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John McCain, Plain and Simple
His run for US president proves a crude brand of patriotism still sells. Plus: Naomi Klein on Barack Obama.
The world according to John McCain is one in which America is triumphant at home and abroad thanks to the Bush legacy, rolling to victory internationally and mastering its domestic economic problems. If daily news, like reports of the 10 French soldiers killed by a resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan and the U.S. government's imminent nationalization of much of the American mortgage-lending industry, would seem to deny such a rosy scenario, then that only shows skeptics lack the courage that sustained McCain as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.
There you have it encapsulated, the McCain campaign for president, an irrational mélange of patriotic swagger and blindness to reality that is proving disturbingly successful with uninformed voters. How else to explain the many millions of Americans who tell pollsters they prefer a continuation of Republican rule when so many of them are losing their homes to foreclosure and the nation is devastated by out-of-control military spending?
The economy is in a downward spiral, the national debt is at an all-time high, the dollar is an international disgrace and inflation in July had the steepest rise in 27 years, driven by oil prices fivefold higher than when George W. Bush invaded the nation with the world's second-largest petroleum reserves.
Crowing 'victory' in Iraq
While the oil-rich Mideast nations we protect refuse to fully open the oil spigots as payback for our military efforts, McCain celebrates Gen. David Petraeus as his No. 1 hero for "victory" in Iraq. Aside from the reality that victory there is now defined as returning to the level of stability provided by Saddam Hussein, who the Bush administration admits had nothing to do with the bin Laden-led terrorists, even that goal requires the cooperation of our former sworn enemies, Iran's ayatollahs.
Presumably McCain envisions a more favorable outcome for Georgia, to which he would commit the unqualified support of the United States with his outrageously overreaching statement that "we are all Georgians." If Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama had been in contact with the leader of a nation before and after that nation provoked a war, his campaign would be a shambles. Not so McCain, who is acting as if he is already the elected commander in chief ensconced in a reconstituted neoconservative-dominated White House. By contrast, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been reduced to a blustering bystander.
War's lessons missed
That military victory in Iraq and any other trouble spot is the key selling point of the McCain campaign is odd because McCain's credentials derive from participation in a war that resulted in the most ignominious defeat in U.S. history. How else to think of the loss of almost 59,000 Americans and 3.4 million Indochinese in a war that even McCain has long since not seriously tried to defend. Surely McCain accepted the notion that a Communist Party-run Vietnam was compatible with U.S. security interests when he, along with Senator John Kerry, led the fight for U.S. recognition of Vietnam.
Wouldn't it have been grand if McCain, who made his own pilgrimage of reconciliation to Hanoi, would have drawn the proper lesson from that sad chapter in American history -- that victory isn't everything it's cracked up to be? Or, by extension, from the recent Olympic festivities in still-Red China, where Bush was photographed quite happily near portraits of the once-dreaded Chairman Mao, whom U.S. propaganda had long described, quite erroneously, as chief sponsor of the Vietnamese communists.
Naomi Klein on Barack Obama
What does The Shock Doctrine author make of Democratic presidential candidate now being anointed at this week's convention in Denver? For Klein and her fellow progressives, does Obamamania represent real hope? Watch this short video.
We are reminded of how brilliant Republican Richard Nixon was in rejecting the neoconservative addiction to the Cold War that McCain embraces when the late president travelled to Beijing to make peace with the man previously depicted as the bloodiest of communist dictators. It turns out that the various communist movements were nationalist above all else, and when we "lost" in Vietnam, the result was not attacks on the United States, but a war between China and Vietnam.
The lesson McCain should have learned is that the world is a complex place, that today's enemies may be tomorrow's negotiating partners -- as Obama has at times dared to suggest -- and that the neoconservative idea of a Pax Americana is a dangerous fantasy. And a costly one at that, not only in lost lives and blowback from the regions we destabilize, but also in the dollars that American taxpayers must waste.
Stronger or weaker?
Thanks to the absurdly misdirected war on terrorism that McCain so enthusiastically supports, we spend more annually in inflation-adjusted dollars on the military than at any time since World War II, even more than during the Korean and Vietnam wars.
Americans who vote for McCain can forget about funding to solve the social security, medicare and subprime mortgage disasters or for anything else that truly would make America stronger.
Related Tyee stories:
- Has US Crippled NATO?
Georgia debacle may be the last straw, isolating US with Canada. - Harper, Bush Share Roots in Controversial Philosophy
Close advisers schooled in 'the noble lie' and 'regime change.' - Is USA Harper Country?
US public opinion might surprise our new PM.
