltrated at one time it was like 4 agent provocateurs to 1 genuine member at one meeting.
Oglesby makes a very, careful, subtle case for the violent split off to the Weathermen as quite possibly being the work of the FBI task force designated to destroy the left. Its ALLLLLLLLL documented and OUT under the FOIA.
I find Dohrn and Ayers very suspect. If one looks at the real leaders of the left and SDS these guys didn’t go insane and become bomb making proxies for Hoover and Nixon.
I think the history of the 60’s left, if anything, shows that those who actually gave a shit were exceptionally bright, passionate and well meaning and then, if anything, disillusioned middle class nin com poops who became neo cons in some cases.
Oglesby’s book is fascinating. Especially for his remembered exchanges with Dohrn. Makes Orwell look like Tweety Bird.
I would bet my cat D and A were agent provocateurs and continued teaching and community work only keeps them in a progressive loop. Her just so sudden rehab after all was said and done and their both being from upper middle class families too gag making.
October 6th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
oops meant to say Ayers’ daddie’s connections allowed for Dohrn to be rehabbed just a wee too fast.
October 6th, 2008 at 2:12 pm
Oglesby is in denial if he thinks Weatherman was the product of the FBI. Of course they exploited it, but the craziness came from within. Oglesby was a sharp guy - terrific speaker and writer in the context of his time - but I would take anyone’s memoirs from those days with a grain of salt. There’s invariably a little too much patting oneself on the back for opposing the war and way too little analysis of how badly the hard core of the movement tanked in developing a coherent political strategy. Of course, a lot of that was about being very young. No way were Dohrn and Ayers “agents” of anything other than upper & upper-middle class narcissism run amok in a very turbulent time. It’s hard to explain to anyone who didn’t live through it what those years felt like from, say, 1963 and the epic - and uplifiting - events of the Civil Rights movement through the JFK assassination, the murder of Malcolm X escalation of the Vietnam war, the draft catalysing student’s, Watts, Detroit, the rise of Black Power, ‘68 - MLK & RFK murdered - Nixon’s rise, etc. A crazy time and a lot of folks, understandably although not laudably, went crazy. Unfortunately, the internal pathologies of the left, their exploitation by the right and the breaking of a coherent link to future effective progressive politics was as definitive as during the McCarthy era.
October 6th, 2008 at 2:25 pm
Ayers dad did what daddies do. Tom Ayers was a very well-intentioned, philanthropic member of the Chicago ruling circles who no doubt saw these kids as well-meaning if misguided and wanted to help them overcome their “missteps.” I’ve met a couple of the other Ayers brothers and it’s obvious they come from a very nice family - and I don’t meant that ironically - so it’s easy to imagine their dad pulling strings to bring the stray sheep back into the fold.
October 6th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
The secret of undermining capitalism is obtaining a critical mass of blown up bathrooms. I thought everyone knew that.
October 6th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Regis Debray bears responsibility for all that…
On current capitalist crisis….Its built into the system…this goes beyond regulations or deregulation. Capitalism must be superseded - and if the Left doesn’t get its act together - at the very least to push Obama into sweeping reforms and nationalizations - then the right will rise, like they did in Germany, Italy and other nations that expereined crisis.
October 6th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
That Rolling Stone article reg linked to is well worth the read. Should maybe put the comments about a former Senator from Georgia into some perspective. But it won’t.
October 6th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
A couple of things to all…
From yesterday, and all the advice regarding Woody, heard it, will do it….thanks much!
About Ayers no need to comment as you all said most and in fact I am so old I was in my 20’s when it all happened, and what a decade it was overall!…loved it! Civil Rights Movement, the Womens Movement, Black Panthers and so much more………
For this moment today,- I leave you with this –
Did any of you see the Obama 13 minute Doc on the - “Keating 5″ - today on You Tube?…brillant, if not go — see it, it is a MUST see!
Now waiting for tomorrow cause ya know the old man from the “crypt” is taking his gloves off and coming out swinging…..my stars can life in terms of politics get any more absurd?
Have a good evening, all of you…..
