[lbo-talk] Churchill's complaint

[Carl Remick]

>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>
>Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
>
>>Mr.
>>Churchill reversed the strategy and applied the standards "we" use to 
>>judge
>>"them" to judge "us."  Lo and behold - the fascist vermin is going nuts.
>>Evidently, the strategy worked.
>
>By what standards did it work? Churchill's job is at risk, and tenure and 
>academic freedom are more at risk than they were a few weeks ago. It's done 
>nothing at all to humanize the "enemy," or even raise the level of 
>discourse. The only principled thing to do is to humanize the "enemy" - 
>you're corrupting yourself if you embrace us/them logic and reverse the 
>signs. When the fascist vermin go nuts, they don't hurt themselves, they 
>hurt good people.

I've been waiting for this damn Churchill story to go away, but it has more 
legs than a centipede -- to the immense chortling delight of the right.  I 
can't see Churchill as anything but a polemical suicide bomber who blew 
himself up for no good at all.  And IMO, endless leftist anatomizing of the 
Churchill saga doesn't help one bit.

Meanwhile, I'm amazed at how the media has seized on the power of the purple 
finger to justify marginalizing Iraq coverage.  The networks seem to have a 
hell of a lot of time available again for "quality of life" stories about 
the US.  E.g., ABC's Peter Jennings is on a tour of the US this week and 
last night had a special report on traffic congestion in Houston.  Zzzzz.

Carl