![[Tyee]](http://thetyee.cachefly.net/ui/img/ico_fishie.png){kind=small}
- BC snuffs out AirCare test program
- AFN national chief Shawn Atleo to launch re-election bid
- Citizens group releases video to fight undead Bill C-30
- Conservative MP says he might vote against budget, then 'clarifies' his position
- Genetically modified plants won't take root with councillors in Richmond, BC
- Hundreds at Vancouver rally to support Quebec students
- Could Fort Mac become an eco-tourist hotspot?
- Rick Hansen's Man in Motion anniversary tour concludes in Vancouver
- The Gem of Canadian Science that Harper Killed
- Who Mowed Down the Premier?
- Canada's Economy, Deconstructed (by a 12 year-old)
- Death in Remand: a Tyee Inquiry
- Now Is the Time to Talk up Big Ideas
- Sexism Tinges Criticism of Teachers' Job Action
- Bill C-38: the Environmental Destruction Act
- Death In Remand: 'A Gut Feeling'
- Bias in BC's Pesticide Decision? Follow the Bouncing Verbs
- The Ethics of Addiction Studies
- The Gem of Canadian Science that Harper Killed
- Sexism Tinges Criticism of Teachers' Job Action
- Now Is the Time to Talk up Big Ideas
- The Ethics of Addiction Studies
- Bill C-38: the Environmental Destruction Act
- Alberta Fills Pipes with Corrosive Denial
- Bias in BC's Pesticide Decision? Follow the Bouncing Verbs
- How Our Immune Systems Exaggerate Fear
- BC biotech company seeks approval for GM apple
- What's Behind BC's Doors?
- The Ethics of Addiction Studies
- What's Behind BC's Doors?
- The Gem of Canadian Science that Harper Killed
- Sexism Tinges Criticism of Teachers' Job Action
- Should You Run from that Medical Test?
- 'The Dictator'
- Death in Remand: Stacked Deck
- 'Moonrise Kingdom'
- From Financial Advisor to Occupier
- Seven Goals to Build the Conservative 'Dream'
- Double lung recipient dances on Ellen show
- ISS astronauts grab DragonX space capsule by the tail with Canada Arm
- Metro Vancouver gas prices peak at record levels
- Ottawa posts $9-billion deficit in March despite pledge to avoid spending spree
- BC phases out AirCare to focus on fighting bigger vehicle emissions
- Tsunami senors to be dropped into deep sea off of Vancouver Island
- Student groups file court challenge against Quebec protest law
- ...while on the streets, pirates and ninjas put aside mutual animosity to join student protests
53
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sanamark
3 years ago
McCain
The GOP are amazingly good at getting the knuckle dragger set out to vote for them, who are ironically the people in America who get shafted by the GOP the most. Go figure.
McCain is more of the same for the USA. Can they really be that stupid? I hope not.
G West
3 years ago
Because things are so bad, all one wants is comfort
There is an interesting piece of analysis by Israeli journalist Bradley Burston in today's Ha'aretz.
You can find it here:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1015095.html
Here's a small snippet:
The extent of the changes that need to be made are, in fact, frightening in dimension. There is, undeniably, something in human nature that suggests that if things are this bad, changing them could only be worse.
What frightens me, at this point, is the possibility that Americans have come to prize mediocrity over excellence, turning a blind eye to facing hard truths full on. Fox News, meanwhile, has gone back to trying to persuade America that global warming may be a fiction, after all. Who better than Fox to know a fiction when it reports one?
What may frighten some Americans about Barack Obama is his very excellence. His fiercest critics have so far had little else to go on.
...
And here's his conclusion:
This foreign visitor doesn't believe that this election is about race. It is about the difficulty and the sacrifice involved in changing course, acknowledging error, actively working for a better common future.
It is a battle over the kind of complacency and fear of change that put into the Oval Office its most underqualified occupant in living memory. Perhaps that is how the joke statistics should be understood - and taken seriously.
After eight years of George Bush, the foreign visitor can say with assurance that Obama frightens him not at all. He is not even that frightened by the sincerely troubled person who watches Fox News hoping for an honest reason to vote for John McCain.
There are those who believe that what this voter, scared but not racist, may be saying is, "please, Fox News, give me a reason to vote against Obama that doesn't include the word black."
But what the foreign visitor finds the most frightening, the most dangerous, is the voter who, after eight years of abject catastrophe, continues to pray "Please, please, give me a reason to vote for the person who says that things are all right, after all." Someone like Bush.
...
And, if he's correct, that truly is sad.
Of course it may be, as Naomi Klein suggests, that even if he wins, Obama has already rolled over for the real power brokers. Looking at the DMC convention the last couple of nights, it's hard not to see something of that too.
[Bolding is mine.]