October 6th, 2008 at 3:33 pm
# jcummings Says:
October 6th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
On current capitalist crisis….Its built into the system…this goes beyond regulations or deregulation. Capitalism must be superseded - and if the Left doesn’t get its act together - at the very least to push Obama into sweeping reforms and nationalizations - then the right will rise, like they did in Germany, Italy and other nations that expereined crisis.
Ya, you betcha. Ditto from me. I have been saying that all along. said Obama’s proving he’s a hot air baloon by not seizing the historical moment despite its being handed him on a silver platter and his getting in and being a big zero will pave the way for a RIGHT wanker to save the day like Hitler did. Its a classic set up waiting to happen.
My theory is that its almost better for FIbber Magee and Molly to get in to keep the progressives and population in general galvanized and with the Dems in control of the house there is a much better chance of grass roots reorganizing and a sustainable paradigm shift occuring.
Obama will betray all…there will be polarization, bickering amongst the left and progressives and a nice jingoistic sound byte swinging borg will arise and thats that.
In fact…if those of us who really want to see a sustainable shift occur the most revolutionary guerrilla tactic we could employ would be to convince enough people to vote in Mc Cain to make sure the inevitable betrayal by Obama doesnt occur.
I have just put up my force field cause i know I will be bombarded.
Reg, I appreciate your view on the 60’s. I was there. I understand a lot of people went cuckoo. But the highly educated ones who became leaders did accomplish a lot and stayed the course did not advocate violence and the crazed shit that came out of Ayers and Dohrn’s mouths.
Sorry, but I think they stink. They were like the character in Dr Zhivago who became utterly inhuman.
Of course, there are always personalities like that in every movement. At heart little Nietzschean psychos.
October 6th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Transistion Town
http://commongroundmag.com/2008/10/pinchbeck0810.html
This is the way to go
October 6th, 2008 at 3:49 pm
http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/bullet142.html
October 6th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
Here’s the keating/McCain link again
http://www.keatingeconomics.com/
October 6th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
I’m sure reg’s link is far more educational than the link I posted by the editor of the Socialist Register and one of the most important political economists in the world. For those interested, the Socialist Project’s “bullets” are fantastic reports and are well worth following during this crisis and beyond.
But let’s just pretend that Obama will make a differencce! Hooray!!!
October 6th, 2008 at 4:01 pm
No, you’re right. Let’s pretend that socialist academics will make a difference.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
We have quite a bit of influence up here.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:09 pm
So is Obama gonna even do minor stopgap Keynesian measures to make America more equitable? i doubt it. But if he does I’ll cheer. But reg, I doubt you even read what I posted. Its people like you who aren’t lighting a fire under the ass of the candidate that you admirably built up who will be responsible if Obama is another triangulator. Capitalism is in crisis, and you prefer to fantasize.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:11 pm
And your incessant use of “academic” perjoratively is precisely the type of bullshit used against Obama. What the hell is wrong with “socialist academics”?
October 6th, 2008 at 4:11 pm
Jcummings says:
But let’s just pretend that Obama will make a differencce! Hooray!!!
Oy. To me, this is the same sort of jaw dropping gushing gibber the women at the RNC uttered after Palin spoke.
JC…not attacking you, per say. Your remark was just handy to make a point with.
I just don’t get it.
THIS ISN’T FEEL GOOD TIME FOR FUCK’S SAKE.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
Obama will make a difference.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Elisabeth Hasselback, who might be Woody, lays the smack down on Obama.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
OK
Lets see where it all is say 6 months from now.
Meet ya “here”. If here is still up and running providing the server hasn’t gone bust and Marc isn’t reduced to scratching broadsides on chicken parchment and pasting them up on all the windows of the foreclosed businesses in his neighborhood.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:19 pm
Anna that was precisely my point - to poke fun at those who actually think even a very progressive president - which Obama would not be - could make a difference at this point. Capitalism is doomed, and it is up to intelligent people to replace it with something better, lest we experience what Germans experienced wehn their markets crashed.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
“Mein Furher I can valk!”
