> [I emailed Adolph Reed with a complaint about the vacuity of so much
> "left" response to the financial crisis/bailout. Here's his response.]
>
> Unsurprisingly, I guess, I've had the same reaction on hearing the left
> demands to block the bailout. I kept thinking that I must have been
> missing something, that they must have some follow-up position that would
> modify that stance. Who, after all, could imagine that the alternatives
> they push for could even be in the ballpark for consideration at this
> point? But, alas, like so much else they do, it's all about making
> themselves feel good at what they hear coming out of their mouths. That
> is, there doesn't seem to be much concern with thinking and acting
> strategically from a left-critical perspective that takes into account
> the actual constraints of the moment, including the ideological
> constraints that no one has been more significant in imposing than the
> Dems so many of these "leftists" insist every two years that we have to
> vote for or else goblins will eat us.
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Reed has a good understanding of the utopian character at the present moment
of demands for the nationalization of the financial sector under democratic
control. But you could equally say "it's all about making themselves feel
good at what they hear coming out of their mouths" when US leftists,
including Reed above, call on liberal Americans within the same political
context to break with the Democrats and to vote for marginal third parties
like the Greens who lack any possibility of representing them in the
legislature. Both demands presuppose a much higher level of political
consciousness than presently exists in the US, for those who believe this to
be a relevant consideration.