Apparently Wall Street’s lobbyists are a little pissy at the Democrats. That’s a good thing, I think.
I have to admit to being kind of shocked that we are a month into #OWS and no one has pointed out that THIS is how you move the Overton window. Not by writing whiny blog posts about how Obama let you down. Now if we can just focus this energy into primary challenges and swing the Democratic members of the money party to the left…
El Cid
__
Probably because it seemed unnecessary to point it out.
Any more than it was necessary to point out that the instinctual condemnation of these hippies as useless and counterproductive needed pointing out once reality intervened.
FormerSwingVoter
FUCK YES.
If Wall Street is scared, then you’re doing the right thing.
Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen
Bu-but, the whiny blog posts INSPIRED the members of OWS. I mean, the protestors’ signs have words, blog posts have words. QED.
El Cid
@Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen: That could be the case; it also seems just as empirically unsupported to assume that urges for get-out-the vote campaigns inspired them either.
More than likely, those among the OWS who followed and commented in blogs included a spread of such types and positions in between or largely unrelated.
Kola Noscopy
Christ, Cole, do you have any self-awareness at all? You were shitting on these protesters four weeks ago. Now you’re all about knowing how it’s done…please.
singfoom
Well, since one of the more common things I hear around OWS is that we need to remove the corrupting influence of big corporate money from our politics, and the lobbyists are the bagmen in that entire system, I would expect them to whine.
Their entire way of life is under attack by OWS. I can only hope OWS continues to be there moving this conversation and that said lobbyists continue to have a sad.
In fact, I hope said lobbyists become unemployed* (*This would be a result of cleaning up our politics in terms of corporate money, which would require legislation by those receiving the money, so I find it unlikely, but who knows, who will be the first politician to renounce any money from Wall Street and its lobbyists? Even though OWS would never endorse them, many people would connect the two anyway….)
JC
You know, the ‘OWS’ here in San Francisco, is no great shakes. You’ve got a really intelligent 5-10%, you’ve got a lot more of the normal Golden Gate Park and Tenderloin panhandlers who have moved, for now, to the OWS, you’ve got the faux pissy hippies.
Yes, it is better than kvetching on a blog, the way I’m doing. And the good 5-10% are awesome.
Something better than nothing!
MBunge
@El Cid: “Probably because it seemed unnecessary to point it out.”
Considering how many whiny blog posts about how Obama let you down were written before OWS started, I’m not sure you know what “unnecessary” means.
Mike
gttim
Yes! This is how you move the Overton Window. That is how the Tea Party and the GOP loyalists have done it. We need more!
Kola Noscopy
Pathetic.
Why the hell would anyone who supports OWS vote Democratic? There would have been no need for OWS if Obama and the Dems had done anything in the last three years to crack down on WS and the banks! OWS is a reaction against establishment Dems as much as Republicans. Do you seriously pretend to not know that?
El Cid
@MBunge: Considering that this blog has a set of commenters just as equally masturbatorily focused on a tiny number of whining bloggers or blog commenters, I’m not sure you know what “considering” means.
cat
Your right, they just sprung up overnight hatched from the unspoken desires to be free. (I just read American Gods)
I mean, its not like they congregated online with other like minded people for months and months prior organizing and building a community.
They totally just thought, Hey! Lets put on a Protest to save the USA!
Linda Featheringill
I thought about the Overton window a couple of days ago but didn’t comment on it because that term is on my list of pet peeves. :-(
However, OWS has certainly changed the topic of discussion around the country. :-)
And you may be quite correct in that the way to change the discussion is to actually get out and do something.
Cat Lady
This might be a good time for Obama to remind the banksters yet again that he’s the only thing between them and the mob, and they can choose to make it easy on themselves or make it hard, because their shtick has gotten old and the mob outside is restless and the party’s over and the good pickings are gone and there’s a giant turd in the punchbowl and the lights are all being turned up and their credit cards are maxed out and the bouncers can’t be trusted.
So go ahead banksters, complain loudly for all to hear about how the Democrats are the problem, because we shall know you by your whine and add you to the list.
Thoughtcrime
And the Greedy One Percent are pissy at Obama for talking about his jobs bill:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/10/18/1027668/-Republican-Party-demands-President-Obama-stop-talking-about-his-jobs-bill?detail=hide&via=blog_1
And that’s a good thing.
slag
@El Cid:
Let’s not overstate the case here. The numbers may be tiny. But the percentages are fairly high.
Linda Featheringill
@Cat Lady: #14
Knit one, purl two.
beltane
@Cat Lady: Yes, now that an actual mob has materialized it might be a good time for Obama to reiterate this.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kola Noscopy:
IIRC, Cole changed his mind about OWS THREE weeks ago.