October 6th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
“The scale of the crisis and the popular outrage today provide a historic opening for the renewal of the kind of radical politics that advances a systemic alternative to capitalism. It would be a tragedy if a far more ambitious goal than making financial capital more prudent did not now come back on the agenda. In terms of immediate reforms and the mobilizations needed to win them – and given that we are in a situation when public debt is the only safe debt – this should start with demands for vast programs to provide for collective services and infrastructures that not only compensate for those that have atrophied but meet new definitions of basic human needs and come to terms with today’s ecological challenges.
Such reforms would soon come up against the limits posed by the reproduction of capitalism. This is why it is so important to raise not merely the regulation of finance but the transformation and democratization of the whole financial system. This would have to involve not only capital controls in relation to international finance but also controls over domestic investment, since the point of taking control over finance is to transform the uses to which it is now put. And it would also require much more than this in terms of the democratization of both the broader economy and the state. It is highly significant that the last time the nationalization of the financial system was seriously raised, at least in the advanced capitalist countries, was in response to the 1970s crisis by those elements on the left who recognized that the only way to overcome the contradictions of the Keynesian welfare state in a positive manner was to take the financial system into public control.[32] Their proposals were derided as Neanderthal not only by neoliberals but also by social democrats and post-modernists.
We are still paying for their defeat. It is now necessary to build on their proposals and make them relevant in the current conjuncture. Of course, without rebuilding popular class forces through new movements and parties this will fall on empty ground. But crucial to this rebuilding is to get people to think ambitiously again. However deep the crisis and however widespread the outrage, this will require hard and committed work by a great many activists. The type of facile analysis that focuses on ‘it’s all over’ – whether in terms of the end of neoliberalism, the decline of the American empire, or even the next great crisis of capitalism – is not much use here insofar as it is offered without any clear socialist strategic implications. It ain’t over till it’s made over.”
October 6th, 2008 at 4:35 pm
Brother, can you spare a tract ?
October 6th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
To reduce all this to a tract indicates that reg’s financially well off or completely deluded, since he doesn’t realize what is at stake.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
Sooner or later people are going to figure out that if all you run is negative attack ads you don’t have much of a vision for the future, or you’re not ready to articulate it. John McCain, 2000.
October 6th, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Palin: “Women that don’t support me are going to hell.” Paraphrasing a misquote (and out-of-context quote) of Madeleine Albright by Sarah Palin.
October 6th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
Don’t go to hell. Support this woman.
October 6th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
This is completely off-topic but it’s something I’ve been curious about for a while. How old are you people? Or if it makes you feel better, “How young?”
I mean absolutely no disrespect here, it has just always been something that keeps popping up for me - not just on this site - but others. I know many of you are quite happy with the anonymity provided by this type of forum - I think that’s one of the reasons I’ve been so curious - trying to break through the cyber-fog or something…
I’ll start. I’m 42.
Obviously there’s no way to verify what any of you say, but it would be interesting to really see what generation - for the most part - is having this conversation on Marc’s blog.
October 6th, 2008 at 5:15 pm
57
October 6th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
BTW Colin, you’re within 2 years of my youngest brother.
October 6th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
“We have quite a bit of influence up here”
Right, that’s why Canada is about to reelect another Harper government, with the only question being whether it will be a a majority or minority one. And that’s why Jcummings social democratic NDP has for the past several decades been ridding itself of the radical socialist policies enunciated by it’s founders, Tommy Douglass and others, all the while consistently moving to the center in an attempt to replace the federal liberals, as explained by a very brillliant a devastating article authored by James Laxer. What annoys me about comrade cummings point is that it’s dishonest and overstates the strength of the left. Cummings and I would both call ourselves leftists and, I think that we agree that it’s important to keep alive a radical critique of society. I don’t dismiss Leo Panitch or Doug Henwood, the smartest economist alive, but I don’t believe that the radical left (I prefer to use the term leftists, as the “left” doesn’t really exist in any organized form in north american) accounts for any more than a tiny minuscule per cent of society, which at this historical juncture has absolutely no pull. We are used mostly as rhetorical foil for others. Jcummings is a good guy but I wonder why he has to resort to bizarre and weird forms of bragging such as saying that “we have alot of pull here” or that he regularly shares a room with the most important political economists on the planet
October 6th, 2008 at 6:22 pm
i just want to add something semi-interesting about Carl Oglesby cited above. He was, during the primaries, a Hillary supporter. He had some contact with her when she was a student and somehow that translated into a belief that she was the progressive who might fulfill some minimal program left over from the “participatory democracy” days. Similiarly, Tom Hayden had to be talked into supporting Obama by his son. There’s some sort of weird generational cluelessness in those anecdotes. It’s like they don’t want to let go of the old sixties bones and recognize that we’ve moved on.