Van Isle
3 years ago
It doesn't matter who is the
It doesn't matter who is the next president. They will continue down the same path cuz the average American is numb and basically in denial of their country's situation. If Obama is elected, he will just piss-off more voters and what ever he says in 2012 he will not get re-elected. If McCain is elected, the job wiil wear him down to the point, health wise, that I wonder even if he'll be alive. He won't be re-elected either cuz he'll be blamed for the economic mess that the U.S. is in and won't be getting out of any time soon.
Yammer
3 years ago
Strength, pride, anger
The Republicans successfully set the American political agenda because they have mastered the ability to trigger the inherent bloodthirstiness of humanity. We didn't evolve from pacifists, and it is quite natural to scoff at the weak and to love the exultant feeling of fitness and Alpha dominance, even if it is secondhand and mostly illusory.
Republican propaganda is all about scorn for those not blessed by God (a red-blooded heterosexual American) or who would dare to poison the elixer of the American ideal. The idea that the beloved homeland is flawed, betrayed, and acting reprehensibly cannot be tolerated. Who wants to feel collective guilt, when you can so easily revel in collective pride?
Thus, opponents are easily smeared as whiners, complainers, snivellers, conspirators, foreigners, uppity minorities, fruits and heathens. These are emotional labels, difficult to defend.
Democrats are, understandably but fatally, reluctant to confront these facts. Tactically, they refuse to advance their best counter-weapons, e.g. an authentic war general in Wesley Clark. But the biggest failure is strategic. Didn't any of them listen to what FDR told them?? The enemy is FEAR ITSELF. Address that. Or fall apart in squabbling factions, which tendency is just about the only link Democrats have with the genuine left.
Budd Campbell
3 years ago
WHO, OR WHAT, IS TRUTHDIG?
Thei article comes from some online magazine calling itself Truthdig. Who, or what, is Truthdig? And who is Scheer?
Frank
3 years ago
Deer Hunting With Jesus
There's a book called "Deer Hunting With Jesus: Dispatches From America's Class War" that seems to be getting lots of attention down south.
There's an article about the author and his town of Winchester, VA right here
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article4428685.ece
The opening paragraph :
bilgladstone
3 years ago
The US has been busy over
The US has been busy over the last few decades destroying the public school system and "dumbing down" the populace with inane broadcasting and crippled journalism in favour of "advertainment".
This election should demonstrate, one way or the other, the success of that strategy.
Watch carefully, Canada. The outcome down south will inform your future!
Mel from Calgary
3 years ago
McCain Hypocracy
What amazes me is divorced politicians can embrace the "family values" agenda with a straight face. They need to be challenged on this as divorce is obviously not about family values.
talksduringfilms
3 years ago
tending our own garden
as compelling and as important as everyone seems to think the u.s. is, i think we should have more dialogue about the mess we are now actively making in canada. the states have had a good run of 60+ years to get where they are today. we on the other hand have just about 3 years more or less under our belts, creating our own brand of pro military, anti gay, pro corporation, sell everything, righteous, and plain hater government. we are now making choices in this country for the very same things we slag the u.s. for.
i left the u.s. to come to canada for all the reason i now see being parroted here in canada. not only by the government, but more troubling, by how people now speak with one another, and how they are perceiving the world and their place in it.
Rose
3 years ago
Negotiating with opponents
I think the comment about how the world is a complex place, and in future, one can find oneself negotiating with one's enemies, is a very important insight. I have found myself surprised, in all the US media coverage about Iraq, that there has been no coverage of the visit to Iraq by members of the Northern Irish parliament, including the former deputy commander of the IRA. The Iraqis invited the Irish, and the South Africans, to visit them to learn from their experience about bringing together former enemies to create peace. It seems the Iraqis feel the experience of Northern Ireland, and South Africa, is more useful than the US experience. This visit to Iraq was recent, the result of several meetings in Finland, but as far as I am aware, was not reported in the US media.
spender
3 years ago
Bush Is A Loser
As I write, al-Maliki - leader of Iraq Parliament - is balking at signing the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), until the US agrees to leave by 2010. Bush wanted to stay until 2015, Unless the deal is signed, the old United Nations legislation binds the US. And that would put Bush in a dilemma because he claims to have brought "freedom" to the people of Iraq.
Ask Iraqis how free they are. Four million are in exile. North Baghdad has been ethnically cleansed of Sunni Muslims. And Maliki is making war on Sunnis, even after making commitments to have them join what has become a Shiite jihad army. So Bush turned Saddam Hussein's secular state and turned over to the same types who carried out the 9-11 massacres.