OK, now you can, understandably, accuse him of being an OvenMitt type, constantly changing his position based on what group he’s addressing today: teatard lackwits or fellow top 1% parasites, but the thing is, Cole has a HISTORY of admitting that he was wrong about something, not changing position and refusing to acknowledge the change.
Unlike OvenMitt.
But then again, why am I bothering to attempt to persuade one of the perpetual trolls around here? He might not be as lost a cause as the vile apologist for Wahhabists who let girls die in a fire, but he’s demonstrated some of the same obtuseness as aforementioned m_c.
Corner Stone
@Cat Lady:
In what respect, Charlie?
Trurl
He still thinks the answer is “better Democrats”. I’d say your question has already been answered.
amk
@Kola Noscopy: hey, my-head-in-my-ass guy. wall street hates dems. ows hates dems, you claim. So next logical step – they should form an alliance a la that firebagger gaunt lady and grover fucking norquist, right ? asshole.
cat
@Kola Noscopy:
I believe, probably wrongly, in a lot of states election laws dictate a much higher bar to get onto the ballot if you are not affiliated with ‘recognized’ parties.
There is also the problem with our system at the state and federal level not being really cut out for a parlimentary system of multiple parties.
And you have almost zero leverage to play the Dem/GOP against each other since it would be suicide to throw in with the GOP.
Ask the LibDem’s how siding with the Tory party over Labour has worked out for them.
Corner Stone
I had to check the byline on this one a couple times because I couldn’t believe it wasn’t a post by The Dougerhead.
geg6
@Kola Noscopy:
You really are stupid. The vast majority of people who were/are at our local Occupy event are union members. They vote and they plan to continue to do so. And, sadly for you, they plan to vote Obama.
David M
@Kola Noscopy: The alternative to voting Democratic is voting Republican, so yeah it’s obvious who OWS should be supporting.
Now working to increase instant runoff voting to provide a more liberal alternative to the Dems without supporting the GOP is a reasonable idea.
Villago Delenda Est
@geg6:
I doubt they’ll vote for union-busting asshat Nader.
cat
@Corner Stone: I had to check the byline on this one a couple times because I couldn’t believe it wasn’t a post by The Dougerhead.
John Cole
@Kola Noscopy: I was whining about a picture of a drum circle with some clown beating on a detached limb. That is it. I even repeatedly said “At least they are fucking doing something.” But my concern was they would just be dismissed.
Fortunately, the NYPD decided to go ballistic and start hosing people down with pepper spray, it got media attention, and spread.
I’m too lazy to look up the post now, but I guarantee I was not shitting on the idea of legitimate anger at Wall Street and our Galtian Overlords. I was concerned it would be dismissed because of antics like that and the guy shitting on a cop car.
I have lots of ability to self-reflect. You should examine your inability to do anything but attribute the absolute worst to me.
fasteddie9318
I was going to move the Overton Window, but it’s still covered with Glenn Beck’s poop from back when he used to smear his adult diaper on it on teevee every day at 5 Eastern. I’m not touching it, sorry.
I applaud the instinct that the correct response to a post like this is to bitch about how everybody else doesn’t “get it.” Nothing changes the world faster than intra-party pissing matches. NOTHING.
ArchPundit
Fucking Amen.
Or just bitch and moan.
JPL
@John Cole: What part of Don’t Feed the Trolls do you not understand?
Trurl
Do those Obama 2012 union members at OWS know about the free trade pacts with which he’s about to sodomize them again?
Talk about stupid…
Villago Delenda Est
@John Cole:
This comes to mind at once:
If wishes were horses, rides would be free
If Cronkite were Huntley, we’d watch NBC!
fasteddie9318
@Kola Noscopy:
I, for one, hope they all vote for Herb Cain, but mostly in a “theater of the absurd” kind of way.
Bago
I like the Greedy One Percent formulation. It encapsulates the “we will knowingly sell you defective products” impetus demonstrated by Goldman Sachs.
MBunge
@El Cid: “Considering that this blog has a set of commenters just as equally masturbatorily focused on a tiny number of whining bloggers or blog commenters, I’m not sure you know what “considering” means.”
I’m not sure Paul Krugman, Glenn Greenwald, Atrios, Digby and the folks at FDL would appreciate you dismissing their efforts like that.
I am sure you personally know what “masturbatorily” means.
Mike
ArchPundit
/irony
Self-awareness fail.
dmsilev
@Thoughtcrime: John McCain really is eaten up inside with jealousy and hatred that he lost to Obama, isn’t he?
david mizner
Actually, a lot us were pointing this out at the same time you were smearing the protestors as “trustafarians.”
You’re almost always wrong, but what makes you worth reading is that you change your mind.