October 6th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Mein gott. Its already started. Left wing hair splitting.
CAN YOU STOP.
NO ONE GIVES A SHIT.
Left, right or up your ass. Capitalism has tanked. Get over yourselves.
Its an epochal shift. Try thinking outside these tired boxes.
The operative word here is SUSTAINABILITY.
God. I cannot believe people still are arguing this shit.
Ahmed. Not personal attack on you.
Just gobsmacked anyone can go on with these fingernail on blackboard screeching arguments.
You wanna talk economists? The only guy or theory that will be left standing is Schumacher’s Buddhist Economics.
Extrapolations of all his work have already been integrated into most all the sustainability briefs.
Calling oneself a “leftist” is, in my view, like totally retro. Atavistic.
ITS CHANGE OR DIE TIME, BOYS.
October 6th, 2008 at 6:30 pm
Colin - almost exactly the same age as…Bill Clinton ! But not as stuck in the past…
October 6th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
Canada is an infinitely more civilized society than the United States, by virtue of having a strong left and labour movement. I know James’s work well and we move in similar circles though I don’t know him - and he and I differ on this issue, there is a split on the Canadian Left as to whether to support the NDP - but James and his comrades in the oldschool left actually want to support the Liberals. I mean this argument is like the party that still has the most militant ridings associations in Canada and has done wonders in many parts of teh country doesn’t desrve support precisely at a moment when, as the public wants it, they can move Left. As well, labour has far more influence in Canadian industrial policy than even in many EU countries.
The Left are a majority of the voting publci in Canada, the labour movement, the entire working class, since there are vital civil society movements that articulate a message of soidarity that is shared as second nature by the broad majority of Canadians in urban areas. We grew up reading Manufacturing Consent and The Communist Manifesto in our public high schools.
Left wing elements of the NDP run most of the urban labour organizations in Canada and many municipilies.
This is not to say at all that Canada is not a neoliberal capitalist country. But we sure as hell ain’t the US, and we sure as hell don’t have a gun culture, a crass culture and a reactionary right - we have a corporate right but no reactionary right of any real power. We are more cultured and bettereducated. There I sais it. We are more progressive, in every way imaginable, than Americans outside of the Northeast and West Coasts - though I don’t blame the opressed Americans for their manipulated conciousness.
Canada’s Harper government - as much as I despise it is well to the left of Obama.
October 6th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
I want the radical critique of society to die, because I want a society that doesn’t need one. The proletariat, we should remember, by its very existence articulates its determinate negation.
October 6th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
If you don’t get off your ass and organize, Anna, that change will come from the McVeigh crowd.
October 6th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
“Similiarly, Tom Hayden had to be talked into supporting Obama by his son. There’s some sort of weird generational cluelessness in those anecdotes. It’s like they don’t want to let go of the old sixties bones and recognize that we’ve moved on.”
Yes, Reg, I’ve noticed, too, that the campaign long ago attained a kind of stock conversion narrative recycled by people like Hayden and Barbara Ehrenreich:the middle-agers having paid little attention to Obama early on, but having been won over by the enthusiasm and energy of their adolescent or twenty-something daughters or sons. I don’t mean to dismiss young people’s role in politics but as Adolph Reed put it, many of them don’t understand the difference between a political movement and a protest march, chat room or ad campaign. They haven’t seen the Dems run a slightly different version of the same candidate and campaign every year, with the same results. Also, many middle class Obama youth enthusiasts, probably believe that the world began when they started paying attention. I’m not saying that it’s wrong to support Obama, but this fetishization of youth that you and the Obama campaign evoke is more than a little flaky, n’est pas?
October 6th, 2008 at 6:53 pm
“and he and I differ on this issue, there is a split on the Canadian Left as to whether to support the NDP - but James and his comrades in the oldschool left actually want to support the Liberals.”
