[lbo-talk] Barack Obama

[Michael Dawson]

One other thing, Kelley:  Do you notice how super-individualist Yoshie and
Carrol are?  The most obvious reason to court rather than castigate Obama is
that he's black and urban and not too hostile to liberalism.  To somebody
with a sociological/materialist mind, that would tend to make you hope that
his ascent could serve to mobilize the black community to become more
involved and participatory and demanding.  Personally, when I read polls and
interviews of African-Americans' political desires and beliefs, I feel like
my own voice is largely right there, too, despite my pigmentation
deficiency.

But neither Leninism nor its modern step-child, the "organizing" fetish,
were ever very comfortable with admitting that history happens and
collective conditions exert as much influence as 1,000 Lenins or "MWM"
charades.

-----Original Message-----
From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org]
On Behalf Of snit snat
Sent: Sunday, November 07, 2004 9:06 AM
To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org; lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Barack Obama

At 11:48 AM 11/7/2004, Jeffrey Fisher wrote:
>um . . . was my response unjustified?
>
>you're right. it IS boring. and more than being boring, it's
>counterproductive. which is why i'm tired of hearing the old "his
>religion makes me uncomfortable" lines. we need to stay focused.
>
>and unlike kelley, i'm not yet prepared to cut obama loose and say
>he's nothing but another reactionary. the first rule of organizing i
>learned is to "meet people where they're at [sic]". maybe we'd like
>obama to be further left, but he's running for statewide office in
>illinois.


:)

damn it! i'm not saying that either! I'm saying that his view are the most 
progressive views--on the domestic front--we have and he articulates them 
in a way people need to hear--that resonates with u.s. moral tranditions. 
what robert bellah et al. called civic individualism. my response to 
carrol's claims about his Iran policy was simply, "so?, that wasn't my 
question." Yoshie's response was equally inane because I'd already 
indicated that, of course, we weren't going to find perfection. we ahve to 
work with the "struggles and wishes of the age" and that means finding the 
most progressive struggles and advancing them, instead of despising them 
every lovin' minute because the people who side with those struggles aren't 
pure leftists.

OK. i need to shut this thing down and not look at this list any more.

"We live under the Confederacy.
We're a podunk bunch of swaggering
pious hicks."

                --Bruce Sterling 

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