Joel
@JC: I think it’s worth keeping this in mind…
Ash Can
@Villago Delenda Est: Yeah, old Fingers-Up-the-Ass is just farting in public, to get attention and offend people. Some people are just that way.
FlipYrWhig
@cat:
How much of a link is there between OWS and any of the blogosphere’s major ports of call? Jesse LaGraca (sp?) is a Kossack, that I remember. But apart from that, what has Big Blog’s role been? My sense has been that it’s rather limited — but I can’t point to anything in particular that serves as a basis for that sense.
lacp
@Cat Lady: When the president told the banksters that he was all that stood between them and the torches-and-pitchforks crew, I didn’t think he was warning them, I thought he was reassuring them. Guess all of our different views depend on what kind of glasses we’ve decided to wear. I tend to wear my paranoid lefty ones most of the time.
The Moar You Know
@fasteddie9318: Big ups for citing the best journalist of all time.
Still miss him.
cleek
@david mizner:
the makeup of the protests has changed from the first week, yes ?
Derfbot 9000
Who is we, Doomer Cole?
Where is Chicken Little John Galt Cole on the issue of primary challenges to Joe Manchin? Where’s your work on this?
Oh wait, that’s right. Nowhere. Nothing but talk. Half empty chest puffing, half emo. All idiot.
slag
@John Cole:
This is true. Tony Baloney has become a false American hero.
rikryah
this can’t be a shock to anyone….
I mean, come on
Trurl
Well, now that Obama has paid polite lip service to OWS, you can’t expect a dutiful foot-soldier like Cole to continue bashing them.
cat
@Trurl:
So they can stay home and get the guy who will sign the trade agreements AND curtail union rights or they can vote for the guy whose just going to sign the trade agreements.
Yeah, staying home and not voting is the stupid thing to do….
FlipYrWhig
@lacp:
Really? That’s a CLEAR warning, I think. “I’m the only thing between you and the rampaging villagers, so count yourselves lucky I’m around.”
Triassic Sands
And not by writing whiny blog posts complaining about people who write whiny blog posts about how Obama let them down.
Mr Stagger Lee
@Trurl: There is strategy that advocates voting the Democrats, warts and all, in 2012.
But beginning in 2013 start a new movement(or evolve OWS) into a political power that will challenge the failed GOP/Democratic merry go round in 2016.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Kola Noscopy: Because, butt camera, in a two party system, you have to get at least one of the parties to move your way for your goals to be implemented, and only one party has done that: The Democrats.
Yutsano
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): He has proudly declared he is above the system and does not vote. So why should we listen to him again?
singfoom
John, you might want to show your support this way: http://occupybanner.wordpress.com/
Thoughtcrime
@dmsilev:
Yes, it is excellent news for John McCain!
PeakVT
Frankly, I see this as a good thing, though NYC-area Dems might not.
YoohooCthulhu
Actually, judging from the number of protesters, I’d be shocked if there was really any overlap between the whiny firebag blog posters. The firebaggers don’t represent a significant fraction of any meatspace community.
cat
@FlipYrWhig:
I’m not getting what you are saying?
Blogs are ineffective tools of community and movement building because Big Blogs didn’t have any role in OWS genesis?
I’m really at a loss.
slag
@Triassic Sands: Agreed. So shall we roll the tape:
More tape:
singfoom
@Mr Stagger Lee: This seems the only practical way forward within the constraints of our political system. OWS is moving the conversation to the left.
It is too close to 2012 for a Presidential primary and that would just make the Republicans win in 2012 anyway.
Once the 2012 election is over, then things will really start to get interesting.
boss bitch
Yeah right. They want this but they don’t want to put in the work for it. I don’t even think they know how because it would have been done long time ago.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
I left a comment on DK about how this was more in line with Obama’s statement “make me do it,” rather than people posting messages on a blog.
david mizner
@cleek:
Well, they’ve grown but the hardcore campers are still pretty much the same — the same demo, anyway. I’ve been down to there a few times now, and I’m always struck by just how, well, alternative the core group members are. Modern day hippies, absolutely. It looks very much like anti-globalization protests.
Most progressive — unlike Cole (and Booman and others) who immediately disparaged the effort — have known for years that our least bad hope is protest politics and civil disobedience. So our initial reaction was, fuck, yeah! Not: those privileged young people are wasting their time.
Paul in KY
@Cat Lady: Unfortunately, they won’t believe him. They truly think they are way past a period of time in which a mob would literally string them up.
I can understand why they would believe that.
Judas Escargot
@Kola Noscopy:
Because it’s been mathematically proven that winner-takes-all voting converges to a two party system. Every. Single. Time.
And the GOP certainly isn’t going to help them.