Bullshit. Sorry Cummings but you’re either willfully distorting the record or you’re speaking out of your ass. Here’s Laxer, the supposed supporter of the Liberals in This magazine
“I haven’t given up hope about Jack Layton in all this. Whatever his shortcomings, Layton is by far the most accomplished leader in federal politics today, with a program that makes far more sense for Canadians than the alternatives. Admittedly, the competition is not impressive. Stephen Harper represents all that is reactionary; Stephane Dion has squandered his reputation for being a man of principle; Gilles Duceppe has dispensed with progressive ideas and has taken to inciting suspicion of immigrants, the hallmark of old-style ethnic nationalism; and Elizabeth May rides a wave of sentiment in search of a party. Layton’s political activism over many years before he became NDP leader shows that he understands, or once understood, the importance of social movements and the way movement politics is needed alongside electoral politics. An upheaval could do him good, but don’t count on him to start it. That’s up to the rest of us.
At 75, the social democrats are worth rehabilitating. Young movement activists, who have been inclined to give all political parties a wide berth, should take a hard look at the NDP. While youthful activists have placed issues on the agenda and have had an undeniable political impact, their proclivity for avoiding party politics has kept them at the margins.
They should consider joining the NDP en masse, respecting its traditions, but insisting on making it their party. The leadership of the party won’t like it. What else is new?”
October 6th, 2008 at 7:01 pm
“Canada’s Harper government - as much as I despise it is well to the left of Obama.”
More nonsense from Cummings, who I still consider to be a nice guy, even if his credibility is plumetting. The idea that the Harper government, a government made up of Alberta oil men, neo cons who argued that Canada while in opposition that Canada should be in Iraq, who sanctioned the torture of Canadian citizens in Guatanamo Bay, who blocked calls for a ceasefire during ISRAELS WAR on Lebanon and who are currently campaigning on a platform of US style “criminal justice” are somehow to the left of Obama is absurd. Sure Canada has a much stronger social democratic traditions, more ingrained idea of the commons and socialised medecine, which suggests that objective conditions from which progressives operate in the US and Canada are differrent. But to suggests that Harper is to the left of Obama is grossly absurd, even if BHO is IMHO not much different than a democrat centrist. I think that Cummings canadian nationalism blurs his conception of reality
October 6th, 2008 at 7:08 pm
“This is not to say at all that Canada is not a neoliberal capitalist country. But we sure as hell ain’t the US, and we sure as hell don’t have a gun culture, a crass culture and a reactionary right - we have a corporate right but no reactionary right of any real power. We are more cultured and bettereducated. There I sais it. We are more progressive, in every way imaginable, than Americans outside of the Northeast and West Coasts - though I don’t blame the opressed Americans for their manipulated conciousness.”
Over the top condenscension coming from a man of the people…
October 6th, 2008 at 7:08 pm
I’m not a Canadian nationalist except as defined against the alternative. Yes, Harper did all of those things…but on cultural and economic policy, the Canadian tories are well to the left of the Democrats. Regulation and socialized health care are too popular for them to get rid of. And the Liberals were the ones who first let Canucks go to Gitmo. And Laxer - who I respect - has suggested tactical voting for the Liberals. I will find the source. And in terms of remaking the party, my friends and I are doing that.
October 6th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
It is not all condescending to believe that consent is manufactured.
October 6th, 2008 at 7:13 pm
(Tactical as in ridings (parliamentary district) that Harper’s crowd may win - so in my reading the NDP riding association is incredibly underfunded and barebones because a lot of the Left fundraisersare letting the libs win as opposed to helping build an NDP. Despite that, we have a good local organization that is building strong links with the South Asian community the new backbone of the Canadian urban left.
