BooMan recently wrote a very well reasoned and careful attempt to continue his pas de deux dance with dKos without either surrendering his own integrity OR calling a spade a spade and thus hurting the power of the netroot based so-called “new middle” in the coming midterm (s)elections.
Here. (Orange versus Green)
I have many disagreements with this tactic, and a comment by the always brilliant economic and energy analyst Jerome a Paris in the thread that followed that diary helped me to focus some of those disagreements into a somewhat cogent…if on first glance a little mysterious…argument.
I wrote a reply to his comment which, as is my wont, jes’ grew like Topsy.
So now it’s a stand-alone diary.
Read on for more, if you so desire.
Jerome’s comment.
It is what YOU make of it.
No, Jerome.
Be honest, please. You are too smart to say that in good faith.
It is what its bosses ALLOW “us” to make of it.
Is their tactic a winning one?
We shall see.
I doubt it.
It will be Plan A or Plan A Lite in both 2006 and 2008. BOTH Blood For Oil, economic imperialist strategies. Just different tactics.
And BOTH paths suck.
Could ANY tactic short of a complete break with the mainstream, corporate owned American system be a winning one if it opposed the far right/center/don’t-give-a-shit-just-don’t-wake-me-up coalition which is held together here in the U.S. by the glue of a bought and sold media? {SUPER glue, it is, if you have not noticed.)
I doubt it very much.
A really well put together third party headed by some kind of true political genius with a great common touch might pull it off, but that would still leave both houses of Congress, the courts and the money/media of the country in the same place.
The new president would be a four year-long lame duck, followed by “See? We TOL’ ya he couldn’t do anything” and outta there.
Jimmy Carter v.2.
Could a complete break “work”?
Not unless it toppled the economy.
Which job the enemies of America are doing fairly well without any help, according to all of the evidence that I can see in my own daily life.
So…what to do?
The I Ching says of this state:
Here enthusiasm is obstructed. A man is under constant pressure, which prevents him from breathing freely. However, this pressure has its advantage–it prevents him from consuming his powers in empty
enthusiasm. Thus constant pressure can actually serve to keep one alive.
“Persistently ill, and still does not die.”
Yup.
Sound familiar?
So, prevented from forward movement…if we have any sense at all…we wait.
NOT consuming our energies in empty posturing or useless internal debates.
Not allying ourselves with those who are prone to take inefficient, halfway measures.
And of course the usual answer to this is…”But we cannot surrender!!!“
No, we cannot.
But we CAN wait.
More from the I Ching:
destructive to the good alone but inevitably destroys itself as well. For evil, which lives solely by negation, cannot continue to exist on its own strength alone.
And also:
There is more. Much more. About halfway measures and how they do not work; about being aware of the evil in our own lives and actions, about choosing well the battles that we DO fight. It basically says that we should wait until they fuck up SO big time that they topple themselves. Now the risk here, of course, is that nuclear weapons and global ecological collapse will do us ALL in if we wait, but…
Ya gotta believe.
Tug McGraw was right. As were Rumi and Hafiz and Francis of Assissi and Moses and Gautama Buddha and Lao Tse Tung…
Ain’t over yet.
Not by a LONG shot.
Patience.
“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” Martin Luther King Jr.
And continued resistance.
“Power concedes nothing without a demand; it never has and it never will.” Frederick Douglass
VAYA!!!
AG
P.S. And BY NO MEANS ally yourself with the halfway guys.
Why?
Economic imperialism IS “evil”.
Evil personified.
The Blood For Oil War is an INSTRUMENT of that evil.
Warner…and ALL the others who do not openly oppose it?
Dark side, baby.
Dark side.
What’s that I hear?
That’s just superstition?
Everything is relative?
There IS no “evil”?
Here is my sole answer to that.
I rest my case.
Do you remember…well, not “remember” exactly, but are you aware of that old anti-Prohibition song that went “Sixty million Frenchmen can’t be wrong?”
Well..the “liberal left” may very well be one of the few segments of successful civilizations in the history of mankind that by and large does not seem to believe in the existence of large forces of “good” and “evil” being engaged in eternal in battle here on earth and throughout the rest of the universe as well.