Lockewasright
And not even a hint of comprehension that the Overton window defines the limits of what is possible at any given moment in politics. Just anger at the president for running into the edge of it and getting what he could within it. The polling data says that a VERY lopsided majority of democrats want this president to be the nominee for 2012. It’s not about this president letting people down. It’s about the Overton Window needing shifted so that he can accomplish more. You know enough to mention the Overton Window, but don’t want to acknowledge its presence when the president doesn’t magically present you with a pony 5 minutes after inauguration. Ridiculous.
Kola Noscopy
@Yutsano:
Hey asswipe! Not that it matters to anyone’s right to express their political views in this country, but I re-registered to vote as a Dem here in Boston for the sole purpose of voting for Elizabeth Warren. I want to feel a few moments of pleasure after her election before she goes off to D.C. to be co-opted by the establishment Dems and told how things REALLY work around there.
So, I guess now that I’m registered again this automatically makes everything I say correct…or something.
boss bitch
@Cat Lady:
No, this is the perfect time for Obama to say, “I told you so”. Then he should give Wall St. the peace sign and get back on his bus tour.
Roger Moore
@David M:
While I like the idea of alternative voting systems, there are good reasons to think that IRV is a bad choice. It’s nice in that it’s easy to explain to people and is reasonably similar to a conventional runoff, but that means it many of the problems you see with conventional runoff systems. It has the added disadvantage of making voting more complicated, which is a serious drawback in places where people have to vote on more than a dozen different races. If you’re going to go to the trouble of using a ranked preferential system, you might as well use one of the Condorcet methods. If you want something simple and comprehensible, you could try approval voting.
Yutsano
@boss bitch:
I think he more or less just did that.
@Kola Noscopy: So I’m supposed to congratulate you for waking up and doing your civic duty again. Forgive me for not busting out the ticker tape parade.
BGinCHI
I hope that when these fuckers DO jump, they take a lobbyist with them for a little conversation on the way down.
David Koch
Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…..
That’s the problem with Republican turncoats, like Cole — they give away our best secrets (AND FOR FREE!).
different-church-lady
@BGinCHI:
A Wall Street trader, a lobbyist, and a telemarketer are standing on a window ledge, and the lobbyist says…
MTiffany
FWIW, Olbermann made that observation last night on countdown. TBS, I thought the Overton window only moved rightward?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Judas Escargot: One of my college professors described it as the only law in Political Science.
Turgidson
@cat:
Obama also at least pretends to care about including worker displacement assistance in free trade bills (not sure if they stayed in the final versions of the recently-passed bills – I assume the GOP and their Blue Dog lackeys cut them out and Obama didn’t fight it?). That’s an improvement over Clinton and Bush, even if I’d also prefer that we just cool it with the free trade bills for the moment.
David M
@Roger Moore: The specific mechanism isn’t too important to me, as long as it’s fairly simple. Main point is be able to vote 3rd party without benfiting the GOP.
NonyNony
Can I just say – could you imagine what a time traveling John Cole from, oh, say a decade ago would think of this sentence?
I’m not mocking with this either. A time-traveling NonyNony from 2 decades ago would be denouncing my ass as a sociamalist bastard (though I would hope that even 20-something me would look at how fucked up the country is right now and realize he was dead wrong). Still – do you ever dig through your archives and wonder “what the fuck was I thinking?” (I mean other than the more recent examples where you link back to something you posted a couple of weeks ago with a “what the fuck was I thinking” post. I mean the DEEP archives – the really embarrassing ones).
ETA: Grod-damned filter and it’s hatred for socialiamism…..
boss bitch
@Turgidson:
Why don’t you find out instead of assuming? All you gotta do is Google FFS!:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/13/business/trade-bills-near-final-chapter.html?pagewanted=all
Napoleon
@Turgidson:
@boss bitch:
It took as long as it did to pass because BO actually drew a line in the sand on the issue. Thankfully he didn’t make the same error Clinton did and think that the job assistance would be passed at a later date.
FlipYrWhig
@cat:
I thought it was pretty clear, but I’ll back up and try again. I take John’s comment about “whiny blog posts” to be referring to particular precincts of the blogosphere rather than the sum total of blogging and social media. In that case, the distinction he’s drawing is between “whiny blog posts” of the Firedoglake or DailyKos diary variety and actual street-level action. I’m asking, because I don’t know, the degree to which the blogs that position themselves as the vanguard of real progressive action have had anything to do with OccupyWallStreet and its success. If OWS used blogs, but not those blogs, then, great, but that’s not really the issue at hand, IMHO.
I guess it all depends if the operative contrast John (and we) want to draw is between street protest and blogging-in-general as tools for advancing progressive politics, or between street protest and blogging-about-how-Obama-done-us-wrong.
Roger Moore
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
Not quite. There’s also the converse, which is that pure proportional representation results in a bunch of special interest parties.
gogol's wife
@Kola Noscopy:
I can’t wait to see the vitriol you spew the first moment Elizabeth Warren says something you don’t like.
lacp
@gogol’s wife: I bet she already has…..
