Dennis Kucinich is a dissident

[avaistheone1]

“You do not become a ‘dissident’ just because you decide one day to take up this most unusual career. You are thrown into it by your personal sense of responsibility, combined with a complex set of external circumstances. You are cast out of the existing structures and placed in a position of conflict with them. It begins as an attempt to do your work well, and ends with being branded an enemy of society.

…The dissident does not operate in the realm of genuine power at all. He is not seeking power. He has no desire for office and does not gather votes. He does not attempt to charm the public. He offers nothing and promises nothing. He can offer, if anything, only his own skin—and he offers it solely because he has no other way of affirming the truth he stands for. His actions simply articulate his dignity as a citizen, regardless of the cost.”

~Vaclav Havel


:kick:

[tekisui]

1. knr!

[upi402]

2. stone him

nt

[The Magistrate]

3. No, Ma'am, But Mr. Havel Certainly Was, And Has The Jail Time To Prove It

Mr. Kucinich not only seeks but clings to office, and runs no risk of harm whatever. There is no comparison between the two men, and their situations.

[avaistheone1]

8. Bullcrap

If Kucinich was desperate to cling to office he would be playing whore to the health insurance industry like most of his colleagues in the U.S. Congress and Senate along with the rest of the upper food chain in the administration. That is the easy obvious road that most of them take.

Kucinich has chosen not to do that. Kudos to Kucinich.

:kick:

[The Magistrate]

12. Nonesense, Ma'am: He Has A Sinicure In A Safe Urban District

It allows him an adequate income, great media exposure, and the chance to take a show on the road every few years pretending to campaign for President, and all the while safe as houses.

Mr Havel defied, as a private citizen, an openly totalitarian regime, and went to jail numerous times in consequence. In the course of this, he gained sufficient moral stature among the citizens of his country that, when Soviet occupation ended, he was President essentially by popular acclaim.

[avaistheone1]

15. You have a pretty narrow definition of dissident that even Merriam Webster does not support.

Clue: Jail time is not the definition of dissident.

[The Magistrate]

19. You Set the Standard, Ma'am, By Quoting Mr. Havel

In relation to the Soviet bloc, and any totalitarian regime, the term has a special meaning, one which you yourself invoked.

[avaistheone1]

20. The Havel quote I used said nothing about prison, yet you stated

Kucinich didn't fit the quote because he did not go to prison. You are reading something into the quote that obviously isn't there.

The only standard that is being set is your attempts to twist my statements and the quote.

[The Magistrate]

22. Mr. Havel, Ma'am, Is A Well Known Figure

In that quote you cited, he was speaking of his own experience in defying Communist rule and Soviet occupation. To defy these was not to risk jail, but to court it....

[ProSense]

4. .

:rofl:

[mzmolly]

5. Kucinich seeks power in stroking his ego.

If he votes no on health care reform, he'll have blood on his dissident hands.

[Name removed]

9. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[avaistheone1]

11. lmao

thanks

O8)

[mzmolly]

26. My keyboard

at the moment. :eyes:

[monmouth]

6. Name in paper and on the news. Election coming up...n/t

[cali]

7. no he's not. you clearly don't have a clue as to what it means to be dissident.

[JI7]

10. hahha, and people accuse those who don't hate Obama or worshipping him

hhahhahaa

[Skidmore]

13. What? For someone who does not have a desire for office, he sure

fooled me. I could have sworn besides running for the Senate, Kucinich has run more than once for the office of President. There is power associated with both of those offices--large amounts of it. There is a whole lot of demagoguery going on there.

[avaistheone1]

14. Interesting given the steady beat of demagoguery that comes

from Pennsylvania Avenue these days, I find Kucinich a refreshing change.

[cali]

16. that still doesn't make him a dissident. he just isn't one.

[avaistheone1]

18. Because?

[cali]

21. I think Mr. M explained that rather well upthread.

I'll simply add that by being a Congressman, Dennis is part of the establishment.

[avaistheone1]

23. Link?

Where upthread?

I don't see Mr. M on this thread.

[Mike 03]

17. Media changed all of that. In Modern Celebrity Culture, the Dissident is the New Celebrity.

Besides, even though Kunicinich has done great things, the bottom line is he often doesn't know what he is talking about. It is that simple. Watch him in Committee.

[bonzotex]

24. I would rather...

...Kucinich play dissident as a private citizen than hold down a Dem district and rarely advance any progressive legislation. I like the guy, but he doesn't get it done. Unfortunately, purists don't make good legislators in the U.S.

