[lbo-talk] Sane and really dumb

[Chris Sturr]

Wotjek: I think D&S tries *contribute* to organizing, but publications like
D&S are at best a tool for organizing--so I agree with your point that
changing people's views on this is much bigger project for the left, but one
that I think many on the left don't want to bother even contributing to.  (I
think you meant to say "I do *not* think its circulation goes much further
than rather narrow circles on the left," which is probably true, though
every year our classroom books reach tens of  thousands of undergrads and
high school students of all political stripes, and probably thousands union
members and community groups, and hundreds of thousands via the website.)

Doug: "The moronocity is in their taking aggressive offense to the
suggestion rather than asking, 'Uh, what's a Keynesian?'" So you don't agree
with me that many of those people just misread the sign as saying "Obama =
Kenyan?"?  Or with the suggestion a couple of other people on the list have
made that the producers of the video likely edited out anyone (most people,
for all we know) who *did* say "Uh, what's a Keynesian?"?

SA: You make a good point, if in fact these folks are "basking in its
irony-drenched sophistication".  I guess that's why the video was funny.
But if the point is that it is just as easy to make these folks look bad as
it is to make the Tea-baggers look bad, the conclusion shouldn't be that any
of them are morons. And it remains hard--but important--to actually organize
them.

------------------------------
>
> Message: 9
> Date: Wed, 03 Nov 2010 13:34:02 -0400
> From: SA <s11131978 at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Sane and really dumb
> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> Message-ID: <4CD19D0A.3060900 at gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
>  On 11/3/2010 1:01 PM, Doug Henwood wrote:
>
> > On Nov 3, 2010, at 12:48 PM, Chris Sturr wrote:
> >
> >> Wait a minute: people who either don't know what Keynesianism is, or who
> >> misread the word as "Kenyan," on a sign intended to encourage that
> >> misreading, are "morons"?
> > The moronocity is in their taking aggressive offense to the suggestion
> rather than asking, "Uh, what's a Keynesian?"
>
> Also, the crowd at that rally was basking in its irony-drenched
> sophistication - see all the smug signs - in counterpoint to those
> dull-witted Tea Party rubes who, e.g., "don't even know" the difference
> between a Sikh and a Muslim, etc. That set loves emailing around
> man-on-the-street videos of ignorant right-wingers, so their meeting the
> same fate is richly deserved.
>
> SA
>
>
-- 
-- 
Chris Sturr
Co-editor, Dollars & Sense
29 Winter St.
Boston, Mass. 02108
phone:  617-447-2177, ext. 205
fax:    617-447-2179
email:  sturr at dollarsandsense.org