In addition, it is believed that 1,000,000 Iraqis have been killed since American troops arrived, and refused to restore the order that they upset. Israeli critics point to a Hizbollah Corridor running from Teheran to Jerusalem. Shiite terror is not only out of control in Iraq; it is governmental. That's Bush's sorry legacy. Even oil production is below pre-invasion levels. As for Kurdish security, they often suffer shelling from both Turkey and Iran.
What did America get for the 4000 lives of soldiers that were spent in the Iraq fiasco? Higher oil prices and huge budget deficits. Saudis formed 15 of the 19, 9-11 hijackers. In spite of same, Bush has never criticized Saudi Arabia for their national church's open finance of terror and extremist mosques.
So why are we in Afghanistan propping Bush's indulgence of the billion dollar Heroin industry in that country? PM Harper promised to support one of Bush's Coalitions of the Stupid, if he dropped the ban on Canadian cattle imports. The Georgian President joined Bush in the Iraq folly; now he has an occupied country.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_ppYoJaoaCUc/SKl4QDD8lTI/AAAAAAAAADM/BzQgVfAa7d8/s1600-h/map-russian-military-units.gif
Would McCain be any different? His chief foreign policy advisor worked for the Georgia puppet government until May of this year.
http://ossetians.com/eng/news.php?newsid=474&f=36&PHPSESSID=5fba7887dd5ddb384b43a12b044f1b96
http://www.new.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1019825981431&oid=22347223862
bob the cat
3 years ago
I`m a Believer
The speeches went on and on, and they were loud. I found myself
thinking of Yeats' "They have loud music and every day hope renewed."
I felt left out: I didn't BELIEVE. And then one of the shouters
yelled BARACK OBAMA in a way that made me BELIEVE. Now I could see the
Movement gathering around his feet as he bestrode the convention like
a colossus.
Now I believe in
Barack Obama,
The Dalai Lama,
The audacity of hope,
And perfumey soap,
The politics of change,
a home on the range,
Pepsi and Coke,
A pig in a poke,
A city upon a hill,
A hand in the till,
A bright, shining moment,
Corpses of foemen,
Bullshit and Horseshit
and even lit crit,
Magic gasbags
and workers in rags.
Yes, Brothers and Sisters, the blindfold was off but now it's on and I
BELIEVE in CHANGE, and so does Frank and GWest
Your brother in Obama,
bob the cat
clubofrome
3 years ago
Really....
Come on. The USA is so yesterday. I mean really. I'm so over them. Don't you just love India and China now? Especially like China, you know, and the Olympics? They're soooooo hot. I'd do Mao in like, a second.....
RickW
3 years ago
I am of the opinion that
I am of the opinion that this election will feature the lowest turnout in US history, but that Obama will capture a young vote that WILL turnout to vote for him, who otherwise wouldn't have bothered showing up at the polls. This will put him "over the top".
Now as to whether he can (or is willing) to actually DO something about America......
lynn
3 years ago
American Idol: The Top Two
The BIG question of the day that the CNN pundits are all aflutter about is:
Will Obama's speech equal... or top that of Martin Luther King's?
I hear they are calling in Randy, Simon and Paula to judge the performance.
lynn
3 years ago
O Brother
Mighty fine music and lyrics, bob the cat.
I'm starting to BELIEVE that party politics is all a matter of changing blindfolds. ;-) Great to read you again.
Interesting prediction, Rick W....it probably will prove to be bang on.
bob the cat
3 years ago
New York Packer
You too L...I agreed with your ideas around the Packer essay ...I was following your thread going "Yes"! Really good stuff.. really right on I think..though maybe you can explain to the folks here as I`m sure they have no idea what I`m on about.
Hope you can `cause your conclusions were the diamond in the Packer rough.
G West
3 years ago
btc
loved the poem, song, elegy...LAMENT - whatever.
Call it what you like - I liked it!
Budd Campbell
3 years ago
THANKS A MILLION FRANK
That British newspaper piece you linked to was just real special!
It reminded me of Alan Fotheringham's political commentaries. In many of his pieces Foth paints a vivid picture of an impending redneck rebellion against politically correct left-wing parties. It helps to understand that Foth remained good friends with Doug Collins to the very end.
Frank
3 years ago
Deer hunting with Jesus
I'm glad you and GWest enjoyed the article. It was interesting.
snert
3 years ago
Things just got interesting.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080829.wpalin0829/BNStory/International/home
A Republican female VP on the ticket. Who'd a thunk it?
lynn
3 years ago
hope this makes sense.....
I'll give it a try, bob the cat.....:
In Packer's piece exceptionally good article on Burma:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/08/25/080825fa_fact_packer?
...Once you skate past the unavoidable American tilt to it, Packer helps you to enter territory that doesn't just reveal Burma but the dangerous wobble of the world these days:
One of total collaspse.
