[lbo-talk] cri de coeur

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Wed Jul 30 14:48:17 PDT 2008


On Jul 30, 2008, at 5:28 PM, Marvin Gandall wrote:


> Doug writes:
>
>> [Hey Marvin, here's one I couldn't sign, but I wasn't asked anyway.]
>
> <http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080818/open_letter>
> ========================================
> Hah! Lots of good people on that list, Doug, (Zinn, Fletcher, Cole,
> Englehardt, etc.) but, yuck, they could have dropped the sycophantic
> title,
> first two and last paragraphs, and taken a scalpel to some of the
> equally
> abominable formulations in the fourth.

That's why I couldn't sign. A simple "don't attack Iran!" is one thing. Laying on a lot of blather about BHO's allegedly pwogwessive performance in the pwimaries is more than I can take.

Love the NYT piece today on BHO's turn as a law prof:


> “I don’t think anything that went on in these chambers affected
> him,” said Richard Epstein, a libertarian colleague who says he
> longed for Mr. Obama to venture beyond his ideological and topical
> comfort zones. “His entire life, as best I can tell, is one in which
> he’s always been a thoughtful listener and questioner, but he’s
> never stepped up to the plate and taken full swings.”


> Nor could his views be gleaned from scholarship; Mr. Obama has never
> published any. He was too busy, but also, Mr. Epstein believes, he
> was unwilling to put his name to anything that could haunt him
> politically, as Ms. Guinier’s writings had hurt her. “He figured
> out, you lay low,” Mr. Epstein said.


> Because he never fully engaged, Mr. Obama “doesn’t have the
> slightest sense of where folks like me are coming from,” Mr. Epstein
> said. “He was a successful teacher and an absentee tenant on the
> other issues.”

Gotta hand it to these Chicago guys - their politics are fucked up, but at least they have politics. And they can spot a chameleon from a mile away.

Doug



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