How many people have lived here since human beings first stood upright and worshiped the sun?
Hundreds of billions of human beings cannot have been wrong, either.
Bet on it.
Tips and recs, please.
Ya GOTTA believe!!!
AG
Believe and agitate, agitate, agitate !
still feeling that Mets ’69 thing, eh, AG?
I was in the band that played in center field during batting practice. The Orioles tried to hit us with balls…the Mets protected us.
The first Earth Day?
We took it OUT!!!
Larry Elgart (cornball swing) meets Elvin and ‘Trane as heard through the strange echoing resonances of a ballpark sound system. I thought Elgart would have a heart attack.
No WONDER they won.
You DO have to believe.
AG
they love the Tugster down here in Philly, too. 1980, the year the Phils finally won. 26 years ago. It’s plastered in barrooms all over the city. Tug throwing his mitt in the air. He died last year and he spent a lot of time at the stadium leading up to it. You do gotta believe. And I loved his cartoons of the Pets.
And when Gandhi won HIS World Series in 1947!!!???
HIS celebration?
Priceless!!!
AG
I am so fucking sick of this shit. I have completely lost faith in my fellow humans on this planet who happen to reside in the USA.
Even here on this blog.
And the tap dancing is driving me nuts. Do we NOT REALIZE how fucking destructive Bush is? Do we not realize that by allowing a CONSERVATIVE (i.e. Markos) to set the tone of debate for progressive ideals, or what the Dem party should be is only feeding the beast? I give the fuck up. Blinders, shades, bifocals, I don’t give a goddamn anymore what the excuse is, but unless Americans WAKE THE FUCK UP they are destined for the dustbin of history along with the Romans… unfortunately they seem hell bent on taking a whole shit load of us with them.
Speak up. And I really mean SPEAK UP. The bullshit arguments about the megaphone that is dkos are so fucking lame I don’t even have the words. Ummm… the ONLY megaphone they have is the one we give them. They are only the biggest and the baddest “Democratic” site because we KEEP FUCKING POSTING THERE AND TALKING ABOUT THEM. We give Markos his power. We allow him to sell his version of what the netroots is. We don’t call foul. Why? Because we’ve been successfully marginalized as the “fringe left”. As much by the MSM as by Kos himself… hell he fucking purged large numbers of that ‘fringe’ and then because of ‘marketing’ concerns, or camraderie, the other actually liberal blogs silenced people. And now we have our own version of diary police to tell us when we’re out of line…. November 2004 all over again.
Yes. This is A HUGE CONCERN AND A VERY VALID TOPIC FOR DEBATE AS KOS IS CLAIMING HE SPEAKS FOR YOU. FOR ME. FOR THE MAJORITY. I don’t let anyone speak for me thank you very much, be his name Hannity, or Coulter, or Rove or Moulitas. I’m just fringe that way.
And to say that Kos is the ‘mainstream’, as if that’s something to be lauded, is just pathetic.
I was going to write my own post the last few weeks, but, why bother, the echo chamber is so much more palatable.
– I do think Boo’s post was well reasoned, and in usual Boo fashion, on point, but I think it’s high past the time to be talking about embracing the right wing as the centre and REALLY about time to start marginalizing the actual fringe elements of the Dem party… i.e. the Republicans who miss their Grand Ol’ Party and are too lazy to start a new one and instead have decided to take over ours… and by that I mean daily kos (and I say “ours” as a Canuck who never decided, yet, to get US citizenship… take it for what you will. I always said I’d get citizenship if Al Gore ran again, so you never know….).
In many ways daily KOS is part of the mainstream media these days and certainly gives a well sanitized section of opinions. None of these opinions are particularly radical and seem mostly to try and fit in with appeasing slightly unhappy right wingers. Shame. Still I guess it gives an ability to cozy up to the Dem party rather than to try to change anything.
Surprise!
Posters at Booman Tribune = not Ann Coulter or trolls. Tell your leadership.
TEMPEST IN A TEAPOT.
In addition to your fine message, I think that too needs to be passed on.
about how DKos is no better than Republicanism, and “Kos doesn’t speak for you any more than Rove does”–this is atrocious, you guys.