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/10/elizabeth-warrens-job-plan-war-with-iran.html
cat
@Turgidson:
Factory closings devestate whole region’s economies. A big stable union shop can feed a whole town of eateries and non-walmart shopping.
Worker displacement assistance is a lie.
FlipYrWhig
@gogol’s wife: I’d be shocked if Warren doesn’t believe in humanitarian-intervention kinds of warfare. If I’m right about that, some of the supporters aren’t going to like it very much.
boss bitch
President Obama in Interview with Jake Tapper:
Liberty60
It is amazing to watch the old “first they ignore us..” thing happen in real time.
A month ago, they were ignoring and ridiculing OWS, now all the bobbleheads are desperately seeking its meaning, and even Eric Cantor is proclaiming how he absolutely agrees with them, that taxes must be cut!
Joe Max
THIS! This this this this this…
The anti-Vietnam War movement succeeded in making the general populace THINK about what was happening, regardless of whether or not they joined the marches.
The anti-war types kept pushing things like Mai Lai, Agent Orange, napalm bombing and “we had to destroy the village to save it” to the forefront, so the dumbed-down masses eventually had to say, “well, I’m no DFH, but herding innocent people into a ditch and executing them is NOT GOOD.” Then the Pentagon Papers come out and people say, “WTF???”
Same happened with the Abu Gharib photos – it was the turning point in support by the public for the Iraq War.
OWS’s job is to keep pointing out what is NOT GOOD. This gives sympathetic politicians COVER, so when the lobbyist from Citibank comes around, they can say, “look, I’d love to help you guys with more deregulation, but right now, you are TOXIC. Don’t you read the news?”
Dave
Not by writing whiny blog posts about how Obama let you down
You don’t move the Overton Window by writing blog posts. Period.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
Fortunately, writing whiny blog posts about how everyone picking on President Obama when he is entirely blameless – just one Fierce Unitary Executive and Good Man droning women and children extra-judicially – is a racist, help tremendously also too.
.
.
cat
@FlipYrWhig:
That distinction was not clear via the post as none of the sites were mentioned, but now that you mention specific websites I see the point you were trying to make.
Its still a trolly rhetorical point though as you can make weepy Obama stole my unicorn emoprog blog posts while actually doing crap. BJ conventional wisdom is that anyone who makes weepy Obama stole my unicorn emoprog blog posts is a useless wanker which I’m willing to bet isn’t true.
Satanicpanic
Christ, do we have to start talking about the overton window again?
Southern Beale
I don’t know about that Overton Window stuff. The Republican Party has decided now is the perfect time to permanently lower corporate taxes by revamping our international tax structure.
BGinCHI
In case you ate something poisonous and need to throw up:
(via TPM)
Hey Eric, go fuck yourself.
Bill E Pilgrim
Huh. Funny, I thought it was a demonstration that all the assertions that the whole idea of Overton windows is silly and the Republicans and Blue Dogs will never be swayed so why try to move the arguments to the left at all and they’ll only get mad and punish anyone who tries were all a crock of shit. As well as it being what you said. Too.
Just goes to show you I guess. Blind men and the elephant; they each interpret it a different way but they all agree it smells like shit.
agorabum
@FlipYrWhig: A lot of people get good info on the blogs, even if they aren’t the major player.
Seen a lot of good graphs / charts (which have made their way into the streets of OWS, too).
Corner Stone
@Turgidson:
Displaced workers get a buy-one-get-one free coupon for “training” at a local for-profit -scam- training center?
dmsilev
@BGinCHI:
Cantor has hired speechwriters from The Onion and The Daily Show, right? And then doesn’t check what goes out under his own name. I mean, there’s no way any human with enough brain activity to breathe on his own could fail to realize how bad that last sentence looks.
ruemara
@YoohooCthulhu:
FTFY. I read more about true activism from Kay and Eclectablog, than I have from Jane Hamsher. And no, I don’t think signatures on an internet petition are significant. Real mail, real calls, real votes-those hit them where it counts. Internet makes it easier, but it is not more effective.
Corner Stone
@lacp:
I’ve always hated this quote, from the first time I heard it repeated here with chortling glee.
I’d like to be clear. After the bank execs wiped their dicks on the US Flag and walked out of the room, what was President Obama going to do about it? Because if there’s one thing I am sure of after reading posts here, it is that President Obama is powerless to act alone. Unless he wants to drone someone.
So let’s imagine Obama does want to punish the banksters. How does he do it if Congress flips him the bird?
FlipYrWhig
@ruemara: IIRC Hamsher got out and did things re: Manning and re: tar sands. The guy who seems to perceive activism to begin and end at the screen is Adam Green of PCCC.
