The Lady Sang Way Back in 68’

[The Whiskey Priest]

Today we are facing the culmination of events that were launched back in 1968 with the election of Richard Nixon. The road map for turning the country rightward and away from 38 years of progressive agenda was unrolled at that time.

The organizational structure that is now maturing with the capture of the Supreme Court was developed by the right-wing after the defeat of conservative Godfather Barry Goldwater. If you lift the costume from most of today’s players you will find that they are Nixonian bit-players who were raised on the milk of radical-conservatism.

This charade taking place in the Senate hearing room today is the final roll-back of the progressive victories of the 30s and 40s. How this has happened is the question. Did Americans become to fat and satisfied with the expansion of protections, rights and economic mobility. Did they not realize that the power elite of the ancient régime would react violently by the expansion of rights to the uppity mob?

We, the progressive left, became so enamored with our success that we did not notice that we were not a cohesive movement. We were fragmented, isolated and without discipline. Those very things that we took pride in where defects when they were turned against us.

The right, led by the wealthy elite, did come together in lock-step and marching towards one purpose, control. They wanted to control each and every one of the uncivilized left. The right played upon the need for stability of thought, life and purpose. Their success and our failure is reflected in their complete control of societies enabling institutions.

Until we can truthfully face our failures, we cannot begin our journey back to a world that is fair, equitable and just. Most of all we must find it within us to agree that these are worthwhile goals and be willing to work to obtain them. That is how the right won and we must do likewise.

[William769]

1. Very good post.

[Surya Gayatri]

2. Good questions,

well posed, Whiskey. For any movement to succeed, its proponents must genuinely believe in it. Somewhere, sometime over the last 40 years, we progressives stopped believing in the dream of social perfectability. Drugged by relative prosperity and material comfort, we sat by while the social progress of the 30s & 40s was slowly eroded away, beginning with the paranoid excesses of the Nixon era and ending here in this PNAC-inspired nightmare. We've allowed our noble goals to be distorted and diluted by a small group of zealots. SG

[400Years]

3. Good Post

There is a book called The Crisis of Democracy that was published in 1975 for the Trilateral Commission and in it they basically argue that the world is facing a crisis of too much democracy and that the elites were on the verge of losing control. They have been working on this agenda since then. This book was published right after Nixon fell.

[greatauntoftriplets]

4. Kicked and recommended....

for the greatest page.

You're welcome. ;)

[KharmaTrain]

5. The Split of '68 Went Far Deeper

Don't forget the divisions within the Democratic party itself. For party had shreaded not only between the pro and anti-war factions...those who supported Johnson/Humphrey and those who didn't, but also a rift appeared between the Progressive and Liberal branches in the battle between Robert Kennedy and Gene McCarthy...this created a splinter in the party that alienated many "mainstream" Democrats at the time and led to the party not only splintering for the primaries and leading to Humphrey's nomination, but remained all the way through the general election. Many Democrats were disenchanted either by the death of RFK, the failure of McCarthy to gain any real power after his primary challenge and Humphrey's reluctance to distance himself from LBJ and Viet Nam.

Also, don't forget the influence that election of George Wallace...the Ross Perot of that year. He helped get Nixon's Southern Strategy going...it didn't really work for Nixon in '68, but did in '72...Wallace carried many of the Deep South states and he was and never became a Repugnican. Wallace was a Dixiecrat...a dying breed within a changing Democratic party that had been the bastion for segregationists and states right southerners for decades. Many followed Wallace out of the party and then were lured by Nixon into the GOOP. When I hear someone say "I used to be a Democrat" with a southern accent...this is the first vision thtat comes to mind.

The Progressive Left was far from an organized force in those days...it just seems like it in the rear-view mirror of nearly 40 years. And today's Progressives are far more diverse.

[Junkdrawer]

6. In the foreign policy realm, the CIA (and their Wall Street backers)...

began their 'privatization' efforts around that time.

Joseph Trento's 'Prelude to Terror' lays it all out with names, events and dates.

Election fraud was limited to voter suppression efforts and the Far Right buyout of voting software makers didn't occur until 1984, but I agree the late 60's was the beginnings of our current troubles.

[WCGreen]

7. Hate to shake your boat.....

But Nixon was far more progressive than any other president since then....

Granted, he was dealing with large democratic majorities in both the House and the Senate...

During the Nixon years, the EPA was established... The Earned Income Credit, while a subsidy to both worker and business owner, created a safety net earned through working that is perhaps one of the most successful social engineering programs of the last 50 years... Nixon bucked conservatives in his party and instigated liberal wage and price controls to try and stem inflation.... His approach to International Relations caused fits for the Goldwater/Reagan win of the party... And his pick of the moderate Gerald Ford as his VP was perhaps the last straw for the Birch wing of the GOP...

Granted, the people who worked hard to elect Nixon provided experience for those who established the so called conservative revolution.... But they had no voice in governing...

Nixon was never at ease with those Goldwater/Reagan folks...