It’s funny how in two separate diaries, one person makes fun of Plutonium Page’s comparison of this site’s vitriolic criticism of DKos to Ann Coulter, while shortly thereafter someone else here calls DKos “pure evil.”
I guess after being here a year I have a somewhat more detached view.
What we’re seeing in this diary is that hubris calls forth its own nemesis – and I don’t mean that in a name calling way, but rather that actions have consequences – when you banish people and say “good riddance” they and their opinions don’t just evaporate.
Or as Jung might say, we all create our own shadows.
Booman is handling things in a very commendable manner – the fewer the restrictions, the fewer the resentments built up. How many well-known posters have left here other than on friendly terms? Five? Ten? Hardly a pie shop.
The two sites really do serve different purposes. There, the issues serve the party; here, most folks would generally say the party must serve the issues, or it has no reason to exist.
Both sites might serve useful functions – nothing of any consequence arises for no reason whatsoever; the universe doesn’t work that way – so both sites are in effect focusing energies in the zeitgeist, albeit different energies. Perhaps instead of only vilifying DKos our time might be well spent considering if there’s a way to use it to our benefit. The efforts of some on this site to cross-post items or suggest when visits to Big Orange are called for to support some specific end may be the first steps as we (so far instinctively more than by conscious thought) coevolve some kind of long-term relationship that is more nuanced than spitting at each other.
In the long haul, if the Democrats are going to be “evil lite” and DKos is tied too closely to them, he will have bought into their fate. That’s what it seems to me that AG is saying.
“If you can’t answer a man’s arguments, all is not lost; you can still call him vile names.”
— Elbert Hubbard
It’s funny how in two separate diaries, one person makes fun of Plutonium Page’s comparison of this site’s vitriolic criticism of DKos to Ann Coulter, while shortly thereafter someone else here calls DKos “pure evil.”
PP has been comparing the women at this site to Ann Coulter and accusing us of sociopathy since the pie wars. As far as I can tell no one has mentioned to her that she’s a bit over the top. Ever. Making fun of Plutonium Page and her husband Frank is long overdue.
The ‘pure evil’ comment did not generate 16 4’s and a great deal of agreement and advice that DK ‘clean up it’s site’ like PP’s comment did. Perhaps you are lecturing people at the wrong blog.
The ‘leadership’ at DKos does not speak for me and they are not my allies.
Y’know what I find, “funny”, hekebolos?
The apparent low reading comprehension abilities of most dKos woof dogs.
I found it funny…funny as in evincing the laugh that does not mean “ha ha”..when I tussled with DHinMI and his hyenas on dKos, and I find it funny now.
Suspicious “funny”, as often as not. Like an intelligent debater who twists the facts on purpose because he finds himself assigned to a given side of an argument.
But sometimes just plain stupid.
If there is ANY comparison to be made between people like Ann Coulter and any leftish situations, it is between the right wing attack dogs and people like the clever little man on Air America who mistakenly imagines that soon he will be Senator Franken from the Great State of Minnesota if he can JUST suck up hard enough to the DNC.
And those cynics in the Democratic Party…like the leadership of dKos, like James Carvillle…who are willing to compromise their “principles” (if indeed they have any principles, which on the evidence is becoming more and more doubtful) in the name of pragmatism.
And as far as calling dKos “pure evil”…please show me where I did that.
I think that the tactic of triangulation espoused by the leaders of dKos and its inevitably centrist results will HELP the purely evil system now in place rather than hurt it. I think that they are tactically incorrect. I think that they are STRATEGICALLY incorrect as well, in that they do not seem to understand (witness the over-the-top symbolic choices made at Ykos…Las Vegas!!!??? Give me a break!!!) that the days of economic imperialism and of 1/10th of the population of the world consuming 9/10ths of its resources are seriously numbered. And I am neither convinced nor NOT convinced of the sincerity of the entire power structure over there. I simply do not know what is really going on in all of their heads, because of course there IS no way to know that. Are there Republican or BushCo-allied intelligence moles working at dKos? Do not categorically tell me that there are not, because just as I cannot tell what is going on in all of their minds, neither can you. What I CAN say without a shadow of a doubt is that WHAT THEY ARE DOING IS GOING TO FALL WAY SHORT OF WHAT IS NEEDED TO EFFECTIVELY CHANGE THINGS FOR THE BETTER IN THE UNITED STATES AT THE PRESENT TIME.