Creature_NYC
Whenever someone asks me “what do they want, what are their demands,” I tell them it’s not about that, it’s about changing the conversation. Most people who don’t spend their day on the Internets don’t get this.
HRA
@cat:
I differ with your opinion on worker displacement assistance. I worked with the program, TRA which was in addition to Unemployment Insurance for several years in a prior job. The workers received the same payment from both programs and even were eligible for training/schooling in new occupations. They were even funded by TRA when moving to another location for a job.
“Trade Adjustment Assistance for Workers
Each Cabinet level Department was tasked with a different sector of the overall Trade Adjustment Assistance program. The Secretary of Labor was authorized to implement Trade Readjustment Assistance (TRA) and relocation allowances through cooperating state agencies. TRA are income support payments that were, at that time, paid in addition to an individual’s regular unemployment compensation. The original program had no training or reemployment component. The program was rarely used until 1974, when it was expanded as part of the Trade Act of 1974. The Trade Act of 1974 established the training component of the program. In 1981, the program was sharply curtailed by the Congress at the request of the Reagan Administration.[2] In 2002, the program was again expanded and combined with the trade adjustment program provided under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).[3]
The program is administered by the Department of Labor (DOL) in cooperation with the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.”
Judas Escargot
@Dave:
I dunno. The Right seems to have zero difficulty using blogs to put pressure on the Overton window (National Review, McMegan, Freedom-Fonz and the rest of the Koch-funded cast of characters). Up until a few weeks ago, it felt (at least to me) like so much money and airtime was being spent on defense that there really couldn’t be an effective, active progressive movement at all.
The left (and middle) just never seemed able to create that tight, closed loop of {blogs -> chain-emails -> whisper campaigns -> demonstrations -> media -> back to the blogs} like the right managed to do.
Then again, the reality-based folks don’t have a dedicated cable news network, a well-funded blog network, and thousands of dedicated professional assholes like Brietbart, Goldberg and O’Keefe to leverage, either. So we do pretty well, considering.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone:
DOJ investigations come to mind. But that quotation isn’t a threat about punishment either. It’s not “Shape up or I stop standing between you and the torches.” It’s “You might not like me, but everyone hates you, and I might prove to be the best friend you’ve got.”
As a statement, what does it amount to? Not much. But that’s how the rhetoric works.
BGinCHI
@dmsilev: Golly, I just assumed he was working hard to try to keep single mothers “at the top.”
Maybe he just needs to explain what they’ll remain at the top of.
cat
@HRA:
Sorry, I left out some pieces of my argument.
I agree the worker assitance helps the workers displaced. My issue was its used as a fig leaf to hide the devestation a factory closing causes to the rest of a regions economy.
The waitress, baker, and candle stickmaker (as it were) are just as effected, by offshoring, but they aren’t given the same assistance as the factory worker.
Turgidson
@boss bitch:
Because I’m lazy, of course. (I deserved that)
cat
@FlipYrWhig:
But… But… But… the DOJ isn’t allowed to politize and anyways the AG is wholy independent and not supposed to answer to the POTUS.
Wait, are we talking about why Obama can’t prosecute the Bush administration for using torture or why Obama can’t prosecute Banksters for fraud.
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig: It’s an “Or else” tactic, if we are to believe it was ever even said. Which implies a threat of punishment if behavior isn’t changed.
And they laughed at him and there has been no “or else” except they have continued to get richer, more powerful and are threatening to destroy the world again as we speak (Europe). Both Geithner and the Bernanke have said the US would cover the Eurozone’s ass.
Lolis
@david mizner:
I don’t think your track record is anything to be proud of. Quit your condescending bullshit.
The Raven
“no one has pointed out that THIS is how you move the Overton window”
kraw-k-k-k:
The Populist
Amen John. I was listening to Thom Hartmann an hour ago and he was interviewing some wingnut who wrote a book complaining about the white house’s overreach of power (rich that this book never came out during the Bush years BUT the guy had some fair points with regards to Obama’s questionable actions). Well the gyst was that one of the complaints was Obama signing exec orders to have the EPA make sure Cap & Trade is being enforced. Hartmann sarcastically admitted he did not know this and that it’s GOOD that Obama is doing what we put him there to do.
I have a sense those who trash Obama aren’t digging deep to see he has done many good things. If the OWS protests don’t help him, I don’t know what will. I would LOVE to see him submit more aggressive job bills to make up for the lesser one that was just voted down in the Senate. I hope he sees that it won’t hurt him to be more aggressive.
HRA
@cat:
You are right the other ones also affected by loss of jobs due to trade are not given the same assistance. Yes, TRA was once only given to the major factory workers and the steel workers.
