>Marvin Gandall wrote:
>Doug writes:
>
>>I don't see how it's ultraleftist to ask if labor is getting a good return
>>on the hundreds of millions it gives Dems. It's a very hardheaded question,
>>I think. Politics doesn't come any more practical than this. Who else who's
>>vaguely on the right side has that much money & that many people to throw
>>around?
>----------------------------------------
>It's not ultraleft, and it's a legitimate question to pose, and it's one you
>could probably also ask in relation to the union-supported British Labour
>Party and other social democratic parties abroad. But you already know the
>answer: these are only political choices currently available to the unions,
>and to all of the social movements for that matter. The other potential
>governing parties are to the right of these liberal parties...
How typically American! The British Liberal-Democratic Party is and has been consistently to the left of Kinnockite-Blairite Labor. It has just won a solidly Labor seat (Dumfermline-West Fife) in Scotland from the Blairites with a 15% swing! And of course, in France parties to the left of the PS (former SFIO) together outpolled it decisively in the recent (2002) presidential election.
Shane Mage
"Thunderbolt steers all things...It consents and does not consent to be called Zeus."
Herakleitos of Ephesos