>A friend also sent this to me saying it was the best thing she'd seen and I just totally fail to get the point. What about it caught you, Charles?
^^^^ CB: The whole thing: a cogent and comprehensive theory and practice for the left's orientation and activities in relation to the Obama Presidency. What specifics don't make sense to you ?
JB: OK, I tried again and I'm still getting not much out of this.
She criticizes:
>The basic orientation is to criticize every move the administration makes and to remain disengaged from mainstream politics.
Who, besides the PLP, is doing that?
(An aside, I don't think Obama's wrenched the DP "out of the clammy grip of Clintonian centrism," notwithstanding that Bush made Clintonian centrism look like a spring day. It seems to be congealing in the center, a gelatinous energy-absorbing blob that shifts, so far, only due to internal crisis.)
A lot of tautology--we have to step up and stay engaged or the potential of the democratic opening will not be realized or maximized. OK. Stay engaged. (Who is she criticizing?)
Specifics: Defend the Democratic opening. This means joining MoveOn or the DP, AFAICT. Hasten the demise of the Southern strategy. OK, that's a really good idea. How? The first thing that occurs to me is we need more fucking unionization around here. But fighting for the Employee Free Choice Act to be a priority (when Obama isn't) that's probably "premature platform erection." Or is it? Could be building a left-progressive alliance.
The electoral arena is an area of struggle. I'm in Florida so maybe this has just been bleeding obvious for oh, a decade. If there's something new or helpful here it's escaping me. The Southern strategy was 'defeated' by a large Black turnout, the economic situation and, specifically in the case of Florida, a bunch of foreclosures making people pay attention to the economic situation. And by 'defeated' we mean a swing of one percentage point. (Of course who knows what it would've been without lying machines, but that's *been* true.)
Left-progressive alliance. This sounds good--but again, what's her point? We're in the middle of a fight on health care. That left-progressive alliance falls apart on the question of healthcare reform, and it falls based on a conflict with the clammy grip of Clintonian centrism that the DP has supposedly been wrenched from. Because she doesn't run any examples through her argument, there's no way to tell what she's suggesting. Is fighting to eliminate health insurance companies too dogmatic and isolating, or part of building a left-progressive alliance? When it's in direct opposition to Obama, then what?
Engage with the movements that exist. (We aren't already in them? What left is she in?) And, there's a depression on. That'll make it messy. Messy? Seems like a big opening to me, but what do I know? I'm probably succumbing to the siren songs of dogma.
Build the left. Again, specifics? More exhortation, more tautology. If we do it right, we'll succeed. If "opportunity is mangled or missed," it will be bad news. But the opportunity she chiefly sees is the democratic opening due to the movement that elected Obama. The capitalist cataclysm doesn't seem to be rating, even as a teachable moment.
I just don't get what people are learning from this article.
Jenny Brown