October 6th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
“Canada’s Harper government - as much as I despise it is well to the left of Obama”
You better not tell that to Jack Layton and the “New Democrats”, who sent their leader to Denver to hang out with Tom Daschle, and are constantly evoking Obama’s “energy” and “vigour” as inspiration for their campaign. While you’re at it try not to tell all those YNDP types that Obama is to the right of Harper, as the latter is their sworn enemy, while the former adorns their facebook profile pictures. And laxer, who goes back to the New Left and the wobblies (who were booted from the NDP) doesn’t support the Liberals as I clearly illustrated. He is mad as hell that the NDP killed a Liberal government at the exact tme when they were going to pass the Kelowna accord and advance a program of Universal childcare. Not onoy that but they spent the campaigned that followed oppotunistically targetting Liberals (including making a big show of the sponsorship scandal) while saying almost nothing against the rwactionary right and Harper. You can disagree but alot of progrs in canada share this position, it has nothing to do with “supporting the liberals”. Man, read the damn article http://www.jameslaxer.com/2008/07/ndp-in-need-of-rehabilitation.html
October 6th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
“this fetishization of youth that you and the Obama campaign evoke is more than a little flaky, n’est pas?”
I don’t fetishize anything about the Obama campaign - I “love” the guy but I haven’t fallen in love in the sense that I’m fully prepared for the disappointment. It’s a pragmatic thing, totally. But do you really believe that engagement is “flaky” ? Frankly, the engagement of the Obama kids isn’t nearly as flaky as an awful lot of the ’60s youth left. That was pathological. I thought Irving Howe was a ridiculous character in 1965. Not that Howe had the answers, but he was less ridiculous than I was at the time. Maybe less relevant to the moment, but certainly not more ridiculous.
October 6th, 2008 at 7:28 pm
Hayden and Oglesby are, to put it bluntly, post-menopausal.
October 6th, 2008 at 7:39 pm
Hayden and Oglesby may or may not have come to the right opinion about the Obama campaign–actually I should say that the “progressives for Obama” blog led by hayden and other similar initiatives have had next to no impact on shifting Obama’s politics during the campaign, but let’s leave that for now–but the fact that Reg frames the issue as those who agree with him are mature and beyond male menopause while those who disagree are relics of the past, is annoying. As for being a relic of the past ot lost in “the sixties” whatever thast means, it’s ironic that one of reg’s favorite writers who authoured an awful book on patriotism, todd gitlin, cn’t complete a sentence without evoking his decades old presidency with the SDS and has made a career of reliving now age old arguments about the anti war movement. He exemplifies male menopause. Man, I like reg and cummings but they sure annoy me in their own distinctive way
October 6th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Its the Waffle who was booted from the NDP. The Wobblies, as far as I know, eschew party politics.
I know the crowd of whom you speak - keeners who wnat Jack to be their Obama. I can’t stand Jack Layton. But there are a lot of good people in the NDP esp. on the municipal and provincial levels that Laxer omits from his analysis. I agree with him 99 percent of issues - but his portrayal of the NDP helping to bring down the government that sent Khadr to Gitmo and didn’t protect Maher Arrar certainly omits some central issues, including that the party was supported by most of the Left in doing so, but not Laxer or some others who I respect.
But that we’re even having this discussion puts the lie to that there is “no left” in Canada. If there’s No Left how come the Chomsky and Verso books are on the front table of every bookstore? If there’s no left, then why is protest and labour movement participation a simple parto f life that every Canadian experiences as part of his life in general, normatively, not as “dissent”?
I’m impressed with your knowledge of Canadian politics and wish I could say the same thing about South Africa. Whats the deal there now? What class forces are behind the new conjuncture?
October 6th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
Do any Americans even know we have an election next week up here? The campaign was all of 6 weeks.
October 6th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
reg: “It’s like they don’t want to let go of the old sixties bones”
Testify.
October 6th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
32
October 6th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
JCummings, my man, as you can probably tell I’ve spent some time in Canada, mostly toronto and vancouver, and I genuinely like the place. I’ve also got alot of friends there. My point wasn’t that there no space for the kind of politics we both seem to be engaged in, it was that you have a way of grossly overstating your case, whikle evoking a kind of self congradulation, which is not that helpful
October 6th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Fair enough.
Bombast seems to run with the territory - I started out merely trying to remind reg of how deluded it is to think Obama can make a tangible difference in regards to the onset of capitalist crisis. Truth be told, I don’t really think I can either at this point. Who knows?