But “pure evil”? As a general wash over the whole dKos fence?
Hardly.
A few quotes from my diary for your remedial reading pleasure and instruction:
Here. (Orange versus Green)
I have many disagreements with this tactic…
“I have many disagreements with this tactic.”
Not “This tactic is the spawn of hellishly evil forces.”
And then I went to quite clearly enumerate the REASONS for my disagreement.
It is what YOU make of it.
No, Jerome.
Be honest, please. You are too smart to say that in good faith.
It is what its bosses ALLOW “us” to make of it.
Is their tactic a winning one?
We shall see.
I doubt it.
It will be Plan A or Plan A Lite in both 2006 and 2008. BOTH Blood For Oil, economic imperialist strategies. Just different tactics.
And BOTH paths suck.
Could ANY tactic short of a complete break with the mainstream, corporate owned American system be a winning one if it opposed the far right/center/don’t-give-a-shit-just-don’t-wake-me-up coalition which is held together here in the U.S. by the glue of a bought and sold media? {SUPER glue, it is, if you have not noticed.)
I doubt it very much.
Translation for those who must move their lips when reading:
“The tactic is wrong.”
Not “This tactic was hatched in hell.”
It is…as has been the tactical approach of almost every halfwayer in the Democratic Party except Charmin’ Bill (Who got over on his sex appeal…errr, I mean, “charisma”…if you really want to know the truth of the matter.) since at LEAST Humbert “Humpty Hump Hump” Humphry…simply ineffective.
As in…
BRAAAAACK!!! YOU LOSE!!! AGAIN.
Economic imperialism IS “evil”.
Evil personified.
The Blood For Oil War is an INSTRUMENT of that evil.
Warner…and ALL the others who do not openly oppose it?
Dark side, baby.
Dark side.
Maybe here is where the disconnect happened.
The old hippie saying?
“If you are not part of the solution then you are part of the problem?”
Well…60 million hippies can’t ALL be wrong, either.
In the classic vampire myths…and real, long-lived myth is simply truth expressed in a manner that the non-analytical among us (an eternal majority, for better OR for worse) can more easily handle…the Renfields and suffering virgins turned vampire whores are NOT “evil” per se.
Just weak, good-hearted people who through no fault of anything but their own genetics fall for the blandishments of the disguised and always clever Evil One and end up helping him to press his nefarious schemes forward.
Yup.
But Pure Evil?
I repeat.
I’ve got two words for you, and they AIN’T Happy Birthday.
All the rest?
Either minor devils or Renfields.
(Often it is devilishly hard to tell the difference.)
I once again rest my case.
Go back to the orange castle, hekebelos.
This line won’t wash out here in the open.
The sun is out over here, and it is by all indications not going to go in any time soon..
AG
I never said you did. But others most certainly have.
“Orange Castle”? Wow. DKos is not your enemy–Republicans are your enemy.
Such antipathy.
“Republicans” are NOT my enemy.
Corporate America is my enemy.
And yours too.
No matter WHAT guise it takes.
AG
DKos is not your enemy–Republicans are your enemy.
Go lecture this guy.
Why? Like trying to negotiate with the Godwin’s Law Party… waste of time and pixels.
“There are none so blind as they who will not see.”
I mean, c’mon. Took less than ten minutes at orange to realize that the majority of the posters there fill the entire range from center-right to neocon to white-robe US Christofascist. Let them play in their egotrip echo chamber; let’s get on with getting our country back. They’re not going to help, so heck with `em.
Take a look at my diary history and tell me what side of the aisle I fall on.
Would you classify me as a neocon or a Christofascist?
Sheer insanity.
Take a look at my diary history and tell me what side of the aisle I fall on.
Please. This is the second thread I’ve read where you insist on thinking these conversations are about you. They’re not even remotely about you.
