Com Wojtek writes:
>
"What makes you thing that Dean will pull an FDR? When was the last time
you saw the ruling class battered by the depression and running scare of
the "red menace" leaping forward economically and militarily?"
>
I don't know, Woj, he's just got that class traitor look about him.
Com. W. continues:
"I admit that Dean is the best candidate for the same reasons as you do - he has a superior party organization and he is a serious politician, well versed in the art of deal making and compromise, not a liberal primadonna more conscious about image than outcome. I believe he will have a better ear for people on this side of the political spectrum. I also share your view that social movements do matter, albeit their impact is mitigated by broader circumstances."
Okay.
>
"I am just more pessimistic about what can be done here and now, given
the current power structure. But then again, who among those who
watched the Nazi columns marching under the Arc de Triomphe could
visualize Stalingrad just two years later?"
>
Nobody's more naturally pessimistic than I am. Listen, I would not bet money on an outright Dean win, I've got to be honest. All I'm saying is that he's not the underdog people think he is and thus you are getting long-shot odds on a real horse. Moreover, if Dean loses, you've still got the organization and it is not an organization that a pro-war candidate can make his own. That's an irreducible good.
I wrote:
> On foreign policy, I don't see the "imperialist dictates" you are
talking
> about.
Woj wrote:
>
"I do not know where you are looking, comrade, but I can imagine that
more opposition was raised in the Soviet Politbureau to the invasion of
Afghanistan than the US congress raised to all aspects of foreign policy
combined during the Bush Fuhrership. That piece of Nazi shit gets
everything he wants, every penny of the $87 bn for his war crimes in
Iraq, free hand to slap sanctions at any country and so on, with no
fight, not even a filibuster threat from the Dems. If that is not
capitulation, I do not know what is."
>
Okay, but let's be honest. Fear of the American voter is what inspired the Dems to give W. the blank checks on Iraq and Afghanistan. DLC wisdom tells them that they are to cower and compromise when faced with any and all challlenges in order to be "electable". The Republicans hit them right where they were living. Simply by opposing the insane blank check, Dean became a raving leftist in the collective Beltway mind.
Your "dictates" really come from local politics to a large extent. There is simply no constituency in America that is persuaded of the value of diplomacy. Americans have no understanding of the need for or validity of diplomacy and no American leader gives voice to the idea that diplomacy is anything but a quaint habit of foreigners.
peace,
boddi