It wasn't until Reagan ran against Ford in the 1976 primaries that the true believers found a home not just in the political world as they did with Nixon, but a champion they felt would be amenable to their radical right agenda in actually governing this country....

The Silent Majority was a campaign strategy to split the south from the Democrats and take advantage of the liberal Democrats support of Civil Rights to create a election winning coalition....

Please don't confuse abuse of government power on the part of Nixon as a sign of conservatism because it wasn't... It was a sign of power bringing out the dark side of a man who had many personal demons...

Nixon was no conservative.... At least not in the way we look at conservatives today...

It is the me me me generation of conservatives who were more concerned with lowering their taxes and were willing to look the other way when the right started to dismantle social programs during the Reagan years that caused the crisis this country is in right now....

The Reagan figurehead was the fountainhead of radical conservatism....

[The Whiskey Priest]

8. I look upon the late 60s as the zenith of the Progressive Movement.

The Nixon era was the sine qua non of today’s conservative success. Having recovered from, what the right considered, a devastating defeat of Goldwater in 64, the had reevaluated, revamped and started their long march. Within four years they had accomplished the first step by recapturing the White House, but more importantly they did so through a strategy that they would follow through out the next four decades; which was strip away the Democratic base.

Nixon is without a doubt a progressive when compared with those that followed him. His era though was the training ground for the majority of those in power today. The Nixon era was also the era that gave rise to what is called today, neo-conservatism. The followers of Scoop Jackson now make up the core of neo-conservatism.

Nixonian, is an era and it is the era that saw the progressive movement start its decline as the leading philosophy for change. That is what we must regain, if we are to further just, equality and our dream.

[LeftHander]

9. kick recom. nt

[EFerrari]

10. I think it's more complicated than that. WP.

Even as the Thuggery is about to capture the Supreme Court, they are about to lose everything else.

- Their mechanism to steal elections is unraveling.

- Their Congressional leadership is about to sport a new orange Spring wardrobe.

- Their illegitimate Executive is looking at impeachment hearings.


This is a very strange, push me - pull me moment in our nation. Take heart.

[The Whiskey Priest]

11. The irony is: Their losing does not mean our winning.

If we are not ready to step into a vacuum, that will be created by their hubris, with a vision that will be accepted by an overwhelming majority; then we will only forestall their march forward. They are well financed, well-disciplined and of singular purpose.

The real power behind their movement will not be dislodged and go quietly. They have too much to loose. We cannot just move in like scavengers when they fall this time. They fell with Nixon and we did not take advantage of that time. For the progressive movement to regain the position, it enjoyed for such a short time, will require new vision, new work and new dedication.

[EFerrari]

12. I agree. We need leadership. We need tens of Deans and

Kuciniches. Unfortunately, neither was born into one of the ruling families that we've been saddled with just as El Salvador is saddled with their own ruling class. But, we need to push for leaders willing to lead.

And we need a structure that works.

Your point that the Cabal will not go quietly is well taken. I for one believe this misAdministration is capable of anything, including violence against their own people. Mr. Cheney, for example, has a penchant for leveling threats when his program isn't passively embraced. I take those threats very seriously. And on another level, the theocrats believe they are entitled to dictate to the rest of us.

This isn't going to be pretty.

[La_Fourmi_Rouge]

13. Great sig!

For the uninitiated - The Whiskey Priest is a great character from Graham Greene's novel "The Power and The Glory".

And I must say that I agree completely with your assertion - the battle is over.

[The Whiskey Priest]

15. No...the battle is not over unless we run up the white flag....

I for one do not intend to do so and am sure that you do not. There is a better way to live than what the right is envisioning. What I am advocating is that we face up to how we have failed, then build from there. It will be hard work, the great thing is that we have plenty of shoulder to put toward the heavy-lifting that will be require.

First we must decide what we stand for, what do we want, and then go to work achieving that world.

It can be done, our fathers and mothers did it before us, we must dedicate our lives to furthering our goals, because those goals are right, just and worthy of our lives.

PS: Thanks for knowing about my sig.

[Amonester]

14. The only true control they were/still are after is the Treasury.

All, and every other "excuse" they spout, 24/7, are just 'accessoires' to their only unique goal. All in all, it's always been that way since History could ever be recorded anywhere on this planet (for future reference and learning purposes).

The real alternative (share the wealth, and share the responsibilities, e.g., one in which universal health care and fighting global warming are a big part) hasn't really been given a slight chance of any honest discussion, lest any 'intelligent enactment.'

On a funny note, I was just going through my bookmarks when this gem showed up:
"The debt owed to liberals that is ignored by the republicans."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=3698010

And this one (brought some "Know who your opponents R" thought up here):
~snip~
"the criminal conspirators who have chosen to misuse their self-avowed devotion to Jesus Christ to advance a very un-Christian agenda."
http://www.insider-magazine.com/ChristianMafia

Stop 'em.
Stop 'n stop 'n stop 'n stop 'em...