I happen am evolved enough and intelligent enough to understand where Booman is coming from when he discusses the language of the street and sports etc.
Words like Pussy, Girly-man and Fag are obviously not for polite company but the outrage expressed by DiHinMI and the others at Dkos over this is just downright prudish. Sure it’s wrong to use this kind of language, but Booman shows a lot of intellectual honesty in admitting that he has used the language, just like the rest of us I am sure have at one time or another.
Where do these people who now dominate dKos live? A Bubble? Utopia?
Give me a break!
WAY out of line. That’s all I’ll say. WAY out of line.
You sound like a freaking LaRouchie.
and strange that calculated style and eager lieutenant authority sounds outside its own realm.
I had to look that one up, but I figured it out. LaRouchie, I guess some folks would understand that, but not me. The more I get to know you the more I’m convinced you’re not real… you’re just a tired cliche.
Well, it certainly does seem sophomoric…
It will be Plan A or Plan A Lite in both 2006 and 2008. BOTH Blood For Oil, economic imperialist strategies. Just different tactics.
This is the essence, right here. All the parties allowed in the political arena stand wholeheartedly for evil: Competent evil vs. incompetent evil. I have no dog in this fight. Nothing will change until evil itself is proven a failure. That will happen.
You will know when that happens. It won’t be pretty. The America you remember will be long gone.
The America you remember will be long gone.
I fear that you are right, Gaianne.
A: I think that it would be a very good idea.
Yup.
Too late now, I think.
AG
it will run its course faster. ugh, what an idea.
Helping evil could be a mistake: It is best not to be too clever.
Better to hold to the good, find real friends, and wait. And speak out–it is not yet to risky for that–but not naively.
For several years now, it has looked like evil might soon turn, yet it has not happened. Why not? We have been counting on America’s decency, but could we have been underestimating America’s deep-rooted selfishness? That is what I suspect now: As long as the gas flows, Americans will care about nothing else.
But the flow of gas is precisely what is going to change; and I have no influence over that at all: I can only notice what geology has decided.
And then a new day will come, for those who are ready.
Does that explain my thought? You may be right.
Signs-of-the-Times is a bit to hot to handle perhaps, but I have been intrigued by their material on Ponerology (science of evil). I wish somebody could comment on that.
Start your own movement dammit…and quit your bellyaching.
Your disappointment with dailykos is heard loud and clear.
America will not reform itself because not enough good people took action…
That is what history will remember.
I am doing what i can within the limitations of my own position in the world.
As are we all.
This weekend I played some of the music that could literally be used to heal this culture as best as I possibly can.
I also gave a young minority member (Who is scuffling his ASS off to learn how to play.) what will hopefully be a literally revolutionary two hour lesson on his instrument.
Free.
And I sit here trying to help this little movement remain untainted by co-option.
Again.,..hours and hours. Free. From someone who quite purposely
lives at the lower end of the lower-middle class/working class level economically.
Had I stayed with my political leanings in the ’60s + ’70s…I would be in a different position.
Quite possibly in prison.
But I did not.
So here I am, doing what I can.
And I respectfully request that you and all of the other people who have over the last year written similar missives to me about what I am doing to quit YOUR bellyaching.
We are ALL doing what we can.
No more, no less.
AG
which type of darkness do you prefer. The Republicans have come out and stated their goals right up front. Hitler did the same thing in Mien Kampt. The Democrats are more like Hitler lite. They are unwilling to state that they in effect wish for the same things the Republicans want.
Both parties want one thing. To own and control it all. This is what the real fight is about. Who gets to own and control it all. This still leaves 90% of the population out of the loop to be victimized over and over again. All that will change is the names and the faces.
Right now the names are Bush and his henchmen. It could have easily been Gore and henchmen. Neither choice would do anything for the common good of all Americans. It is all bullshit with one purpose that creates the Orwellian Society of total control.
Dkos is just another form of control. A very subtle one, but a control none the less. The people who truly care about the word Democracy and Social Progress are now the real Enemies of The State.
This is a war that is being waged on very concept of Democracy.
