Tenable in politics today means little other than well funded. Without a wealthy (and cultured) elite, I really don’t think left-of-center values would have any influence in the US today. They’d be held mostly by radicals and the disenfranchised. The opposition just has too much money and too much fight in it.
Most middle- and lower-middle-class folk are just - just - comfortable enough and socially cocooned enough that they’re stuck in the center or center-right. Their minds can be changed only by a. losing everything, or b. constant big-media opinion-making and fearmongering. And b. is going to cost hundreds of millions and even then, take years.
The only thing a. has to recommend it is that at least it changes minds truthfully. If you want to get cocooned people to stop listening to fear merchants, you have to offer them a bigger fear. Appealing to their principles is meaningless because they’re cocooned. Their morality stops with People Like Them.
All power to you. But I repeat - in an era when mass media and big business hold all the cards, what are you going to use for money?
Well the social issues are minor things in my opinion, it’s the economic issues that matter right now. Progressives differ from liberals in this way: liberals won’t touch Wall Street, at least, not the ones who have jobs or money. Progressives understand that Wall Street needs to be reformed so that when they invest money, it has some relationship to Main Street, so it’s not just a big gambling casino, as it is now, so that Wall Street money is reflected in American jobs. Progressives will engage in protectionism if that’s what’s needed to protect the American economy, whereas liberals have been schooled to do whatever economists say, and economists hate protectionism … like corporations. Progressives understand that corporations are not, in fact, people, and unlike liberals, will do something about it.
I agree it is going to take mucho effort to get the middle class out of its comfy little coccoon, but I think some of that will be accomplished by the Big Die Off of the baby boom generation that will come in a couple of decades. The young today have been growing up in extreme economic hard times, and they don’t watch television. They should be easier to reach. Frex, the real progressive television is only to be found on Youtube, i.e., The Young Turks and Russia Television. There are progressive websites like Alternet.
The Young Turks gets its money from advertising dollars, because they bring the eyeballs, big time. Russia Television gets its money from Russia, I think. As the boomers die and the TV numbers continue to shrink along with the number of Stupid Old White Men, things should get better all round. Gonna take time, for sure. Now is the time for planting seeds, not harvesting fruit.
The question is whether we have that much time. Extrapolating current trends (never the smartest thing to do, I admit), we could be living in corporatist feudalism in 20 years, which would suit a lot of libertarians and conservatives just fine.
We are definitely headed that way. If you have a better idea than hunkering down and planting seeds, I’d be glad to hear it. Maybe a US spring? And if that happened, what would keep the governments from fighting it with even more savagery than they fight OWS?
I agree with the following quote and have edited it to add every type of emphasis I could think of.
So many Americans seem to choose their candidates based on issues like guns or abortions. :smack: (And many focused on economics support gibberish about gold standard or discredited supply-sidism.)
What’s so clueless about voting for candidates based on social issues rather than economic issues. (And What’s the Matter with Kansas implies that something is a matter with it.) I wouldn’t vote for a candidate that differed with my opinions on guns and abortion if they promised to send me a $10,000 tax refund check every year for life.
The usual social issues are just there as a diversion and a smoke screen and the typical list isn’t all that important the nation’s health. Instead, they are topics where everyone can have an opinion and no one can be truly wrong. We can debate abortion but all we want everyone already has their mind made up anyway and nothing substantial is going to change. The same is true with gun control and all the other usual suspects.
Economics are a lot harder to have an informed opinion about. The typical voter doesn’t know how the Fed or Wall Street works yet money controls the vitality of the country and has a lot more impact on social issues as a whole than the hot button ones that we pretend do. It is just more boring and complicated to discuss so that the general public can understand it even if they wanted to. Politicians use this fact to throw out social issues as a diversion and the public happily responds to those rather than the more important issues simply because it is much easier.
Of course not. But the voting public (you agree?) gets the politicians it wants and deserves.
If you want an outcome where the voting public gets politicians that are better than what they want and deserve (and by “better” you have to go to some criteria that is outside the voting public’s definition, obviously) you have to ditch democracy. Go for something like a benevolent dictatorship model, which unfortunately can only last until the benevolent dictator dies, or a meritocracy. Or have polling exams that deny vote to idiots - although I have this feeling that the left wouldn’t like the result of that.
This argument is so full of shit. You are saying that you cannot dislike the outcome of a democratic election and still support democracy. The voting public includes a lot of people who are, in fact, not very bright and not at all well-informed. They voted for Duyba … TWICE!!! It is perfectly all right to lament the outcomes that result, and to seek better outcomes. I don’t see anyone proposing an end to democracy here, just seeking better outcomes. If you LIKE the outcomes we’ve been getting, bully for you, have the courage to say so.
Well while the dumbass portion of the electorate is getting worried about some small fraction of Americans having access to abortions, the one percent and their tools in Washington are robbing them blind, systematically destroying their ability to control their wages, the hours they work, the conditions they work in, unions both public and private, and eventually reducing them to the point where home ownership and getting their kids through college without shouldering mountains of debt will be a forgotten dream. Buy hey! World of Warcraft is coming out with an expansion pack!
Sure you can dislike it. Where did I say you can’t dislike it?
Lament it all you want, but the “seeking better outcomes” means, by necessity, having supposedly “better” politicians (ROFL) play the same electoral propaganda game as current “bad” politicians, so don’t pretend having some kind of moral high ground. Except, of course, current “bad” politicians know how to play the game pretty well, and besting them at it is not going to be easy at all.
I agree with Evil Captor, and the key words here are not well-informed. We know what the media tells us. Why do you think we know so much more about the presidential candidates than we know about the people running for office right within our own state? Because the information regarding the former is easily accessible, and the latter is not. Why does everyone know the presumptive nominee for president, but third part candidates are not widely recognized? Because the media pays attention to the major parties. Why are certain issues discussed ad infinitum, while others slip right under the radar? Because the media can choose to shine the spotlight wherever it likes.
I agree, we have a long row to hoe, and the most important thing we will have to do is clear out the stranglehold that money has on electoral politics, esp. since Citizens United. If we can de-influence money (hell to do, I know) the politicians will at least be paying attention to the electorate once they are in office, something that does not happen nowadays. I want MORE democracy in America, not less.
Since producing political speech that reaches the electorate (especially fairly disinterested electorate, like we have) costs money, and a LOT of it, you cannot “de-influence” money. And, since political speech is protected by the 1st amendment, you cannot prohibit people producing it in VAST amounts (and paying money to do it) without repealing it.
You can force TV and radio stations and newspapers to give a certain portion of free coverage to candidates. You can enact criminal penalties for political spending. That should go some way toward de-influencing money.
Whatever it takes. It’s plutocracy or democracy, I choose democracy.
Another libertarian/conservative thread. These terms are so loosely defined I don’t think there’s any generalization that can be made. The conservative label has been applied all over the place. Historically in this country the idea of a liberal political identity is fairly new, and the result of a campaign by some conservatives, labelling others who called themselves conservatives. At least up to the Civil War, all the political camps in this country called themselves conservatives. And into the 20th century conservatives were in the pro-choice camp. Anti-abortion efforts were led by a progressive movement who believed that abortion denied liberty to fetuses. Issues like prohibiton turned all politics on it’s head. The Great Depression and FDR policies may have been the start of the modern liberal label applied to those who favored active policies to maintain the economy, and then later applied to any progressive concepts.
But everyone in this country should be a small ‘l’ libertarian. It’s just a preference for liberty. All the arguments are about how best to keep the liberty we already have.
:smack: (And many focused on economics support gibberish about gold standard or discredited supply-sidism.)