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If I Had My Way |
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Friday, February 13, 2009 previous post <> next post The Other Side of the Coin - XII Glenn Greenwald, today, posted, "Obama and liberals: a counter productive relationship" where he quoted The New Republic's John Judis: But I think the main reason that Obama is having trouble is that there is not a popular left movement that is agitating for him to go well beyond where he would even ideally like to go. Sure, there are leftwing intellectuals like Paul Krugman who are beating the drums for nationalizing the banks and for a $1 trillion-plus stimulus. But I am not referring to intellectuals, but to movements that stir up trouble among voters and get people really angry. Instead, what exists of a popular left is either incapable of action or in Obama's pocket. Following is a quote from my previous post, number XI, dated Sunday, February 8, 2009. The real problem is that it is all talk -- and Moyers, Greenwald, and Rosen are no better than the people they talk about -- it is just more talk. There is no mechanism for converting the talk to political action -- and without political action there will be no changes. Judis states "that there is not a popular left movement" and I state that "there is no mechanism for converting talk to political action". Restated -- Of course there is no popular left movement, because there is no mechanism for converting talk to political action -- makes sense, right?? In other words, it takes intellectuals like Paul Krugman (and Glenn Greenwald), beating drums, to start movements to stir up trouble among voters -- and it takes a lot of work to start a movement (in addition to talk) -- it is an educational process. Greenwald states: As Judis points out, Obama, on some issues, might move to the Right because he wants to. In other cases, he will do so because he perceives that he has to, because the combination of the GOP Blue-Dog-following-caucus/Beltway-media-mob might force him to. Regardless of Obama's motives, the lack of a meaningful, potent movement on the Left to oppose that behavior ensures that it will continue without any resistance. The lack of any independent political pressure from the Left ensures that Obama will be either content to ignore their views or will be forced to do so even when he doesn't want to. And I am stating again that the only way we are going to get that independent political pressure from the left is for Greenwald, Rosen, Judis, Moyers and others to convert some of that talk to organizational/educational work -- and the very first step is to open a better line of communication -- "better line" meaning a seminar type of educational, two-way communication. BTW, Accountability Now is NOT the answer -- it is a solution in search of a problem -- any movement needs to identify the problem/s -- determine the cause/s -- create a consensus about corrective action -- prior to organizing for any kind of action, political or otherwise. Doug Skoglund skoglund@pdmsb.com Please put a [MYWAY] in your subject line if you use normal email.
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