The unravelling of all systems.
Total abandonment of the people.
This article follows a small and courageous troupe of dissidents who have turned the old colonially-inspired Burma Book Club into a vehicle that moves new ideas, new critical thought, and a new organizing force when all is being deathly stilled by the reigning miltary junta. Ironically it is the smallness and the personal human touch of it all that is inspiring a kind of human greatness...that politics doesn't hold a candle to.
As the article makes clear, during the devastating cyclone, it was these same small groups of dissidents who alone managed to provide some measure of relief and refuge to the abandoned Burmese people. What they did worked... while all else shamefully failed. At the same time, hope is probably not a word that would be used here, by dissidents or by monks. These are eyes that have seen too much - this is a practical attempt to find a new way through crtical thought and critical action when there is nothing, absolutely zippo, to count on... or to turn to.
What to do?...is an interesting question - here and afar - in this catastrophic global collaspe of governance, and of the grand mal failure of politics.
The Fall of All Alternatives, that dangerous and not so poetic territory "where the center will not hold". Scary terra incognito stuff that has to be faced.
In a thread on John McCain - not as far off topic as it first may seem.
RickW
3 years ago
snert
It was necessary.
snert
3 years ago
RickW
A whole new ballgame.
ME2
3 years ago
The redneck is a better as a friend than as an enemy.
Thank you GWest and Budd for recommending Frank's Link, Deer Hunting With Jesus. Since I don't read every link offered here, you prompted me to go back and bring it up.
I concur that it is not only an interesting read, but a most informative one as well. And regardless of what one may think of the political views of the US redneck, the story correctly points out he / she's come by them honestly, if unwittingly.
Obama's lack of understanding and / or empathy for their viewpoints will probably result in the loss of their votes.
But he is not alone, the redneck here as well have not forgotten the stupid registration of hunting rifles and the onerous costs of licensing etc which has accompanied it, all of which Lefties pushed so hard for, (and has accomplished nothing). Nor are they happy about carbon taxes, another hobby-horse oil-hating Lefties will not give up either, and which as it progresses will cost us peons a bundle while gaining only PR.
Lefties have yet to learn that regressive taxation / legislation, whether THEY welcome it or not, is STILL regressive.
We should choose our enemies more wisely, since we have plenty enough already.
spender
3 years ago
McCain's Running Mate
Wannabe VP candidate is unqualified and scandal ridden, and a former cheer leader and beauty queen:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x177832
She left huge deficits in the 9000 person Alaska city that she ran as mayor, by over-building a legacy to herself. She knows nothing of either foreign or military policy. I guess McCain wants pretty wallpaper.
snert
3 years ago
spender
Since when has the truth mattered in a US election.
RickW
3 years ago
Sarah Palin Scandal?
http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=Sarah+Palin+scandal&btnG=Google+Search&meta=
Just more grist for the Democratic mill......
Frank
3 years ago
Budd, GWest, ME2
Would it not be fair to say that the US "Left" (calling Democrats Left is pretty rich I know), when in power, doesn't affect the economic lives of the people in Winchest, VA any more than the Republicans do?
Therefore, with everything else being the same why not stay with the party that is against abortion, pro-guns and says they want prayers in schools?
I think the lesson for the Democrats is they should offer a real alternative, have some policies that will actually help people instead of continuing with the right-wing lie of "a rising tide lifting all boats".
G West
3 years ago
Prob'ly you're correct Frank
'An maybe them good ole boys aren't really ..."dumber than owl shit" after all...'cause they know nothin's gonna change if'n them ivy league types get power over there in Washington anyways.
If you want real change in the US of A I think you have to e-lect a real reformer like Ralph Nader...
That Joe Bageant feller shure has a way with a met-aphor, eh?
ME2
3 years ago
GWest
How fervently you rail against classism, Garth, yet how easily you revert to it.
RickW
3 years ago
Frank
From the guy who admires The Chicago Boys.....?
G West
3 years ago
ME2 - not really
I enjoyed the article - which, as Frank noted, contained the suggestion that a certain kind of voter in West Virginia might actually cast ballots against what Joe Bageant saw to be their own best interests.
I think, given my own interpretation of things, that's just another version of a treasured American myth. In other words, I don’t agree with the basic premise.
I think Frank's observation was ironic and it contained the suggestion, with which I heartily agree, that there isn't much difference (particularly for the people who need real help) between the two old line parties.
In other words, despite the 'labels' we put on poor people, they are intelligent enough to realize that the 'system' in the United States (and I think this is true in Canada too) doesn't really concern itself with the welfare of the poor and the downtrodden.