Later and shortly before the program I worked on died out for lack of funds in the 1980s, a few minor companies met the criteria to get the assistance. One was a restaurant supplier of plates and other accessories. The other one was a hat and glove company.
A once booming part of the town where I grew up is now only flat open fields and a few very small industries.
The Populist
@Corner Stone: If we don’t the consequences could be the final nail in our proverbial economic coffin.
The Populist
@FlipYrWhig: Well, judging from the change in rhetoric from Cantor and others, it might be working to some minor effect. Give it time, these idiots will realize they are more vulnerable to being tossed out of office as the dems were in 2010.
FlipYrWhig
@cat: Right, that’s true, my mistake. I should’ve remembered that from the Clinton years.
@Corner Stone: I don’t hear the “or else” part. I hear it more as “you should realize how few people are on your side.” Maybe a bit of “you may find it worth your while to work with me rather than against me.” But they proceeded to take a different course, and now the pitchforks are sharper and the torches hotter.
Instead of “Don’t you dare, or else,” consider a statement like, “Don’t come crying back to me when you get hurt.” That’s not a threat to hurt the other person, but a warning that hurt is likely to happen.
(Now you’ll probably say that the threat is to withhold help, and if the “pitchforks” comment was that kind of implicit threat, Treasury and the Fed aren’t following through on that, so we’re back to its being a bad threat. Fair enough, Projected Corner Stone, well played. But it’s still not the same to me as “Or else.”)
HRA
I should have said the auto workers and steel workers above besides acknowledging my father’s business being shut down, too.
cat
@HRA:
Interesting, I did not know that. Thank you for enlightening me.
Its a real shame the program died out. Its one of the social safety nets we really need to bring back and expand in my opinion.
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig: The “pitchforks” comment was an explicit threat but Treasury and the Fed aren’t following through on that, so we’re back to its being a bad threat.
Corner Stone
The pitchfork apocrypha was silly on its face at the time, and has been proven even sillier since.
Obama never had the ability to hinder the banksters, they knew it and he knew it.
Saying he was the only thing between them and the mob didn’t phase them because they knew it to be false.
And I will stick with the interpretation that mob vengeance was an explicit threat, and a poor one at that as it was clear at the time it would never be allowed to come to that during the crisis stage.
I said so at the time, and shockingly, I continue to agree with myself on this.
Even now, with OWS in full swing the banksters aren’t feeling it because they know they still have the muscle on the streets and the toadies in the legislature.
The military will be called out before a TBTF bank is seized by the people.
edited
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: What about, “I’m offering you a deal here, and if you pass it up, you’ll regret it”? That could carry a corollary that I’ll _make_ you regret it, or, alternatively, just that you’ll live to regret it and kick yourself.
YMMV as usual.
(I know, this is starting to stray from the real issue, but I can’t help it, it’s a matter of How Language Works.)
Mr. Poppinfresh
@Judas Escargot: Explain Canada, dickshit. Last I checked, a whole bunch of people there had opted for Option C in a historic election that turned the left-wing also-rans into a major political party a few months ago.
There are exactly as many parties as people are willing to work for and elect, no more no less. If you vote Democratic despite knowing for a fact they will continue to fuck you over, you get what you deserve, and it’s your own goddamned fault. Whining about how it’s a Two Party System as if that’s somehow written into the constitution is so fucking dumb I honestly lose all sympathy for how bad you’re going to get dicked over in the next decade by your overclass.
Grumpy Code Monkey
@Trurl:
If they’re not supposed to vote for Obama or the Democrats in general, then what are their options? Should they vote Republican? Libertarian? Do you believe that those choices going to result in any more favorable an outcome?
How many other parties are there that a) have a presence in all 50 states; b) have a hope in hell of actually winning a majority of their races; and c) will be any more effective while in office?
Mr. Poppinfresh
@Grumpy Code Monkey: So make one! How the fuck do you think America was founded in the first place! People didn’t sit around talking about how hard it would be to start a new political movement to replace the British, they just DID IT.
Those kids in the park, and the social media across the country that is supporting their efforts, are primarily engaged in an effort to build new communication networks and new linkages that will work outside of the traditional two-party system. GO JOIN THEM.
FlipYrWhig
@Grumpy Code Monkey: 3rd, 4th, and Nth parties would be great to have. The problem is what to do while making them viable, of course — and, paradox-of-thrift-ishly, supporting a major party while the new party gets off the ground also suppresses the new party’s ability to get off the ground in the first place. Both the New Party and the Green Party have tried to build organizations from the city council level up, but their successes were limited, and, I think, their momentum slowed dramatically after the 1990s. What “minor” parties are still at it these days?
