> So when I insist on
> identifying people like Obama with people like Kennedy as committed
> terrorists and war criminals, I am hoping to wean people from ruling class
> politics. I am hoping to divorce them from their delusions with
> charismatic
> leaders and the man on the white horse or the woman carrying the torch.
In my experience - whether in a union, political party, or other organization - you can't gain a hearing among people who don't see you as part of their struggle or as hostile, and whose ideas don't correspond to their own experience and present consciousness. Try handing out leaflets in front of some Democratic rally or function identifying Obama as a "war criminal" and see how far you get "divorcing them from their delusions" if you don't believe me.
> The kind of politics you are advocating is in fact the opposite of the
> kind
> of organizing we need to develop a radical mass movement. Electoral
> politics is usually demobilizing and aids disorganization and not the
> opposite. This has been the usual effect of electoral politics. There
> are
> exceptions. You speak of the enhancement of anti-imperialist politics "by
> tens of millions of expectant Democrats emboldened by victory". Well it
> is
> always possible but usually this kind of disillusionment leads to
> bitterness.
You think the FDR and JFK victories demobilized rather than stimulated mass expectations and activity, and that the better outcome would have been their respective defeats by Hoover and Nixon?
> But look at what you are doing. What you are doing is advocating
> disillusionment and I find this much more cynical. You are saying that
> the
> people who support Obama don't need to know what little truth we do know
> about how the U.S. state and corporations treat those who have little
> power
> in the world. They don't need to know that they should oppose the Afghan
> war and that it matters that Obama supports the Afghan war. They don't
> need
> to know that the U.S. backs murderous policies by Israel and our
> corporations in Latin America and that Obama is in full supports of those
> policies.
You know I'm not "advocating disillusionment". But how and when to raise particular issues is always a tactical rather than a principled question. Do you always and everywhere call for armed struggle because you don't accept there can be a peaceful overthrow of capitalism, and are you "cynical" if you don't do so? Clearly, to be heard, you have to address issues in context, as events provoke discussion of them. Alas, you can't force your agenda on people no matter how urgently you may feel about it. You run the greater risk of being regarded as a nettlesome crank. As it happens, I suspect many if not most Democrats already have serious reservations about US policy in the Middle East and Latin America but think Obama's bellicose talk in just electioneering and that once in office there will be a more "even-handed" and accomodative foreign policy than under Bush. They may be right, but even if they are wrong, you will unfortunately have to wait for them to experience Obama's policy before you will be able to credibly indict him for betraying their hopes.
>...somehow the people who are enthusiastic about Obama
> will be transformed and by the election, will be "emboldened by victory",
> and will come to anti-imperialistic politics sometime in the future when
> Obama doesn't fulfill their hopes. So why won't they get sick of politics
> altogether and say "let the devil take the hind-most I will get what is
> mine" when they are betrayed by ruling class politics? This happens more
> often than your scenario.
They may well say this. Some will for sure. But I still maintain the historical record shows electoral victories have stimulated mass action rather than been a deterrent to it, while defeats have had a dampening effect. Venezuela may provide us with a contemporary example of this maxim - both ways.
> And why is Obama winning "a victory." I look at an Obama victory as a
> defeat for oppressed people but all elections between ruling class
> candidates are some variety of defeat. The fact that we are unable to
> organize an independent non-ruling class movement makes this kind of
> electoral politics always and everywhere self-defeating for those of us
> opposed to the ruling class.
So if I may ask again: Why in heaven's name would you contremplate voting for Obama if it's your conviction his election would represent a "defeat for oppressed people...(and) for those of us opposed to the ruling class?" At least, those who choose to abstain or toss their vote to Nader or McKinney (another form of abstention) are being consistent. I'll leave you to continue wrestling with this contradiction. But we seem to be at an impasse.