Joseph Catron wrote:
>
> On Tue, Dec 8, 2009 at 8:12 PM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
> It's all rhetorical to him, isn't it? Special bodies of armed men don't
> > figure, right?
> >
>
> Yeah, but one could use that same logic against any kind of political
> engagement except armed struggle. (And I realize I use this card a lot, but
> it isn't purely hypothetical; I've heard actual people make that argument.)
Not quite. Power enters int _regular_ peaceful politics: You can only "frame" an argument if there is unequal access to audience. Note: Not just access to the mike, but access to the audience. But if political issues are alway preformed by the dominant ideology, then then you can spout framing rhetoric all you please, but (a) there will be no one tuned to that station or sitting in that auditorium and (b) even if they are, they won't be an audience because 'your' rame will automatically be trnaslated into the terms intelligible in the dominant frame. Lakoff was speaking to Democrats, who evenn when out of power can muster an audience. "The Left"prior to becoming the left, that is, prior to the emergence of mass struggle on the streets, can muster only itself for an audience. (Left writers will reach a scattered few now and then, but not in any significant numbers.
And "armed struggle" is a misleding phrase in the core capitalist nations. There was no armed struggle in the Bolshevik revolution until after it had seized power, and its casualties during the run-up to the insurrection were all incidents of "special bodies of armed men" killing more or less peaceful demonstrators. The same was true in Iran when the Shah was overturned. "Armed struggle" raises images of the protract4ed struggle in wars of liberation. I'm not sure what is useful shorthand for the process in core capitalist states. "Forceful seizure." "Illegal or Extra-legal exercise of power." Both pretty a wkward. But socialism can NOT be brought in by legal or constittuional means. And that, not military conflict, is what has to be emphasized.
Carrol
>
> --
> "Hige sceal þe heardra, heorte þe cenre, mod sceal þe mare, þe ure mægen
> lytlað."
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