Mr. Poppinfresh
Honestly, this to me is the #1 reason America is dying on the vine. There was a time when Americans greeted a major social issue with political action, be it abolitionism, the sufferage movement, the Anti-Saloon League and prohibitionists, etc. Each of them treated the established political parties of the day as opponents and targets for aggressive takeover, not as senior partners in some kind of Dom/Sub alliance.
Now, people treat the inevitability of Democratic/Republican One-Percenter rule as inevitable. There is simply no thought given to the idea that maybe this economic catastrophe of historic proportions that neither party seems willing or able to address JUST MIGHT be a reason to perhaps get organized on their own terms. Nope, democracy needs to be spoon-fed with a nice label that conveniently comes with absolution when things inevitably go totally shitty.
FlipYrWhig
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
Well, don’t leave out segregationism, nativism, and Red-baiting, because those are kinds of political action too.
I think you’re right that there have been movements that don’t piggyback on existing political parties. But when it comes to how to turn that movement’s goals into actual policy, there needs to be a turn towards the electoral realm at some point. We’ve seen over and over again that no matter how widespread public support may be for a cause, politicians aren’t necessarily going to vote for it, and they won’t necessarily lose their next election for it either. So _some_ concern for how to translate public opinion into changed votes is absolutely warranted.
Cat
@Corner Stone:
Technically, its the National Guard.
If a unit from one of the active branches of the armed services is called out… I don’t know what to think. It would be really bad.
Cat
@FlipYrWhig:
Its really irksome being principled.
The Federal Gov’t would be pretty damn scary if it kept getting up all in the last administrations business. The chances if it going horribly wrong far out weigh the benefits of going down that path. :(
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
Yes, they were so successful, they gave Stephen Harper an outright majority in Ottawa. Woo! Victory!
How about we talk about Nick Clegg instead?
Kola Noscopy
@Yutsano:
“Civic duty,” my ass. Those are the kinds of words totalitarians use to guilt people into participating in rigged systems, which ours is.
And really, now, there is nothing you need do to honor my registration but fuck yourself with a butterfly ballot.
Kola Noscopy
@gogol’s wife:
Well, yeah…duh. Because unlike you, I do not ascribe to cults of personality in which our Dear Leaders are right even when they’re wrong because we secretly wish to bear their children or something.
I’ll expect Warren to stick to her guns and at the first sign or being co-opted by the oligarchical Dems in D.C. I will call her out. That a problem for you?
Corner Stone
@Cat: Actually, that wasn’t a mistake.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: Except for the part where I literally say it was a mistake.
Cat
@Corner Stone:
I wished we had elected the mythical emoprog candidate as much as the next guy, but if you think He’d call in the Army to disperse an army of protesters camping out in the Mall or on Wall Street…
Why are you on the internet rather then canning this seasons crops?
John S.
Nah, that’s pretty much your standard repertoire.
Corner Stone
@Cat: Oh, they’re canned. They are canned, indeed.
They got the canning of their frackin’ lives, my friend.
The Raven
I am not sure that Occupy could have made a difference earlier. We had to get to the point where the consensus on austerity had emerged, which it did in the 10-year deficit-reduction deal, before an opposition could form. It all sounds very Hegelian. (But I haven’t read Hegel.)
I just don’t see the Democrats as becoming a liberal party again. They are too compromised, dominated by their conservatives and likely to remain so. Which may indicate the emergence of a new party on the left. But it’s going to take a while. Look to 2020.
Meantime, batten down the hatches. It’s gonna be a tough decade.
cynn
Do any of you know first hand the occupy movement? I heard the helicopters Saturday night and I took a walk downtown to witness. I wound up standing with the occupiers; I was let go because I wasn’t a violent threat. But I am the 99%, and I’m pissed.
wilfred
How is the OWS movement going to shift the Democratic party to the left when progressives have been unable to? Beats me.
The first principle of any OWS intervention into party politics should be to demand candidates renounce Wall Street money. Schumer and Gillibrand were the biggest state level recipients of that money.
Does anyone think they are going to be shifted through a primary challenge? They’d bury the OWS candidate with Wall Street money and then demand that the losers show party unity.
It’s a trap. For OWS to remain viable and continue its organic development it has to stay away from the Democratic party.
Corner Stone
@wilfred: There are so many traps waiting for them.
I hope they continue doing it a little different, for as long as they can.
Lockewasright
If we’re lucky, by giving a larger base of voters to candidates for legislative office who will vote like actual democrats on the bills in congress. If it happens, I will be waiting for the emoprog firebagger whiners to heap praise on the president for making these newly elected officials all so progressive since it’s his fault today that conservadems in congress aren’t progressives.
AA+ Bonds
@Lockewasright:
Never say shit like this, this is stupid as hell.
Lockewasright
@AA+ Bonds:
THEY are stupid as hell, and the things they say don’t even rise to that level.