It is a war being waged that can be summed up as acquiring Cheap Raw Materials using Cheap Labor to make Cheap Products the public will buy so Corporations can make Massive Corporate Profits without Any Accountability for the Destruction it causes to Society, The Environment and Real World Economies.
This is the real war and they are winning as America is kept asleep at the wheel by division, deception, misdirection and outright lies by all the players in a postion of control.
You write:
“The Democrats are more like Hitler lite.”
More like Neville “Peace In Our Time” Chamberlain, actually.
Once again, from the I Ching:
Yup.
I watched several minutes of Gore on HeartAttack Larry’s show last night. (Just looking for my favorite downhome bluegrass show. Really. On that there Farm Channel. Cumberland something…)
Sumpin’ REALLY WRONG about THAT boy.
Same thing that was wrong in 2000.
Dunno exactly what it is, but if he was selling me something…I wouldn’t buy it no matter HOW good it seemed on a logical level.
Like General Clark and Governor Warner and Senator Small K kerry.
John-Boy Edwards, too.
Sumpin’ WRONG about THEM fellas.
Ah kin SMELL it.
HEAR it, too. (Us hillbillys is NOTORIOUSLY polymorphous perverse. Yup. An’ we kin READ, too.)
They singin’ the right melodies…sorta…
But thet high harmony part?
Ain’t happenin’ right.
“NEXT!!!
AG
They all have links to the petrol dollars so whatever does anybody expect them to really represent. It’s not the People that’s for sure.
Your right about the Peace in Our Time quote. That is what makes it so scary when dealing with the Democrats. Republicans are stated Fascist Petty Tyrants and are proud of it too.
Somebody pinch me. I would really like all this to be a very bad dream.
Great stuff here, AG.
The immediate next hexagram after the one you quote also seems scarily relevant for our current situation:
I guess my only difference with you is that I don’t hold it personally against Kos in that if it wasn’t him filling that role, it would be someone else. The constellation of power makes it inevitable that such a site would arise from the blogosphere; if it wasn’t at that web address it would simply be somewhere else. He didn’t create it all himself; he put out a particular banner that others, powerful and weak, thronged to. It’s all a part of the cycle playing itself out, as you describe. The poisons take time to flush from the system.
In time, things come to fruition.
Believe it or not…I do not hold it “personally” against ANYONE.
All the way up to and including Butch and his handlers.
Nuthin’ personal. It’s just business.
The business of automatic action as it is mandated by genetic makeup.
Sperm meets egg?
Bada BING!!!
Mother Tersea, Julian of Norwich, Dick Cheney, Hitler and all of the others in between and around them as well.
The great hunting and warrior societies ALL understood this, at their highest level.
You do not hate the enemy.
The prey.
The opposition.
You simply fight as you must to survive.
If I often use hostile humor on these people, it is because humor of that sort is a weapon that I believe could be most effective in this particular situation. I think that they could quite literally be LAUGHED out of office by the right campaigner. JFK beat Nixon on good humor as much as on anything else.
But is it personal?
No.
Except in this way.
Jimmy Breslin used to say that all politics are local..
Well…all politics…all COMBAT situations, on any level…are personal, too.
Bet on it.
May the best evolutionary tactic win.
VAYA!!!
Later…
AG
thought I’d wonder over here this morning since I can’t get on dk without getting bumped. BTW markos has diary about problems on site and some possible bannings.
The guy who starts this sub thread is your main site problem. Deal with him
Kos’s Cheney, I think.
ONE of them, anyway.
AG
This we can agree on.
…I will not risk what little liberty I have left, and what little property I have acquired, merely to fight for the lesser of two evils.
I will fight–but only for a just and noble cause.
Where are the leaders who call upon me to restore our Constitutional liberties of free speech? Of being secure in our homes against warrantless searches and wiretaps?
Who thunders against our government setting up torture chambers across the globe?
Who speaks up for the right of women to control their own bodies, and for the religious convictions of all peoples to be respected?
Who speaks against the depredations of the corporations against the working class?
Who speaks in favor of protection of our natural environment, the water we drink and the air we breathe?
These are the people I will gladly follow. These are the people for whom I will risk all that I have.