[hayu_lol]

25. For all the good he has done...

Dennis ought to work as a rep for $1.00 per year. He sure the heck is not worth the $177,000 or so he costs the people he represents.

Dennis 'do nothing' Kucinich should resign.

[elias7]

27. Those criticizing your post are being too literal

I see Kucinich well defined in the two paragraphs you post. He is a man of dignity and principle, cares naught for the ridicule foisted upon him, nor for acquiring political power or gaining office. The disagreement by some seems off the mark to me, and I have known Kucinich since his Cleveland mayoral days.

Thanks for the post.

[The Magistrate]

28. Nonesense, Sir

To say Rep. Kucinich cares nothing about gaining office is a comedy turn; gaining office is his leading drive and his career, the way he earns his living. That alone is enough to break the identification. The fact is that the O.P. attempted to compare Rep. Kucinich to a man, Mr. Havel, who displayed genuine heroism, in the face of severe trial, and displayed it to such a degree that he won the respect and affection of his nation. That comparison is nonesense. If it ever occurs to you to wonder why people sometimes rise to speak against Rep. Kucinich here, you need look no further than that sort of unthinking and distorted adulation, which his acolytes here sometimes put up on display.

[elias7]

31. I read the OP differently

I don't read an attempt at direct comparison; I see the words as as a fairly accurate portrayal of Kucinich as he is positioned in relation to the existing structure of our political world. Has he been cast out of that existing structure? Not literally, but I understand the OP's thought. Kucinich has impressed for standing on principle in an arena where one's career is best served not doing so. To label those who admire the stances he has taken his entire career as acolytes displaying unthinking and distorted adulation is just contemptuous.

Perhaps Kucinich offends you, perhaps the loose use of dissident offends you. Perhaps if Havel had lived here, he'd be merely a playwright. Kucinich does not have the respect and affection of the nation, but I would suggest that it is easier to be a classic hero in an authoritarian state where the illusion of freedom is not maintained.

The OP's quote does resonate with me, if not in a literal sense, in the spirit of going against the grain in the face of ridicule. I think you are mistaken if you are challenging the post as an attempt to compare the two men.

[The Magistrate]

37. The Diference Between Mr. Havel And Kucinich, Sir, Is That Between Lightening And A Lightening Bug

The purpose of the cited quote was to wrap Rep. Kucinich in a robe of glory he has never, and will never, come anywhere near earning on his own merits.

[elias7]

39. And I disagree

I lived in Cleveland when he stood alone and was ridiculed and castigated for refusing to privatize the electric company, but in the end, he was proven right. He has been belittled by the media in large part because of his appearance, the public has followed suit, critically thinking hordes that we are, ignorant of the screaming sensibility of the content of his words.

He is a true progressive and truly principled, who unfortunately has the non-regal bearing and demean of a court jester. A curse in our culture.

Perhaps you are equally harsh to every other congressman, I wouldn't know, but his robes are more regal than most.

Spellcheck working?

[The Magistrate]

40. Back Then, Sir, He Was Not Much To My Taste Either....

[Echo In Light]

29. k/r - More quotes on dissent:

Alan Barth:
"Thought that is silenced is always rebellious. Majorities, of course, are often mistaken. This is why the silencing of minorities is necessarily dangerous. Criticism and dissent are the indispensable antidote to major delusions."

John L. Lewis:
"We live in a country where we're supposed to have freedom of the press and religious freedom, but I think to some degree, there's a sense of fear in America today, that if you say the wrong thing, what some people will consider what is wrong, if you step out of line, if you dissent, whether you be an entertainer, that somehow and some way this government or the forces to be will come down on you."

Barbara Ehrenreich:
"No matter that patriotism is too often the refuge of scoundrels. Dissent, rebellion, and all-around hell-raising remain the true duty of patriots."

[L0oniX]

30. ...---...

You measure a democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.- Abbie Hoffman

[dionysus]

32. douchebag, dissident, they both start with the same letter at least...

:shrug:

[stranger81]

33. funny -- so does your username. [n/t]

[Toasterlad]

35. Swish.

[Toasterlad]

34. Then Call Me "Mrs. Dissident"!

[Brickbat]

36. Uh. No. He's an elected official with a cushy job.

Nice hyperbole, though.

[Ardent15]

38. Kick