My remark, far from being 'class-ist' was just the opposite; it gave credit to those good ole boys who clearly recognize that, no matter who resides in Washington, things aren't going to change much in the hills and valleys of West Virginia.
Y'see, I don't think there is a left/right dichotomy between the donkeys and the elephants - and that's why, were I an American - I'd vote for Nader.
Apart from that, I liked the word picture that Bagaent constructed - and so, putting it clearly in quotes, I used it myself.
For anyone who actually read the piece from the Sunday Times I think that would be pretty clear and should have, I reckoned, given them a moment of levity or mirth.
It's too bad you didn't see it that way.
My conclusion about American politics is that, if the Democratic Party wanted to do something new and radical they would have chosen Ralph Nader as their candidate...and done it years ago.
I like Obama, but, even if he's elected, he's going to fall victim to a serious case of unrealized expectations.
Nothing much is going to change.
My view.
bob the cat
3 years ago
Lotsa Bageant Columns here
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/?s=Joe+Bageant
Bageants health is not so great. He was having trouble in the Southern heat and humidity ..air conditioner broken down...tired of trying to reconnect with his roots in Winchester and tired of his 9-5 editing job with the magazine and his columns reflected that..he was sounding really down and his health was bad and he was drinking too much.
I was really worried for him. I sent him an e-mail saying hang in brother, I really like your work and please look after your health....I got the nicest reply...he said he was in tears that there was nothing nicer than to be called a brother...anyway.. He`s since quit his 9-5 and lives most of the year in a Belize village on the ocean with his wife. Not a tourist place but a fairly remote location. I think he still has his old Southern style fixer upper in Winchester.
Frank
3 years ago
RickW
I believe you mean Obama? If so, I agree its hard to believe anything will really change if that's where he's getting his advice from.
ME2
3 years ago
GWest
You've deliberately avoided my point, which was made clearly enough. But I won't make it again, since pointing out a political mistake to Lefties is an entirely useless exercise.
But enlarging upon my "class-ist" charge, I quote Frank who writes rednecks off with :
"Therefore, with everything else being the same why not stay with the party that is against abortion, pro-guns and says they want prayers in schools?"
You followed by mocking their speech patterns, crudely parodising them. "Class-ist"? You bet.
May I humbly suggest that since I agree with the point both of you make - that like us they have an exreme distrust of their leadership, which lies to them as readily as it does to us, that surely this is a wedge issue?
Has it not occurred to either of you that their leadership, like ours, seeks to emphasise and widen the ideological gulf between us, even while we have a great many common concerns?
I am not suggesting here that we simply drop our political differences, I'm only saying that we share enough commonalities that mocking them as a subculture makes us enemies at a time when more than ever the common people have to recognise and unite against their common enemy.
The revolution some hope for isn't going to happen. The only possible hope is for civil disobedience, such as a work stoppage, and that doesn't require a common political ideology, only a common realisation that "enough is enough".
G West
3 years ago
I wasn't mocking...
I wasn't mocking anybody - these people have every right to their speech patterns - I was honouring them, not criticizing them, as, I think Bageant and his writing do - it's too bad you didn't see that. Their suspicion and distrust of folks from outside who drop in from time to time to ‘solve’ their problems is entirely justified. But a change in diction by Barack Obama won’t fix that – what’s needed is something more fundamental.
As btc has pointed out, and as is clear from Bageant's writing, these people have dignity too.
Just like the garbage man and the truck driver and the dishwasher down the pub. The 8 bucks an hour clerk at Tim Horton’s and the lady who scrapes the corruption off the walls in the toilet. The fifteen students renting a house on West 10th and living 2 and 3 to a room so they can afford to go to university. The single mom who thought having a baby was going to make her feel fulfilled. I could go on.
The problem is 'liberals' and folks like Gordon Campbell and his cronies who don't respect them and the conservative money lenders who are happy to take their hard-earned cash in exchange for a counterfeit promise of something better.
If you're gonna have a revolution, it's going to have to be based on some common understanding and respect and I'm not sure civil disobedience is the ticket. Woodstock very quickly degenerated into Altamont.
Ralph Nader, who I don't think has ever been elected to any office, has probably done more to change America for the better than any president.
As for mocking, I think, truth be told, it's the Ivy League experts and Chicago School manipulators who need to be mocked.
Actually, as I said in my stupid little piece, I love metaphor. Furthermore I wish to hell I could write with Bageant's style and lucidity...if I could, I wouldn't be bothering with this and trying to explain to you what I was doing.
Some might have thought that crowd in Denver represented average Americans...I don't.
Too bad there was a misunderstanding.
Frank
3 years ago
ME2
I'll quote you in response
So if they come by their beliefs honestly or unwittingly and those beliefs are that things we believe in are wrong, then what do you suggest?
