[lbo-talk] Re: Dixiecrat Dean?, or, why i'm not a liberal

[marc rodrigues]

maybe it's just me, but I don't get what the big deal is about howard dean's comment, and in fact it could even be seen as a radical thing to say. all this shit does is give the Right more ammunition to complain about "political corectness" and "oversensitivity."  liberals get upset about little comments like this, but fail to see the strutures and institutions of white supremacy in society.  big city "liberals" like to scapegoat and talk a lot of shit about "rednecks" and "hicks."  but who are these people?  poor, un/underemployed folk- last time i checked, thats the exact type of people who any serious "leftist" movement needs to have on its side. you have to reach people where they're at, and i have to believe that once you cut through all the crap, most of these people would be in favor of a fundamental change in society that shifts power and wealth from the haves to the have-nots.  these are our *allies.* as for the confederate flag thing, i wonder how many of those peop

 le display that flag out of a nuanced historical knowledge and explicit white supremacy versus those who display it because it's a southern cultural/identity thing to do... i mean, i could make the argument that it's far worse to display the american flag considering the things that have been done under it, yet everyone from "liberals" to "conservatives" wave it around for their own reasons.  not many people wave their american flag and think to themselves "this is for the 3,000 spics we knocked off in panama." i think it was actually one of the smartest things dean has said.  shit like this and the obsession with gun control are among the main reasons why this wishy-washy centrist "liberalism" has so few fans out there and why the democrats keep getting their asses kicked.

anarchism and confederate flag culture:
http://www.prolecat.com/Confederate_Culture.htm


> Reps
> >> were able to use
> >> race-baiting to get working-class whites to vote
> >> against their
> >> economic interests.
> >>
> >> Doug

exactly!

----- Original Message -----
> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 6 Nov 2003 13:14:34 -0500
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Re: Dixiecrat Dean?
> From: jeffrey fisher <jfisher at igc.org>
> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> Reply-To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> 
> i honestly don't think this was big and confrontational enough to be a 
> sister souljah moment . . . at least, not until everyone jumped on the 
> bandwagon to call him on it and maybe *made it into* a sister souljah 
> moment.
> 
> that said, it does strike me as clintonesque in its big tent appeal.
> 
> but then, what do i know? i thought EP Thompson should be on the "best" 
> list rather than the "worst" list . . .
> 
> 
> On Thursday, November 6, 2003, at 01:06 PM, andie nachgeborenen wrote:
> 
> >
> > Actually I think the people who say that this may be a
> >  deliberate attempt to do a  Sista Soulja moment may
> > be right -- otherwise he's dumber than we thought. jks
> >
> > --- Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
> >> Joseph Wanzala wrote:
> >>
> >>> For his ("shocking!") embrace of Confederate flag
> >> wavers, Dean is
> >>> risking offending the liberal part of his following
> >> (pissing off
> >>> blacks and "lefties"), and going for the "big
> >> Clinton umbrella".
> >>> This move smacked of Clinton, who managed to do all
> >> sorts of things
> >>> deemed offensive to the black voting bloc, but
> >> never really suffered
> >>> for it---and grabbed Republicans at the same
> >> time......
> >>
> >> He phrased it really stupidly this time, but in
> >> earlier versions of
> >> the argument, he pointed out, rightly, that the Reps
> >> were able to use
> >> race-baiting to get working-class whites to vote
> >> against their
> >> economic interests.
> >>
> >> Doug

-- 
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