October 6th, 2008 at 8:07 pm
Todd Gitlin isn’t “one of my favorite authors.” But he’s got the Sixties more right than Hayden or Oglesby. I’m not sure if his book referenced on patriotism is the one with essays on Mills, Howe and Reisman, but we could do a lot worse than have someone of C. Wright Mill’s caliber - or even Howe or early Reisman - writing currently. Gitlin, unfortunately, isn’t up to the task. Mills was, IMHO, a model for an “oppositional” public intellectual. These guys - as social and cultural critics - were head and shoulders above glib, shoot-from-the-hip, cloying characters like Cornel West or Michael Eric Dyson (Dyson is, again “IMHO”, a buffoon.)
October 6th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
Well, we both tend to have a profound respect for C Wright Mills, “The Power Elite” remains, for me, a valuable social critique, and I’m probably offending by Eric Dyson’s posing as politics, cultural commentary stuff, and Cornel’s vagueness in the same way you are. That said Dyson has written a very nice response to the Cosby, and the underclass ideology his initial rant was predicated on. If I’m not mistaken it’s one of reg’s favorite reads
October 6th, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Btw, I meant the Waffle not Wobblies
October 6th, 2008 at 8:32 pm
The best thing I’ve read on Cosby to date was Ta-Nehisi Coates’ piece in The Atlantic.
October 6th, 2008 at 8:34 pm
Russell Jacoby wrote a much better book than Gitlins on the old-school “public intellectuals.” Can’t remember the name of it right now, but I like Jacoby very much.
October 6th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
“The Last Intellectuals” - scathing on the post-modernist bullshit.
October 6th, 2008 at 8:40 pm
What are you organizing, reg?
I have been talking to chairman of county commissioners; Dem candidate for state representative; challenging the candidate for house of rep on her stance on universal health care, did volunteer work for Move On, doing recon on all that will be involved in order to perhaps be able to set a precedent in my local area on an environmental issue. Change ONE thing in my backyard.
Once the election is over I will be starting a petition gathering campaign with the aid of local chapters of major environmental groups.
If something disgusting happens–which it frequently does in the state in which I am a relatively new resident–I call the Gov’s office, my state senator, rep etc etc. Dept of Ed; County Sherriff’s office–whatever bureaucratic body has oversight.
And…I recently got Kucinich on Maddow. How? I picked up the phone and called NBC.
I spent months a few years ago telefunding for every goddam progressive advocacy group including the fucking DNC to whom I wouldn’t give my cat’s spit up. But I was able to form a convincing argument to furious Democrats all over the country, in 2005, to continue to support the Democratic party BUT to call the DNC and demand they grow the balls everyone was whining about their lack of. I tried to remind all the liberal whiners that THEY ARE THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY. I called the DNC–spoke to Dean flunkies.
Reg…McVeigh is so last decade. Bombs are like soooooooo OTT. We live in a country where people take a Sarah Palin seriously.
Organize? who. Liberals? Have you been reading this comments section? Have you convinced anyone that McCain and Palin are off the map?
They sent Jung to try and talk to Hitler. He said fahgettabowit.
This is Nazi Germany in 30’s time. Its here. Its been here for years.
But this current meltdown will be the collective ball breaker. look at how Obama is leading now since people realized their lives are in jeopardy. Republicans are grabbing at Democratic straws.
The organizing will be organic. It will have to be. Real change cant be imposed. Americans will eventually be forced to find their inner common sense. But it will have to get real ugly first.
October 6th, 2008 at 8:48 pm
I’m with reg on Jacoby.
I have to say I’m more optimistic - despite my doomsaying - than Anna, about it getting ugly. Modern fascism will come with a smiling face and a credit card. People are oppressed by their flat screens and obesity and easy credit.
October 6th, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Mills I dig too. Dissent was great until the mid 60s.
October 6th, 2008 at 9:12 pm
To be fair, although I although I profoundly diagree with alterman and gitlin wher they argue that the radicalism and excess of the sixties gave us Nixon, and while I think that Paul Buhle historiography of the new left is far more valuable, I should say that “Days of Hope Years of Hope, Days of Rage” is a must read
October 6th, 2008 at 9:25 pm
reg - I think you were looking for Gitlin’s book the Intellectuals and the Flag. That’s where he talks about Mills, et. al.
cummings - Your relentlessly sneer at and patronize people from the US. I think in this thread you’ve charged your fine southern friends with being stupid, fat, deluded, uninformed, and uncivilized.