That we change our beliefs? That we try to out right-wing the Conservative party? Demand the Lord's Prayer in our schools, demand guns be available anywhere at anytime?
What would be the point? Canadian and America rednecks aren't swing voters. They are not at the friction point between any parties. Their votes are safe in the right-wing camp, they aren't going anywhere. Therefore they've marginalized themselves.
As for the carbon tax, its the right-wingers that are pushing that, not the Left. Luke and realisticman for example love it and they're both conservatives, not left-wing. Cycling Commuter loves it too, and he's a very right-wing Green.
As for gun registration, it was also supported by the police chiefs of Canada, not known for being socialists. And normally the conservatives say they care what police think.
If you have a way of moving very conservative voters to vote NDP I'm all ears but the only way I can think of is to move further to the Left and offer a real alternative. Try and improve their financial lives and let them choose between their social values and the accompanying poverty or our social values and a better standard of living.
G West
3 years ago
Apropos
There are a couple of lines in one of Bageant's other pieces that seem very apt here.
I hope you won't mind if I quote 'em:
At the precise moment that the intellectual underpinnings of conservative free market ideas that have dominated politics for the past 30 years are crumbling across the globe. Obama calls for a post ideological and partisan world.
At the time when the American military industrial complex is despised around the world, he is a front man out of central casting which will buy it more goodwill and new room to maneuver in the first 15 minutes after being sworn in that John McCain could in the next 100 years.
His very presence, the color of his skin, the very strangeness of his name is the best guarantee of his betrayal of the expectations of the constituencies that will vote to elect him. Barack Obama is in short order a far more reassuring prospect for the continued dominance of the financial elite than another four years of neo-conservative rule which in an almost historically unique combination of greed, ill will, incompetence and stupidity have brought the country to the edge of disaster.
Audacity yes, change hardly.
I've bolded the money quote - at least as I see it.
Luke Skywalker
3 years ago
Frank...
You still don't get it. Carbon taxes are the forte of the centre-left... the David Suzuki's, the NDP-appointed Marc Jaccard of the 1990's and on and on.
Campbell introduced the carbon tax as a political strategy to grab some of that soft Green/ soft NDP enviro vote. The only voters attracted to that, IMHO, are situate in the core urban areas of Vancouver/Victoria... ya know bike riding, anti-car, organic-food eating urban dwellers.
I agree with ya... dumb move with the skyrocketing price of gasoline in other areas.
And the NDP wants to outflank them further with the "Axe the Tax" campaign on the one hand, and then introduce more carbon measures that will all:
An even dumber political move.
And I love the carbon tax???? To re-iterate: NADA.
And from your political perspectives viewpoint: There's the hard left and the left... and anything to the right of that... centre-left/centre/centre-right/right are right-wing/conservative. ;)
Wonderful sentiments but the real world is a bit different.
The over-riding wishes of the electorate at large has always been...a strong economy, low unemployment, and good government management of finances.
And that's never been the BC NDP's forte.
And with that foundation, health care, social issues, education, enviroment, tax, and infrastructure issues fall into place.
G West
3 years ago
Too bad it's worked out so badly
Child poverty, a health care system in disarray, higher education a bad joke, a pointless Rube Goldberg carbon tax, the forest industry on its knees, real estate prices that 80% of the working population can't afford, care homes in crisis, wholesale sell-outs of public assets to Campbell's friends, one of the lowest minimum wages in the country...debt rising by billions each year of the Campbell kleptocracy - an indolent and compromised press: a premier so stupid he can’t understand what’s wrong with flying in a private jet paid for by his close personal friends and a media unable to understand why their not screaming blue murder about it is just another proof of how bought and paid for it is.
And these are supposedly the good times.
There is nothing in place for the bad times to come and the silver has been sold to finance Gordo's circus.
This government has been a dismal failure on every measure.
And, by the way, this thread is about US politics.
Luke Skywalker
3 years ago
Al Bundy...
Good stuff Al! The "hard left" elements within Operation Solidarity during 1983/84 attempted to force a wonderful "Workers of the World" revolution right here in BC at the time.
Interestingly enough, Operation Solidarity only had 19% support in a front page Vancouver Sun poll in 1984 and that was without the "revolution".
The NDP remained quiet and was fearful of being decimated and linked to Operation Solidarity.
The pragmatic wing of the labour movement, including the private sector and the IWA's Jack Munroe, took it upon themselves to get BC out of that political quagmire between the left and and the centre-left/the rest of the silent majority.
Yep, BC deserves folk like you advocating for a revolution. It certainly will marginalize the hard left/left (not centre-left) even further. ;)
Frank
3 years ago
Luke Skywalker/Al Bundy don't care which
And you still don't pay attention. The carbon tax was implemented by Gordon Campbell and Carol Taylor. You might have missed it but I assure you it was in all the papers.
