Alan Rudy wrote:
>
> You gotta love this. "We want a strong economy, operationalized as high
> profitability; low regulation, and a disorganized, docile, skilled, low wage
> & benefits and politically quiescent (or at least culturally- or terror-
> distracted) labor force that's in hoc up top their ears."
>
I do, I do. No sarcasm intended. I wish I had written that. In fact for
a second I thought maybe you were quoting some post of mine that I had
forgotten.
For years, with increasing intensity I have been saying that leftists are failing to know their enemh in their criticism of the DP, criticisms that are almost always groudned in a false understanding of wht the actual principles of the DP (as an institution represented by its leadershp). This is a magnifcent statement of what really has been at the heart of the DP for well over a hundred yaars.
And these principles mean tha the DP regularly has to follow policies that risk defeat in elections, and superficial lefti observers call these policies stupid when they are in fact principled.
The DP is not a weak and wavering friendof the people. The DP is strong, courageous, intelligent Enemy of the u.s. populace but (I'm trying toincorporate Dough's formulation on this) which for various reasons does attempt to include in its program various measues which either are or can be made to seeem to be in response to real public needs.
One of those reasons is that the Myth of DP Liberalism is believed by a very small minority of DP office holders at loca, state, and national levels, as well as writers for the Nation, ec. etc., and this 'interest group' has to be given some consideration, because they willy-nilly support the Myth by their attachment to the Party. And no doubt the bulk of the leadership, so far as condtions allow, are willing, even anxious, to improve living conditons for a larger portion of the public -- but in noting this one must ALSO note that they define possibility within the limits described in the pasage quoted by Alan above. They sincerely hope, many of them, that what is good for GM (past tense) will be good for the country, but if it is not, well then, as Jimmy Carter said, the world is not fair.
“I weep for you,” the Walrus said, “I deeply sympathize.” With sobs and tears he sorted out those of the largest size…
William McKinley stayed up all night praying before he made the decision which sealed the doom of so many of the Philoppine population. There is a good reason to believe those prayers were sincere, not hypocritical or not entirely so. The habit of calling ourenemies stupid or hypocrical carries over to calling the people who support them (or at least don't oppose them) stupid or hypocritical or morally culpable, etc. BUT, Mao was right: "Trust the peple." That is, we (whover we is) do want to destroy that enemy, and we are not going to do it by throwing rhetorical thunderbolts. Only a rather large number of tose stupid people will havd o do it. AND EVERY SO OFTEN A LARGE NUJMBER OF THEM DO TRY TO DO IT -- SOMETIMES WITH CONSIDERABLE SUCCESS. Whatever we think of the present, we are, are we not, glad that Jim Crow no longer rules in the south, that cops no longer beat up gays to add a little excitement to a dullshif, and so forth. Large minorities forced those improvements. Core radicals (even radicals a sloppy political line*) contributed greatly to that success, and to do so they had, in some important sense, to trust the people. (*I am thinking the CPUSA -- 1940-1960, of local NAACP chapters, partiuclarly in the south; of left-liberals, many of them "fellow travellers" of the CP, who kept piddling away for all those years when nothing could be done but what they did while doing nothing was to create and maintain some of the factors that were part of the great upsurge of 'The '60s.)
Carrol