Stop Bitching, Start a Revolution

[The Straight Story]

Stop Bitching, Start a Revolution

17 Jun 2007 11:43 pm

I've read a lot of "why liberalism is so screwed up" pieces, like this one by Matt Taibbi, over the last decade or so, and they've usually made me feel warm and fuzzy with schadenfreude. But enough is enough. At least until December 2008, I declare a moratorium on left-of-center whinging about how screwed up the left-of-center is. It's one thing to complain when you're down and out, getting smacked upside the head by Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman; it's quite another to complain, as Taibbi does, that your side of the political spectrum is "a skittish, hysterical old lady ... easily mesmerized by half-baked pseudo-intellectual nonsense, and quick to run from anything like real conflict or responsibility" when the world is actually going your way. And I say that even though I actually agree some of the substance of what Taibbi has to say about the tensions and contradictions with American liberalism; it's not that he's wrong, it's that his tone is all wrong for a political moment when his side happens to be winning.

Look, liberalism has a lot of problems. FDR isn't walking through that door. And so on. But America's liberal political party just scored an enormous political victory, taking back both houses of Congress from what was supposed to be an invincible GOP machine, and there are plenty of reasons - from electoral math to fundraising numbers to, well, the polls - to think that 2008 is going to be a banner year for liberals/progressives/whatever. The right had the left on the ropes for a long time, but for now, at least, it's the other way around. Public opinion is going liberalism's way on everything from gay marriage to taxes to health care to poverty to global warming, and the Iraq War has temporarily undone conservatism's long-running advantage on foreign policy. There's more money flowing into liberal coffers than ever before; the left is well ahead of the right in internet organizing; the rising generation is having its political views forged in the crucible of the Bush years, with predictable consequences - and for once, the right-wing coalition's intellectual contradictions are more pronounced than liberalism's divisions.

Obviously, all of this could turn on a dime. But at the moment, liberalism looks less like a "hysterical old lady," and more like a winning coalition, than it has in years or even decades. There will be plenty of time for bitching if the Democrats blow it in '08; until then, spare me.


http://rossdouthat.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/06/stop_bitching_start_a_revoluti.php

[canetoad]

1. Nope. Won't happen

as long as the the tubes stay working, swivel chairs take the weight off your legs and and the DU server doesn't crash.

[GreenTea]

2. You won't see tons of protest on every campus & towns as one did during Vietnam war....

That's because then there was a draft and young kids were being forced into going into the military and dying for the corporations!

And there will never be a draft during BushCo's rein, though people have been saying every few month's and still, that there will be a draft (Iran, etc.) BushCo & the power structure learned very well from Vietnam, and they will go at it shorthanded if necessary, as they are now...rather than re-instate the draft and having people screaming & yelling daily in the streets! And when there is a protest ...the republicans and their media have learned to simply just not cover it on the news...like it never happened.

People just protest from behind their keyboards now and only shouting when on liberal radio...And some even make donations, to candidates & organizations so others will do something for them!!

The Internet makes it so easy for us to be armchair activist...Yes, aren't we just so tough.

[melody]

3. The internet is the revolution & we're walking through a lot more territory than 100s of marches

eom

[canetoad]

4. Yep. It's a wonder the world survived

for 6000 years without it.

[melody]

5. Don't laugh -- on an anthropological level, it's a huge step in cultural evolution

You have to see it in perspective to get that, but well, it's so much easier to sneer. ;)

[canetoad]

6. I don't know your age group

so it is not possible to estimate your level of experience.

Having been lucky enough to experience and embrace first hand both the late 60s early 70s and the digital revolution, if you don't think I embrace new technology closely enough, check the computer group. There is information and there is good information. The tubes, unfortunately have no lint trap. More is not necessarily better, it only means that the BS filters must be tuned to a screaming edge. And it's very hard to quieten the mind for more than a few moments at a time through the constant influx of irrelevant information.

We are in the first few years of what will be know in the future as the 'Digital Revolution' and it would be a mistake to confuse all the gleeful kids with new toys with what this medium will grow into. The screen is a hypnotist. Stare into my Googly eyes, you are getting sleepy......

See how it goes round in circles?

[melody]

7. I'm a 47 year old anthropology major

I don't need to look into your eyes, I have my own. ;)

Incidentally, I thought my old friend Terence was a big hero to you DU hackerlings and he
was devout about the net. lol

[canetoad]

9. See, this happens all the time

I rattle on in what I think is a chatty, sociable way and someone gets defensive.

[melody]

10. Who is defensive?

It's 2:57 am, I came over here for posts and email, and answered a couple of replies.

Have to file under a deadline. Good night.

[canetoad]

11. And to your good anthropological self.

[TomClash]

8. Whenever someone says "left of center"

ordinary people are about to get their pockets picked.