And failed. Instead he lost a big chunk of his support. Which was exactly the opposite of what you predicted would happen.
And if they do I'll do something you and realisticman have never done with the Liberals, I'll attack them on it.
You defended it and called it brilliant.
Coming from a guy that thinks that anyone to the Left of David Emerson is a communist, that's high praise indeed. You're also the only person I ever met that wants less political choice, just two right-wing parties. Again, being called a person who sees shades of grey politically I will take as a compliment.
Written like you just finished PoliSci 110. Unfortunately, that doesn't explain how many people vote. But then I guess you don't read stuff like Deer Hunting with Jesus or What's the Matter with Kansas or any other political books except biographies?
You're against all those things. You agree with Mikey Walker that it should all be privatized, even the air.
I find that hard to believe? Do you have a link to your source?
I guess old Jack preferred the huge recession the Socreds gave us eh?
Frank
3 years ago
Deer Hunting with Jesus
In trying to gain the redneck vote in the US I think the worst move for the Left is to shoot more deer than the Right.
Luke Skywalker
3 years ago
Frank...
You are usually... usually... on the mark, the best "left-winger" [NOT centre-left] that I've ever read here on the Tyee... but tonight ...you are REALLY off the mark. Both here as well as on the other thread.
I'll blame it on the Labour Day weekend. ;)
You defended it and called it brilliant.
NOPE. My first comment on the carbon tax was "Meh, it's just social engineering." And I've re-terated that a few times but ya don't seem to listen.
I find that hard to believe? Do you have a link to your source?
NOPE again. From memory. And if ya wanna question my memory I can still recall many pleasant events from my childhood since I was 3.
But that ain't a good response.
I'll gladly go the the UBC Sun archives and dig it out and forward same to David Beers. That I'll never forget!
Frank
3 years ago
Luke/Al
Why to David? Why not send it to me? Does this mean you're at UBC?
Unless there's two of you I'm pretty sure it was you that I argued with. The old right-wing crowd have pretty much left this place and although realisticman said Campbell converted him and he supports it, he didn't argue it much.
Sorry old chap, but I'm sure it was you that defended it.
Luke Skywalker
3 years ago
Frank/Al Bundy...
Heck. I'd actually like to bet ya $100 bucks, worth it, but then you would castigate same in a negative light. But I digress.
I can ascertain that you are definitely not a young buck anymore. Sometimes memories fade... reminds me of my folks.
Frank
3 years ago
Luke/Al
Yes, I would.
And you are a "young buck" as they say. So how old were you in 1983 while committing Vancouver Sun polls to memory?
Luke Skywalker
3 years ago
Frank/Al Bundy...
Old enough! And some people have photographic memories. But I digress.
I'll be back on this matter. Am gonna check out the Sun archives and provide an exact date.
If ya don't learn from history, ya never will learn. ;)
Frank
3 years ago
Luke
Just to ask beforehand, what will I learn exactly?
A link to the actual article would be appreciated, I'd want to know the context and the background.
Your age in 1983 is a state secret?
G West
3 years ago
Just a small reminder
That you NEVER actually deal with the points anyone else makes.
Maybe that memory of yours isn't all that great after all.
To wit:
Child poverty, a health care system in disarray, higher education a bad joke, a pointless Rube Goldberg carbon tax, the forest industry on its knees, real estate prices that 80% of the working population can't afford, care homes in crisis, wholesale sell-outs of public assets to Campbell's friends, one of the lowest minimum wages in the country...debt rising by billions each year of the Campbell kleptocracy - an indolent and compromised press: a premier so stupid he can’t understand what’s wrong with flying in a private jet paid for by his close personal friends and a media unable to understand why their not screaming blue murder about it is just another proof of how bought and paid for it is.
And these are supposedly the good times.
There is nothing in place for the bad times to come and the silver has been sold to finance Gordo's circus.
This government has been a dismal failure on every measure.
And, by the way, this thread is about US politics.
Luke Skywalker
3 years ago
Frank...
A link to the actual article would be appreciated, I'd want to know the context and the background.
Links from 15 years ago are tough if impossible to find on the 'net. 25 years ago???? NADA.
But I'm a man of my word and again out of interest am gonna go to the Sun archives, get the article, place same in Photobucket (?) and link it. Remind me!
How sharp you are. Remember I'm of Bavarian heritage and some of that relates to the negative "Achtung, Ihre Papier bitte!!!" ;)
Frank
3 years ago
Luke
I look forward to the article if you can get it.
On the Bavaria thing, you've lost me.