Then you top it of with a nice helping of your endless preening peacock routine. All of it very becoming, and I’m sure I’m not alone in finding it extremely persuasive too. Keep up the good fight, comrade!
October 6th, 2008 at 10:00 pm
Yep, just talk.
October 6th, 2008 at 10:14 pm
I actually like cranky, lefty Sergio as well even if his focus (all reg, all the time) is rather narrow. I am reminded today why i am a very irregular commentator, it’s too easy to get pulled into here
October 6th, 2008 at 10:18 pm
Interesting discussion. Love to hear about projects and ideas people get fired up about…
I just got done watching the BBC’s Planet Earth series. Last disc had environmentalists trying to tackle the problem of climate change and the endangerment of so many species from the economic side of the equation. In light of the recent global financial contractions/corrections, one should be excused to think that the notion of transforming from growth economics to a “sustainable retreat” perhaps has a moment — albeit unintended.
—
But, as some other peacock-dude with a goatee once quipped, ‘What is to be done?’ Hmmm. 4 weeks left to impact the US elections. I’ll confess, I’m mostly consumed by sending Obama into the White House with as much help as possible. Thinking and trying to act down ticket. Give him a huge majority. Look how desperate Rep Kollenberg (MI-R) has become, he’s calling out BullWINkle
http://tinyurl.com/4ec3vp
Feel a need to adopt a Democrat? Gary Peters could really use your help. Just saying.
October 6th, 2008 at 10:44 pm
Just dawning on you, is it, Ahmed? Welcome to my world. Thanks for the ages, those that participated. Anyone else?
October 6th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
Allow me to settle this dispute with a simple slogan:
“Canada for the Canadians!”
(I spent 20 years in Vancouver one weekend)
October 6th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
P.S. A little known fact: My father was born in Canada (Toronto). Seems like his old man had tb and couldnt get past Ellis Island on the way on from Czarist Russia. Right after my father was born in 1917 the whole family snuck across the border and was legalized by some sort of FDR era amnesty.
October 7th, 2008 at 6:11 am
“his focus (all reg, all the time) is rather narrow”
Not really fair. He also does that sycophant thing with Marc.
As for Gitlin, I credit his analysis in part because he’s not treating it as a memoir but as history. Obviously he’s got a dog in the mix, but his approach is more serious than most of the other stuff.
October 7th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
Rob, regarding the series that you watched: ‘Earth: The Climate Wars’ - More Bias from the BBC and BBC Bias Part 2 - ‘Earth:The Climate Wars’ Programme 3 - A Viewer’s View
October 7th, 2008 at 3:37 pm
“Canada for the Canadians!”
(I spent 20 years in Vancouver one weekend)
On one hand we have JCummings the idealistic if not somewhat deluded Canadian natiionalist and on the other we have Marc Cooper, the ugly American. Coops, I’m guessing that you went to Vancouver some time back. It’s one of the most beautiful cities in the world, and I can almost gurantee if you came back that you’d enjoy it
October 7th, 2008 at 4:35 pm
Gotta go with Ahmed here. If I had the means to spend the summer in one place every year, I believe it would be Vancouver.
October 9th, 2008 at 9:37 am
Vancouver is suffering the neoliberalization of Canadian cities…more junkies than any city in Canada and shrinking social services.
October 9th, 2008 at 1:29 pm
You’re referring specifically to the Downtown Eastside in Vancouver which has suffrred decades of policies which crimanilised both poverty and mental illness. I read somewhere that the DTES is the poorest area code in Canada and has the highest concertration of users anywhere on the North American planet, I don’t care too much for the term “junkie” as uterred by comrade cummings, as it belongs mostly in Stephen Harpers lexicon. For a very humane, socio, political critique of our societies gross misunderstadning of addiction, I’d strongly reccomend people read Gabor Mate’s “In the realm of the hungry Ghost” as the context is his long time work as a doctor in the DTES of vancouver