Why oh why did O suddenly become the bete noir on LBO-Talk ?
Shane Mage replied:
The question asked by Geraldine Ferraro, WJC, and other hacks (the implied answer--he's a halfbreed). But Charles's question asks why LBO is so hospitable to stupid Clinton-hack insults like "Subprime Pritzker?"
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This is extremely frustrating and makes me yearn for the simpler pleasures of quantum cryptography and cold fusion.
It's very simple and yet, it keeps getting twisted into all sorts of knots.
Let's review.
Several of us - including yours truly, Shag, C.G. Estabrook, Doug and a few others - have expressed misgivings about the effect Sen. Obama's campaign may be having on progressive politics. Specifically, we've talked about the incredible enthusiasm many otherwise politically savvy people have shown for a fairly standard Democratic candidate.
Charles Brown and Julio Huato were the two most consistent (and, I must say, coherent and well reasoned) objectors to this POV. Charles' position is that, even taking into account his regrettable Dem pedigree, the Senator's campaign is inherently progressive because it has attracted massive amounts of white support for a black presidential candidate: an unprecedented event in US history.
Julio's position mirrors Charles' to some extent adding that the Senator's campaign is pouring energy into the black polity - and perhaps, by extension, other minorities as well.
My own position, expressed here -
<http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20080107/000587.html>
follows the lead of Black Agenda Report's Glen Ford who, in an interview with Doug (see url above) and, at BAR (blackagendareport.com), details his reasons.
Now, this is merely a point of view, a position among others which is, I insist, worthy of consideration. Yet, for our trouble we've been called "Obama-phobic" and, it has been implied that we're "crypto-Hillary supporters", 'nihilists', terminally pessimistic and other melodramatic things.
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Ravi fairly regularly admonished us to avoid performing amateur psychoanalysis on our debating opponents. Once upon a time I misunderstood why he stressed this but now I clearly understand. As I've said many times before, the fact that people differ on the question of the meaning and meaningfulness of Sen. Obama's campaign - with some seeing it as a Trojan horse while others view it as an opportunity - is not a sign of a *moral failing*.
The fact that mere disagreement is described in such sensational terms should be a tip-off that we need to chill the fuck out and get a grip.
About a Democrat, of all things.
.d.
-- "I somehow doubt that 20 years of amphetamines and failure have changed you."
Dr. Impossible
...................... http://monroelab.net/blog/